Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, China and Japan, Volume XIV, Part 2

694.001/2–652

No. 497
Memorandum by the Secretary of State¹

secret

[Washington,] February 6, 1952.

Before the NSC meeting this afternoon, I spoke with Mr. Foster, who was substituting for Mr. Lovett, on the report given me by Mr. Matthews that Mr. Lovett might be going to speak to the President urging that consideration of the Japanese peace treaty be delayed² because of a message from Mr. Earl Johnson that certain difficulties were being encountered with the Japanese on the administrative agreement. I strongly urged that no such proposal should be urged upon the President and that if it were I should be present to discuss it. I pointed out that our information was that the treaty would not come before the Senate until about the 18th and might well take a week to go through the Senate. It seemed to me, therefore, that Messrs. Rusk and Johnson had plenty of time. Mr. Foster said that this might be true if the dates which I mentioned were the correct ones. However, if the Japanese got the impression from the press that the ratification of the treaty was a sure thing, they might prefer to drag out the discussions. I replied that delaying the treaty in the Senate would not help this matter and could get us into serious trouble. I said we would be glad to discuss the ways of disabusing the Japanese of the idea that ratification would be an easy matter.

I suggest that Mr. Allison and Mr. Matthews discuss this and perhaps we can find some way of giving Messrs. Rusk and Johnson appropriate material.

DA

1. Routed for action to Allison.
2. The Senate Foreign Relations Committee had unanimously approved the treaty on Feb. 5. See Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, 82d Cong., 2d Sess., Senate Executive Report No. 2, Japanese Peace Treaty and Other Treaties Relating to Security in the Pacific (Washington, Government Printing Office, 1952).