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

Tokyo Post files, 320.1 Bilateral Security Treaty

No. 510
Memorandum by the United States Political Adviser to SCAP (Sebald) to Dean Rusk, Special Representative of the President

secret

Tokyo, February 14, 1952.

Subject:

• Revised Article XXII (Deptel 2193)¹

I believe that the penultimate sentence could be omitted without doing violence to the scope of the revised Article. The antepenultimate sentence states “…² establish a combined command and designate a commander thereof.” It appears to me that a definition of what the commander might do, as contained in the following sentence, is redundant and might, in some respects, be considered as restrictive. Moreover, the commander of a combined command in time of emergency would, of necessity, perform, among other duties, the functions contained in the penultimate sentence.

As a matter of tactics, I would suggest that the Japanese be approached with the revised Article XXII, but that, in the meantime, authority be requested as an ultimate position to omit the penultimate sentence.

W. J. S.

1. See footnote 3, supra.
2. Ellipsis in the source text.