Newly declassified Japanese diplomatic documents showed Friday that the United States in 1969 demanded Japan pay $650 million, worth some ¥234 billion under the exchange rate at that time, to finance unspecified costs related to the 1972 reversion of Okinawa to Japanese sovereignty from U.S. control.
A secret cable dated Oct. 22, 1969, which was sent by Japanese Ambassador to the U.S. Takeso Shimoda a month before the bilateral summit, revealed that Washington strongly pressed Tokyo to make the lump-sum payment, even suggesting it would help Tokyo compile a breakdown of expenditures to gain Diet understanding.
Under an official bilateral pact on the Okinawa reversion, Japan was to shoulder $320 million of the costs. But it remains unknown to this day how much Japan actually paid the United States.