Historical Dictionary of United States-Japan ... - Bakumatsu Films

86 • GENERAL HEADQUARTERS/SUPREME COMMANDER FOR THE ALLIED POWERS
and led by the United States, in October 1947, 23 nations signed the
General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), an international
agreement designed to expand trade and deal with trade conflicts
among GATT members. GATT’s basic ethos was to promote liberal,
multilateral, and non-discriminatory trade. GATT came into effect in
January 1948 and Japan joined in 1955. Along with the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Bank for Reconstruction
and Development (IBRD), GATT underpinned the Bretton Woods
framework in the post–World War II era. From its establishment,
there were eight rounds of multilateral GATT negotiations. From
1947 to 1993, advanced countries’ tariff rates on mined products and
manufactured goods were cut from an average of 40 percent down to
3 percent, and the volume of trade of physical goods increased about
14-fold. At the end of 1993, 114 nations were members of GATT. In
January 1995, the World Trade Organization (WTO) succeeded
GATT. GATT covered trading of only physical goods, while WTO
deals with not only physical goods but also services and intellectual
property rights. As of 2005, 148 nations are WTO members.
GENERAL HEADQUARTERS/SUPREME COMMANDER FOR
THE ALLIED POWERS (GHQ/SCAP). GHQ/SCAP is a central
administrative institution for the allied powers that occupied Japan after
World War II. On 26 July 1941, the United States created General
Headquarters for the U.S. Army Forces Far East (GHQ/USAFFE)
in Manila, Luzon, The Philippines, and appointed Major Douglas
MacArthur as commander. After the outbreak of the Pacific War,
Japan landed in Luzon, and after the fall of the Corregidor Fortress,
the USAFFE lost its unified command. On 18 April 1942, the United
States, Great Britain, Netherlands, Australia, and New Zealand concluded
an agreement to establish General Headquarters for a unified
front forces for the Allied Powers in Southwestern Pacific Area
(GHQ/SWPA) and appointed MacArthur as Commander-In-Chief of
the Allied Forces. On 3 April 1945, the United States established General
HQs, U.S. Army Forces in the Pacific (GHQ/AFPAC) in order to
unify command authority for the Army forces in the Pacific area and
appointed MacArthur as commander-in-chief. Consequently,
GHQ/AFPAC and GHQ/SWPA came to coexist at this point. Because
occupation of Japan was an occupation of a high-level non–Western