Chapter 2: Apathy and Neglect ~ Arnold G. Fisch, Military Government in the Ryukyu Islands, 1945- 1950 (1988)

 

以下は全く未修正のコンコーダンス用読み取りと意訳ですので、必ず原典をお確かめください。

 

米陸軍公刊史書

  • Arnold G. Fisch, Military Government in the Ryukyu Islands, 1945- 1950; Center of Military History U.S. Army, Washington, D.C., 1988. PDF
  • アーノルド・G・フィッシュ『琉球列島軍事政府 1945~1950年』米陸軍軍事史センター、ワシントン DC、1988 年。

 

以下、コンコーダンス用に公開していますが、機械翻訳で未修正の為、興味のある方は必ず原典でご確認ください。

 

Chapter 2


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第三章: 無関心とネグレクト

pp. 69-70.

【和訳】*1

琉球アメリカ軍は 1945年9月に守備隊の作戦段階に入った。敵の拠点は占領され、司令部の基地開発計画によって必要とされていた国民の大規模な移動は停止した。軍事政府部隊による大規模な救援活動により、民間人の飢餓と伝染病の脅威は回避された。反省と評価の時間ができたので、沖縄の民政担当官は軍事政権の使命をより広い観点から再考し始めた。攻撃段階で遭遇した問題や落胆にもかかわらず、これらの男性の多くは少なからず理想主義を保持していました。機会と資源があれば、彼らは平和な沖縄社会を再構築しようと熱心に試みるだろう。この目的を達成するために、彼らは暴行後の救済措置を超えて、戦前の社会的および経済的正常な状態への回帰に目を向け始めた。

【和訳】*2

いかなる戦後復興も軍事的利便性と密接に関係していることは明らかだった。戦後数年間、島々に対するアメリカの軍事的関心は何度か変遷を経た。沖縄はアメリカのすべての戦略計画において引き続き重要であったが、政府の琉球に対する経済的関与はそれほど一定ではなく、軍事政府の努力は戦後の軍事的緊縮財政によって深刻な打撃を受けた。極東軍ののけ者扱いで、琉球軍の兵力と人的資源の必要性は、日本と韓国の部隊が優先される組織では優先順位が低い傾向にあった。同じ時期に、司令部は大学側が準備した軍事政府要員が沖縄から離れていくままにした。彼らは沖縄戦の計画に参加しただけでなく、沖縄社会の復興を構築していっていた人員でもあったが、今や急速に動員解除されつつあった。彼らに取って代わられたのは、仕事に対する知的な取り組みも、教育や訓練における前任者のような特別な利点も持たないものたちだった。こうした戦後の人的資源の現状は、軍事政権にとって重大な任務を担うための戦略的、経済的、社会的考察の現実と結びついて、正確には琉球に対するアメリカの関心の最低点と言えるかもしれない時期をうみだした。

 

沖縄と戦後戦略

*3

沖縄と「戦後」戦略

日本の崩壊後の数週間で、統合計画スタッフは世界の軍事基地サイトを調査し、それらをいくつかのカテゴリーに分類した。そのうちの幾つかは、米国とその所有物の安全保障に不可欠な、または計画される軍事作戦に必要な「主要基地地域」と決定したものもあれば、より小さなカテゴリーに分類されるものもあった。統合参謀本部はこの決定を受け、基地に関する議論を米政府と調整した。必要な用地を確保するために外国政府と交渉するプロセスの一環として、国・戦・海軍調整委員会を設置し、琉球に関しては、統合参謀本部は当初から、アメリカの直接的な宗主権、あるいは少なくとも国連の信託統治を通じ琉球の島々を継続して支配することを前提とし、主要基地地域のリストに琉球の島々を入れていた。

*4

国務省はこの考えに疑問を呈した。ジェームズ・F・バーンズ長官は、「政治的・外交的考慮」により、琉球「日本に返還され非武装化されるべき小島々」として検討する必要があるとする同省の結論を新大統領ハリー・S・トルーマン伝えた。外交上の配慮に対する長官の懸念は、第二次世界大戦終結時の琉球の曖昧な地位に由来していた。1945年7月26日、アメリカ、イギリス、中国、そしてその後ソ連は、ポツダム会談で「日本の主権は、我々が規定するところの本州、北海道、九州、四国の島々およびその他の小島嶼に限定されるものとする」ことに同意した。 1945年9月2日の正式な降伏において、日本はポツダム宣言の規定を受け入れた。沖縄県宮古島八重山郡島とその周辺の島々からなる沖縄県は消滅した。しかし、沖縄の最終的な地位は依然として不明確であり、沖縄の基地の軍事的潜在力にもかかわらず、「我々が規定するところの小島嶼」という表現の曖昧さは、関係国間の潜在的な領土紛争の種を含んでいた。

*5

統合参謀本部は即座に国務省の立場に否定的な反応を示した。彼らは国・戦・海軍調整委員会を通じて行動をおこし、国務長官に対し、自分たちの反対の評価を大統領に知らせるよう要請した。1946年9月10日、統合参謀本部議長ウィリアム・D・リーヒ海軍大将は、琉球の日本への返還案に対する軍指導者の「重大な懸念」を大統領に伝え、トルーマン大統領にこの問題をさらに検討するよう促した。 
Continuing the argument, State officials pointed out to the president that retaining possession of the Ryukyus could create diplomatic and political problems and would in any event certainly be an economic drain on the United States. The military chiefs contended, on the other hand, that the secretary of state underestimated the military value of the Ryu- kyus, especially Okinawa, and that the cost of maintaining the islands was minimal compared to the lives and treasure expended in capturing Okinawa—or to the cost of recapturing the island again from a hostile power.))

議論を続けて、国務省当局者らは大統領に対し、琉球の領有を維持することは外交的、政治的問題を引き起こす可能性があり、いずれにせよ米国にとって確実に経済的損失となるだろうと指摘した。一方、軍首脳らは、国務長官琉球、特に沖縄の軍事的価値を過小評価しており、島々を維持する費用は沖縄占領に費やされた人命と財宝に比べれば、あるいは敵対勢力から再び島を奪還する代償を払うことに比べれば最小限のものであると主張した。

 

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*6

 

*1:CHAPTER III: Apathy and Neglect
American forces in the Ryukyus settled into the garrison phase of operations in September 1945. By then most enemy holdouts had been captured, and the wholesale movement of citizens necessitated by the command's base development plan had ceased. Extensive relief efforts conducted by military government units had averted the threat of starvation and epidemics among civilians. Now that there was time for reflection and assessment, civil affairs officers on Okinawa began to rethink the mission of military government in broader terms. Despite problems and discouragements encountered during the assault phase, many of these men had retained more than a small measure of idealism; given the opportunity and resources, they would eagerly attempt to recreate a peaceful Okinawan society. To that end they began to look beyond the post-assault relief measures toward a return to prewar social and economic normalcy.

*2:It was obvious that any restoration would be closely linked to military concerns. During the postwar years American military interest in the islands underwent several permutations. Although Okinawa remained important in all American strategic planning, the government's economic commitment to the Ryukyus was not so constant, and the military government effort there suffered severely from austere postwar military budgets. A stepchild of the Far East Command, the Ryukyuan command's physical and manpower needs tended to receive a lower priority in an organization where units in Japan and Korea took precedence. In the same time period, the command watched its university-prepared military government personnel depart. Those who had not only participated in the planning for the campaign but had also organized the rehabilitation of civilian society were rapidly being demobilized. They were replaced by individuals who had neither the intellectual commitment to the job nor the singular advantages of their predecessors in education and training. These postwar manpower realities combined with strategic, economic, and social considerations to create formidable tasks for military government during a period that might accurately be described as the nadir of American interest in the Ryukyus.

*3:Okinawa and Postwar Strategy

In the weeks following the collapse of Japan, the Joint Planning Staff looked at the world-wide base sites and divided them into several categories. Some it decided were “primary base areas," those essential to the security of the United States and its possessions or necessary to projected military operations; others it classified in lesser categories. The Joint Chiefs accepted their staff's definitions and coordinated their discussion of bases with the State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee as part of the process of negotiating with foreign governments to secure the needed sites. As for the Ryukyus, the Joint Chiefs, from the first, included the islands in their list of primary base areas, assuming continued American control over the islands either by direct sovereignty or at the very least through United Nations trusteeship.

*4:The Department of State questioned this assumption. Secretary James F. Byrnes passed on to the new president, Harry S. Truman, his department's conclusion that "political and diplomatic considerations" made it necessary to consider the Ryukyus "minor islands which should be returned to Japan and demilitarized." The secretary's concern for diplomatic considerations stemmed from the ambiguous status of the Ryukyus at the conclusion of World War II. On 26 July 1945 the United States, Great Britain, China, and, later, the Soviet Union, agreed at the Potsdam Conference that "Japanese sovereignty shall be limited to the islands of Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, and Shikoku and such minor islands as we determine."3 In its formal surrender on 2 September 1945 Japan accepted the provisions of the Potsdam Declaration. Its Okinawa Prefecture, consisting of Okinawa, Miyako, and Yaeyama Gunto and surrounding islands, ceased to exist. But the ultimate status of Okinawa remained unclear, and the vagueness of the phrase "such minor islands as we determine" contained the seeds of potential territorial discord among the interested nations. The military potential of Okinawa's bases notwithstanding, Secretary Byrnes sought to minimize the chances of international disputes by demilitarizing the Ryukyus and returning them to Japanese control.

*5:The Joint Chiefs of Staff reacted quickly and negatively to the Department of State's position. Acting through the State-War-Navy Coordinating Committee, they urged the secretary of state to inform the president of their contrary assessment. On 10 September 1946 Fleet Ad- miral William D. Leahy, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, informed the president of the military leaders' "grave concern" over the proposed return of the Ryukyus to Japan and urged Truman to review the matter further.

*6:The debate would take several curious twists and turns as the basic assumptions that supported it changed abruptly in the immediate postwar years. Both the Joint Chiefs and the Department of State assumed that international affairs in Asia would revolve around a democratic China controlled by the Nationalists and assisted by American aid and support; that America and the Soviet Union would continue to work in approx- imately the same sort of international cooperation that had characterized their wartime partnership; and that decolonization of South and South- east Asia would come quickly and easily with a number of independent democratic nations emerging. All these assumptions proved incorrect, although it was not until the late 1940s that the new, harsh realities would be fully appreciated."

 

Disagreement over the near- and long-term disposition of Okinawa persisted, but remained low-key and generally went unpublicized. The secretary of state tended to focus attention on the Japanese question, and until 1951 the issue of Okinawa's status remained a corollary to the larger issue of a peace treaty between Japan and her former adversaries. The Department of State was content to let the War Department administer occupied territories. For their part, the Joint Chiefs concentrated on the emerging military realities of the postwar period that included America's expanded global responsibilities and the potential threat from long-range air power. By retaining existing overseas bases and by securing others, they hoped to provide a defense perimeter, as an Army spokesmen put it to a congressional audience in 1946, “surrounding ourselves with a cordon of bases from which our forces may intercept attacking units and from which we may launch immediate... counterblows."" As a large Far East outpost, Okinawa was a strategic link in this "cordon of bases." To harden this link the Joint Chiefs committed a large occupation force and drew up claborate base development plans for the island, although the particulars of these plans and the size of the force would vary from year to year with the ebb and flow of international events.

 

Postwar Military Organization

 

The last months of the war ushered in a period of rapid change in the organization of military forces on the Ryukyu Islands. The Joint Chiefs originally assigned both operational control and military govern- ment responsibility for the islands to the Navy, but the fact was neither the Army nor the Navy wanted to assume responsibility for the region." Admiral Nimitz argued that since the Tenth Army had invaded Okinawa to stage the planned invasion of Japan, it should assume these respon- sibilities. Bowing to the Pacific commander's request, the Joint Chiefs, on 18 July 1945, ordered control of the islands, excluding certain naval facilities, turned over to the Army. This transfer of command, they noted, was to be a temporary expedient; once the invasion of the Japanese home islands was accomplished, command of the Ryukyus was to be returned to the Navy." Effective 31 July, Headquarters, Island Command, Okinawa, was reconstituted as Headquarters, Army Service Command I (AS-COM I), and assigned to Army Forces, Western Pacific." At that time. the command's military strength totalled some 259,000 officers and men (see Table 1). The Commander in Chief, U.S. Army Forces, Pacific, Gen- eral MacArthur, assumed responsibility from his headquarters in Manila for military government in the Ryukyus, although he continued to direct what had been for some time a joint service operation with the prepon- derance of its manpower in naval uniform. In July civil affairs personnel in the islands included about 2,600 naval officers and men (including Seabees) and 279 Army officers and men.12

 

These arrangements lasted only seven more weeks. The abrupt surrender of Japan found the Army ill-prepared to exercise its responsibility for military government on Okinawa. Its few hundred civil affairs officers on the island were desperately needed for occupation duty with the Tenth TABLE I U.S. ARMY FORCES STRENGTH IN THE RYUKYUS 31 AUGUST 1945-31 August 1949
Date        Officers    Enlisted    Nurses    Warrants    Total
August 1945.    20.502    236.320    866    1.312        259,000
August 1946    1.332    18.561    64    59        20.016
August 1947.    1.378    15.054    46    45        16.523
August 1948.    703    9.748                10,451
August 1949.    919    11.538                12,457
Source: DA, Strength of the Army (STM-30), | Sep 45, p. 4; | Sep 46, p. 24; 1 Sep 47, p. 10; 1 Sep 48, p. 13: 1 Sep 49, p. 12.
Army in Korea and with the Eighth Army in Japan. Consequently, the Chief of Naval Operations, Fleet Admiral Ernest J. King, advised the Commander in Chief, Pacific, Fleet Admiral Nimitz, that military government would be a permanent Navy responsibility." On 21 September 1945 the Navy assumed complete accountability for military government although the Army retained operational control of the islands. Fleet Admiral Nimitz designated the Commanding Officer, Naval Operating Base, Okinawa, Rear Adm. John D. Price, as Chief Military Government officer while Col. Charles I. Murray, USMC, continued in his capacity as Deputy Commander for Military Government.'4

 

The Navy accepted responsibility for military government based on the assumption that Okinawa was desirable as a naval base and that the Navy would soon be given operational control, since the Army's tenure in the Ryukyus was merely temporary. Both assumptions proved false. The surrender of Japan not only curtailed Army Service Command I's base development plans, it also obviated most of the rationale for development of Okinawa's naval facilities. Moreover, by early 1946 the Navy had more closely examined the anchorages in Buckner Bay and found them less desirable than originally thought. Consequently, the Navy lost interest in the Ryukyus except as a location for minor facilities. In March 1946 the Chief of Naval Operations recommended to the Joint Chiefs of Staff that the Army not only retain operational control of the Ryukyus, but also assume responsibility for military government. Later the same month the Army's Chief of Staff concurred with that recommendation, asking only that Navy civil affairs officers continue to serve until sufficient Army personnel became available." Accordingly, on 1 July 1946 the Navy surrendered all administrative authority in the Ryukyus to the Army. The Okinawa Base Command became the Ryukyus Command with Brig. Gen. Frederic L. Hayden, senior military officer in the Ryukyus, commanding. Col. William H. Craig, USA, replaced Colonel Murray as the Deputy Commander for Military Government.'7

 

In preparation for the transfer of military government responsibility, Army civil affairs officers began arriving on Okinawa in late May 1946. By the end of the month 73 officers, mostly second lieutenants, had reported. These officers, all of whom were from military government assignments in Japan, had a measure of on-the-job training, but little or no formal instruction in civil affairs. Nevertheless, the transition pro- ceeded smoothly. On 1 July the administration of military government in the Ryukyus south of 30 degree north latitude passed from the Navy to the Army.

 

A comprehensive reorganization of American forces would soon affect these command arrangements. As the result of a Joint Chiefs of Staff decision in December 1946 to create more unified commands in areas of strategic importance, responsibility for all American land, naval, and air military operations within the Far East area fell to General Douglas MacArthur as Commander in Chief, Far East (CINCFE). The Far East command superseded U.S. Army Forces, Pacific, as the command re- sponsible for military government in the Ryukyu Islands, as well as in the other areas assigned to it. General Headquarters, Far East Command, and General Headquarters, Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers (SCAP), were physically combined in Tokyo, and the same staff served for both headquarters. The Joint Chiefs of Staff divided authority and responsibility on the basis of geography and function. MacArthur's authority as Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers remained limited to the four main islands of Japan and a few minor outlying islands where he was responsible for a variety of nonmilitary activities. As Commander