Stark’s words danced before Kimmel’s eyes as he read the CNO’s letter of July 25, 1941: “You may be called upon to send a carrier load of planes to one of the Asiatic Russian ports. I don’t know that you will, but the President has told me to be prepared for it, and I want you to have the thought.”1
This thought Kimmel could do without. After discussing the problem with his staff, he sent a brisk answer to Stark on July 30: “Whether or not planes are to be supplied to the Russians may be outside my province, but I do remain keenly aware of our own deficiencies in aircraft. It is quite an undertaking for the United States to supply planes to any quarter of the globe in which fighting against Axis Powers may occur.”
The admiral’s most vociferous objections arose from his conviction that any such move would anger the Japanese beyond all restraint. “I entertain no doubt that such an operation, if discovered (as is highly probable), will be tantamount to initiation of a Japanese-American War,” he declared uncompromisingly. “If we are going to take the initiative in commencing such a war, I can think of more effective ways for gaining initial advantage. . . .
“In short,” Kimmel continued, “it is my earnest conviction that use of a carrier to deliver aircraft to Asiatic Russian ports in the present period of strained relations is to invite war. If we have decided upon war, it would be far better to take direct offensive action.” Kimmel knew that Stark had been straining every nerve to avoid war with Japan in the U.S. Navy’s current state of unpreparedness, so he bore down hard on Stark’s fears rather than on the danger to the Fleet. “If for reasons of political expediency, it has been determined to force Japan to fire the first shot,” he went on, “let us choose a method that will be more advantageous to ourselves. Certainly an operation such as that proposed is far less likely to bluff Japan into acquiescence or inactivity than it is to disturb her to the point of hostile use of bombs, torpedoes and guns.”2
Of course, Kimmel was indulging in irony, a hazardous thing to do on paper, as Yamamoto was later to discover. Kimmel no more thought that the United States was prepared to launch a war against Japan than Yamamoto believed he could dictate peace in the White House.*
Although the German-Soviet war had changed the entire political complexion in Asia as well as Europe, the U.S. Navy had not amended its instructions to Kimmel. So, on July 26, he had posed some pertinent queries to Stark concerning the “importance of keeping the Commander in Chief advised of Department policies and decisions and the changes in policies and decisions to meet changes in the international situation.” He reminded Stark that the Pacific Fleet had not yet received
official information on the U.S. attitude toward Russian participation in the war, particularly as to the degree of cooperation, if any, in the Pacific, between the U.S. and Russia if and when we become active participants. Present plans do not include Russia and do not provide for coordinated action, joint use of bases, joint communication systems and the like. The new situation opens up possibilities for us which should be fully explored and full advantage taken of any opportunities for mutual support.
Kimmel then asked whether England would declare war on Japan should that country attack the Maritime Provinces. If so, would “we actively assist, as tentatively provided in case of attack on N.E.I. [Netherlands East Indies] or Singapore?” and were “plans being prepared for joint action, mutual support, etc?” On the other hand, if England did not declare war over a Japanese invasion of Soviet territory, what would be its attitude and that of the United States? And if England declared war on Japan, but the United States did not, what would be the American position “in regard to Japanese shipping, patrol of Pacific waters, commerce raiders, etc?” Kimmel pointed out:
. . . the Russian situation appears to offer an opportunity for strengthening of our Far Eastern defenses, particularly Guam and the Philippines. Certainly, no matter how the fighting goes, Japan’s attention will be partially diverted from the China and Southern adventures by either (1) diversion of forces for attack on Russia or (2) necessity for providing for Russian attack on her. It is conceivable that the greater the German success on the Eastern front, the more Russia will be pushed toward Asia, with consequent increased danger to Japan’s “New Order” for that area. . . .
He then went into lengthy technical priorities to meet such contingencies.3
The question of what Japan would do vis-a-vis the Soviets was so inextricably snarled with its activities in the south that no one could disentangle a single clear thread. But Stark did his best. “Certainly there can be no joy in our camp over the occupation of Indo-China,” he informed Kimmel on July 31. “I think it is fairly safe to say opinion here in general holds that Japan will not go into the N.E.I.”4 On the contrary, “we have felt that the Maritime Provinces [of the USSR] are now definitely Japanese objectives. Turner thinks Japan will go up there in August. He may be right. He usually is.” In this case he was dead wrong, but understandably so.
Stark did not necessarily concur with his chief of War Plans: “My thought has been that while Japan would ultimately go to Siberia, she would delay going until she had the Indo-China Thailand situation more or less to her liking and until there is some clarification of the Russian-German clash. Also she may concentrate on the China ‘incident.’”5
Nor could Stark pry a concrete policy out of Roosevelt. “To some of my very pointed questions . . . I get a smile or a ‘Betty, please don’t ask me that,’” Stark wrote to Captain Charles M. “Savvy” Cooke, Jr., aboard Pennsylvania, with a copy to Kimmel. “Policy seems to be something never fixed, always fluid and changing.” And Stark burst out with uncharacteristic bitterness: “God knows I would surrender this job quickly if somebody else wants to take it up and I have offered to, more than once. . . .”6
Not only American tempers showed signs of fraying at the edges. Since Hitler’s attack on Russia the relationship between Germany and Japan had taken on a tinge of acrimony. The alliance had always been a somewhat unnatural one in view of Hitler’s rabid racism, and on July 26 the United States received an intriguing hint that the honeymoon might be on the wane. The prime minister of Thailand advised the American minister that the German military attaché had warned him against “going too far” with Japan because “you cannot trust Japan.” The attaché added ominously that Germany would “settle with Japan after she has won the war in Europe.”7
On July 31 the Foreign Ministry sent Oshima a lengthy and significant message evidently intended to pour oil on troubled waters. An information copy went to Nomura. This dispatch contained this significant passage:
Commercial and economic relations between Japan and third countries, led by England and the United States, are gradually becoming so horribly strained that we cannot endure it much longer. Consequently, our Empire, to save its very life, must take measures to secure the raw materials of the South Seas. Our Empire must immediately take steps to break asunder this ever-strengthening chain of encirclement which is being woven under the guidance and with the participation of England and the United States, acting like a cunning dragon seemingly asleep. This is why we decided to obtain military bases in French Indo-China and to have our troops occupy that territory. . . . 8
Here was a clear-cut assurance (picked up by Magic) that Japan intended to use French Indochina as a launching pad for further conquest, despite all official reassurances to the contrary.
“Needless to say,” Toyoda’s office went on in bland self-revelation, “the Russo-German war has given us an excellent opportunity to settle the northern question, and it is a fact that we are proceeding with our preparations to take advantage of this occasion. Not only will we have to prepare, however, but we must choose well our chance.”9 Thus, the Japanese attempted to placate their partners with promises of assistance against the Soviet Union in some vague by-and-by.
“I know the Germans are somewhat dissatisfied over our negotiations with the United States,” this revealing message admitted, “but we wished at any cost to prevent the United States from getting into the war, and we wished to settle the Chinese incident. . . . Let him who will gainsay the fact that as a result we have indelibly impressed upon the United States the profoundness of the determination of the Empire of Japan and restrained her from plunging into the conflict against Germany.”10 One would give much for a candid camera snap of Hull’s face when he read that paragraph in translation!
The message ended with a rather fulsome assurance that “all measures which our Empire shall take will be based upon a determination to bring about the success of the objectives of the Tripartite Pact. . . .”11 Dispatches such as this, frankly expressing in a code long overdue for revision sentiments which should have remained locked in a courier’s briefcase, gave the United States a clear understanding of Japan’s true intentions.
So one cannot blame Roosevelt’s Cabinet secretaries who had access to Magic for taking an increasingly dim view of Japan’s international dealings as revealed in Tokyo’s own words. The message to Berlin of July 31 became available on August 4 and probably was one of a batch which Stimson took to Hull on the eighth, when the two secretaries had their first conference since Hull’s return to duty. Stimson states that on that occasion he brought along “the last magics . . . which gave a very recent example of Japan’s duplicity.” Discovering that the secretary of state had not yet read these dispatches, Stimson showed them to him. Small wonder that Stimson recorded: “He has made up his mind that we have reached the end of any possible appeasement with Japan and that there is nothing further that can be done with that country except by a firm policy and, he expected, force itself.”12 The Japanese themselves have a cogent proverb: “Even a rabbit will bite if it is fooled three times.”
Nomura anticipated trouble and called for reinforcements. On August 4 he reported to Tokyo the strength of American popular support of the government’s firm policy. Then he suggested:
As I will have no excuse to offer if I should commit mistakes at this time, and besides, as there is a limit to my humble ability, I wish that you would be good enough to arrange to send some veteran diplomat who is well informed on the state of things at home and abroad (say, Ambassador Kurusu) by the first available ship in order to cooperate with me for the present . . . [Nomura’s italics].13
Quite a clever move on Nomura’s part! By associating with himself Saburo Kurusu or someone similarly high in the government’s confidence, Nomura would ensure that at least a part of the blame and hard work fell where it belonged. As ambassador to Germany Kurusu had signed the Tripartite Pact. He had married an American and spoke exact, idiomatic English, so he could not possibly misinterpret what any American said to him. Seemingly with a foot in both camps, he could lean whichever way the wind blew.
In the meantime, Konoye had a brain wave. Why not revive the idea of a personal meeting with Roosevelt, even as Hitler had met with Chamberlain? A complete aristocrat, Konoye liked the idea of settling national affairs on a gentleman-to-gentleman basis. He outlined the plan to Tojo and Oikawa on August 4. The navy minister approved, but Tojo demurred because he thought that such a meeting would displease the Germans. However, after thinking it over, he wrote Konoye that the Army would agree, provided Konoye intended to support Japan’s basic principles and go to war with the United States if Roosevelt did not yield. “You shall not resign your post as a result of the meeting on the grounds that it was a failure,” he concluded; “rather, you shall be prepared to assume leadership in the war against America.”14 Such phraseology reveals very clearly just who called the shots in Japan in the summer of 1941.
The next day Tokyo forwarded to Nomura a new set of proposals, so totally unacceptable that it is no wonder Hull met Nomura with a perceptible frost when the ambassador brought them to him on August 6. He remarked that “so long as Japan did not stop her conquest by force, there was no room for reaching an understanding” and that “so long as the Japanese Government termed the United States [sic] actions an ‘encircling’ policy, there was nothing to be expected from Japan.”15
On August 7 the Foreign Ministry instructed Nomura about the proposed Konoye-Roosevelt meeting.16 This message evidently crossed one of Nomura’s excellent evaluations of the American attitude toward Japan, which he had written the same day. In it he warned his superiors: “There is no doubt whatsoever that the United States is prepared to take drastic action depending on the way Japan moves.” That included northward because Washington had “suddenly established very close relations with the Soviet Union.”17
As it happened, on the same day Roosevelt and a large party of advisers, including Marshall, Stark, Arnold, and Welles, arrived in Argentia, Newfoundland, to await Winston Churchill. The prime minister was crossing from England on Prince of Wales for a summit conference of quite a different nature from that which Konoye suggested.
Japan loomed large in the consciousness of both Roosevelt and Churchill. Welles and Permanent Undersecretary of State for Foreign Affairs Sir Alexander Cadogan discussed a “Draft of Parallel Communications to the Japanese Government” which the British had prepared. In seeking this joint declaration, nothing was further from Churchill’s intentions than to provoke Japan into war. On the contrary, he believed that such a declaration “participated in by the United States, Great Britain, the Dominions, the Netherlands and possibly the Soviet Union would definitely restrain Japan.”18
No one ever accused Churchill of lacking imagination, yet it never appeared to dawn on him that Japan might deliberately choose war with the United States. Roosevelt, too, “felt very strongly that every effort should be made to prevent the outbreak of war with Japan.” He discussed the Japanese proposals of August 6 with Churchill, who found them “particularly unacceptable.”19
Nomura was not one of Konoye’s more ardent fans. He thought the premier “weak and inexperienced, and he had made many mistakes, . . . he was grass-green in diplomacy, and . . . he was not a first-rate statesman.” Still, he credited him with being “in dead earnest” about meeting Roosevelt. Nomura believed that Konoye had become “frightened of the entire situation and wanted to do something—anything to settle the problem and prevent war.” Nomura set little store by the idea.20 He clearly understood that in this matter, as in l’affaire Matsuoka, the issues far transcended personalities.
Scanning the Japanese proposal in the Magic translation, Stimson regarded it as “another example of Japanese duplicity.” He recorded:
They are trying now to get up a conference between . . . Konoye and President Roosevelt on a most engaging program of peace while at the same time they are carrying on negotiations with their Ambassadors throughout the world showing that on its face this is a pure blind and that they have already made up their minds to a policy of going south through Indo-China and Thailand.21
In the second observation Stimson was quite correct. Back in Tokyo, Uchida scribbled briefly in his journal under August 8: “Since July war conditions between Russia and Germany not so progressive. Russian resistance good. So Japan could not begin operations in Siberia against Russia in 1941.” The next day the Army Division of Imperial Headquarters decided to drop the idea of operating northward in 1941 and to concentrate on the south. It agreed to keep sixteen divisions in Korea and Manchuria, to continue the China operations, and to step up preparations to fight the United States and Great Britain, with a target date as of the end of November.22
On August 10 a man who agreed completely with these belligerent sentiments joined the Combined Fleet headquarters as Yamamoto’s fourth—and final—chief of staff. Rear Admiral Matome Ugaki was fifty-one years of age and, according to Tomioka, who knew him well, “one of Japan’s best officers and a recognized authority on Japanese naval strategy.”23 With Ito scheduled for reassignment as Nagano’s vice chief in the very near future, Yamamoto had requested a new assistant who was not only extremely able—that went without saying—but also thoroughly conversant with the high naval setup in Tokyo. Ugaki filled both specifications to the letter.
“Ugaki was handsome, tall for a Japanese, very brainy, slightly bald and an eloquent speaker,” said Watanabe. “He was by nature forceful and aggressive with a head full of temperament and ideas. He possessed an acute memory and was a careful, exacting man. . . .”24 In time Ugaki became one of the Pearl Harbor plan’s staunchest advocates.
Hawaii, too, faced problems uniquely its own in these warm August days. Short pulled no punches when he addressed a conference on food production at the University of Hawaii on the twelfth. “As military commander of this department of the army, let me say that an attack upon these islands is not impossible and in certain situations it might not be improbable.” Short’s words carried weight, for he had worked closely with the local agencies and did not speak as one removed from his civilian surroundings.
“I am not an alarmist,” he continued earnestly. “I am a realist, and I am interested in facts. But where all estimates of the present political and military situation point in one direction, probability must be acted upon—and let me assure you that—so far as action in preparedness to defend Hawaii is concerned, the time has come—it is here now.”25
Yet, for a man so vitally concerned with preparedness, Short permitted an unwise degree of laxity in the installations under his command. For instance, on August 6 Wheeler invited the public to a Galaday, the only restriction being against cameras.26 Needless to say, “Tadashi Morimura” of the Japanese consulate accepted this gracious invitation. He wandered freely over Wheeler and missed nothing worth seeing. He watched the P-40s in flight, observed that “they were very fast” and the pilots’ “flight technique most skillful.” He also collected such items as the number of hangars, direction of runways, their length and width, and the fact that three aircraft took off at once. Back in the consulate he wrote up his impressions but he did not tell Kita about this visit until quite some time later.27
In Washington on the twelfth Hull, Stimson, and Knox resumed their informal “War Council” meetings. “We are now back again on the same ground—appeasement is over—and Hull, with his analytical mind, is asking searching questions now of the Navy what they’ll do next in case any of these issues that he has been handling brings [sic] up an impasse and the necessity of force,” Stimson noted in his diary.28
Even as they debated, Kimmel was pleading with Stark for personnel stability, just as Yamamoto had done with Nakahara. He particularly asked that captains and executive officers of battleships and cruisers should remain a minimum of two years, and he told Stark that “gunnery in the Fleet is much better than we have any right to expect considering the enormous changes in personnel and the lack of permanency in the officers. We have of course stressed battle procedures above everything else.”29
Up on Capitol Hill, Congress extended the term of the Selective Service Act to eighteen months by a slight majority. The Senate voted 45 to 30; it squeaked through the House 203 to 202. No wonder Nomura could never quite convince the Foreign Ministry that the Americans “meant business”; talk and bluster were cheap, but when it came to a hard vote to lay before their constituents, Congress felt safe in nearly scuttling the draft.
Nothing in the news gave the congressmen any indications to justify such complacency. And behind the scenes, disquieting hints began to appear that the Japanese tiger was coiling its muscles for another spring. Thus, the CNO’s office advised Kimmel and other key admirals on August 14: “Japanese rapidly completing withdrawal from world shipping routes. Scheduled sailings cancelled and majority ships in other than China and Japan sea areas homeward bound.”30
The Army General Staff was deep in war games rehearsing the Southern Operations on August 14 and 15. The Naval General Staff sent four representatives from Tomioka’s section: Uchida; Miyo; Lieutenant Commander Prince Kacho; and Commander Yuji Yamamoto.31
Strangely enough, on August 16 G-2 presented a memorandum for Marshall which sized up the Japanese position very well:
a. Adherence to Tripartite Pact.
b. Establishment of a Greater East Asia sphere of co-prosperity (under Japanese domination and control) regardless of other developments in the world situation.
c. Disposal of the China Incident.
d. Expansion southward for reasons of economic and strategic security.
Nevertheless, the report estimated that in implementing this policy the Japanese would “resort to every means available to keep the United States out of the war.” G-2 further observed acutely:
The great danger in the situation lies in the fact, so often proved, that Japanese military and naval authorities are not under the complete control of their Government. We have seen for the past year an extraordinary example of discipline and selfcontrol [sic] exercised by the German military in conformity to their Government’s decree of avoiding any possible armed clash with the United States. We can, unfortunately, expect no such selfdenial [sic] and restraint on the part of the Japanese military. . . . 32
Nomura chose the same day, August 16, to send Tokyo a long message following another conference with Hull. “Japanese-American relations have today reached a stage in which anything might happen at any moment, and they are likely to grow worse suddenly as Japan makes her next move,” he stated, and added this accurate judgment:
. . . the United States has not yet attained sufficient unity of mind with regard to participation in the European war, and the President himself is hesitant. However, the people are unanimous with regard to taking a strong hand in the Far East. . . .
I hear that they are beginning to think that I have been fooled by my country and that his [Roosevelt’s] having conferred with me was an exceptional thing. . . . 33
When Nomura first came to Washington, Grew had hoped that he would honestly and faithfully report the real voice of the American people.* Nomura did just that, with true insight. He made mistakes, and like so many in the Pearl Harbor story, they originated in the perpetrator’s own goodwill. Nomura’s errors were principally of the kind to interest historians concerned with the interplay of diplomacy; it is doubtful that they affected the ultimate result. The plain fact is, Nomura’s mission was not meant to succeed on any terms short of virtual American capitulation to Japanese demands.