'Top secret' U.S. document says N-weapons can be unloaded at Japanese ports

Akahata of September 3 revealed a top secret U.S. Navy telegram of 1963
showing that nuclear weapons can be unloaded from U.S. nuclear capable
warships visiting Yokosuka or Sasebo port.

The telegram, now kept in the John Fitzgerald Kennedy Library in Boston,
was sent to Pacific Fleet Commander John Sides and to U.S. Naval Operations
Acting Chief C. D. Griffin from Thomas Moorer, commander of the U.S. 7th
Fleet, on March 29, 1963.

At that time, the U.S. was planning to have a U.S. nuclear-powered
submarine visit a Japanese port for the first time, but public opposition to
the plan was growing stronger.

This was why the 7th Fleet commander reported to Washington that they
were considering overall reductions of U.S. warship visits in case the
Japanese government refused to allow the nuclear submarine to enter Japanese
ports.

The 7th Fleet commander suggested that vessels would be moved to the
Philippines (Subic) or Guam, but that major repairs that take a long time or
heavy emergency repairs should be done at Sasebo in Nagasaki Prefecture or
at Yokosuka in Kanagawa Prefecture. Within that context the commander said,
"This, of course, would require off-loads and we are looking into this
problem."

In 1960, in the talks for a revised Japan-U.S. Security Treaty, the two
governments made a secret agreement that entry of U.S. warships or aircraft
into Japanese seaports or airports will not be subject to "prior
consultation." This gave U.S. warships or aircraft carrying nuclear weapons
free access to Japanese seaports or airports.

The latest revelation of the top secret telegram deepens the suspicion
that nuclear weapons might have been unloaded in Japan.

The secret agreement has a gray zone which is ambiguous about the
bringing in of nuclear weapons into Japan, and the Japanese government has
always parrotted what the U.S. government has explained.

In 2000, Fuwa Tetsuzo, Japanese Communist Party Executive Committee chair
at the time, revealed a U.S. Department of State record of discussions Japan
and the United States held in connection with the revision of the Japan-U.S.
Security Treaty. His question was focused on secret agreements concerning
the bringing in of nuclear weapons into Japan in violation of the Three
Non-nuclear Principles (not to possess, manufacture or allow nuclear weapons
to be brought into Japan).

Fuwa at the time studied declassified U.S. documents and found that Edwin
O. Reischauer, U.S. ambassador to Japan at the time, secretly met with Ohira
Masayoshi, foreign minister at the time, to remind the Japanese government
of the existence of secret agreements between the two governments.

The recently revealed telegram concerns U.S. Navy work in preparation for
the Reischauer-Ohira talks.

Three days before the Reischauer telegram was sent, President Kennedy
called a White House conference to discuss the problem of the planned visit
of a U.S. nuclear-capable warship to a Japanese port. In this conference,
Naval Operations Acting Chief Griffin, who was one of the recipients of the
Reischauer telegram, stated that "nuclear weapons were normally carried
aboard aircraft carriers which have been calling at Japanese ports since the
early 1950s."

Nuclear weapons can be brought into Japan at any time

For many years, there have been rumors about suspicions that nuclear
weapons may have been unloaded at munitions depots at the U.S. Yokosuka and
Sasebo Naval bases.

On November 2, 1974, Kyodo News Service reported from Washington that
U.S. military sources said that there is a temporary storage of nuclear
weapons at the munitions depot on the Yokosuka base.

In 1970, documents distributed at the hearings before a subcommittee of
the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee contained descriptions that
apparently referred to the storage of nuclear weapons at the munitions
facility at the Yokosuka base.

The U.S. government in 1991 began withdrawing tactical nuclear weapons
from abroad, but maintains the readiness to redeploy them in emergencies as
well as its policy of "neither confirm nor deny" the existence of U.S.
nuclear weapons.

The Japanese government continues to deny the existence of Japan-U.S.
secret agreements on nuclear weapons, even after relevant documents have
been revealed, and even tries to thwart local governments attempting to ban
nuclear warships' visits to Japanese ports, thus desperately maintaining
what was agreed secretly between Japan and the United States.

The problem of U.S. nuclear capable warship visits now involves the
unloading of U.S. nuclear weapons in Japan. This shows how deeply Japan, the
only atom-bombed country, is incorporated into the U.S. nuclear war system
in clear violation of the Three Non-nuclear Principles. (end)