January 14, 1960

Letter Number 14
Your Excellency,
As I reported earlier, I went to see Mr. Parsons, Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs, accompanied by Minister Han. Mr. David Bone was present with Mr. Parsons. Our meeting took place at his office at 4:00 p.m. January 13, and it lasted a little over an hour. I am reporting to Your Excellency the gist of our conversation, and incidentally, may I say that the meeting was called by the State Department, and it was not for the discussion of the Korea-Japan negotiation or any phase of it, as Your Excellency can readily see from the following account of the meeting. I did, of course, bring out the question of the compensation and the basie requirements that we demand for the just settlement of our Korean residents in Japan and other matters during our meeting with Mr. Parsons. This will also be reported later in this letter.
Now, as for the items brought up by Mr. Parsons, first of all he said very sincerely that they were very chagrined about the shaving incident of the two Korean women involving US Army officers and G.I.S. He said that Ambassador McConaughy had already expressed regrets to our Government. He than pointed out that remedial action seemed to have taken place, but he said again that he was very sorry about the incident, and he wondered why people sometimes behaved the way these people did.
I told him too, that when General Magruder was in town, I talked with him at my residence when the General came to see me and also at the airport when I went to see him off in Baltimore. I said that we talked about this shaving incident in Korea and General Magruder promised some action as soon as possible. In saying all this, I told Mr. Parsons that we do not condone what these two women were trying to do, but certainly, I pointed out that it is bad for anyone to take the law into his own hands. These things do not help the good relations between our two countries.
When I said this, Mr. Parsons repeated how badly he felt about the incident, and then pointed out that General Magruder is a strict man and that anyone under his command who was guilty of misbehavior would certainly get proper and strict punishment.
The next item that Mr. Parsons brought up was regarding the new United States-Japan Security Treaty. It appeared that this was one of the two major items Mr. Parsons wanted to take up with me in our meeting of January 13th. The other item was the Exchange Rate, on which I will report later in this letter.
Mr. Parsons said that he wanted to tell me something about the US-Japanese Security Treaty which is scheduled to be signed next week. He said that naturally the text will not be made public until its final signing, but he said he wanted to let us know about the Treaty and also he told me that he has called a Sixteen Nations Meeting on January l4, to also tell them about the Treaty, particularly because of the fact that the UN Command position will continue to be in affect as it was before and this earlier arrangement regarding the position of the UN Command forces was done in an exchange of notes between Secretary of State Acheson and Yoshida. As soon as Mr. Parsons brought up the question of the new Japanese-American Treaty I said that we were quite concerned about the prior consultation provision in the Treaty. I pointedly asked a question of Mr. Parsons -- if the communists launch an attack against Korea, what if Japan deliberately tries to prevent any effective deployment of US Forces and facilities to give proper assistance to Korea's defense against such a communist invasion? Mr. Parsons, instead of answering this question directly wanted to explain the background and then said he would answer my question. What he said was that the Soviet Union and Communist China have been trying very hard to obstruct the negotiations of this Treaty. However, now that Japan has shown her willingness to collaborate with America in a collective security measure, it appears to be a major setback for the communists. He said that the chief aim of the communists in that part of the globe is the neutralization of Japan, the capture of Formosa and the withdrawal of US influence and forces from the Pacific. These basic aims are not being fulfilled by the communists because of the signing of this new Treaty.
He further stated that Japan, under this new Treaty, is assuring America the continued use of the bases and facilities--thus America retains all the same rights and privileges as before, but under this new Treaty Japan voluntarily lets America retain all these rights and privileges, while under the old Treaty Mr. Parsons said that America merely had rights and privileges but no obligations. Then he pointed out that the new development should be good for the Republic of Korea, because he said from the standpoint of the interests of the Republic of Korea it is better to have Japan committing herself to such a defense alliance with countries like the United States rather than choosing to be a neutral country.
Coming back to my earlier question, he said that it isn't really important whether we have the consultation provision in the Treaty or not. He said the absence or presence of that clause is not the significant thing. The significant thing is whether the US will continue to have the rights and privileges regarding the bases and facilities and freedom for the deployment of forces and weapons.
Mr. Parsons said that America does have all this and that is the most important thing.
I said we do not question the US judgment in this, but that in case of any major trouble in Korea, if Japan tries to stop America or any other countries helping Korea, that certainly is our concern. We just went to be sure that there won't be anything like this under the Treaty. Then I said that we know the Japanese -- we know they have been "fence-straddlers" for a long time. We certainly would not be too concerned as long as America is free to take action whenever the need arises without specific Japanese approval.
Mr. Parsons said he can readily understand the feelings of the Koreans and he said that if America had been under the Japanese for forty years as Korea had been, he too, would feel the way we do. I added that we do not trust the Japanese wholeheartedly and Mr. Parsons said that the important thing is that Japan is willingly committing herself to a collective security arrangement. To this, I asked what would happen if there is a new government or even if a leftist Government comes into power---there is no way of knowing what they may do. Mr. Parsons said that we all have to take some chances in this, but we always hope for the best.
I further dwelt on this problem and said that certainly Korea would not be the only country in Asia which would be concerned with the consultation provision and I suggested that in order to reassure Korea and other Asian countries, the United States could perhaps communicate with these countries giving specific assurance that they can always depend on America in case of danger regardless of the thinking and wishes of Japan. Mr. Parsons said he would think about this suggestion and I repeated that this is a very disturbing aspect of the Treaty, but Mr. Parsons reminded me that America has given repeated assurances to Korea and actually under the present Treaty America's position is much better in the sense that she is getting voluntary consent from Japan which was not the case in the old treaty.
The next important item which Mr. Parsons brought up was the question of the Exchange Rate. As I said earlier, the main purpose of his calling for the meeting with me was to take up the two items -- namely, the new American-Japanese Treaty and the Exchange Rate.
As for the Exchange Rate, Mr. Parsons said that he was not too happy to bring this out, but as Ambassador McConaughy had already talked to the Korean Government at instruction of his home government, they are concerned with the continuing and growing gap between the real value and the external value of the US aid money. He said that many of the US Government departments such as Defense and Treasury are much concerned about this problem and the State Department shares this concern. The US money being spent in Korea under the Aid Program is not getting the true return of its real value. He said that the US Congress is also concerned about this problem and to make the situation even more difficult the US itself is having difficulty because of the imbalance of the flow of the US money. For example, more money is going out then coming in and Mr. Parsons said that if the US does not get adequate relief from the Republic of Korea, the American Government may get into a great deal of difficulty in Congress, and I think he meant with regard to the Aid Fund.
I told him immediately that I knew something about this problem myself, but I pointed out to him that our budget has all been finished and if any change in the Exchange Rate is to take place it would have a disastrous effect on the whole economy of the Country; and I said perhaps it would be better if the American Government doesn't push this matter for the next six or seven months. Mr. Parsons repeated that there are many agencies which are concerned with this problem including Congress, but I said that certainly people in Congress could understand our problem if Mr. Parsons and his associates would point out to the Congressmen and Senators that the Korean Budget had already been passed and that it would be disastrous to introduce any change now.
At any rate, Mr. Parsons repeated that he wanted me to know that this is a very strongly held view in the American Government.
The above matters are what he wanted to discuss with me, and at the conclusion of his observations on the Exchange Rate, I brought out the question of the Korean residents in Japan. I told him very firmly that the only ways to settle the Korea-Japan question are:
1) That the amount of compensation should be decided to the mutual satisfaction of both Korea and Japan.
2) That all the Koreans who went to be repatriated (and from our own knowledge I told him that they all went to go back to Korea) must be allowed to take back all their assets.
3) Japan should agree to give proper status to those Koreans who choose to remain in Japan. I said further that the Republic of Korea will undertake the mass repatriation but I pointed out that Japan should pay the compensation before the actual repatriation takes place.
Of course we certainly will need money in Korea for the resettlement of all these people. Then I said that perhaps we will come and ask the United States for help in this connection.
Then I pointed out further that sometimes we are accused that Korea refuses to buy things from Japan but I said this is not true because actually Korea has bought more from Japan than Japan has bought from Korea, but then we always are puzzled because Japan does not buy Korean rice which they like very much, and Korean see weed. I said that even about the fishermen the Japanese talk about so much -- if the Japanese are doing right with the inmates of Omura and other camps in Japan -- in other words if they release them from these camps and send them back to Korea would also send these fisherman back to Japan. Mr. Parsons said he knows all these issues very well, but he said he was quite disturbed about the element of confusion which had set in recently and which certainly hinders the progress of current negotiations by recalling the question of compensation. Of course, he was referring to whether or not America was to advance the money to Japan for the compensation of the Korean repatriots. I pointed out to him that this information emanated from the Japanese Foreign Ministry and I suggested that perhaps the American Government could check and investigate about the motives of the Japanese Foreign Office in saying such a thing. Another point I made in connection with the Korean residents in Japan was that Korea is willing to accept all these Koreans in Japan regardless of political affiliations if they went to come back to Korea.
Mr. Persons said that about two years ago, the American Government had told our people to settle the problems between Korea and Japan, saying that under Kishi's Government it might be a better time than others. I immediately countered by saying that we have been continuing to negotiate but that Japan has to show her good faith. For example, they promised to send art treasures that belong to Korea back to us but they still have not done so. These art treasures were those they had stolen from Korea.
That was about all I discussed with Mr. Parsons on the Korea-Japan problem and then I again sold to him that we are still anxiously waiting for discussion on the Agreement for the facilities and status of United States Forces in Korea. Mr. Parsons said he knows he certainly owes me a letter regarding this matter since June of last year, at which time 1, under Government instruction, sent a formal note to the State Department regarding this matter. He said that the State Department and other agencies concerned have been seriously looking into this matter and that substantial progress has been made. I believe they are about ready to enter into a formal discussion with our Government.
With renewed sentiments of loyalty and esteem, I remain Respectfully yours,

You Chan Yang