U.S.-JAPAN TREATY

Press, Issue 29236, 21 June 1960, Page 15

U.S.-JAPAN TREATY

Operation In Few Days

(Rec. 8 pan.) WASHINGTON, June 20. American officials were hoping today that the pro-American Government of Mr Nobusuke Kishi will stand fast against any further mob violence and stay in power until the United StatesJapan Security Treaty comes into operation. The United States Senate is expected to ratify the new treaty today or on Tuesday. Reuters said. Full ratification will be completed with an exchange of documents in Tokyo by the two Governments. This procedure will take several days and it is hoped that Mr Kishi win survive long enough to see the treaty in operation. Most Washington observers expect Mr Kishi’s resignation and new elections in Japan. Minority, but entrenched Leftwing groups, which succeeded in keeping President Eisenhower out of Japan, were expected to continue their attempt at undermining the treaty by exploiting fears that the presence of American troops in Japan might drag the country into war against itwilt

The Secretary of Defence, Mr Thomas Gates, attending secret talks at Quantico, Virginia, with American defence leaders from all over the world, told a press conference yesterday that the Japanese crisis was. one of the factors which had given the cold war a turn for the worse

The “Washington Star" report from Quantico interpreted Mr Gates’s remarks as meaning that the United States might have to pull its Far East defences back “if the Communists have further successes and imperil American bases as they have in Japan.”

The treaty was automatically ratified shortly after midnight on Sunday and anti-treaty demonstrations appear to be futile, but the Leftists are still out to get Mr Kishi, the news agency said. Peking Radio today exhorted the Leftists to destroy the United States-Japan alliance and said it was not ratified because the ‘ ‘Japanese people and public opinion” had not ratified it. “We are confident that the Japanese people, through their resolute struggle, will in the end destroy the alliance,” the radio said, quoting the official “Peking People's Daily.” It is doubtful whether Mr Kishi can hold on long enough to have the personal satisfaction of seeing the new treaty signed, sealed and delivered in Washington where the United States Senate must ratify it He seems determined to hold firm, but there seems to be no end to the demonstrations against him. The Minister of Trade, Mr Hayato Idekka, is regarded as the strongest candidate for the post of Prime Minister if Mr Kishi does resign, but it is said that he might be too “tough” for some of the factional leaders in the Liberal-Democratic Party. They might prefer a weaker man who would not gain too firm a grip on the post. Party leaders expect Mi Kishi to resign as Prime Minister and as party president The party would elect his successor to the presidency and normally the same man would become the new Prime Minister. With a new

Cabinet, the new Prime Minister would be free to decide on a later date for dissolution and a General Election.

Inevitably the security treaty and Japan’s adherence to the Western system would be election issues. But party leaders are already talking in terms of making prosperity and economic expansion the keynote of a new campaign under new leadership. The Opposition Socialist Party today decided during a meeting of Socialist Diet members not to resign en bloc. The party earlier decided that the 125 Socialist members of the Lower House would resign aS a protest against the Kishi Cabinet and the new treaty. Members decided that the party would continue to exert “special efforts” to block Diet approval ‘of bills related to the security treaty, but they did not say what form these efforts would take.

Foreign observers in Tokyo express confidence in an election victory for pro-American forces, but predict the strengthening of neutralist elements. The “New York Times” commented today: “Probably they could not force a direct repudiation of the treaty. But they might build up such pressure against the treaty as to largely vitiate it by making it psychologically and morally difficult for the United States to retain its bases In Japan. “Washington could be put in the untenable position of trying to impose bases on an unwilling ally.” it said