Ambassador to Japan
MacArthur was appointed U.S. Ambassador to Japan in December 1956 and presented his credentials in February 1957.
During his four years in Tokyo, MacArthur oversaw the re-negotiation of the U.S.-Japan Security Treaty, known as "Anpo" in Japanese. MacArthur appeared on the cover of the June 27, 1960, issue of Time magazine, in which he was characterized as "the principal architect of present-day U.S. policy toward Japan."
However, the new treaty was met with the massive Anpo Protests in Japan, and was only ratified with great difficulty. As the protests grew in size in June 1960, MacArthur summoned the heads of major newspapers and television station NHK to his office and demanded more favorable coverage of the treaty.
Then on June 10, MacArthur deliberately provoked the so-called "Hagerty Incident" (ハガチー事件, Hagachii jiken). That afternoon, MacArthur was leaving Tokyo's Haneda Airport in a black car carrying himself and President Eisenhower's press secretary James Hagerty, who had just arrived in Japan to prepare for a planned visit by Eisenhower, when MacArthur ordered that the car be deliberately driven into a large crowd of anti-treaty protesters. The mob surrounded the car and proceeded to smash the car's windows and tail lights, slash its tires, and dance on the roof until MacArthur and Hagerty finally had to be rescued by a U.S. Marine helicopter. MacArthur had hoped that by provoking the incident, he would force the Japanese government to carry out a more forceful police response to suppress the protests ahead of Eisenhower's planned arrival. However, MacArthur's gambit backfired, as widespread shock at the Hagerty Incident helped force prime minister Nobusuke Kishi to cancel Eisenhower's visit, for fears that his safety could not be guaranteed.
It was revealed in 1974 that MacArthur had negotiated a secret agreement with the Japanese foreign minister Aiichiro Fujiyama to allow the transit of American nuclear weapons through Japanese territory. It was also revealed, through documents declassified in the 2000s, that MacArthur pressured the Japanese judiciary, including Chief Justice Kōtarō Tanaka, to uphold the legality of the United States military presence in Japan after a lower court decision found it unconstitutional.
