Locating Primary Sources of SOFA and Mutual Defense Treaties

Question

I'm doing a research project that requires me to examine the revision history of the SOFA (Status of Forces Agreement) and Mutual Defense treaties between the US and Germany (via NATO), the US and South Korea. I'm trying to locate primary sources.

Unfortunately, I've only been able to find the original and latest versions of the treaties above. For example, here is the original document for the US-South Korea case.

And here is the 2001 Revision.

The documents indicate there was also a 1991 revision, and I want to know how the version differ. Where can I find the 1991 version?

I have similar questions for the revisions and revision history of the US-Germany (via NATO) treaty and agreements (the notes published about the minutes/records of the negotiation and revision process, such as those published by the US Naval War College or other bodies - revised in 1971, 1981, and 1993)

Answer 1

germany

US-German SOFA Treaties

German laws and treaties that Germany becomes party of are published in the Bundesgesetzblatt (BGBl).

All issues of the Bundesgesetzblatt can be read online which means you can get the original versions of all German laws after 1949 (Part 1 of the BGBl) and all German treaties after 1951 (Part 2 of the BGBl).

Here's the 1959 treaty, I'll leave finding the others to you. Note that the date of publishing may be later than the date of signing if the treaty had to pass the Bundestag first.

Since this is a German publication, the titles and most texts will be in German, but treaties tend to be published in multiple languages, you might be lucky there.

There's also this website that allows you to search in the texts, although I can not tell you how accurate the results are. Searching for SOFA does look promising, however.

Note that US-German military relations have a history beyond the Bundesrepublik, namely the Occupation Statute of 1949. There are also some other treaties like the Paris Accords and the Two Plus Four Agreement that govern the status of Allied and NATO troops in Germany.

Other SOFA treaties

I don't know enough about other countries to help you with them, but similar publications might exist in the United States and South Korea (I found this page for the US).