740.0011 P. W./457
Memorandum by the Adviser on Political Relations (Hornbeck)
Reference Tokyo’s telegram number 1097 of July 26, 6 p.m. In this telegram Mr. Grew recounts the substance of a conference which he had on that date with the Minister of Foreign Affairs “for an hour”.
Mr. Grew records his feeling that in the discussion with the Minister there could be “no meeting of minds” because of the radical divergence of views.
Mr. Grew describes the Minister as profoundly disturbed by the breakdown of the recent conversations. He says that the Minister asked “with obvious anxiety” whether the United States would take additional steps of retaliation beyond the mere freezing of assets. He describes the Minister as seeming to be “greatly crushed” by the turn of events. He concludes by saying that the Japanese are profoundly concerned, are astonished and are bitterly resentful.
It may be pointed out that if the general Japanese attitude is one of “profound concern”, the resentment of which Mr. Grew speaks need not, presumably, be cause for alarm on the part of the United States. This is all the more the case if the reaction of the Foreign Minister is representative of the Japanese Government’s attitude as a whole in so far as the Minister appeared to be “crushed” at the turn of events and anxious as to possible further retaliatory steps by the United States.
As noted above, Mr. Grew was conscious that there could be “no meeting of minds” between him and the Minister. Mr. Grew says that he explained to the Minister that it had become utterly “hopeless” to accept the assurances of the Japanese Government at face value. In spite of this expressed attitude on Mr. Grew’s part, it is significant that he informed the Minister that he was unwilling to close the conversation “on a defeatist note” and that he urged the Foreign Minister now to direct his efforts toward preventing a further deterioration of relations through the continuance of aggressive acts in the Pacific. This closing note may well have indicated to the Minister that once again the United States was prepared to start over again on the basis of accepting Japan’s latest acts of aggression in the hope that the latest act will be the last. Such an attitude on the part of the American Government may well explain the impression of which Mr. Grew makes report in his concluding paragraph that the Japanese have always discounted the possibility of serious retaliation by the United States and that the freezing of Japan’s assets has taken the Japanese [Page 347] “completely by surprise” [which, however, is certainly not a fact].62
If now our freezing of Japanese assets is allowed to become a mere gesture and is not implemented by a sharp curtailment of the economic benefits which Japan has been deriving from its trade with the United States, it would seem that the Japanese attitude which Mr. Grew describes may indeed be warranted and in any event be likely to continue to be held by the Japanese Government.
Conversely, the effect of a mere gesture of retaliation on the morale of the Chinese and of the Dutch in the Netherlands East Indies would be likely to be adverse. The effect of such a policy upon American public opinion—which has apparently unanimously assumed that drastic retaliation is appropriate and has been decided upon—would also appear likely to be adverse.
- Brackets appear in the original.↩