Hull note

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The Hull note or officially Outline of Proposed Basis for Agreement Between the United States and Japan was the final proposal delivered to the Empire of Japan by the United States before the attack on Pearl Harbor and the declaration of war between the two nations. The note was delivered on November 26, 1941; it is named for Secretary of State Cordell Hull.

Background

The United States objected to the Second Sino-Japanese War and the occupation of part of China by Japanese troops. In protest, the United States sent support to the Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek. In July 1941, Japanese military units occupied southern French Indochina, violating a gentlemen's agreement. Japanese bombers quickly moved into bases in Saigon and Cambodia, from which they could attack British Malaya. As a result, immediately after the Japanese military occupation, the U.S. government imposed trade sanctions on Japan, including the freezing of Japanese assets in the United States, and an embargo of oil exports to Japan. Dean Acheson, a senior State Department official, was the key decision maker. He shifted American policy away from export restrictions and toward "full-blooded financial warfare against Japan." The expected result was the financial freeze, which Miller described as "the most devastating American action against Japan."[1]

On 5 November 1941, Emperor Hirohito approved, in Imperial Conference, the plan for the attack on Pearl Harbor.[2] At the same time, his government made a last effort to arrive at a diplomatic solution of their differences with the United States. Ambassador Kichisaburō Nomura presented two proposals to the American government.

The first, proposal A, he presented on November 6, 1941. It proposed making a final settlement of the Sino-Japanese War with a partial withdrawal of Japanese troops. United States military intelligence had deciphered some of Japan's diplomatic codes, so they knew that there was a second, follow-up proposal in case proposal A failed. The United States government stalled and then rejected proposal A on November 14, 1941.

On November 20, 1941, Nomura presented proposal B, which offered to withdraw Japanese forces from southern Indochina if the United States agreed to end aid to the Nationalists Chinese, freeze military deployments in Southeast Asia (except for Japan's reinforcement of northern Indochina), provide Japan with "a required quantity of oil," and assist Japan in acquiring materials from the Dutch East Indies.[3] The United States was about to make a counteroffer to this plan which included a monthly supply of fuel for civilian use. However, President Franklin D. Roosevelt received a leak of Japan's war plan and news that Japanese troopships were on their way to Indochina. He decided the Japanese were not being sincere in their negotiations and instructed Secretary Hull to drop the counter-proposal.[4]

The note

By November 26 top American officials at the White House, State, Navy and War departments knew Japan was moving invasion forces toward Thailand. They also knew that the Japanese foreign ministry had put an absolute deadline on negotiations of November 29, because "after that things are automatically going to happen." The Americans were convinced that war would start in a matter of days, and probably with a surprise Japanese attack. No one knew where the strike would be. The previous plan to present Japan with a temporary modus vivendi plan was strongly opposed by China and Britain, and was dropped.[5]

On November 26, 1941, Hull presented the Japanese ambassador with the Hull note,[6] which as one of its conditions demanded the complete withdrawal of all Japanese troops from French Indochina and China. Japanese Prime Minister Tojo Hideki said to his cabinet; "this is an ultimatum".[7] The Note did leave Japan an alternative to war, namely concession to American demands, and did not even express an intention to cease negotiations, and thus it cannot be seen as an ultimatum from the perspective of international law. While the Japanese may have felt that they could not accede to such demands and thus were provoked into war, the Hull Note cannot be considered to be a first act of war or even as sufficient provocation to relieve Japan of the responsibility for initiating the use of force in this conflict.[8]

The strike force which attacked Pearl Harbor had set sail the day before, on the morning of November 26, 1941, Japan time, which was November 25, Washington time. It could have been recalled along the way, but no further diplomatic progress was made and on 1 December, Emperor Hirohito approved, in Imperial Conference, attacks against United States, Britain, and the Netherlands. They began on December 7/8 against Hawaii, Malaya, and the Philippines.

Interpretations

Historian Charles A. Beard argued in 1948 that the Hull Note was an ultimatum that meant unnecessary war. He suggested it was part of a conspiracy by Roosevelt to get the U.S. into a war in order to help Britain fight Germany.[9] Beard's argument and similar conspiracy theories came under very heavy attack from scholars, and only fringe elements now believe that a war between the United States and Japan could have been avoided. The United States and Japan had totally contrary positions regarding China, and both sides believed the China issue was of the highest importance.[10]

Some modern Japanese commentators say the note was designed to draw Japan into war and thus claim Japan was not the aggressor nation in the Pacific War. Toshio Tamogami, who was the Japan Air Self-Defense Force chief of staff, was forcibly retired by the Japanese government in 2008 for taking this position.[11]

According to Benn Steil, director of international economics at the Council on Foreign Relations, while "no single individual can be said to have triggered" the Pearl Harbor attack Harry Dexter White "was the author of the key ultimatum demands". Steil also maintains "the Japanese government made the decision to move forward with the Pearl Harbor strike after receiving the ultimatum".[12]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Edward S. Miller, Bankrupting the Enemy: The U.S. Financial Siege of Japan before Pearl Harbor (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2007) pp 108, 1
  2. ↑ Peter Wetzler, Hirohito and War, 1998, p.39
  3. ↑ "Draft Proposal Handed by the Japanese Ambassador (Nomura) To the Secretary of State," November 20, 1941
  4. ↑ Henry Stimson diary, November 26, 1941
  5. ↑ Robert Dallek, Franklin D. Roosevelt and American foreign policy, 1932-1945 (Oxford University Press, 1979) pp 307-8
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ PEARL HARBOUR ATTACK - 7 December 1941, solarnavigator.net
  8. ↑ Myres S. McDougal & Florentino P. Feliciano, Law and Minimum World Public Order pg. 231-41 (1961)
  9. ↑ Charles A. Beard, President Roosevelt and the Coming of the War 1941 (Yale UP, 1948) ch 9, pp 574-75.
  10. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ See Tamogami's controversial essay
  12. ↑ Steil, Benn (2013), The Battle of Bretton Woods: John Maynard Keynes, Harry Dexter White, and the Making of a New World Order, Princeton University Press, p. 55

References

  • Costello, John, The Pacific War 1941-1945 (New York: William Morrow, 1982) ISBN 0-688-01620-0
  • Dallek, Robert. Franklin D. Roosevelt and American foreign policy, 1932-1945 (Oxford University Press, 1979)
  • Langer, William L. and S. Everett Gleason. The undeclared war, 1940-1941 (1953), highly detailed semi-official US government history, esp pp 871–901
  • Gordon W. Prange, At Dawn We Slept (McGraw-Hill, 1981), Pearl Harbor: The Verdict of History (McGraw-Hill, 1986), and December 7, 1941: The Day the Japanese Attacked Pearl Harbor (McGraw-Hill, 1988). This monumental trilogy, written with collaborators Donald M. Goldstein and Katherine V. Dillon, is considered the authoritative work on the subject.
  • Peter Wetzler, Hirohito and War, University of Hawaii Press, 1998 ISBN 0-8248-1925-X

Conspiracy theories

External links

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