Foreign Relations of the United States, 1955–1957, Japan, Volume XXIII, Part 1

119. Memorandum of a Conversation, Department of State, Washington, February 19, 1957¹

Washington, February 19, 1957

SUBJECT

• Ryukyuan Administration

PARTICIPANTS

• Mr. Harold Seidman, Bureau of Budget
• Mr. Charles Per-Lee, Bureau of Budget
• Mr. Richard D. Kearney, Assistant Legal Adviser for Far Eastern Affairs
• Mr. Howard L. Parsons, Director, Office of Northeast Asian Affairs
• Mr. James V. Martin, Jr., Officer in Charge, Office of Japanese Affairs
• Mr. Harry F. Pfeiffer, Jr.—NA
• Mr. Charles H. Pletcher—NA

Mr. Seidman and Mr. Per-Lee called to discuss the problem of the legal basis for our administration of the Ryukyus. Mr. Seidman said that he would be leaving a week from Thursday for a trip to Japan and Okinawa.

Mr. Seidman was much concerned that our administration of the islands was based only on the so-called “Presidential directive”. He explained that this was in reality only a Department of Defense Directive that had been initialed as approved by the President. It was intended only as a temporary stopgap measure when it went into effect in 1954.

He said there were many problems regarding the irregularities of the present administration. He cited as one the issue of B yen—which is really occupation currency and therefore should be backed up by the occupied country. In this case there is no such country and therefore no authority for the issue of the money.

Mr. Seidman said that separating the administrative authority from the military command might cause serious problems for the Administrator. He cited the example of Guam where the Navy cut off most logistic support including electricity, the governor’s servants, etc. There it took a year to straighten things out. He opined that in Okinawa the civil administration and military activities were so intertwined that separation might well prove not only difficult but impossible. Also there will be serious problems in the suggested new command structure with the Governor concurrently USARPAC—i.e., not the Theater Commander and not located in Japan. (As he is not part of the Theater Commander’s setup, he will have difficulty insuring that the Theater Commander takes proper cognizance of the Ryukyus. As he is not located in Japan he will himself lack sensitivity to Japanese feelings toward the Ryukyus.)

Mr. Parsons said that he was primarily worried about preserving our military position in Okinawa which will be of increasing importance as we reduce our military bases in other Far East areas. The Ryukyus will certainly be a major issue between Japan and the United States. The military have shown that they are politically unsophisticated (they wanted to throw out Senaga)² and this will greatly complicate the Ryukyuan problem in United States–Japan relations. He pointed out that if we weren’t careful we might get kicked out of the Ryukyus.

Mr. Seidman agreed that this was true and said that it was another reason why the basis and structure of the administration should be regularized. He then presented a brief history of Ryukyuan administration, the “Presidential” Directive, and the draft Executive Order: A civil administration for the Ryukyus was originally provided by Proclamation 13 of the Military Government. To this day, this is the only publicly known “constitution” for the Ryukyus. In December of 1952, Bureau of Budget sent a letter to State and Defense suggesting that the administration be regularized. This resulted in a stalemate between the two Departments. The matter was referred to the National Security Council but no solution was reached. The undecided issues were whether or not to return the islands to Japan and how they were to be administered. Early in 1954 the President took the problem out of the NSC. General Hull, Mr. Murphy and, Mr. Seidman thought, also Mr. Robertson had a conference and State conceded and agreed to a military administration. The “Presidential” Directive is the result of this meeting.³ It is really a Defense draft of an operations directive which was submitted for Presidential approval without careful rewriting and without clearance. The Directive clearly makes all GRI executive offices elective. It completely subordinates the GRI executive branch to the legislative. In any case, as it is just a Defense operations directive it cannot have the force of law. Among other things, the court structure it provides is incomplete—there are no appellate courts and no civil courts having jurisdiction over American contractors. The draft Executive Order was prepared to take the place of the Directive. By the end of 1955, agreement on a draft had been reached between State and Defense. Then General Gailey⁴ took over CAMG and wanted the Order resubmitted to the field for comments. This was completed in early 1956. The Order was then held up pending March elections in the Ryukyus, afterwards because of the Price Report and subsequent land agitation.

Mr. Seidman wanted to emphasize the necessity of issuing the Executive Order as soon as possible. He pointed out that in the coming months, under pressure from Congress and possibly from other nations in the United Nations, we may be forced to make public the instrument on which we base our administration. He said that it would be very embarrassing to make the Directive public as (1) since it is only a Defense directive it has no legal validity, (2) the administration of the islands does not and can not follow the provisions of the Directive, (3) it is classified and therefore the Ryukyuans have never been informed of the basic “law” or constitution of their own government, (4) as there is no legal validity to the Directive, Congress might well withdraw budgetary support. As the BOB had assumed that the Executive Order would be in effect this year, the budgetary provisions for the administration of the Ryukyus are based on the Executive Order.

Mr. Seidman maintained that promulgating the Executive Order would not interfere with our attempts to persuade Defense to convert to a civilian administration. While it is true that the Executive Order does delegate administrative authority to Defense (under present provision authority has never been delegated) and does provide that the Governor should be a military officer on active duty, these two provisions could easily be changed at some later date. He maintained that even if successful, our discussions with Defense and subsequent changes of the Administration would take at least two years and that the Executive Order was desperately needed to fill the existing gap. He emphasized the desirability of not being forced to publish the existing Directive.

Mr. Seidman summarized his position: Although he had originally felt that the civil administration should be separated from the military command and placed under civilian control, careful study of conditions on Okinawa had led him to change his mind. He has become convinced that the military and civil affairs activities are too inextricably intertwined to be separated and therefore it is necessary to continue the civil administration as part of the military command. He is very apprehensive over the effect of the coming command changes in the Pacific on Ryukyuan administration (he had noticed a reversal in the trend toward “civilianizing” USCAR—the appointment of several colonels to fill positions which had been held by civilians—and discovered that this was at the instigation of CINCPAC) and does not see how it could possibly work. However, promulgating the Executive Order need not have any effect on long-range administrative changes which we hoped to make and it would provide a legal foundation for our administration of the islands and get us off the hook of having to publish the “Presidential” Directive.

He discussed the proposed organic legislation currently before the BOB for its consideration and to which State has expressed objection, and he agreed that the more usual and probably more desirable way to phrase it would be to have it simply place administrative responsibility in the executive and not specify to whom the President will delegate authority. Although he said there was need for such organic legislation, it was not urgent as was the need for the Executive Order. In his opinion, the legislation would not pass Congress this session in any case.

1. Source: Department of State, FE Files: Lot 59 D 19, MC—Miscellaneous 1957. Confidential. Drafted by Pletcher.
2. Kamejiro Senaga was removed from office as Mayor of Naha, Okinawa, on November 23; see Documents 249 and 251.
3. For documentation on circumstances attending the approval of the Directive by the President on August 2, 1954, see Foreign Relations, 1952–1954, vol. XIV, Part 2, pp. 1577 ff.
4. Major General Charles K. Gailey, Chief of Civil Affairs and Military Government, Army Staff.