‘Better to be a chicken’s head than an ox’s tail’: Japanese envoy diplomacy in the mediation of Konfrontasi (1965)

ABSTRACT

This article examines a lesser-known episode of the Cold War in Asia, namely Japan’s mediation in the Konfrontasi crisis between Indonesia and Malaysia, focusing on Prime Minister Satō’s appointment of a special envoy, Kawashima Shōjirō, in spring 1965. Drawing on multi-archival research in Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States, it shows how Japan’s envoy diplomacy initiative was shaped by unilateralism, partisanship and a brazen diplomatic style that defied ‘low-profile’ expectations and revealed regional leadership aspirations. Kawashima’s (eventually unsuccessful) endeavour played out as a remarkably ‘interventionist’ initiative, mirroring domestic tensions over the definition of Japan’s post-war role in Asia.

KEYWORDS:

• Japan
• Indonesia-Malaysia confrontation
• Cold War in Asia
• third-party intervention
• special envoy
• envoy diplomacy

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers of Cold War History for their helpful comments, as well as the three members of the journal’s board, who offered preliminary recommendations. I am also grateful for the generous feedback I received on earlier versions of this paper from the participants of the 2021 edition of the European Summer School on the Global Cold War, in particular Dr Sean Fear and Professor Leopoldo Nuti, as well as from the broader community of the Cold War Research Network (CWRN). Lastly, my appreciation goes to my mentors at Cambridge – my supervisor, Dr John Nilsson-Wright, and advisor, Professsor Barak Kushner – for their helpful feedback and constant encouragement.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

¹ Lam Peng Er, ed., Japan’s Relations with Southeast Asia: The Fukuda Doctrine and Beyond (New York: Routledge, 2013). Adopted in 1977, the Fukuda Doctrine became the blueprint for Japan’s relations with Southeast Asia, based on the principles of pacifism, ‘heart-to-heart’ dialogue and equal partnership.

² Hattori Ryūji, Satō Eisaku: Saichō Futō Seiken e no Michi (Tokyo: Asahi Shimbun Shuppan, 2017), Chapter 5. Satō in particular often relied on personal agents to advance his foreign policy agenda, such as in the case of the scholar Wakaizumi Kei in the Okinawa reversion negotiations (1967–9).

³ J. A. C. Mackie, Konfrontasi: The Indonesia-Malaysia Dispute 1963–1966 (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1974), 150–1. The sovereignty over Northern Borneo was also disputed by the Philippines. In the June 1963 Manila Summit, Malaya, the Philippines and Indonesia had attempted to settle their competing claims in the name of Malay brotherhood, forming the short-lived ‘Maphilindo’ association.

⁴ Taomo Zhou, ‘Ambivalent Alliance: Chinese Policy towards Indonesia, 1960–1965’, The China Quarterly 221 (2015): 208–28. In reality, Beijing’s influence on Sukarno was far more limited than what was claimed by the successive Suharto regime.

⁵ Odd Arne Westad, The Cold War: A World History (New York: Basic Books, 2019), 327; and Christopher Bayly and Tim Harper, Forgotten Wars: Freedom and Revolution in Southeast Asia (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2010), 534–5.

⁶ David Easter, Britain and the Confrontation with Indonesia, 1960–66 (London: Tauris Academic Studies, 2004), 1. The British involvement entailed the deployment of over 54,000 servicemen, making Konfrontasi ‘Britain’s forgotten post 1945 war’. Paul Lashmar, Nicholas Gilby and James Oliver, ‘Slaughter in Indonesia: Britain’s Secret Propaganda War’, The Guardian, 17 October 2021, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/17/slaughter-in-indonesia-britains-secret-propaganda-war (accessed 20 October 2021).

⁷ Audrey R. Kahin and George McT. Kahin, Subversion as Foreign Policy: The Secret Eisenhower and Dulles Debacle in Indonesia (New York: The New Press, 1995); and Ang Cheng Guan, Southeast Asia’s Cold War: An Interpretive History (Honolulu: University of Hawai′i Press, 2018), 119. The October 1964 Political Action Paper by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) aimed at countering communist influence in Indonesia by supporting anti-Sukarno elements and identifying his potential successor.

⁸ Mackie, Konfrontasi, 225.

⁹ Memorandum of Conversation, 12 January 1965. FRUS, 1964–68, Volume XXIX, Part 2, Japan, ed. Karen L. Gatz (Washington: United States Government Printing Office, 2006), Doc. 41. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v29p2/d41 (accessed 14 October 2021).

¹⁰ Amb. Shima Shigenobu (London), quoted in MacLehose (FO) to Amb. Rundall, tel. 111, 2 February 1965, FO 371/181495, The National Archives, Kew, Richmond (henceforth TNA).

¹¹ MOFA Asia Bureau, ‘List of representatives attending the ceremony for the 10th anniversary of the Asia-Africa Conference’, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. I), Diplomatic Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, Tokyo (henceforth DA-MOFAJ).

¹² Item no. 029, Cabinet Meeting on Personnel no. 173, 8 April 1965, Hei 4 Sō 00533100, National Archives of Japan, Tokyo. Kawashima’s appointment as ‘special envoy’ (tokuha taishi 特派大使) to the 10^th Anniversary of the Asia-Africa Conference was approved by the Cabinet on 8 April 1965.

¹³ For more on this important distinction, see: Kenneth J. Grieb, ‘Ambassadors, Executive Agents and Special Representatives’, in Encyclopaedia of American Foreign Policy, ed. Alexander DeConde, Richard Dean Burns and Fredrik Lodgevall, 2nd ed., vol 1. (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2002), 29–48.

¹⁴ Telegram from Bentley to Hanbury-Tenison, IM 1042/95, 23 April 1965, FO 371/181499, TNA.

¹⁵ Hayashi Masaharu, Kawashima Shōjirō (Chiba: Hanazono Tsūshinsha, 1971), 233–4.

¹⁶ Kōsaka Masataka, ‘Satō Eisaku: “Machi no Seiji” no Kyojitsu’, in Sengo Nihon no Saishōtachi, ed. Watanabe Akio (Tokyo: Chūōkōronsha, 1995), 204.

¹⁷ ‘Chōtōha Gaikō ni Michi Hiraku: Kawashima Tokushi, Kansōkai de Aisatsu’, Nihon Keizai Shimbun, 13 April 1965.

¹⁸ Fukunaga Fumio, Sengo Nihon no Saisei: 1945–1964 Nen (Tokyo: Maruzen: 2004).

¹⁹ Thomas R. H. Havens, Fire Across the Sea: the Vietnam War and Japan, 1965–1975 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987), 32. The anti-Vietnam War group beheiren (Citizens’ Federation for Peace in Vietnam), including prominent Japanese intellectuals, was established in April 1965.

²⁰ For more on Japan’s Konfrontasi policy during the Ikeda administration, see: Oliviero Frattolillo, Reassessing Japan’s Cold War: Ikeda Hayato’s Foreign Politics and Proactivism During the 1960s (London: Routledge, 2019), Chapter 3.

²¹ Japan’s involvement in Konfrontasi has been written off in virtually all main accounts of the conflict, such as Mackie, Konfrontasi; Matthew Jones, Conflict and Confrontation in Southeast Asia, 1961–1965: Britain, the United States, Indonesia and the Creation of Malaysia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001); and John Subritzky, Confronting Sukarno: British, American, Australian and New Zealand Diplomacy in the Malaysian-Indonesia Confrontation, 1961–65 (Basingstoke: Macmillan Press, 2000).

²² It suffices to say that the most comprehensive account of Kawashima’s attempt at mediation was published more than 40 years ago: Nishihara Masashi, The Japanese and Sukarno’s Indonesia: Tokyo-Jakarta Relations, 1951–1966 (Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii, 1976). For recent research on Konfrontasi see: Miyagi Taizō, Sengo Ajia Chitsujo no Mosaku to Nihon: ‘Umi no Ajia’ no Sengoshi, 1957–1966 (Tokyo: Sōbunsha, 2004); Sengo Nihon no Ajia Gaikō (Kyoto: Minerva Shobo, 2015); and James Llewelyn, ‘Japan’s Return to International Diplomacy and Southeast Asia: Japanese Mediation in Konfrontasi, 1963–66’, Asian Studies Review 30, no. 4 (2006): 355–74.

²³ Kweku Ampiah, The Political and Moral Imperatives of the Bandung Conference of 1955: The Reactions of the US, UK and Japan (Folkestone, Kent: Global Oriental, 2007), 167–97.

²⁴ ‘Japan finds herself as the point of contact between the East and the West. In a dual sense, Japan stands as a link between East and West, that is, in the sense of standing between the Communist and Free countries, and in the sense of standing between the Orient and the Occident.’ ‘Prime Minister Sato Addresses National Press Club’, Japan Report 11, no. 1 (20 January 1965): 3–5.

²⁵ Soeya Yoshihide, Sengo Nihon Gaikōshi (Tokyo: Keio Gijuku Daigaku Shuppankai, 2019), 119.

²⁶ Irie Toshihiro, ‘Ikeda – Satō Seikenki no “Kokusaiteki Heiwa Iji Katsudō” Sanka Mondai: Kongō Hanran – Marēsha Funsō to Jieitai Haken no Kentō’, Gunji Shigaku 42, nos 3–4 (2007): 111–29.

²⁷ James Llewelyn, ‘Diplomatic Divergence: The Japanese and British Responses to Indonesia’s Confrontation of Malaysia 1963–66’, Asia Europe Journal 4, no. 4 (2006): 601 and 587; and James Llewelyn, ‘Japan’s Return to International Diplomacy and Southeast Asia’, 360.

²⁸ Saadia Touval, ‘Mediation and Foreign Policy’, International Studies Review 5, no. 4 (2003): 91–5; and Saadia Touval and I. William Zartman eds., International Mediation in Theory and Practice (Boulder: Westview Press, 1985).

²⁹ Tobias S. Harris, The Iconoclast: Shinzō Abe and the New Japan (London: C. Hurst & Company, 2020), 27.

³⁰ Llewelyn, ‘Japan’s Cold War Diplomacy and its Return to Southeast Asia’, Asia-Pacific Review 21, no. 2 (2014): 90.

³¹ Nishihara, The Japanese and Sukarno’s Indonesia, 106–7.

³² Reto Hofmann, ‘The Conservative Imaginary: Moral Re-armament and the Internationalism of the Japanese Right, 1945–1962’, Japan Forum 33, no. 1 (2021): 95.

³³ In April 1965, Kawashima led a 10-people delegation made up of members from across the political spectrum, including a Deputy Special Envoy (Ōno Katsumi, a retired diplomat), four members of the House of Representatives, and five officers from MOFA, with the addition of 12 journalists. MOFA Asia Bureau, ‘List of representatives attending the ceremony for the 10th anniversary of the Asia-Africa Conference’, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. I), DA-MOFAJ.

³⁴ ‘Kono Hito to Ichijikan. A. A. Kaigi ni Nozomu Nihon no Shimei’, Ekonomisuto 43, no. 28 (June 1965): 51.

³⁵ Hattori, Satō Eisaku: Saichō Futō Seiken e no Michi, 191.

³⁶ ‘Prime Minister Sato Addresses National Press Club’, Japan Report 11, no. 1 (20 January 1965): 3–5.

³⁷ S[atō] – OP[eration], ‘Mareishia Funsō wo Meguru Nihon no Yakuwari ni tsuite no Teian’, 23 January 1965, in Kusuda Minoru Papers, Part I Section E, Japan Digital Archives Center Database. http://j-dac.jp/KUSUDA/kaidai_index.html (accessed 16 November 2021).

³⁸ Telegram from FO to Tokyo, no. 889, 31 August 1965, FO 262/2136, TNA.

³⁹ Andrea Pressello, ‘The Fukuda Doctrine and Japan’s Role in Shaping Post-Vietnam War Southeast Asia’, Japanese Studies 34, no. 1 (2014): 43.

⁴⁰ Background note to Brief for Lord Carington’s Interview with the Japanese Ambassador, attached to Peck to Stratton, DH 1391/2, 13 January 1964, FO 371/176005, TNA.

⁴¹ Ōhira Masayoshi, ‘Diplomacy for Peace: The Aims of Japanese Foreign Policy’, International Affairs 40, no. 1 (1964): 395.

⁴² ‘Text of Foreign Minister’s Policy Speech’, The Japan Times, January 22, 1964, clipping attached to Cortazzi to Bentley (FO), 1013/1/64, 24 January 1964, FO 371/176005, TNA.

⁴³ Kōsuke Yoshitsugu, Ikeda Seikenki no Nihon Gaikō to Reisen: Sengo Nihon Gaikō no Zahyōjiku, 1960–1964 (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2009), 197.

⁴⁴ Amb. Shima (London) to MOFA, tel. 642, 10 May 1965, A’7.1.0.12, DA-MOFAJ.

⁴⁵ Kenn Nakata Steffensen, ‘Post-Cold War Changes in Japanese International Identity: Implications for Japan’s Influence in Asia’, in Japanese Influences and Presences in Asia, ed. Marie Söderberg and Ian Reader (Richmond: Curzon, 2000): 150.

⁴⁶ Kawashima’s Press Conference in Jakarta on 19 April 1965, quoted in Rodgers (Jakarta) to FO, tel. 822, 20 April 1965, FO 371/181500, TNA.

⁴⁷ Instructions from the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy) to Attorney General Kennedy, 14 January 1964. FRUS, 1964–68, Volume XXVI, Indonesia; Malaysia-Singapore; Philippines, ed. Edward Keefer (Washington: United States Government Printing Office, 2000), Doc. 166. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v26/d16 (accessed 19 October 2021). Kennedy’s mission was ‘to convince Sukarno of the inevitable consequences of the policy of military confrontation’ against Malaysia.

⁴⁸ Quadripartite Meeting on Indonesia and Malaysia, Working Group Meeting, 17 October 1963, Department of State. Library of Congress, W. Averell Harriman Papers, Box 497 Folder 3. The United States’ support for Thai mediation dated back to the early stages of Konfrontasi, as Thanat was encouraged to ‘strive to achieve whatever measures might alleviate the current impasse’.

⁴⁹ US Embassy Jakarta to US Department of State, Telegram no. 1593, 31 January 1964, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 Central Foreign Policy Files, RG 59, Box 2321, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD (henceforth NARA).

⁵⁰ FO to Tokyo, tel. 213, 26 February 1965, FO 371/181496, TNA.

⁵¹ Nick Kapur, Japan at the Crossroads: Conflict and Compromise after Anpo (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2018), 71.

⁵² Department of State to US Embassy Kuala Lumpur, Telegram no. 711, 25 February 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 Subject-Numeric Files (henceforth SNF), RG 59, Box 2324, NARA.

⁵³ US Embassy Bangkok (Martin) to Department of State, Telegram no. 1388, 19 March 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA.

⁵⁴ Quoted in telegram from Rumbold (Bangkok) to FO, no. 236, 12 March 1965, FO 371/181,498, TNA.

⁵⁵ US Embassy Tokyo (Reischauer) to Department of State, Telegram no. 3072, 30 March 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA.

⁵⁶ US Embassy Jakarta (Jones) to Department of State, Telegram no. 2299, 22 April 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA.

⁵⁷ Amb. Kasuya (Bangkok) to MOFA, tel. 182, 2 March 1965, A’.7.1.0.12–4 (Vol. I), DA-MOFAJ.

⁵⁸ Amb. Shimazu (Bangkok) to MOFA, no. 198, 31 October 1964, A’.7.1.0.12–4 (Vol. I), DA-MOFAJ.

⁵⁹ ‘Joint Communique issued by Thai foreign minister Thanat Khoman, Philippines foreign secretary Salvador P. Lopez and Indonesian foreign minister Subandrio on 18th November 1963’, in A’.7.1.0.12–4 (Vol. I), DA-MOFAJ.

⁶⁰ Amb. Furuuchi (Jakarta) to MOFA, tel. 135, 21 February 1964, A’.7.1.0.12–4 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

⁶¹ Amb. Furuuchi (Jakarta) to MOFA, tel. 116, 15 February 1964, A’.7.1.0.12–5 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

⁶² US Embassy Bangkok (Martin) to Department of State, Telegram no. 1388, 19 March 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA.

⁶³ Government of Malaysia, ‘Record of Conversation No. 25/65 between The Honorable the Prime Minister and Mr. Shojiro Kawashima, Special Envoy of the Prime Minister of Japan’, attached to Chargé d’Affaires ad interim Hayashi (Kuala Lumpur) to MOFA, tel. 353, 13 May 1965, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

⁶⁴ US Embassy Bangkok to Department of State, Telegram no. 1638, 25 April 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA.

⁶⁵ Saadia Touval, The Peace Brokers: Mediators in the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1948–1979 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), 8.

⁶⁶ Amb. Furuuchi (Jakarta) to MOFA, tel. 42, 22 January 1964, A’7.1.0.12, DA-MOFAJ.

⁶⁷ Amb. Rundall to FO, tel. 116, 17 February 1965, FO 371/181496, TNA.

⁶⁸ As identified by Van Jackson, ‘Understanding Spheres of Influence in International Politics’, European Journal of International Security 10 (2019): 1–19.

⁶⁹ Miyagi Taizō, Japan’s Quest for Stability in Southeast Asia: Navigating the Turning Points in Post-War Asia (Abingdon: Routledge, 2017), 39. Kishi’s tour of Southeast Asia in May 1957, albeit largely successful, was met by violent anti-Japanese protests. Ōba Mie, Ajia Taiheiyō Chiiki Keisei e no Dōtei: Kyōkai Kokka Nichigō no Aidentiti Mosaku to Chiiki Shugi (Tokyo: Minerva Shobō, 2004), 25. Ōba argues that control or influence over a ‘region’ is a constant feature of Japan’s security and foreign policy due to the country’s position in the world as a ‘liminal nation’ (kyōkai kokka).

⁷⁰ Clipping from the Malayan Times, included in Amb. Kai (Kuala Lumpur) to MOFA, tel. 247, 22 April 1965, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

⁷¹ Marvin C. Ott, ‘Mediation as a Method of Conflict Resolution: Two Cases’, International Organization 2, no. 4 (1972): 597.

⁷² Touval, ‘Mediation and Foreign Policy’, 91–5.

⁷³ Amb. Rundall to FO, tel. 65, 29 January 1965, FO 371/181495, TNA.

⁷⁴ Telegram from Rundall to FO, no. 298, 27 April 1965, FO 371/181499, TNA.

⁷⁵ Clipping from The Japan Times, ‘Politics in Review’, 19 February 1965, attached to Amb. Kai (Kuala Lumpur) to head of MOFA Asia Bureau, 15 March 1965, A’7.1.0.12, DA-MOFAJ.

⁷⁶ Amb. Rundall to FO, tel. 302, 29 April 1965, FO 371/181500, TNA.

⁷⁷ Kawashima’s political career had been entirely focused on the domestic, with very few appointments in the realm of foreign policy. It was only in his last years as LDP vice-president that he assumed more representational roles abroad, often as a ‘reward’ for a distinguished career, travelling widely as a government representative (to India and Burma in September 1965; the Middle East in February 1966; the Soviet Union in May 1967; and South America in August 1968). In none of these instances, however, did he pursue a proactive personal initiative as he did in Konfrontasi.

⁷⁸ Obata Shin’ichi, Seikai Issunsaki wa Yami: Aru Kawashima Tantō Kisha no Shuki (Tokyo: Kihosha, 1972), 44. Kawashima’s slogan (a shorthand for seiji supōtsu bunri) parroted the famous policy of seikei bunri (‘separation of politics and economics’) that guided Sino-Japanese relations in the post-war period.

⁷⁹ Tri Joko Waluyo, ‘Peranan Jepang dalam Konfrontasi Indonesia-Malaysia, 1963–1966’ (Master’s dissertation, University of Riau, 1996), 37.

⁸⁰ Chow Chi Mo, Sukaruno Daitōryō no Tokushi: Sū Shibo Kaisōroku, ed. Masuda Atō (Tokyo: Chūōkoronsha, 1981). Chow, an ethnic Hakka Chinese Indonesian, had collaborated with the Japanese occupation forces in Xiamen, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Jakarta, later joining the Indonesian nationalist movement. After the war he established a textile trading business between Indonesia and Japan, becoming exceptionally well connected to political and business circles in both countries. In 1957, he liaised in the settlement of the war reparations package between Sukarno and Kishi ahead of the latter’s official visit to Jakarta.

⁸¹ Ibid., 206.

⁸² Kōsaka, ‘Satō Eisaku: “Machi no Seiji” no Kyojitsu’, 204.

⁸³ Chow, Sukaruno Daitōryō no Tokushi, 199.

⁸⁴ Ibid., 217.

⁸⁵ Satō Eisaku, Satō Eisaku Nikki, vol. 2 (Tokyo: Asahi Shimbun, 1998), 263 (diary entry, 14 April 1965); MOFA Asia Bureau, Southeast Asia Division ‘Wagakuni no Tai Indoneshia Seisaku no Arikata’, 27 January 1966, A’7.1.0.12, DA-MOFAJ.

⁸⁶ Gotō Ken’ichi, Tensions of Empire: Japan and Southeast Asia in the Colonial and Postcolonial World, ed. Paul H. Kratoska (Athens: Ohio University Press; Singapore: Singapore University Press, 2003), 57; and Miyagi, Japan’s Quest for Stability in Southeast Asia, 40.

⁸⁷ MOFA Asia Bureau, Southeast Asia Division, ‘Wagakuni no Tai Indoneshia Seisaku’, 23 February 1965, A’7.1.0.12, Diplomatic Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, Tokyo (henceforth DA-MOFAJ).

⁸⁸ Llewelyn, ‘Japan’s Return to International Diplomacy and Southeast Asia’, 356.

⁸⁹ Amb. Rundall to Peck (FO), 10321/85/65, 26 February 1965, FO 371/181496, TNA.

⁹⁰ Kahin and Kahin, Subversion as Foreign Policy, 221. Malayan premier Abdul Rahman, backed by the British government, had announced the creation of a new Malaysian State before a UN mission completed its popular consultations in Sabah and Sarawak.

⁹¹ Amb. Furuuchi (Jakarta) to MOFA, tel. 78, 1 February 1964, A’.7.1.0.12–5 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

⁹² FO to Tokyo, tel. 489, 30 April 1965, FO 371/181500, TNA.

⁹³ US Embassy Tokyo to US Department of State, Telegram no. 3543, 3 May 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA.

⁹⁴ Touval, The Peace Brokers, 325–6.

⁹⁵ Peck to Caccia, 28 January 1964, DH 103145/10, FO 371/176005, TNA.

⁹⁶ Gilchrist to FO, tel. 407, 19 February 1965, FO 371/181496, TNA. Gilchrist quipped: ‘the same man, not a friend of either, ought to visit both places [Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur]’.

⁹⁷ As recounted by the Japanese ambassador to Malaysia, who accompanied Abdul Rahman on his trip, in Kai Fumihiko, Kokkyō wo Koeta Yūjō: Waga Gaikō Hiwa (Tokyo: Tokyo Shimbun Shuppankyoku, 1990), 60.

⁹⁸ Gilchrist to Peck, 1046/65, 13 January 1965, FO 371/181495, TNA; ‘A Commentary on the Memorandum “The Malaysia Question and Indonesia” Prepared by the Asian Affairs Bureau of the Japanese Foreign Ministry’, attached to Peck to Cheke (FO), 13 January 1964, FO 371/176005, TNA.

⁹⁹ Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Ōda, Report on the Mission to Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur, 20 November 1963, A’7.1.0.12, DA-MOFAJ.

¹⁰⁰ Memorandum of Conversation, 12 January 1965. FRUS, 1964–68, Vol. XXIX, Part 2, Japan, Doc. 41.

¹⁰¹ US Department of State, Quadripartite Talks on Indonesia and Malaysia, Summary of First Meeting, 16 October 1963. Library of Congress, W. Averell Harriman Papers, Box 497 Folder 3.

¹⁰² US Embassy Jakarta to US Department of State, Telegram no. 1908, 14 March 1964, file POL INDON-US, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2327, NARA. One unnamed Western ambassador described Jones as the ‘most loyal member of Sukarno cabinet’ in an article published in March 1964 on Djakarta UPI.

¹⁰³ US Department of State, National Intelligence Memorandum: Prospects for Indonesia and Malaysia, 1 July 1965. FRUS, 1964–68, Vol. XXVI, Indonesia; Malaysia-Singapore; Philippines, ed. Edward Keefer (Washington: United States Government Printing Office, 2000), Doc. 126. https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1964-68v26/d126 (accessed 14 October 2021).

¹⁰⁴ Department of State to US Embassy Tokyo, Telegram no. 2122, 23 February 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2324, NARA.

¹⁰⁵ Ibid.

¹⁰⁶ US Embassy Bangkok to Department of State, Telegram no. 1013, 1 February 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2324, NARA. As relayed by Thanat, ‘Subandrio had felt Japan too big a country for intermediary role and might have ideas of exacting some price in return for its services’. US Embassy Lusaka to Department of State, Airgram no. A-569, 29 January 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2324, NARA. US Embassy Kuala Lumpur to Department of State, Airgram no. A-693, 16 March 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA. In March 1965, President Kwame Nkrumah offered Ghana’s good offices to mediate in the dispute.

¹⁰⁷ US Embassy Jakarta to Department of State, Telegram no. 1639, 22 February 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2324, NARA.

¹⁰⁸ Department of State to US Embassy Tokyo, Telegram no. 2122, 23 February 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2324, NARA.

¹⁰⁹ Quoted in correspondence from Amb. Rundall to Peck (FO), 7 February 1964, FO 371/176005, TNA.

¹¹⁰ US Embassy Jakarta to Department of State, Telegram no. 1418, 20 January 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2324, NARA.

¹¹¹ Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, ‘The Malaysia Question and Indonesia’, translation of document received on 28 December 1963, attached to Cheke to Peck, 1059/2/64, 3 January 1964, FO 371/176005, TNA.

¹¹² Ibid.

¹¹³ Sukarno’s sincere commitment to communism has been widely disproven, and interpreted rather as a tool of populism (Julia Lovell, Maoism: A Global History [London: The Bodley Head, 2019], 170–1), informed by a syncretic ‘colonial hybridity’ (James R. Rush, ‘Sukarno: Anticipating an Asian Century’, in Makers of Modern Asia, ed. Ramachandra Guha, 172–98 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2014), 180).

¹¹⁴ MOFA Asia Bureau, Southeast Asia Division, Report on ‘Sukarno-Rahman Meeting’, 5 June 1963, A’.7.1.0.12–5 (Vol. I), DA-MOFAJ.

¹¹⁵ Gotō, Tensions of Empire, 84.

¹¹⁶ Amb. Furuuchi (Jakarta) to MOFA, tel. 135, 21 February 1964, A’.7.1.0.12–4 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

¹¹⁷ Government of Malaysia, ‘Record of Conversation No. 25/65 between The Honorable the Prime Minister and Mr. Shojiro Kawashima, Special Envoy of the Prime Minister of Japan’, attached to Hayashi (Kuala Lumpur) to MOFA, tel. 353, 13 May 1965, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

¹¹⁸ Nineteenth-century US history offers several examples of the intertwined nature of envoy diplomacy and imperial expansion, with envoys being regularly dispatched to territories that the United States would either incorporate (e.g. Native American territories, Hawai′i) or meddle in during civil conflicts (e.g. Mexico and Santo Domingo). See for instance: Kenneth J. Grieb, ‘The Lind Mission to Mexico’, Caribbean Studies 7, no. 4 (1968): 25–43.

¹¹⁹ Soeya Yoshihide, Nihon no Gaikō: ‘Sengo’ wo Yomitoku (Tokyo: Chikuma Shobo, 2017), 20.

¹²⁰ Prior to Kawashima, Satō dispatched another lawmaker, Ogasa Kōshō, to Jakarta in January 1965. However, Ogasa (also from the Kawashima faction) visited Indonesia as a representative of the LDP, not of the Japanese government, and was only on a ‘fact-finding’ mission. Telegram from Amb. Shima (London) to MOFA, no. 182, 2 February 1965, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. I), DA-MOFAJ.

¹²¹ US Embassy Jakarta to US Department of State, Telegram no. 2307, 24 April 1965, file POL 2 INDON, 1964–66 Central Foreign Policy Files, RG 59, Box 2308, NARA.

¹²² Benjamin R. Young, Guns, Guerrillas, and the Great Leader: North Korea and the Third World (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2021), 19–26. Indonesia and North Korea had successfully pursued close economic and diplomatic relations since the 1950s, with Pyongyang backing Konfrontasi.

¹²³ US Embassy Jakarta to Department of State, Telegram no. 1498, 1 February 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2324, USNA.

¹²⁴ Miura Ryōichi, ‘Marēshia Funsō Chōtei: AA Kaigi Shikiten e no Hōfu. Kawashima Tokuha Taishi ni Kiku’, Mainichi Shimbun (Morning Edition), 11 April 1965.

¹²⁵ Foreign Minister Shiina to Special Envoy Kawashima via Amb. Saitō (Jakarta), tel. 372, 19 April 1965, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

¹²⁶ Special Envoy Kawashima’s Report on meeting with President Sukarno, attached to Foreign Minister Shiina to ambassadors in the United States, United Kingdom and the Philippines, tel. 1033, 24 April 1965, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

¹²⁷ Excerpt of Letter from Tunku Abdul Rahman to Prime Minister Satō handed over to Kawashima, attached to Lord Head to CRO, tel. 716, 22 April 1965, FO 371/181499, TNA.

¹²⁸ Llewelyn’s interpretation of some archival documents makes him argue that Kawashima’s use of the word ‘assurance’ was a strategy deliberately devised by him with the backing of ambassadors Kai (in Kuala Lumpur) and Saitō (in Jakarta) – a bluff meant to trick Sukarno into accepting to meet Abdul Rahman in Tokyo. Llewelyn, ‘Japan’s Return to International Diplomacy and Southeast Asia’, 367. However, considering the reaction of Japanese diplomats, who were left scrambling to contain the diplomatic fallout, as well as Kawashima’s idiosyncratic impulsiveness and diplomatic inexperience, it remains unclear to what extent the envoy’s words faithfully reflected any previous consultation.

¹²⁹ MOFA Asia Bureau, Summary of First Meeting of Vice Foreign Ministers of 18 June, 19 June 1964, A’.7.1.0.12-5 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

¹³⁰ Amb. Rundall to FO, tel. 306, 30 April 1965, FO 371/181499, TNA. Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Ōda Takio told Rundall that Kawashima had overdressed any commitment given him by Sukarno. Amb. Kasuya (Bangkok) to MOFA, no. 353, 22 April 1965, A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

¹³¹ Telegram from FO to Kuala Lumpur, tel. 1311, 30 April 1965, FO 371/181499, TNA.

¹³² Bentley (Kuala Lumpur) to Hanbury-Tenison (FO), IM 1042/95, 23 April 1965, FO 371/181499, TNA.

¹³³ Touval, The Peace Brokers, 13.

¹³⁴ Llewelyn, ‘Japan’s Return to International Diplomacy and Southeast Asia’, 367.

¹³⁵ Department of State to US Embassy Tokyo, Telegram no. 2122, 23 February 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2324, NARA.

¹³⁶ Satō, Satō Eisaku Nikki, Vol. 2, 267 (diary entry, 26 April 1965).

¹³⁷ Quoted in Loomes (Bangkok) to Office of the High Commissioner for Australia in London, tel. 346, 27 April 1965, FO 371/181499, TNA.

¹³⁸ Written note by FO (dated 22 April 1965), in Rodgers (Jakarta) to FO, DH/KL 1214, 20 April 1965, FO 371/181499, TNA.

¹³⁹ The conference was eventually postponed due to the June 1965 military coup in Algeria.

¹⁴⁰ US Embassy Jakarta (Jones) to Department of State, Telegram no. 2348, 28 April 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA.

¹⁴¹ Nishihara, The Japanese and Sukarno’s Indonesia, 144.

¹⁴² Cheke (Tokyo) to FO, (1059/18/65)G, 29 January 1965, FO 371/181495, TNA.

¹⁴³ US Embassy Jakarta (Jones) to Department of State, Telegram no. 2348, 28 April 1965, file POL 32–1 INDON-MALAYSIA, 1964–66 SNF, RG 59, Box 2325, NARA.

¹⁴⁴ Clipping from Asahi Shimbun, ‘Seifu no Degata Hitotsu’, 26 April 1965, included in A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ; clipping from Tokyo Shimbun, ‘Junchō na Suberidashi. Nihon wa, “Toki no Ujigami”’, 17 April 1965, included in A’.7.1.0.12–7–2 (Vol. II), DA-MOFAJ.

¹⁴⁵ Comment by Cable, in Amb. Rundall to Peck, 7 February 1964, FO 371/176005, TNA.

¹⁴⁶ Telegram from Gilchrist to FO, no. 980, 8 May 1965, FO 371/181500, TNA. In defiance to calls for a united diplomatic front, a parliamentary delegation led by Utsunomiya Tokuma, an unruly pro-Beijing LDP lawmaker, visited Indonesia during Kawashima’s mission in April 1965, causing ‘much embarrassment’ to the Japanese diplomats in Jakarta.

Additional information

Funding

This work, based on my doctoral research, was supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council Doctoral Training Programme (AHRC DTP) under Grant no. AH/L503897, and by the Cambridge Trust under the ‘Cambridge Toshiba Japan and World Graduate Scholarship’. Additionally, archival research in Japan and the US was supported, respectively, by the AHRC DTP under Research Training Support Grant no. AH/L503897/1, and by the AHRC International Placement Scheme at the John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress, Washington DC, under grant no. AH/V004387/1.