Chapter 1 Washington, D.C. December 6, 1941 A very good morning to you, gentlemen!" President Franklin Delano Roosevelt said, appearing in the White House cabinet room all hale and hearty. The president then lit a cigarette and fixed it into a tortoiseshell holder and placed it in his mouth at the jaunty angle that the press liked so much. The act served as a signal for everyone to light up as well. Missy LeHand, the president''s secretary and the woman closest to him on the White House staff, handed round the coffee. Then Roosevelt got right down to cases. Winston Churchill wanted a face-to-face meeting with him as soon as humanly possible.
Harry Hopkins had passed on the message and urged FDR to agree to such a meeting. The president sensed a ripple of unease among the cabinet members, including a deep frown on the face of Secretary of State, Cordell Hull. Old Hopkins had gotten his way again, jamming up the cabinet members'' diplomatic channels with his own private agenda. FDR was well aware that his cabinet resented Hopkins, but then so did all the other politicians in town. He also knew that every man in front of him, on this cold and sunny Saturday morning, was engaged in some sort of feud or other with their own deputies or rivals. He could step in at any time and replace any one of them. And they damn well knew it! So they could listen to what Harry was reporting back and advise their president on what he should do. He cleared his throat loudly and said, "Well, gentlemen, what do you think?" One by one, they spoke in turn.
Cordell Hull''s cautious view was reinforced by an even more negative reaction from Ickes. He said, "What would America gain from such a public meeting, one which would be feted by the British press and interpreted as just one more step down the road to war? Lindbergh and all the other isolationists would absolutely crucify this administration. I''ll tell you that much, Mr. President!" Even Knox, who was the most pro-British, came out against such a meeting. He said, "The merest suggestion that the president was going to such a meeting would only strengthen the isolationist case and swing public opinion further behind them." When wrapping up a discussion, Roosevelt always made sure that everyone had had their say. He listened carefully to the balance of the men in the room. "Well, does anyone have anything else to add?" "I certainly do, Mr.
President," Cordell Hull said. "I wonder, is that really all that Harry Hopkins had to say?" "Yes, he said a good deal. Now, anyone got anything else?" There was silence. "Good," said the president. "That''s decided, then." Hull fired back, "What''s been decided?" "I''ve decided that I''m going to think about it," said Roosevelt, looking down his nose at the man. At 9:30 p.m.
, on that December 6, a certain Lieutenant Lester Schulz, paunchy and slightly out of breath, arrived at the White House with a locked pouch containing a top secret document. The leather pouch contained thirteen parts of the fourteen-part Japanese reply to the hard-line U.S. proposal presented to Japan in November. The messages had been sent from Tokyo to the Japanese Embassy in Washington, but they had been intercepted by American intelligence. The United States had cracked the Japanese diplomatic code, code-named ÒPurpleÓ in August 1940. American officials had been reading top secret Japanese messages before her diplomats received them, meaning that President Roosevelt had the advantage of knowing what the Japanese government was doing and saying for the sixteen months prior to the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. They had not, however, thus far cracked the military code.
So, while the U.S. government was aware of Japan''s diplomatic maneuvering, it remained cloaked in darkness about the specific movements of Tokyo''s Imperial Navy. Harry Hopkins, former secretary of commerce and one of Roosevelt''s speechwriters and his closest confidant, delivered the documents to the president in his study. The president, in a pensive mood, his Scottie Fala perched on his lap, said, "What have we got here, Harry?" "You''ll see," Hopkins said. "It ain''t good. I''ll tell you that much." As Hopkins paced back and forth, the president read the fifteen typewritten pages carefully for about ten minutes.
Most of it outlined Japan''s peaceful intentions in the region and laid the blame for the rising tensions on the United States. The final section of the document announced there was no chance of reaching a diplomatic settlement with the United States "because of American attitudes." Roosevelt looked up, stared at Hopkins, and said, "This amounts to a declaration of war, Harry. Sooner rather than later. Most likely precipitated by a Japanese attack on British, or possibly Dutch, possessions somewhere in the region. Maybe the Philippines." Hopkins pulled up a chair and sat. He was doing what he was best at, which was why he was held in the highest esteem by the president and his closest thing to a real friend in Washington.
"Yes, by God. And I think we damn well ought to consider pushing the Pentagon for a preemptive strike against those bastards. Rather than sit back and wait for war to come at the convenience of the Japanese. Strike the first blow at their homeland and prevent any sort of unpleasant surprises. I urge you to immediately get the Navy and Army Air Corps brass over here and-give these bastards a righteous punch." But Roosevelt was a student of history. And like Lincoln on the eve of the Civil War, he understood the political appeal of having the enemy fire the opening shot. "No, Harry.
No, we can''t do that. We are a democracy and a peaceful people." And then, raising his voice, he said somewhat cryptically, "But by God, we have a damn good record when it comes to waging war! And by God and all that''s holy, I will take it to them!" FDR was still in his bed with the newsapers on that frosty Sunday morning when he received notice that his military aide, Admiral Alex Beardall, would be bringing the locked pouch containing the missing fourteenth, and final, part of JapanÕs diplomatic response. The man delivered it to the president at 10:00 a.m. and waited patiently at his bedside while the president read it. Then read it again. This document, Roosevelt clearly saw, instructed the Japanese ambassador to destroy the code machines at their Washington embassy and to deliver the message to the secretary of state at 1:00 p.
m. And said that the "chances of achieving peace in the Pacific were gone, because cooperation with the American government has been lost." The president turned to the admiral and said, "It looks as though they are breaking off negotiations. They''re planning to strike, Alex. But when? And where?" Roosevelt''s first scheduled appointment on Sunday, December 7, was with the outgoing Chinese ambassador, Dr. Hu Shih, at 12:30 p.m. The elderly ambassador had taken the midnight train down from New York for the meeting.
They met in the Oval Study. FDR was anxious to let the ambassador know that he had sent a private appeal directly to the Japanese emperor. He told Dr. Hu: "I want to assure you, sir, that if the Japanese emperor does not intervene and restrain his military, war between the United States and Japan is utterly inevitable. We will be in this fight together, your country and mine. To the bitter end. May I have your unbridled assurances that your replacement here in Washington will be up to the Herculean task before us? He has some mighty big shoes to fill, I will say." "Indeed," the ambassador replied, still holding his hat in his lap.
"Too kind. But more than up to it, Mr. President." "He''s coming to see me tomorrow. I''ve read every last scrap they''ve given me. What I would appreciate is not our appraisal, but your personal appraisal. He''s very young, isn''t he? A bit untested in the intricacies of world affairs? Current events in Europe as well as the Pacific, especially in this most tenuous of times? You know him, of course. You were part of the team that selected him.
" "Of course. Since boyhood. I''m an old friend of his father''s. A man who, outside of Chiang Kai-shek, is probably the most powerful man in China not in the government. The Tang clan is one of the oldest and most powerful families in the country, dating back four or five hundred years. They have amassed vast holdings around the world, vast wealth. "The son has been groomed by his father since the age of two to take over leadership of the family. But also to assume a position of power on the world stage.
He has been to the finest schools. Eton, then Le Rosey, in Switzerland of course, in the early years. Later, he completed his undergraduate studies at Christ''s College, Cambridge. He read history, of course, literature, and political studies. Took a first in all three." "Impressive," FDR agreed. "Then on to Oxford for his postgraduate PhD candidate work. Again, political studies and history.
He took a first in both, I can tell you. The boy looks like some Hollywood action hero. But I will say that he is brilliantly educated-that, no one can deny." "A love of his.