No. 630
Editorial Note
In his memorandum of a conversation held with Admiral Radford on February 4, Allison reported on CINCPAC’s views regarding several East Asian matters. The section on rearmament of Japan follows:
“Rearmament in Japan. Admiral Radford touched briefly on the problem of rearmament in Japan and expressed the belief that the Army was pushing the Japanese too fast toward rearmament. He felt it was necessary, and said he had told Admiral Fechteler, that [Page 1384] in bringing about the rearmament of Japan it should be kept in line with the development of Chinese forces on Formosa as well as Korean forces so that Japan would not be in a position of definite dominance over these countries. In his opinion, while it was important that the Japanese be on our side and while we should do everything possible to encourage this, we should have no illusions about the fact that the Japanese were interested first in their own concerns and that we should not put all our eggs in one basket and depend solely on the Japanese as our only friend with power in Asia.” (790.5/2–453)
For additional sections of this memorandum, see Document 77 and volume XIII, Part 1, page 384.