British Commonwealth Occupation Force
At the end of World War II, Sturdee was again invited to become CGS. He made it a condition of his acceptance that Northcott be given the appointment of Commander in Chief of the British Commonwealth Occupation Force (BCOF) in Japan. Sturdee felt that Northcott had missed out on opportunities for active service through his being CGS and saw the BCOF post as a just reward for that service.
Northcott headed the BCOF from December 1945 until June 1946. As such, he negotiated the Northcott-MacArthur agreement with General of the Army Douglas MacArthur, which governed the terms and conditions under which the BCOF would occupy part of Japan. The BCOF would serve under American command, with American policy being followed. Northcott was offered, and accepted, the post of Governor of New South Wales in April 1946. He remained in Japan until June though, because Prime Minister Ben Chifley wanted the changeover to coincide with his own visit to Japan in May, and because he needed to obtain consent of the other governments concerned for the appointment of Lieutenant General Horace Robertson as Northcott's successor. Northcott's lack of experience in command once again showed, and his command was again overhauled by Robertson.
Read more about this topic: John Northcott
Famous quotes containing the words british, commonwealth, occupation and/or force:
“If we were doing this in the Falklands they would love it. It’s part of our heritage. The British have always been fighting wars.”
—British soccer fan. quoted in Independent (London, Dec. 23, 1988)
“We must conceive of this whole universe as one commonwealth of which both gods and men are members.”
—Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C.)
“Parenting, as an unpaid occupation outside the world of public power, entails lower status, less power, and less control of resources than paid work.”
—Nancy Chodorow, U.S. professor, and sociologist. The Reproduction of Mothering Psychoanalysis and the Sociology of Gender, ch. 2 (1978)
“When we can drain the Ocean into mill-ponds, and bottle up the Force of Gravity, to be sold by retail, in gas jars; then may we hope to comprehend the infinitudes of man’s soul under formulas of Profit and Loss; and rule over this too, as over a patent engine, by checks, and valves, and balances.”
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881)