It is requested that the enclosed directive be forwarded to the Joint
Chiefs of Staff for transmission to General MacArthur for his guidance
in accordance with paragraph III, 1, of the terms of reference of the
Far Eastern Commission. It is assumed that if the Joint Chiefs of Staff
have any question regarding the draft directive they will refer the
matter to the Department of State for clarification before transmitting
a directive on the subject.
It is also requested that the statement of the U.S. representative on
November 20, 1947,6 and the statements of
the U.S., Chinese, and New Zealand representatives at the time of the
adoption of the policy decision, December 11, 1947, be transmitted to
the Supreme Commander for his information.
The Secretary-General of the Far Eastern Commission has requested that
the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in transmitting the enclosed draft directive
to the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, inform him that in
adopting the policy decision regarding the supply of food for civilian
consumption in Japan the Commission agreed that it should be released to
the press after being received by the Supreme Commander. Therefore, in
accordance with normal procedure, acknowledgment of the receipt of the
directive is requested.
[Annex 2]
Statement by the New Zealand Representative, Far
Eastern Commission, December 11, 1947
“Mr. Chairman, may I be permitted to make some statements on the
general aspect of this paper now that it is going to be passed? This
is not the first occasion on which the Far Eastern Commission has
been called upon to consider the question of food supplies for
Japan. The Commission will recall the very keen interest which my
Government, and particularly my Minister, Sir Carl Berendsen, has
taken in the matter in its earlier stages, and I don’t have any
desire at all to recapitulate any part of the difficult and
prolonged discussions which we have had on this paper extending
almost for over a year—well over a year.
“I am instructed by my Government to support the present paper as
being the best obtainable under the circumstances, but I should like
to comment on one or two of the general aspects involved.
“Of course, we realize that it is entirely natural and understandable
that an occupying power holding such a predominant place in Japan as
does the United States should earnestly desire to avoid any
unnecessary complication of its difficult and delicate task. It is
also true that it is difficult to build a democratic country out of
a hungry people. These things are plain and undeniable.
“But there is another principle involved. If there is to be hardship,
and if at a time like this when there is not food enough to go
around, anyone has to go short, then clearly, as we see it, the
shortage and the suffering should fall upon the aggressors and not
upon their victims. There does not seem to be any reason whatever,
in logic or in equity, why, for example, the people of China, or
Malaya or the Philippines or India or Burma, or, indeed, any of the
peoples of the world who are suffering from hunger as a direct
result of Japanese aggression, should be allowed to go short of food
in a time of desperate need while the Japanese, the substantial
cause of their miseries, are supplied with food in greater
proportion. The paper before us acknowledges this general principle,
the validity of which, of course, is unquestionable, but the paper
provides an important exception, in that the Japanese may be
permitted to receive more food than their former victims if such
extra food is necessary to prevent such starvation and widespread
disease and civil unrest as will endanger the safety of the
occupation forces. This is an exception, sir, which may become both
unjust and dangerous.
“It may become unjust because it can lead to a violation of that
general principle I have referred to, and it may become dangerous
[Page 335]
because it leaves the
way open for the Japanese, by deliberately fomenting internal
disorder, to induce SCAP and the
United States Government to allow more food. But, of course, in the
proper discharge of the Commission’s responsibilities, it is clear
to all of us that such an exception must be inserted in the policy
paper. In the circumstances we couldn’t possibly do otherwise, but I
do suggest that we should act with our eyes open. It is, therefore,
obviously the duty of all concerned to minimize both the possibility
of injustice and of danger, and to take all necessary steps to
insure that the amount of actual food required by this exception is
as small as possible. The Japanese food problem is only one part of
a world-wide problem, as is recognized in the statement of the
United States Member in the document recently filed, FEC 248/4, and the more the Japanese
can be got to see it in this light, and together with their own part
in the history of its development, the less is there likely to be
unrest and the more cooperative will the Japanese become and the
lower will the level of food required to prevent danger to the
occupation forces also be. In a previous food paper before the
Commission, that is, FEC 026/12,
there was a very significant paragraph which doesn’t appear in the
present paper, and I should like, with your permission, sir, to
quote that paragraph. The paragraph reads as follows:
‘The Supreme Commander should make it clear to the Japanese
people that:
- ‘(1) Many countries are suffering from a dire
shortage of foodstuffs largely due to Japanese
aggression and in many of the countries devastated
by the Japanese the diet of the people is inferior
to that of the Japanese.
- ‘(2) The Supreme Commander assumes no obligations
to maintain, or to have maintained, any particular
standard of living in Japan, and
- ‘(3) The Supreme Commander assumes no
responsibility to the Japanese people to import
foodstuffs to meet any deficit arising from the
failure of the Japanese Government and people to
assure the just and impartial distribution of their
indigenous foodstuffs.
- ‘(4) The standard of living will depend upon the
thoroughness with which Japan rids itself of all
militaristic ambitions, redirects the use of its
human and natural resources wholly and solely for
purposes of peaceful living, administers adequate
economic and financial controls and cooperates with
the occupying forces and the governments they
represent.’
“Now, sir, in the course of the food discussions, which, of course,
were very prolonged in the Commission and in the committee, the New
Zealand Delegation fully understood the reasons for most of the
arguments which were adduced by the United States, although, of
[Page 336]
course, on occasions we
contested their validity, but we never did understand the reason for
the flat United States rejection of subparagraph (1) in the abstract
of the paragraph which I have just read. That is the subparagraph
which suggests that the Supreme Commander should make it clear to
the Japanese people that many countries are suffering from shortage
of food stuffs largely due to Japanese aggression. The remainder of
the paragraph that I quoted was fully accepted by the United States
Delegation. Now my Government attaches great importance to this
matter being understood in its correct perspective, and being so
understood by the Japanese, and it has at times felt doubtful
whether this was the situation or even whether SCAP was doing what could be done in
this respect. And the attitude of the United States upon that
subparagraph (1)1 have referred to didn’t help very much to remove
the doubts. But it does not appear that comparatively recently
something has been done to put the matter to the Japanese in the
proper light. I refer to the two papers that have been filed in the
Commission—FEC 248/5 and
248/6—and I refer also to a press report to the effect that the
Japanese miners have been informed that they were getting twice as
much food as the European miners but that they were only producing
one-fourth as much coal. Now that is the sort of thing which ought
to be told to the Japanese, but here again in the statements that
were made by SCAP officers at their
press conference, the two statements that are filed as of record in
the Commission, I note that the SCAP officers gave a reasonably good picture of the
world food situation but there was no significant mention of the one
big fact which must be brought home to the Japanese—that their own
carrier [career?] of wanton aggression throughout the food-producing
lands of Southeast Asia has been and still is a major cause of the
world shortage of rice. We should like to see this fact hammered
home to the Japanese until every man, woman and child in Japan had
at least some appreciation of the grave extent of Japan’s own
responsibility in this matter. I repeat that the information at our
disposal may not be complete, but in any case I would suggest to the
United States Representative that possibly his Government might
profitably look again at the whole paragraph that I have referred
to, that is, the paragraph that was in the previous document, and
carefully consider the advisability of implementing it so as to
attain the two objectives:
-
a.
- The maximum possible cooperation from the Japanese,
and
-
b.
- The reduction in the amount food required to keep safe the
occupation forces.”
