Office of the Historian

740.0011 European War 1939/13121a: Telegram

The Acting Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Japan (Grew)

Washington, July 11, 1941—11 a.m.

386. We have received further information from a high authority of a foreign government30 to the effect that, according to reliable and most confidential reports reaching his Government, Germany, Italy and Japan several days ago entered into a secret agreement where-under Germany and Italy recognized the special position in the Far East which Japan claims for herself and in return Japan agreed to take action against French Indochina and Thailand and later to attack the Soviet Union. A further such report from the same source was to the effect that Japan’s moves southward and northward as described above would be carried out simultaneously.31

Welles
  1. See telegram from Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, p. 1004.↩
  2. See also memorandum by the Acting Secretary of State, July 10, p. 300.↩