Next Ambassador to Japan Answers to the POW Questions
Questions
for the Record Submitted to Ambassador- Designate John Roos by Senator John
Kerry, Senate Foreign Relations Committee
July 23, 2009, and Mr. Roos' answers.
(Mr. Roos was confirmed by the US Senate on August 7 as the next Ambassador to
Japan.)
(photo:
from website of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati）
Question #1:
In December 2008, the Government of Japan revealed in testimony to the Diet by
an official of the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry that there were still
unexamined documents held in Japan’s ministries and private corporations
containing detailed information on American POWs held by Japan during WWII that
have not yet been released to the public.
What efforts will the U.S. Embassy make to ensure the release of these records
so that appropriate American authorities and scholars can create a complete and
accurate list of those interned by Imperial Japan?
Answer:
Over the past 60 plus years, our relationship with Japan has evolved from one of
bitter enmity to a rock-solid friendship. The sacrifice of the men and women who
served our nation in WWII made that possible. The Department of State believes
that post-war Japan has made significant efforts to atone for the actions of the
Imperial Government of the 1930s and 1940s. We hope Japan’s apologies expressed
by Ambassador Fujisaki in San Antonio provide our brave men and women with a
sense of peace and satisfaction at this late stage in their lives, but I am
aware that such deep suffering may sometimes find no healing salve.
Japanese industrial conglomerates were heavily involved in prosecuting the
Japanese war effort and supplemented their work force with Allied POWs. The
position of the United States is, and has been, that subsequent claims against
Japanese corporations were satisfied by the 1951 Treaty of San Francisco.
I believe, however, that an open accounting of the past will help to strengthen
our Alliance even more in the future, and if confirmed, I will work for such an
accounting.
Question #2:
On May 30th, the Japanese Ambassador to the U.S., Ichiro Fujisaki, delivered in
person a long-sought formal and official apology to the former American POWs
from the Japanese government. The Ambassador also noted during his apology that
the Foreign Ministry was considering including American POWs in the 1995 Peace,
Friendship and Exchange Program for Allied POWs or a better, more permanent fund
for the joint U.S.-Japan fund for the study and exchange on the Pacific War.
How do you plan to encourage the Japanese government and Japanese companies to
follow through with a program for understanding and reconciliation?
Answer:
The United States is actively encouraging Japan to include American POWs of
Japan in the Peace, Friendship, and Exchange Initiative. The State Department
has engaged both the Japanese Embassy in Washington and Japan’s Ministry of
Foreign Affairs in Tokyo on this issue, and we believe that the Japanese are
considering our request in earnest. If confirmed, my staff and I at the U.S.
Embassy in Tokyo will continue to stress the importance of this overture to our
Japanese counterparts and will encourage a quick decision so that our veterans
are offered inclusion in this initiative of reconciliation.
Dr.
Lester Tenney, the last Commander of the American Defenders of Bataan and
Corregidor, said that he was encouraged by Ambassador Roos’ commitment to work
on the POW issue.
He hopes that “an open accounting of the past” will include actions taken by the
private corporations that enslaved American POWs. Dr. Tenney also hopes that
Ambassador Roos will inform the Japanese that not including American POWs in the
Peace, Friendship, and Exchange Initiative was an insult to all Americans and
can no longer be tolerated.