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

Further Indications of Impending Japanese Action 241
against Japan.” 5 Halifax asked to see Secretary of State Hull and
he called at Hull’s apartment on the morning of December 5, to
discuss Eden’s cable.
Tokyo Replies to FDR Concerning Japanese
Troops in Indochina
On December 5 the two Japanese ambassadors called at the
State Department to present formally the Japanese government’s
answer to FDR’s question “with regard to the reported movements
of Japanese troops in French Indo-china.” Th e two men
handed Hull the Japanese government’s reply. It was short. Th e
ambassadors waited while the secretary read.
“Chinese troops have recently shown frequent signs of movements
along the northern frontier of French Indo-china bordering
on China.” Hence, “Japanese troops . . . have been reinforced
to a certain extent in the northern part of French Indo-china,”
for the principal purpose of “taking precautionary measures.” As
a result, some Japanese troop movements have been carried out
in southern Indochina and apparently “an exaggerated report has
been made of these movements.” However, the Japanese government
said, “no measure has been taken on the part of the Japanese
Government that may transgress the stipulations of the Protocol
of Joint Defense between Japan and France.” 6
When Hull had fi nished reading, he asked the ambassadors
“whether the Japanese considered that the Chinese were liable
to attack them in Indochina.” He said the Chinese contended
they were “massing troops in Yunnan [a province of China on the
northern border of Indochina] . . . in answer to Japan’s massing
troops in Indochina.” Ambassador Nomura said that
5 Ibid., p. 719.
6 Department of State, Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United
States: Japan, 1931–1941 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing
Offi ce, 1943), vol. 2, p. 784.