A suicide note from Kei Wakaizumi, Japan's secret negotiator for the 1972 Okinawa reversion, is now on display at the Okinawa Prefectural Archives. The letter expresses his grief over brokering a covert nuclear agreement with the United States, highlighting tensions in U.S.-Japan relations.
The Okinawa Prefectural Archives is exhibiting a suicide note left by Kei Wakaizumi, the international politics scholar who served as a confidential envoy for Prime Minister Eisaku Sato in the negotiations for Okinawa's 1972 return to Japan. In the letter, Wakaizumi conveys his profound grief over secretly assuring the United States that Japan would permit the reintroduction of nuclear weapons in emergencies—a deal that resolved a deadlock in the talks.
This covert promise enabled Sato and then-U.S. President Richard Nixon to finalize the reversion agreement. At the time, U.S. bases in Okinawa held immense strategic value amid the Vietnam War. The arrangement, which contradicted Japan's non-nuclear principles, was first revealed in Wakaizumi's 1994 book, sparking ongoing debates about U.S.-Japan nuclear understandings.
The display, available through Sunday, offers public insight into the behind-the-scenes diplomacy that shaped postwar relations, underscoring the personal toll on those involved.
