Office of the Historian

170. Memorandum From the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Cutler) to the Secretary of Defense (Wilson)1

Washington, June 7, 1957.

SUBJECT

  • Reduction of U.S. Military Stationed in Japan
1.
At the morning conference on June 6/57 on the Saratoga,2 the President authorized you to reduce U.S. military forces and equipment stationed in Japan; the Secretary of State expressing his general approval of such a step. There were subsequent talks between the President, Mr. Dulles, and you while on shipboard at which I was not present.3
2.
Before leaving the Saratoga after luncheon today, the President asked me to send this memorandum as a reminder to you to have prepared—in time for consultation with the Secretary of State before the arrival of Prime Minister Kishi on June 19—a statement of Defense proposals for carrying out such future reduction: including a schedule of timing; numbers of military and civilian personnel and related dependents [Page 344] to be so reduced; and military units and equipment to be so reduced. The President recognizes that such a statement can be only reasonably accurate, because of the short time available. While he did not have in mind numbers and quantities presently located in Japan, he was apparently thinking of a proposal for reduction amounting to not less than 60%.
3.
In talking with me, he remarked that such a reduction should help Defense to reduce future expenditures in line with the goals recently described; and that our ability to outline to Mr. Kishi during his impending visit a reasonable program for U.S. military reduction might bear favorably on the Girard case.
4.
You also have in mind the reduction in U.S. military stationed in Iceland, authorized by the President at a recent Council meeting in May.
Robert Cutler4
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 794.5/6–757. Top Secret.↩
  2. The President and his party were on the U.S.S. Saratoga to witness naval training exercises in Florida. During a conversation (on the plane to Florida) among the President, Dulles, and Wilson, U.S. force levels in Japan were discussed. In his memorandum of the conversation dated June 6, Dulles wrote:

    “The President and I discussed at some length with Secretary Wilson the question of cutting down the United States ground forces in Japan. The President and I, each independently, said that from our viewpoints this was, and for some time had been, entirely possible politically and indeed desirable. We could not understand why more had not been done. Secretary Wilson said he would go into the matter. I said I felt that some firm position and program were needed by the time Kishi got here.” (Eisenhower Library, Dulles Papers, General Memoranda of Conversation)

    ↩
  3. No memoranda of these subsequent conversations have been found.↩
  4. Printed from a copy that bears this typed signature.↩