711.94/1987: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Japan (Grew)
163. On March 8 the Japanese Ambassador called on me at my apartment on the basis of a joint and equal initiative on his and my [Page 66] part growing out of his talk with the President at the time he presented his credentials.
A chance remark offered occasion for me to refer to this Government’s program of a liberal commercial policy and the need for its adoption by all important nations, and to review the course of extreme nationalism during the post-war period and the disastrous results thereof. I said that we were struggling to get forty nations behind this movement based on equality of treatment and equality of access to raw materials so that all forty nations might then turn to countries like Germany and Italy and assure them that they would be welcomed into this program of commercial opportunity and equality. I said that, unfortunately, this sound healthy movement was interrupted by military movements and the program of conquest by force which seemed to block for the time being the movement for peaceful commerce and increased consumption and employment throughout most of the world.
I told the Ambassador that I was glad to have him come in in the hope that he might have something definite in mind which would offer a practical approach and consideration of the course and attitude of his Government.
The Ambassador expressed interest in and wholehearted approval of what I had said about attempts to organize the world on a liberal commercial basis. He said that with very few exceptions the people of Japan were averse to getting into war with the United States; that the Prime Minister was not one of the extremists; that his Government would like to effect peace arrangements with China and hoped that terms might soon be developed which would include their puppet regime and Chiang Kai-shek as well in arrangements which would be on the basis of equality to all nations. When I inquired as to further details of the proposed Chinese-Japanese peace, the Ambassador made no specific comment but said that his adviser, Colonel Iwakuro, was on his way here and that Colonel Iwakuro had intimate details of the whole Chinese-Japanese situation.
The Ambassador commented that it would be almost unthinkable for our two countries to fight each other on account of the destructive effects that would inevitably result. In this I concurred. I then asked whether the military groups in control of his Government could possibly expect important nations like the United States to sit absolutely quiet while two or three nations organized military and naval forces and set out to conquer the balance of the earth. The Ambassador sought to minimize the idea that such military conquest was really the purpose of his Government. I referred to the terms of the tripartite agreement and the public declarations of Hitler and Matsuoka and other high authorities in Japan to the effect that their countries under the tripartite arrangement were out by military force [Page 67] to establish a new order for the whole world. I said that the American people who had for many years been complacent with regard to dangerous international developments had now become very thoroughly aroused to what they regarded as a matter of most serious concern in relation to military expansionist movements by Japan and Germany. I said that these apprehensions and this tremendous concern would of course remain as long as Hitler continued his avowed course of unlimited conquest and as long as the Japanese army and navy increased their occupation by force of other and distant areas on both land and sea.
I spoke of the necessity for acts and utterances by Japan which would make it clear that Japan in good faith did not intend to pursue a course of expansion and conquest by force. The Ambassador did not express disagreement. I said that we would of course get nowhere if the military group should say that they were not expanding in a military way, as they had often said in China, and should at the same time go forward with their military expansionist plans.
I asked the Ambassador whether he thought Japan would attack Singapore or the Netherlands East Indies. To this the Ambassador indicated that he did not believe that there would be an attack but he said that, if embargoes by this country continued to press his Government and the military group in control, they might feel forced to proceed further in a naval or military way. I said that this question could not arise with any reason or warrant in as much as the responsibility and initiative with regard to military conquest and departure by Japan from laws and treaties and other basic rules of friendly relations rested entirely upon the Japanese Government. I said that none of the countries engaged in military conquest had pretended seriously to charge the United States with any action of omission or commission in relation to the present movement of world conquest by some three nations, including Japan.
I told the Ambassador that I came from the President who sent his regards and that the President would be glad at any time to talk further with the Ambassador. The Ambassador said that he might call on the President the next time and that he would hope to continue these conversations. Several times I asked whether he wished to follow the President’s suggestion of talking over the past relations between our two Governments and the questions which have arisen which call for settlement by mutual agreement. The Ambassador indicated that he was favorably disposed but was not specific as to time or as to officials with whom he might talk.
During the conversation I reminded the Ambassador that few nations had ever had more mutually profitable and genuinely friendly relations than our two countries had had for two generations.
[Page 68]The Ambassador said that doors of trade had been closed against Japan by other countries, including Indochina, and that Japan had consequently felt obliged to take steps to improve the economic position of her people. I replied by reminding the Ambassador that during the twenty years of the post-war period under the doctrine of extreme nationalism all nations had shut their doors to a large extent against each other; that Japan was not an exception; and that it would be an amazing thing to abandon the whole program of economic rehabilitation on peaceful lines and under the principle of equality and to turn to military force and conquest as a substitute.
I pointed out that conquest of the world by Germany and by Japan with the methods of government which were being applied would result in setting back not only the world in general but the conquering countries themselves to very low levels of existence and that the conquering countries themselves would be the losers to a tremendous extent.
In reply to inquiry the Ambassador said that he did not believe the Japanese Foreign Minister was going to Berlin.
During the conversation I emphasized to the Ambassador that the President and others in the Administration believe that the British will beyond any reasonable doubt be able successfully to resist Hitler.
When referring to Japan’s activities and utterances, I said that the United States and most other countries practiced only policies of peaceful international relations; that at times these policies were proclaimed, such as our good neighbor policy, with special reference to Pan America; that the acts and programs adopted by the twenty-one American nations had been made universal in their application so that Japan and all other nations receive the same equal opportunities for trade and commerce generally throughout the Americas that each of the American nations receives itself. I mentioned the striking contrast to this presented by the new order in greater East Asia which was believed to be purely a program of military aggression with arbitrary policies of military, political, and economic domination.
With reference to the question of Japan’s halting its program of aggression in order to engage in discussions with this Government, the Ambassador made no definite promise as to what his Government would do. I definitely brought to the Ambassador’s attention the question of the attitude of the Japanese Government toward the tripartite agreement in the future but the Ambassador did not indicate what the attitude of his Government would be.