JAPAN: Nukes for Nippon?

JAPAN Nukes for Nippon? Unlike recent junkets by other Administration officials, Defense Secretary Melvin Laird's ten-day swing through Tokyo and Seoul seemed carefully calculated to be thoroughly unspectacular. Laird's message was the same for both allies: they could count on continued protection from the Seventh Fleet and the U.S. nuclear umbrella, but they would have to furnish "credible deterrence" on the ground themselves. Who could get upset over what amounted to yet another sales pitch for the Nixon Doctrine?

Certainly not the South Koreans. To be sure, they...

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