“The third prong of SCAP’s early efforts to eliminate the old order consisted of two inter-related directives issued on January 4, 1946. SCAPIN 548 ordered the Japanese government to abolish certain political parties and societies that resisted or opposed Occupation policy, had supported military aggression, had opposed free cultural and intellectual exchange with other countries, and—most important of all—had used assassination and terrorist tactics to alter earlier policies. SCAPIN 550 ordered the removal and exclusion of “undesirable personnel” from public office. The latter was based on Article 6 of the Potsdam Declaration: “There must be eliminated for all time the authority and influence of those who have deceived and misled the people of Japan into embarking on world conquest, for we insist that a new order of peace, security and justice will be impossible until irresponsible militarism is driven from the world.” SCAPIN 550 became known in common parlance as the political, or white, purge. I spent most of my two and a half years in GovSec working on this program and will use it as a brief case study illustrating some of the complexities inherent in “regime change.”
Brian Kagen is an avid web researcher with a particular interest in martial arts. His training background includes both judo and aikido. He has contributed hundreds of article links over the years for AJ readers.