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

The Countdown Begins 185
Pacific. . . . [W]hen a large Japanese army is anywhere in
Indochina, we have to give that situation all the more attention
when Japanese statesmen say that they will drive us out of east
Asia.
Hull accused the Japanese of using methods in China “similar
to those which are being adopted by Hitler to subjugate Europe.
. . . [W]e cannot lose sight of the movement by Hitler to seize
one-half of the world.” Hull said he believed the Japanese militarists
were “moving in a similar direction to seize the other half
of the earth. . . . [T]his Government cannot yield to anything of
that kind.”
Ambassador Kurusu replied there was
not much diff erence between Japan’s idea of a co-prosperity
sphere and [the U.S. policy of ] Pan-Americanism, except that
Japanese methods may be more primitive. He denied that it
was Japan’s purpose to use force. . . . Japan was motivated by
self-defense in the same way as Britain had been motivated by
her acts, for example, in Syria.
He pointed out that
Japan needed rice and other materials at a time when she was
being shut off by the United States and other countries and
she had no alternative but to endeavor to obtain access to these
materials. . . . Th e Ambassador commented that today war is
being conducted through the agency of economic weapons,
that Japan was being squeezed, and that Japan must expand to
obtain raw materials.
Hull pointed out that
we were selling Japan oil until Japan suddenly moved into
Indochina; that he could not defend such a situation indefinitely;
and that the United States would give Japan all she