Statement by the Secretary of State, December 7, 194174
Japan has made a treacherous and utterly unprovoked attack upon the United States.
At the very moment when representatives of the Japanese Government were discussing with representatives of this Government, at the request of the former, principles and courses of peace, the armed forces of Japan were preparing and assembling at various strategic points to launch new attacks and new aggressions upon nations and peoples with which Japan was professedly at peace including the United States.
I am now releasing for the information of the American people the statement of principles governing the policies of the Government of the United States and setting out suggestions for a comprehensive peaceful settlement covering the entire Pacific area, which I handed to the Japanese Ambassador on November 26, 1941.
I am likewise releasing the text of a Japanese reply thereto which was handed to me by the Japanese Ambassador today. Before the Japanese Ambassador delivered this final statement from his Government the treacherous attack upon the United States had taken place.
This Government has stood for all the principles that underlie fair-dealing, peace, law and order, and justice between nations and has steadfastly striven to promote and maintain that state of relations between itself and all other nations.
It is now apparent to the whole world that Japan in its recent professions of a desire for peace has been infamously false and fraudulent.
- Issued by the Department of State as a press release; reprinted from Department of State, Bulletin, December 13, 1941 (vol. v, No. 129), p. 461.↩