80. Memorandum From the Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs (Robertson) to the Secretary of State1
SUBJECT
- The Okinawan Land Problem and Tenure of American Bases in Japan
There has been an outburst in Japan of troublesome anti-American feeling stemming from the Okinawan land problem. The furor began with the publication on June 13 of the report of the Price Subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee recommending long-term United States acquisition of land in Okinawa and lump sum payment therefor. It was aggravated by sensational misrepresentations by the Japanese press arising from a Congressional hearing on June 14, where a Defense Department witness acknowledged that under Article IV of the the Security Treaty it would be possible for the United States to keep bases in Japan even for one hundred years. His statement was interpreted by the Japanese press to mean that the United States would unilaterally decide how long to keep its Japanese bases.
The Department of Defense will address itself to quieting public sentiment in Okinawa. In your letter of June 22 to the Secretary of Defense2 you recommended that he make a public statement which would clarify American intentions in Okinawa. On June 22 the President sent a letter to Mr. Shuhei Higa,3 Chief Executive of the Government of the Ryukyu Islands, characterizing the Price Subcommittee report as “both sympathetic and constructive in character” and stating that he was asking Secretary Wilson to communicate further with Mr. Higa on this subject.
It would appear to devolve upon State to meet the crisis that is brewing in Japan. The Socialists in Japan are making capital both of the Price Subcommittee report and of the misrepresentations of United States intent to maintain bases one hundred years in Japan without consulting Japanese desires. Their chief purpose, obviously, is to influence the outcome of the Upper House elections, scheduled for July 8.4
Embassy Tokyo has urged that the Department make public a restatement of United States intentions in Japan and Okinawa, in a series of telegrams (Tab C),5 and the Japanese Government has made [Page 183] informal representations of a similar nature. We have drafted a telegram to Ambassador Allison, authorizing him to make such a statement directed principally at the Japanese situation and the Japanese concern of Okinawa (Tab A).6 The draft statement acknowledges officially for the first time our view of Japan’s residual sovereignty in the Ryukyu Islands. The concept was first stated by you when you were U.S. Delegate to the San Francisco Peace Conference, and it appears in the Minutes of that conference but not in the Treaty. With respect to our bases in Japan, the draft statement says nothing specifically, but it does say that the Security Treaty with Japan unites the Japanese and ourselves in maintaining international peace and security in the Japan area, and in this enterprise we are working together in our best mutual interests.
Recommendation
That you sign the telegram to Ambassador Allison (Tab A) and that you give a similar statement to the press (Tab B)7 when you meet them on June 27, if asked.
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 794C.0021/6–2556. Confidential. Drafted in NA and sent through S/S.↩
- Supra.↩
- Not found.↩
- See footnote 3, Document 82.↩
- Not found attached. Telegraphic correspondence on the subject is in Department of State, Central File 794C.0221 for 1956.↩
- Not found attached. The draft, prepared in NA and cleared with Lemnitzer by Robertson, was approved by Dulles with a minor change and sent as telegram 2847 to Tokyo, June 25. (Ibid., 794C.0221/6–2256) The statement authorized in that telegram was based on suggestions made by the Embassy in telegram 2999, June 22. (Ibid.) On June 27, the Embassy released the statement. For text, see Department of State Bulletin, July 9, 1956, p. 60.↩
- Not printed. Okinawa was not discussed at the Secretary’s news conference on June 27.↩