June 22, 1941, when Hitler attacked his Russian ally, began the escalation of the European war into a well-nigh universal bloodbath. Among other things, it interrupted an episode of halfhearted maneuvers by the Roosevelt administration to cut a deal with Japan. The  negotiations stemmed from the hopes of two Maryknoll priests, Father James Drought and Bishop James Walsh, to protect the Order's missionary work in China and Japan, and involved the Japanese ambassador, retired Admiral Kichisaburo Nomura, who had been sent to Washington expressly because he was  a good friend of Roosevelt's. Despite the State Department's reservations about unofficial negotiations, FDR made available Postmaster General Frank Walker in a New York hotel to assist. It was the sort of hush-hush thing FDR liked. But the talks violated the usual rules of diplomacy. The partly deaf Nomura had a hard time understanding Hull's severe lisp, and he doctored reports to put the best face on things, while Hull was sick much of the time, and kept insisting on a fundamental settlement when the situation begged for a temporary accommodation. A mistrustful FDR shied away from a serious negotiation. At any rate it all collapsed when  pro-Axis Japanese Foreign Minister Matsuoka returned from Europe and found out what  was going on behind his back. He had been negotiating a non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union

In fact, neither Tokyo nor Washington would move perceptibly from previous positions. One sticking point was China; others, the Japanese alliance with the Axis; and Japanese oil supplies. The circles around Prime Minister Prince Fumimaro Konoye who hoped for an understanding with the Americans needed something concrete in the way of concessions to show the Army, and Navy.(1)

By early July the Japanese government decided that the German attack on the USSR had removed any Soviet threat to Japanese pretensions. Japan was now free to move against the western colonies in southeast Asia, left vulnerable by German success in Europe. The Tokyo authorities didn't rule out  making progress through diplomacy, but were prepared to resort to arms

In what followed  FDR had an advantage. Army cryptographers had broken the principal cipher used by the Japanese Foreign Office, and the president knew by reading the intercepts, known collectively as "Magic," about the Japanese decision very soon after it was made. Had there been any doubts, they would've been removed when the Japanese forced the  French authorities to admit them to southern Indo-China, which enabled them to flank British,  Dutch and American positions. The Japanese weren't absolutely bent on war. Their improved prospects might enable them to dicker from a position of strength. Win recognition of their gains in China and Manchuria! Finally settle with Chiang Kai-shek! They were equally prepared to attack the Soviets in the Far East or bargain away their alliance with Germany.(2)

FDR reacted on July 26th by freezing Japanese assets in the United States. When the British and the Dutch followed his lead, the effect was to cut off the imports of oil on which Japan was dependent. Previously, FDR had been reluctant to cut off oil lest it trigger a Japanese move into the oil fields of the Dutch East Indies, and he didn't intend to shut off the tap entirely with his freeze, but his underlings took him further than he wished to go.

The same day that he froze the assets, FDR published the orders that he had held ready in the White House for nine months, and filled in the name of the officer who would be taking over Manuel Quezon's Philippine Army, which was being called into federal service. But the name, instead of George Grunert, the Philippine Department commander, was Douglas MacArthur. Major reinforcements would now be going to the Far East. There would be a new Army command with a reactivated MacArthur at the top. This move came as a shock to Francis Sayre, theoretically the senior American representative in the Islands, personal representative of the president. He wasn't consulted or informed, and in fact hoped it would be Grunert who would be elevated. Grunert may not have been told, and it was probably a shock to Quezon as well. After all, he had lost an army. But Manuel  knew what to do.  He hurried over to MacArthur's suite at the Manila Hotel to "champagne" him.(3)

Several American officials commented afterwards that the takeover of the Commonwealth Army came in the nick of time, presumably heading off some move toward neutralism. Quezon had been thinking about not renewing MacArthur's contract.(4)

MacArthur's reaction was enthusiastic, even euphoric. He had been lobbying Washington  for the job, and there was certainly no point in displaying anything but optimism before Quezon, the Filipino public, and the American officers who were understandably dubious about the prospects  MacArthur believed in his star. He strode about his penthouse with its wonderful view of Manila Bay and declaimed before visitors, sometimes in his old West Point bathrobe. Destiny had brought him to Manila. He could feel it in the air.(5)

Actually, destiny had so far shorted him. Every American war had afterwards sent a military hero to the White House. Washington, Jackson, Grant, Teddy Roosevelt, and the rest. Every war, that is, except World War I, which somewhat soured the taste for generals.

MacArthur was soon talking in terms of 200,000 men in his Filipino army, organized into ten divisions, although less than 5,000 bodies were currently under arms. Raising such a host could only be justified by expanding MacArthur's mission to the politically more palatable one of defending all of the Philippines, or at least something more than Manila Bay.The heavy bombers and fighter squadrons Washington were scheduling for the area would need real estate. MacArthur estimated that his ten divisions would be ready by April 1942 which was convenient because he had convinced himself that the Japanese wouldn't move before that date, when the monsoons would have passed. By way of comparison, the War Department allocated a year to training a division in the States, and didn't have to cope with many languages and so many illiterates among the recruits.

Roosevelt, Churchill and their staffs imagined that it would take less than three months for the Germans to shatter the Russians. However long, it meant a breathing spell for Britain. There might even be a sequel if Japan moved against the Soviet Far East. Roosevelt obviously hoped that the cutoff of oil and his reinforcement of the Far East would complicate matters for the Japanese, perhaps lead them to think twice. But in laying on reinforcements for the isolated Philippines, Washington ignored the advice of a generation of plans officers. Even Churchill went against his instincts and allowed reinforcements to be sent to Hong Kong, where they only swelled the Japanese prisoner rolls. MacArthur was given top priority for American materiel, which was being turned out in some quantity and began piling up in American ports for lack of shipping. Very little reached the newly raised Filipino divisions. MacArthur had once been critical of last minute reinforcements. Ambassador Grew quoted him as saying: "Armies and Navies in being efficient, give weight to the peaceful words of statesmen, but a feverish effort to create them once a crisis is imminent simply provokes attack."(7)

Beefing up the Philippines appealed powerfully to Army and Navy professionals who had friends serving in the Far East. Also, Americans felt obligated to their "wards," the Filipinos.The move was more popular than beefing up the British, the Russians, or the Chinese. General Arnold was content to sign a paper allocating more than 300 B-17s to the Far East, even if most of them were not yet out of the factory. The Navy absolutely refused to commit additional major warships but prepared to send the Asiatic Fleet more than two dozen patrol bombers and submarines, useful against invaders. No longer was the Asiatic Fleet flagship moored in the Whangpoo. Admiral Thomas Hart brought most of his units to the Philippines and opened a headquarters on the Manila waterfront. The river gunboats, sisters of the Panay, and the Marine detachments stayed in China, for the time being.(8)

 Wiith these major initiatives launched,  FDR sailed off to the Newfoundland coast for a long-sought  rendezvous with Churchill, where he told the prime minister that he would step up American participation in the Atlantic anti-U-Boat campaign until he could provoke a clash with the Germans that the American public would accept as justifying entering the war.

While the president conferred in chilly Newfoundland, Fumimaro Konoye sweated over the implications of Washington's suddenly getting tough. A melancholy intellectual who hoped that Tokyo's expansion might be achieved short of war, he had the confidence of the emperor. What Konoye came up with was dramatic. FDR had earlier mentioned that he might consider meeting  with Matsuoko. Konoye now proposed nothing less than a conference, he and  Roosevelt, head to head. Konoye said that he would come to Honolulu. He would bring along  admirals and generals. He had even picked out a ship to travel on. While the admirals and generals had agreed to this initiative, they had also made it clear to Konoye. If he couldn't get an agreement in Honolulu, he must lead Japan into war!(9)

How far was Konoye able to go? Important details were lacking. But the Japanese were prepared to discuss a range of issues. They might interpret their treaty engagements with Germany in the light of their national interests. Sell out the Germans! They might require the United States to mediate a peace with China. Sell out the Chinese? The Americans were to quit reinforcing the Philippines and resume sales of oil. Japan would undertake to advance no farther into southeast Asia, and withdraw from the southern part of Indo-China. It would guarantee the neutrality of the Philippines. In time it would withdraw the major portion of its forces from China, but not from Manchuria. All these issues were up in the air. Afraid that hard-liners would block him, Konoye was reluctant to reveal his hand before the meeting.

Essentially the Japanese were asking that the Americans acquiesce in gains Tokyo had already made in China and Indo-China which Washington hadn't been able to prevent. In return Tokyo might sit out the European war. FDR's main concern at the time wasn't China but England. There wasn't much he could do for China anyway. Geography and the hapless Chiang regime were against him. But he might avoid a two-front war.

He should've jumped at the offer. At the very minimum he would've forced a political crisis in Japan and caused heartburn in Berlin. The impact of a well-publicised conference between the Japanese and the Americans would have been tremendous. Even if nothing came of it,  FDR would ‘ve gained time. Time for reinforcement. Things might have rocked along until the Japanese had moretime to ponder the failing momentum of the German onslaught against Russia, where winter would be coming.(10)

And at first he did jump at it, but suggested Juneau rather than Honolulu.

FDR believed that face-to-face meetings were his specialty, where his great personality would count. They were the great nightmares of his subordinates. Enthused, genial, anxious to be liked, full of largesse, he was apt to make spur-of-the-moment concessions that he didn't always tell his staff about. The State Department blanched and so did Cordell Hull.  Left to himself,  FDR might do anything! The ailing Hull knew that the president wouldn't take him to Honolulu or Juneau. He never took him anywhere, finding him tedious. FDR preferred Sumner Welles.  Hull insisted that the bones of an agreement be worked out beforehand.

Ambassador Grew was enthusiastic. He said that he hoped that: "that this Japanese proposal not be turned aside without very prayerful consideration . . . the proposal has the approval of the Emperor and the highest authorities in the land . . . the good that may flow is incalculable."

Obviously, Konoye was sincere. Otherwise, he was taking foolish risks.  Japanese ultranationalists were mulling the best way to assassinate the traitor. Dynamite the Konoye train! Shoot him! A squad of assassins actually opened fire on his auto on a country road.

Cordell Hull kept complaining. FDR never accepted the invitation. Konoye gave up. Halfway through October he resigned.

FDR never made a worse mistake.

In fact, neither FDR nor Hull trusted the Japanese. Hull abominated the national habit of bowing and "hissing." So far as they were concerned, Tokyo had earned for itself an international reputation for treachery in the Russo-Japanese War, when its torpedo boats had attacked a sleepy Russian squadron without waiting for a declaration of war. In FDR's mind the Japanese  were "notorious" for such behavior. Some of the Powers were disturbed enough by the surprise attack so that the whole subject was debated at the Hague Peace Conference in 1907. The lineup on the question was predictable. On the one hand, nations such as Holland which argued for a twenty-four-hour notification prior to actual hostilities. On the other side, the big powers for whom a surprise attack was a practical and attractive military option. Teddy Roosevelt was in the White House at the time. There would be no pacifist pussyfooting for him. His delegates agreed to a watered-down formula which declared that nations oughtn't to open hostilities without prior notice, but didn't specify how much notice should be given. The resulting convention didn't mention any penalties for violators The Americans were mostly interested in clarifying the picture for neutrals.(11)

Even so, this toothless convention of 1907 gave FDR and his people a last chance to avoid a great disaster, had they been really sharp in December 1941.

American officials scrambling to reinforce the Pacific were putting great stock in the potentialities of the B-17s, even though the president wasn't weaned from promising them to the British or to the Russians. The plane wasn't as great as the Air Corps contended, but it was a lot better than the RAF concluded from rather ill-conceived trials against the Germans. It was a good bomber, and eyes had opened when twenty-one of them had made the mass flight from California to Hawaii. If they could manage the long flight from the Coast, they could island-hop all the way to the Philippines, using fields at Wake, Midway, and various Australian strips. An all-out effort was laid on and, sure enough, on September 12th nine of the big bombers materialized out of a monsoon rain to land at Clark Field near Manila. But then things slowed down, and by early December no more than thirty-five had come in, out of a total of more than a hundred scheduled.(12)

What such a force could accomplish obviously depended on how many were deployed, provision of air bases, maintenance, air defense and much more. Time was lacking. But the plane offered the heady prospect of bombing and reconnaissance within a thousand miles. It could attack Formosa, Japanese convoys in the South China Sea. It could even attack Japan on a one-way mission, but this meant that the Russians would have to allow landings at Vladivostok. Secretary Stimson briefly reveled in a mad, rosy dream of a great bomber offensive against Japan oscillating between the Philippines, Kamchatka and Alaska! The truth was that the Russians, hard-pressed by the Germans, were anxious to avoid another war. When approached by the American ambassador in Moscow, the Kremlin refused to have the B-17s landing at their Far Eastern bases.(13)

Up to the outbreak of hostilities in December, Roosevelt, Churchill, and many of their experts thought and may have hoped that Japan would become embroiled with the USSR in the Far East, and go north. Information on Japanese industrial targets was sent out to the Philippines, and there was renewed talk of the paper cities of Japan. In November General Marshall invited a group of Washington correspondents to a ‘secret' briefing at which he said that the movement of heavy bombers to Manila was viewed by the president as a means of discouraging the Japanese from opening hostilities in the Far East. He observed that the B-17s could fly on to Vladivostok, and that they would be welcome. It is possible that the general hoped the Japanese would get wind of his secret briefing. The Japanese knew about the B-17's performance from their German friends and didn't consider the few planes at Clark Field a threat to their plans.(14)

The reinforcement of the Philippines brought changes in Hawaii. Because he had recently strengthened Oahu, Chief of Staff  Marshall looked on the place less as a threatened outpost and more as a training center and staging area for the buildup farther west. The officer he sent out to command the Hawaiian Department, Walter Short, an old friend of his, had made a reputation in training. According to his predecessor General Herron who briefed him,   Short didn't seem enthusiastic about his new command.  He became immersed in the rapid expansion of facilities and the development of alternate, safer, air routes to the Philippines. He put his command on full alert when FDR froze the Japanese assets, but relaxed afterwards into a "half-alert" against sabotage. Later on, he proposed and Washington approved, a three-tiered alert that allowed him to guard against sabotage without materially disrupting training. Like Herron, Short admitted that he didn't worry all that much about sabotage, in contrast to Marshall and Frank Knox. The targets were mainly within the perimeters of military or naval reservations and there was no compelling evidence of saboteurs.(15) The general knew, of course, that he was expected to install a military government when war broke out. Husband Kimmel even took time out on a visit to Washington to call on Secretary  Ickes and urge him to arrange for a special session of the Hawaiian legislature to enact the M-Day bill which would give the governor, and any military successor, wide emergency powers. Poindexter was sick and on the way to Walter Reed Hospital where he had a kidney removed. In November Stimson suddenly sent Congress a draft bill to allow the president to use the Army or Navy to form a military government in Hawaii. He cited the thousands of aliens in the Islands, but the congressional committees were unimpressed and planned no immediate hearings.(16)

Betty Stark was still fighting off Rooseveltian brainstorms, such as sending a one-carrier task force to Manila. The feisty Kimmel was doing his best with his ill-balanced fleet, hobbled by slow battleships. The most the Navy expected of him was that he would be ready  when the balloon went up on "One Jay Day" to raid the Marshall Islands, hoping to divert the Japanese from southeast Asia. There was no thought of going farther toward the Philippines. Stark and Marshall pleaded for more time to prepare (17)

FDR was notorious for handing out overlapping and duplicative assignments, so as to keep the last word for himself. But in the summer of 1939, he had settled an argument by investing the Justice Department and the FBI with the principal roles in loyalty investigations, antisabotage, and counterespionage programs. The panic over the Fifth Column  simmered down, and lists of suspect aliens had been trimmed, although the FBI's moderate approach had its detractors. In November 1941, there showed up in Honolulu from John Franklin Carter's stable of operatives one Curtis Munson. Carter had been ordered by FDR, in the president's words, to investigate "the loyalty or otherwise" of the Japanese Americans, the favorite bugaboo of the White House. Carter's people had been covering the American Southwest and Carter had already turned in a report by Munson on the West Coast Japanese. Roosevelt seemed disappointed when Munson reflected the consensus of the FBI, Army and Navy intelligence, that there were plenty of sabotage targets on the Coast but no trace of saboteurs. "Not much new," was FDR's comment.(18)

Munson felt the same about Hawaii, although, like everyone he talked to, he was in favor of martial law, afraid that Poindexter wouldn't hold up in an emergency. But he found that G-2 wasn't worrying because, as one colonel put it, the governor was "under General Short's thumb." Short was already flexing his muscles. He was applying pressure in the trial of a Chinese customs guard who had shot an Army flier during a scuffle at Honolulu's customs gate. Uniformed Army officers crowded the courtroom.(19)

The pilot had been injured training on one of the P-40 fighters that had been rushed out to the Philippines, where the defense buildup was going on concurrently with a presidential campaign in which Quezon was a heavy favorite to succeed himself. A month before the election, Sayre, no doubt under instruction, had a talk with the Filipino politician. The high commissioner asked where Quezon intended to locate the government in case of a Japanese attack. Sayre went on to mention the possibility of Roosevelt declaring martial law and setting up a military authority.. Although he had no doubt got wind of the scheme, Quezon expressed surprise and outrage.  He blew up. He threatened to resign and take all the Filipino mayors and governors with him. He asked for a few days to think about it, then declared that he would stay in Manila where the people could see him and be disabused of any idea that he was under Japanese influence. He intensely disliked Sayre, and put up with him, he said, only because he feared that Roosevelt would replace him with some hard-nosed admiral. But he volunteered that he would do anything that MacArthur asked.(20)

Quezon of course was being disingenuous. He probably knew that the Americans planned to take him to Corregidor, to keep him out of Japanese hands. The Japanese hoped to use the popular Quezon régime to rule the conquered Philippines. It would save much  trouble and blunt the American desire to reclaim the Islands.

When the Navy pulled the Asiatic Fleet out of Shanghai, it had propelled a four-star admiral onto the Manila scene. Tommy Hart was tired and looking forward to relief. He was no fan of FDR, who a year or so before had stricken his name from the list of candidates for command of the main fleet. Hart had to deploy his cruisers and destroyers so they wouldn't be caught by the Japanese invaders, and organize his PBYs and subs so they could strike at approaching fleets. The commander of the Sixteenth Naval District at Manila had inconveniently gone sick. Hart lived in a comparatively modest apartment below MacArthur's imperial suite at the Manila Hotel. After a little experience with the upstairs neighbor, whom he had known for years, Hart wrote Betty Stark:" We have in high place here a man who is basically of the lone-wolf characteristics with prima donna complexes. He has a brilliant and quick mind and a vast amount of general knowledge so that it is natural for him to have developed a mental superiority complex."(21)

MacArthur, who had been recalled as a major general, childishly resented Hart's seniority. He rejected in outrageously insulting language Hart's official proposals to coordinate PBY and B-17 reconnaissance He objected to overflying Formosa lest an incident involve the Philippine Commonwealth in a war prematurely. With his usual regal disregard of channels, he went over Hart's head to the Navy Department. This brought an order from an exasperated Marshall to forward all his correspondence with Hart.(22)

By Thanksgiving Day, November 27th, the prospects for peace in the Pacific were forlorn. The emperor had ordered the new premier, General Tojo, to try once more for a settlement, but the talks in Washington stalled. Wishing to string the Japanese along, FDR played with the idea of offering a three-month or six-month modus vivendi, but he knew from his code-breakers that the Japanese were preparing their moves, although where they would strike was hidden from him. Meanwhile, Britain and China, eager for American belligerency, protested any concessions to Japan.(23)

Given the situation, the instructions FDR now gave his people made eminently good sense. Tokyo was opting to start a war. FDR wanted nothing to obscure this fact for the American public. Japan must not only be allowed to commit the first overt act, but must be clearly seen to commit it. FDR had listened to a generation of complaints of how Woodrow Wilson had dragged the United States into a useless war with Kaiser Bill. He had himself been vilified as a warmonger planning to "plow under every fourth American boy." And plotting to pull chestnuts from the fire for the British Empire. He and his advisers worried that the Japanese might cunningly bypass American positions in the Pacific and attack only the British and the Dutch, leaving him with the problem of selling Congress on a war for the defense of British colonies. He believed that Germany was the main threat to America, and he knew from intercepted messages that Germany as Japan's ally would probably declare war on him. The day before the Thanksgiving holiday, Stimson recorded the president as putting the issue as follows: " ...we were likely to be attacked perhaps next Monday[December 1] for the Japanese are  notorious for making an attack without warning. The question was how we should  maneuver them into the position of firing the first shot without allowing  too much  damage to ourselves."(24)

Thus, FDR on November 25th.

Complicating the situation was the squabble in Manila. Already on the 22nd, Stimson had sent out an updated proclamation for MacArthur to establish a military government, if that was needed. A solemn war warning had been given Pacific commanders, the key sentence being:  "Surprise aggressive move in any direction [by Japan] is possibility."(25)

The president had addressed the problem of Quezon. He instructed Sayre to solicit his cooperation:" ...please impress upon him the desirability of avoiding public pronouncement or action  that might make situation more difficult . . ."(26)

Sayre called Quezon, Hart and MacArthur into conference, a conference on issues that should've been settled months earlier. He was regaled with one of MacArthur's perorations: gesticulating with his cigar, denying that a Japanese attack was imminent. No wonder when Stimson decided on Thanksgiving morning that MacArthur needed additional instructions, Roosevelt agreed. Stimson met with Knox, Stark, and Gerow, the chief Army planner, and they used as a basis a warning message that had been discussed by the Joint Board. The resulting directive to MacArthur has been roundly denounced as wishy-washy, and "do-don't," but reasonably read, it merely told MacArthur to pull up his socks and collaborate with the Navy, and not worry about the Philippine Commonwealth.(27) " Negotiations with Japan appear to be terminated for all practical purposes with only the barest possibilities that the Japanese government might come back and offer to continue. Japanese future action possible at any moment. If hostilities cannot repeat cannot be avoided the United States desires that Japan commit the first overt act."

Then the message drove home the point:" This policy should not repeat not be construed as restricting you to a course of action that might jeopardize your defense. Prior to hostile Japanese action you are directed to undertake such reconnaissance and other measures as you deem necessary.(28)

Reconnaissance of course had been jeopardized by the MacArthur-Hart feuding. MacArthur apparently was reluctant about overflying hostile territory because of the danger of provoking incidents. He may have wanted a clear case of aggression to present to Quezon to justify involvement of the Commonwealth. But without reconnaissance he was blind, the Navy was blind, and the Commonwealth authorities were blind as to what moves the Japanese were planning.

"Other measures" clearly included a military government.

MacArthur now replied that reconnaissance was being intensified in cooperation with the Navy. Marshall answered that he and Stimson were reassured because the earlier controversy had "disturbed" them.(29)

FDR still wasn't satisfied. He had been at Warm Springs and when he returned he instructed Stark to send Admiral Hart a message ordering him to improvise and send off a few small picket boats to the invasion coasts. Filipinos were to be in the crew. These pickets, a "Defensive Information Patrol," would be in the path of Japanese fleets heading for Siam and Malaya. Pretty obviously, in Admiral Hart's view, the president was hoping to provoke an incident which would foil any cunning Japanese plan to bypass the Philippines. In the event, the Japanese identified and ignored the only boat to reach station, Admiral Hart's yacht Isabel. Nothing happened, except that years later a retired admiral wrote a good-humored account of how the chief executive had apparently schemed to get Japan to commit the first overt act on his picket ship and his extremely junior person. Tommy Hart, thinking back, believed that Washington, i.e., Roosevelt, was obviously  thinking about provoking an incident by allowing Asiatic Fleet destroyers to head toward Singapore to help the British and an inevitable clash with the Japanese.(30)

Quezon was understandably frustrated. Disregarding his tuberculosis, on November 28th he made a violent speech from a wheelchair at the University of the Philippines, accusing Sayre, and implicitly Roosevelt, of blocking his efforts to create a civil defense program:" I am going to say something terrible but that is what I feel. If war breaks out and people die here unprotected . . . those men who have stopped me from doing what I should have done ought to be hanged--every one of them on the lamp post."(31)

At the same time MacArthur was warned, the Navy again warned its Pacific commanders--Kimmel and Hart. They were told to deploy defensively preparatory to executing the war plan. The Philippines were mentioned as a danger point, but not Hawaii.

What about Hawaii? The busy army plans officers tried to adapt the warning message they had sent MacArthur to suit General Short's situation. Unlike what they told MacArthur, they told Short that any reconnaissance or other measures he carried out should not alarm the civil population or disclose his defense posture. This was somewhat ambiguous  because Short had nothing much in the way of reconnaissance. His B-17s had been sent to the Philippinesand in Oahu reconnaissance was mostly Navy business. But Short was in no doubt about what else they were telling him. They wanted no premature arrests of Japanese suspects, no premature takeover of the territorial government--nothing that the Japanese government might allege as a grievance that would justify war. He received additional warnings about sabotage but was told not to attempt anything like arrests.

He kept his aircraft together, the better to watch them; put a pair of radar operators in training on a four-hour early morning watch. He continued his existing sabotage alert and so notified Washington. His counter-intelligence people said that they did a little extra "snooping" around Japanese neighborhoods.

The part of the fleet at anchor in Pearl Harbor had a percentage of antiaircraft guns on alert, but normal weekend leave was granted. Kimmel had got a negative from his intelligence people about the possibility of a Japanese raid, but the Fourteenth Naval District went on an anti-submarine alert. Destroyer patrols off the Pearl Harbor channel were cranked up, but reconnaissance flights were curtailed to save the planes for the planned fleet sortie to the Marshalls. Navy and Marine aircraft were bunched, like the Army's, in deference to sabotage warnings from the Navy Department. But in response to Washington orders Kimmel's two carriers sailed off to deliver Marine aircraft to Wake and Midway to protect the B-17 route to the Philippines.There were also several task forces at sea for exercises.(32)

FDR's final maneuver was an appeal to the emperor. He had been thinking about it for a while and the suggestion had come unofficially from the Japanese embassy. He dispatched his appeal and released it to the press on December 6th, without expecting too much from it. But  his conscience was clear and he was planning in a few days to lay the whole Japanese situation before Congress, to ask for a declaration of war if Japan advanced on western positions in Asia. He had his evidence from intercepted Japanese messages to Berlin that Germany would join its ally.(33)

He may have been influenced when saw the newspapers on December 4th. Someone had leaked the official estimate known as the "Victory Parade" to the isolationist Chicago Tribune, which timed its scoop to spoil the debut of a new rival, the interventionist Chicago Sun. The story laid out the numbers of men and totals of materiel estimated as necessary for a war to defeat Germany, Italy and Japan. Congressional critics planned to demand hearings on this evidence of FDR's scheming to enter the war.

The document had been smuggled out of the War Department by a junior Air Corps officer,  and offered to Senator Burton Wheeler. Wheeler confirmed that the officer had funneled material to him before. A persistent rumor made the rounds of Washington that Hap Arnold was involved, and years later an assistant director of the FBI commented that when the Bureau reached General Arnold in its investigation, it quit.  While the leaker or leakers, the offending newspapers and possibly a United States senator could have been prosecuted, and Harry Stimson was all for it, as a practical matter it was soon seen that it was best to forget the whole thing. Hap was out of town at the time. He had gone to the West Coast to help prepare another flight of B-17s on the way to the Philippines, and to do a little quail shooting with his friend, airplane manufacturer Donald Douglas. First stop for the B-17s, Hickam Field, near the Pearl Harbor channel.(34)