Pearl Harbor: The Seeds and Fruits of Infamy - Ludwig von Mises ...

Talk of Ultimatums and Deadlines 117
At the conclusion of these discussions the Joint Board adopted
Ingersoll’s proposal, with amendments suggested by Stark and
Marshall. A memorandum was to be prepared for the president
opposing (1) the issuance of an ultimatum to Japan, (2) military
action against Japan if she moved into Yunnan, and (3) support
of Chiang Kai-Shek with U.S. military forces. Th e memorandum
was to recommend that the State Department postpone hostilities
with Japan as long as possible, and that some agreements be
made with Japan “to tide the situation over for the next several
months.”
In addition to these recommendations, the memorandum
was to (1) point out how a U.S.-Japanese war in the Far East
would impair the help the United States was giving Great Britain
and the other nations fi ghting Germany, and (2) emphasize that
the United States was not in a position to engage in an off ensive
operation in the Far East without transferring to the Pacifi c most
of the ships now in the Atlantic. 13
Japanese-U.S. Relations “on the Brink of Chaos”
Our facility in decoding and translating intercepted messages
sent in the Japanese diplomatic code, “Purple,” had improved dramatically.
On November 4, we intercepted, decoded, and translated
a message sent from Tokyo earlier that day:
Well, relations between Japan and the United States have
reached the edge, and our people are losing confi dence in the
possibility of ever adjusting them. . . . Conditions . . . are so
tense that no longer is procrastination possible, yet in any sincerity
to maintain pacifi c relationships between the Empire of
Japan and the United States of America, we have decided . . .
to gamble once more on the continuance of the parleys, but
this is our last eff ort. . . . If through it we do not reach a quick
13 Ibid., pp. 1064–65.