MacArthur Pats Japan On Back

Chronicle (Levin), 2 September 1949, Page 5

MacArthur Pats Japan On Back

ReceAved Thursday, 7 p.m. TOKiO, Sept. 1. General j\IacArtliur, in a stateuieni on the fourth anniversary of the Japanese surrendel*, paid tribute to the Japanese people and expressed eonlidence in the eountry's 1'uture. The main points uiade by Gencral MacArthur were : — Firstly, Japan deserved a formal peace treaty. Secondly, the Communist threat in Japan was past. Thirdly, the danger of a reemergence of a police state was non-existent. Fourthly, Japan was well on the way to self-support. Fifthly, there was no need for Japan to trade with Communist China. Sixthlv, the Allied Occupation Poree's effdifs to reorient and reconstruct Japan, had proved eminently successful. General MacArthur said: "The! Japanese have i'ully and faithfully fulfilled their surrendel* commitments and have well earned the freedom, dignity and opportunity which alone can come with the restnration of fofmal peace. With energy, hope and industry, they have now launched on the huge task of making Japan once again self-supporting among the family of nations. Today Japan might be viewed as a svmbol of hope for the iess fortimate peoples overwhelm- , 4 . "

ed by despotic rule and coercive force." General MacArthur decdared that Ihe last year had witnessed accelerated progress in every phase of Japan's reconstruction. Industrial production was rapidly approaching the 1930-34 level which the Far Eastern Commission prescribed as the interim standard. The United States' "significant decisions" to halt reparations removals - and to finance the rehabilitation of Japan, hau played an important part in the recovery. "The threat of communism as a major issue in Japanese life, 1 is past. Its own exeesses oroused Japanese public opinion to the threat it constituted to their free institutions. Enfranchised women promised to prove a powert'ui and effeetive force in Japanese politics while a broad midqieclass was emerging which would support democracy and reject with scorn any will-of-the-wisp economic Utopias which require the surrender of the individual's freedom to the State." Trade union ism, despite a degree oi freedom uilsurpassed in moderu civilisation, had been somewhat iinpeded by irresponsible union leadership. The rank and file, however, were increasingly insisting on a moderation oi' objec-' tivity. Tlic police services- were being administerod with restraint, tolerance and commondable officiency, said General MacArthur. The dangor that a police state would re-emerge or that the police system as now constituted and manned would. not maintain reasonable law and order, was uon-existont. General MacArthur said there was no mass unemployment, no soeial unrest and no large scale dole despite an inereaso of 9,500,000 people since Oetober 1, 1945 — 5,000,000 by repatrintion and the "remainder as a resiilt of thu I jiatural increase, _ ^ • ,, , ^ . 0"