741.94/324: Telegram
The Chargé in Iran (Engert) to the Secretary of State
[Received 6:48 p.m.]
92. Japanese Minister told me this morning that he has received several personal and confidential cables from Tokyo indicating that the military party in Japan is now thoroughly discredited and that his Foreign Office and the liberal elements in the country would welcome an opportunity of being friends with England and America. The Minister says his Government is now at the crossroads and if London and Washington could seize the occasion and by some gesture still [Page 214] further weaken position of the military leaders far-reaching results might be obtained. He says he knows that Ambassador Shigemitsu in London and ex-Ambassadors Matsudaira and Ishii fully share this view.
The Minister added that ever since last summer his Foreign Office had been suspecting Hitler of trying to make common cause with the Soviets against Poland and the Democracies by taking advantage of Soviet feeling of resentment at being ignored at Munich. In any event unnatural alliance between the Democracies and Moscow could not have lasted because of record of duplicity and treacherous deceit of Soviet leaders whose aim was still revolution and class warfare in all bourgeois countries.