Mixed signals on report led to secret nuke deal

A difference in interpretation of a diplomatic document in 1959 apparently led to a secret pact allowing Washington to bring nuclear weapons into Japan--and decades of denials from Tokyo, former officials said.

The revision of the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty in 1960 introduced a "prior consultation" system between the two nations about nuclear wea-pons.

At that time, Japanese officials believed prior consultation would be conducted when U.S. ships and aircraft carrying nuclear weapons anchored or landed in Japan or even passed through Japanese waters or airspace.

However, U.S. officials thought that the 1959 document meant that such acts would not require prior consultation.

When Japanese officials finally figured out the U.S. interpretation of the document, they went along with it instead of publicly acknowledging a change in position. This led to an unwritten secret pact about the bringing in of nuclear weapons to Japan, the former officials said.

Japanese government officials continued to testify in the Diet that no nuclear weapons were being brought into Japan by the U.S. military.

On a number of different occasions, some Foreign Ministry officials argued that the government should publicly acknowledge that U.S. ships and aircraft had in fact been bringing in nuclear weapons to Japan.

But such moves were always silenced on the grounds that a pronouncement would lead to the collapse of the Cabinet.

Six former high-ranking Foreign Ministry officials who were in a position to know about the secret pact confirmed the process of the deal in interviews with The Asahi Shimbun.

The document that triggered the entire process was a "Record of Discussion" compiled in June 1959. This record listed the points confirmed by Japan and the United States concerning details of the prior consultation system.

The problem phrase in the temporarily declassified U.S. document stated: "'Prior consultation' will not be interpreted as affecting present procedures regarding the deployment of United States armed forces and their equipment into Japan and those for the entry of United States military aircraft and the entry into Japanese waters and ports by United States naval vessels."

The U.S. military had been bringing in nuclear weapons in the 1950s and did not want to give up the practice. So U.S. officials interpreted this phrase to mean that those practices would still not require prior consultation, according to the former officials.

But the United States did not specifically explain its interpretation to Japan. Some U.S. officials were concerned that if they forced their Japanese counterparts into a corner about bringing in nuclear weapons, they would resist.

Instead, the U.S. side gave a vague explanation. This allowed Japanese officials to interpret the phrase to mean that prior consultation would also cover ships and aircraft anchoring or landing in Japan with nuclear weapons or just passing through.

"I often wondered why the Japanese side didn't ask their American counterparts, 'What is the meaning of that phrase?'" said a retired Foreign Ministry official who once served as director-general of the Treaties Bureau. "I once thought it was a foolish oversight, but recently, I have changed my mind to think that they likely were unable to press the issue."

In 1959, Japan was still on the road to recovery from World War II, while the United States was not only a military superpower, but the guarantor of Japan's national security.

Things unraveled in 1963, when Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda said in the Diet that U.S. Navy ships carrying nuclear warheads will not be allowed to anchor at Japanese ports.

U.S. officials then realized that the Japanese side had a completely different position on the bringing in of nuclear weapons to Japan.

On April 4, 1963, U.S. Ambassador Edwin O. Reischauer invited Foreign Minister Masayoshi Ohira to a breakfast meeting where he passed on American concerns about the misinterpretation by Japanese officials.

U.S. documents show that Ohira accepted the U.S. interpretation of the 1959 document.

It would take a few more years for the secret pact to be established.

U. Alexis Johnson, who became U.S. ambassador in 1966, realized that Foreign Minister Takeo Miki had not been briefed about the interpretation of the document.

On Jan. 26, 1968, during a flight to inspect the Ogasawara islands and Iwojima, Johnson explained the background of the interpretation to Foreign Administrative Vice Minister Nobuhiko Ushiba and Fumihiko Togo, North American Affairs Bureau director-general.

Togo was the division chief at the time of the 1960 Security Treaty revision. He was stunned to learn that he had missed the meaning of the 1959 document. He is said to have written a memo apologizing for his oversight.

The secret pact can be said to have been established on Nov. 21, 1969, when Prime Minister Eisaku Sato signed a document with U.S. President Richard Nixon concerning the return of Okinawa to Japan.

The document said the agreement on the return of Okinawa would not negatively affect the U.S. position on the prior consultation system as laid out in the revised Security Treaty.

Japanese officials at that time understood the U.S. position--U.S. ships and aircraft could bring in nuclear wea-pons to anywhere in Japan, including Okinawa.

Since then, Japanese officials have continued to insist in the Diet and elsewhere that the U.S. military was not bringing in nuclear weapons to Japan, even though they knew otherwise.(IHT/Asahi: September 22,2009)