9 - Europe

Summary

In the spirit of ambassadors Grew and Craigie, this chapter searches for diplomatic failings between 1931 and 1941 that contributed to the outbreak of Second World War in Asia and the Pacific. It proceeds from the assumption that diplomacy does not exist merely to prevent war, and that it would therefore be ahistorical simply to tell the story of a litany of diplomatic failures that led to war in Asia and the Pacific. Japanese diplomats tried to delimit the fighting in Manchuria. Two examples of the diplomats' early efforts, and the results, are instructive. In the first example, Shidehara made an urgent phone call soon after the outbreak of fighting to General Kanaya Hanzo, who, as Chief of the Army General Staff, had the authority to call off the operations in Manchuria. In the second example, acting Japanese Consul General Morishima Morito rushed to Lieutenant Colonel Itagaki's residence soon after the outbreak of hostilities and counselled a diplomatic settlement.