강화와 안보를 둘러싼 미일 교섭과 일본의 전략 ‒ 요시다 시게루(吉田茂)를 중심으로 ‒

Abstract

Studies on the rearmament of Japan have a strong tendency to be dealt with in a position that Japan had to be led to the change of the US and international situations. However, it is necessary to reconsider a series of processes from the San Francisco Peace Treaty to the Japan-US Security Treaty in the aspect that they are not just ‘passive’. This is because the rearmament of Japan was not just necessarily against Yoshida’s own thought. The biggest problem over peace negotiation within Japan was “how security assurance for Japan after independence should be”, and Yoshida was holding fast to the policy that Japan refuses rearmament until peace treaty is concluded. But as the full-scale negotiation for adjustment of peace treaty with Dulles started in January 1951, Yoshida changed the existing position about rearmament and suggested the establishment of new security forces with 50 thousand soldiers including army and navy. About this fact, Yoshida himself revealed that there was no way except for yielding to the demand of Dulles but the facts that Yoshida was admitting necessity of Japan’s rearmament after the peace treaty are found in various places. Only, Yoshida was to promote gradual rearmament based on the strategy that economic groundwork should be fully prepared first in order to retain armed forces. In this aspect, Yoshida’s non-armament contention asserting the article 9 of the constitution and Japan’s economic revival and concerns of many Asian countries as the grounds was the means very suitable for sealing his political strategy.