Threshold of War

by Heinrichs, Waldo;

  At his November 10 meeting with Nomura, Roosevelt twisted the conversation around to drop in a word about the modus vivendi as an instrument of diplomacy, it “being not merely an expedient and temporary agreement, but also one which takes into account actual and human existence.” Nomura was bewildered but determined to find out whether the president had in mind a provisional agreement.90 The Hull-Nomura conversations now entered a curious bilevel phase: discussion continued on various aspects of a comprehensive settlement, punctuated now and then with sallies into a temporary agreement.

  The Americans preferred to have the Japanese take the initiative for a modus vivendi to gain bargaining advantage and to keep their own record clear of any taint of appeasement. A Japanese initiative seemed a practical first step too, since, as the Americans knew, they had Plan B in the wings. This proposal, sent November 4, decrypted and translated the next day, would pledge Japan not to advance beyond Indochina and to withdraw her troops from there upon reaching a settlement with China in return for American restoration of trade and agreement to “engage in no activity which might put an obstacle in the way of Japan in her efforts to make peace with China.”91 Nomura and his new colleague Kurusu, who arrived November 15, saw no hope for such an American engagement and, though instructed to present the plan, devised a formula of their own. In this they were encouraged on November 17 by word from a cabinet member, undoubtedly Postmaster General Walker, that the president wanted an understanding but needed something concrete, such as Japanese evacuation of Indochina.92

  On November 18, steering clear of a Japanese troop withdrawal contingent on peace settlement elsewhere, the two ambassadors suggested to Hull a return to the status quo of July, before the Japanese advance into southern Indochina and the freezing of assets. Hull was not displeased, but Togo was. The foreign minister reproved Nomura and ordered him back to Plan B, but with changes, notably a pledge to evacuate southern Indochina, an important concession, Tōjō pointed out. This was the Plan B presented November 20, Thanksgiving Day.93

  The ball was now in the American court. Plan B had improved but still had the impossible requirement that the United States suspend assistance to Chiang during Sino-Japanese peace negotiations. New ideas were needed. Hull had already asked his advisers to explore all possibilities. The Japan desk officers sent up a set of terms; another set from Treasury would solve in one swoop all Japanese-American problems back to the turn of the century. The air was charged with reciprocity. Maxwell Hamilton, the sober, meticulous chief of the Far Eastern Division, in a moment of giddiness suggested a swap of New Guinea, or parts of it, for Japanese ships.94

  Even Roosevelt tried his hand, giving Hull an outline modus vivendi on November 17.95 The president, as before, had in mind a six-month agreement exchanging relaxation of trade restrictions (“some oil and rice now—more later”) for pledges by Japan not to send more troops north or south and not to invoke the Axis alliance in case the United States became involved in war with Germany. The United States would bring the Japanese and Chinese together for peace talks but take no part in them. The outline undoubtedly spurred the search for a modus but it was outdated by the Nomura-Kurusu proposal the next day and unhelpful on specific issues. Roosevelt was content to leave the management of this diplomatic initiative to Hull and his experts. He offered guidelines, he nudged the process along, but he kept his distance from a project that risked accusations of appeasement.

  The Friday and Saturday after Thanksgiving, Hull and his Far Eastern advisers, taking the various drafts from all sources, including Plan B, put together two new sets of proposals, a modus vivendi and a comprehensive agreement. The short-term proposition would prevent any further Japanese cross-border military encroachment but not affect American-British-Dutch reinforcements or existing Japanese deployments except in Indochina. It adopted the revised Plan B idea of a return to the status of July in Indochina with a limit of 25,000 Japanese troops in the north. In return the United States would modify its trade restrictions to allow export of certain non-defense commodities such as food and raw cotton and, on a month-by-month basis, lower-grade petroleum products in quantities appropriate to civilian use. The proposal was silent on the Axis alliance, reflecting the failure of Roosevelt and Hull to secure any Japanese concession on this issue at least for a modus vivendi. The duration of the agreement would be three months, gaining the needed time for reinforcement of the Philippines at the least cost in replenishing Japan’s oil stocks.

  On the crucial issue of peace in China the proposal broached the idea of bringing the two sides together for talks in the Philippines. The United States would not look with disfavor, it even suggested, upon an armistice, raising the possibility which that term implied of a suspension of American aid to China during the talks. But Chinese-Japanese peace talks were not a necessary condition of the modus, and neither therefore was suspension of American assistance to China, which was a requirement of Plan B. So, while the two sides were moving within negotiating range of each other, fundamental difficulties remained, not only the question of aid to China but also the question of how much of what kind of oil.

  Whereas the modus reduced the framework of discussion, the comprehensive proposal extended it beyond the most exhaustive restatements of the American position, such as those of June 21 and October 2. Japan would have to withdraw from China and Indochina, recognize Chiang’s as the only legitimate government of China, negotiate the Manchurian question with Chungking, give up (with the Western powers) its extraterritorial rights and concessions in China, sign a multilateral non-aggression pact, guarantee the neutralization of Indochina, and make a dead letter of the Axis pact as the price for restoration of trade and for peaceful settlement.96

  Although the draft comprehensive proposal and the draft modus vivendi were annexed to each other, it seems very unlikely that they were supposed to be presented together to the Japanese, for the stringency of the former would wither the latter. Instead they were alternates. They would be combined for presentation to the allies, as a means of reassuring them about the modus and of making a record, and then one or the other would be handed the Japanese depending on circumstances and allied approval. On November 22, Hull met with the British and Chinese ambassadors and the Dutch and Australian ministers to launch the modus.

  First reactions were on the whole encouraging. The secretary of state seems to have been hoping for quick approval of the American lead without getting into fine print. He described Plan B, gained approval for offering a substitute rather than improving the Japanese draft, and then gave a “rough sketch” of his own modus and a quick reading of the comprehensive plan without presenting copies to the envoys. Halifax was cautiously supportive: an agreement which got the bulk of Japanese troops out of Indochina without giving too much economic relief seemed sensible. Churchill’s first reaction was similar. Hu Shih, the Chinese ambassador, agreed that removal of the troops would be a great relief but asked whether the military standstill applied to Japanese troops within China, to which Hull was forced to respond in the negative. Hu said China regarded the embargo as vital and “would be very reluctant to see it seriously reduced.” On that note the diplomats left to seek instructions from their governments.97

  These were mostly negative. At the Foreign Office in London firmness in dealing with Japan was the rule, and greater firmness the more threatening Japan became. British officials wished to avoid another war, needless to say, and were determined to stay exactly in the shadow of American policy. But they had always been suspicious of the Hull-Nomura conversations, a suspicion heightened by Hull’s high dudgeon at the least bit of criticism and his failure to take them into his confidence. For some the modus vivendi smacked all too much of appeasement. Others looked to growing strength: the Prince of Wales was noticed at Capetown on November 23. The Dominions were informed, and the War Cabinet met to decide.

  Britain chose an oblique response, urging a toughening rather than a rejection of Hull’s proposal. Our demands s
hould be pitched at a higher level, the Foreign Office advised. Japan should be required to remove all its forces of all kinds, including air, from Indochina and suspend advances in China. Relaxation of trade curbs, not to include oil, should occur only after a Japanese withdrawal and on condition of progress toward a general settlement. It is impossible to say from available sources what the British knowledge of Japanese intentions was at this point, but the implicit assumption was that time remained for bargaining. The Foreign Office simply did not share the American apprehension, derived from MAGIC, of imminent Japanese operations in the south.98

  The Chinese response lacked all subtlety. Chiang Kai-shek was determined to defeat any possibility of a temporary arrangement with Japan. By all channels of communication—the Chinese ambassador in London, Hu-Shih and T. V. Soong in Washington, and Owen Lattimore, the Generalissimo’s personal American adviser-China sounded its dissent. Chiang scarcely paused with an objection over the number of troops Japan would be permitted to keep in Indochina. Any relaxation of economic pressure “while leaving Japan entrenched in China” would make the Chinese people feel “completely sacrificed” by America. By putting aside the Chinese question, the United States “was still inclined to appease Japan at the expense of China.” The agreement would destroy American prestige in Asia just as surely as the closing of the Burma Road had destroyed British and would lead Japan and Chinese defeatists to urge “oriental solidarity against occidental treachery.” Supplementing official objections were leaks to the press, one, for example, to a United Press correspondent by the Chinese embassy in London. Readers of the November 25 New York Times, for example, learned the essential provisions of the modus vivendi.99

  Contrary to public claims of ABCD harmony, there was indeed “a rift in the alphabetical lute.” Looking for support, Hull called the ABCD envoys back on Monday, November 24. Only the Dutch minister was instructed, though he was positive. This time Hull permitted the representatives to copy the proposals. Halifax asked to refer the detailed provisions to the Foreign Office for study. Questioning and argument continued until Hull complained of his partner governments’ “lack of interest and lack of a disposition to cooperate” and on that sour note the meeting broke up.

  That night to ensure prompt consideration at the highest level, the president at Hull’s request sent a copy of the modus vivendi proposal to Churchill. The following day Halifax gave Hull detailed and severe Foreign Office criticisms of the proposal. During the following night, November 25–26, Churchill’s reply arrived. “{O}nly one point … disquiets us,” he wrote. “What about Chiang Kai-shek? Is he not having a very thin diet?” Should China collapse, “our joint dangers would enormously increase.” Churchill was sure that American “regard for the Chinese cause” would govern action. The prime minister seems to have concluded that a firm ABCD front was Britain’s safest bet because it made most likely American participation in any war begun by Japan, and more likely thereby American entry into the European war. The course of settlement, however temporary, risked that combination and made it more likely that the United States would stay on the sidelines. By this skillful thrust the onus for killing the Hull proposal would fall on the Chinese more than on the British.100

  The modus vivendi was failing rapidly by Monday and Tuesday, November 24–25. Hardly encouraging were three MAGIC intercepts translated on Monday, all instructions to Nomura and Kurusu that cessation of American aid to China during peace negotiations was essential. Chiang Kai-shek must be “made” to propose an end to hostilities. On November 22, Hull learned that the deadline for a Japanese-American agreement had been extended from November 25 to November 29. Monday he learned that the extension was in Tokyo time, meaning Friday, November 28 in Washington.101

  Accompanying this terminal date for diplomacy was increasing evidence that Japanese forces were moving up to a starting line for attack: reinforcements to the Mandates, increased naval activity at Truk and Jaluit, an expeditionary force in the Palaus, surveillance of American supply routes to Australia, accelerated troop debarkation at Haiphong, 20,000 soldiers landed at Saigon. Hanoi heard from a reliable source that the Japanese would attack Thailand, including the Kra isthmus, on December l.102

  Of particular concern was the embarkation of Japanese troops at Shanghai. The assistant naval attaché there reported intense activity since November 15, with the arrival and loading of many ships including troop transports and vessels carrying timber trestles (for pier or bridge construction) and landing craft. On November 19 ten transports sailed, and in the following week many were sighted by ship captains between Shanghai and Hong Kong on a course for Indochina. Similar information came from British intelligence. These were troops intended for Malaya. The United States Navy was coming alive to the probability of amphibious landings, but the army was more complacent. Stimson’s mind was still set on Indochina, where, he recalled, the Japanese had informed French authorities they would be moving 50,000 more troops. They were talking evacuation and stuffing more troops in. This for Secretary of War Stimson was perfidy—typical Japanese perfidy stretching back to the Manchurian crisis of 1931. Early on November 26 he warned the president of the Japanese troop movements.103

  This suddenly rising storm found the Philippines reinforcement in disarray. A stream of heavy bombers, now amounting to forty-eight planes, was scheduled to depart December 3–10. Another eighty-two would fly out in the following ten weeks. Fifty-two dive bombers, delayed at Hawaii two weeks and then placed in a slow convoy, would not arrive until Christmas Day. One pursuit group of 105 P-40s had arrived; half of a second was at sea and the other half would depart on December 5. Due to sail in early December were aircraft maintenance, command, and warning units, together with field artillery and signal battalions, a cavalry troop, an infantry regiment, and medical detachments, altogether 21,000 troops, by far the largest reinforcement yet. To the question whether they would arrive in time now was added the question whether they would arrive safely. So worried was the navy at the incompleteness of Philippine defenses that it denied Admiral Hart permission to stay and fight at Manila Bay, and so the cruisers and destroyers of the Asiatic Fleet began moving southward out of reach of Japanese air strikes.104

  East Asia did not supply the only ration of bad news. On November 21 the press reported the ousting of General Weygand as Vichy’s supreme authority in Africa—at the express demand of Hitler, it was said. This opened the way to further Nazi penetration of Africa and left in tatters Washington’s policy of encouraging French North African autonomy. On November 18 the British forces in Egypt launched their long-awaited offensive against Rommel. They plunged deeply behind German-Italian lines but soon were locked in a “brutal slugging match,” an armored “battle of Kilkenny cats,” which destroyed most of the tanks on both sides. London was now “putting a brake on overoptimism.” By November 26 Roosevelt himself was wondering whether the British could sustain the drive.105

  The outlook on the German-Soviet front now seemed absolutely precarious. The final German push on Moscow began on November 15 and was soon making substantial progress over the frozen ground. Panzer armies striking southeast captured Klin, Solnechogorsk, and Istra by November 25, opening a breach for an “armored jemmy of tremendous strength that soon threatened to break open the whole Russian position in the northwest.” The 7th Panzer Division struck for the Moscow-Volga Canal, “the last major obstacle before Moscow was completely outflanked from the north.” To the south of Moscow, Guderian swung east of Tula, captured Venev on November 25, and made for Kashira on the Oka River, loss of which would open the road to the capital and its encirclement. Along the Black Sea, Kleist’s Panzer group captured Rostov and an intact bridge across the Don on November 20. From this gateway to the Caucasus the road seemed open to Astrakhan on the Caspian or the Maikop oil fields.106

  The press learned enough of the savage fighting to grasp the significance of this “doom-laden final week of November,” as John Erickson calls it. The New York Tim
es described the attack as “overpowering,” “the like of which has not been seen.” The flanks of Moscow’s defenses were “yielding.” The Germans were straining with every ounce to capture Moscow at any cost. On November 23 the Russians admitted the situation was “gravely worsened” on the northern sector and even more critical on the southern. On November 25 the Nazis were reported thirty-one miles from Moscow; the Germans claimed eighteen. The Red Army was fighting “one of the most critical battles of its history.” The moment of greatest danger in the five-month war had arrived. The Russian situation, Roosevelt told Morgenthau on November 26, was “awful”: Moscow was “falling.”107

  The modus vivendi had no hope in this moment of pervasive and deadly threat. Stark and Marshall undoubtedly made the argument for delay to Hull and Roosevelt in their meetings November 25. The director of the army’s War Plans Division stated the position bluntly to Hull on November 21: the army considered it a matter of “grave importance to the success of our war effort in Europe that we reach a modus vivendi with Japan.”108 The negative case became overwhelming, however. The Chinese attack on the modus, abetted by the British, was right on target. Roosevelt had to consider the implications of a partial settlement for the anti-Japanese and anti-German coalitions. Japanese deadlines, deployments, and stiff bargaining terms, as revealed by MAGIC, did not encourage diplomacy. The supreme crisis in Russia and discouraging news from Africa called for solidarity and steadfastness. Above all, the movement of Japanese troop convoys into the South China Sea had a crystalizing effect on the president, for conciliation in the presence of aggression was appeasement. Roosevelt and Hull decided to drop the modus Vivendi and present in its place, with full recognition they had come to the end of diplomacy, the comprehensive proposal which predicated any settlement on a total Japanese withdrawal from China. This Hull did on November 26.