Embargo Dbq

On the Japanese side of intelligence, Yamamoto believed to have the element of surprise at Midway, which was thought to draw the Americans out of Pearl Harbor. Yamamoto had numerical naval superiority in the Pacific to defeat the Americans at sea but remained unaware that the code breakers ascertained its operational and strategic plan to attack at Midway. Spector argues that Japanese submarines knew the American forces were planning something at Pearl Harbor, but the intelligence was never passed on to Yamamoto. Additionally, Yamamoto believed that two of the American carriers were sunk at Coral Sea, which the Yorktown was hastily being repaired in Pearl Harbor. In reality, the Japanese had no idea where the American fleet or carriers were leading up to the Battle of Midway.

The second and one of the more underrated reasons Japan attacked Pearl Harbor was because of America putting an embargo on their oil. In August of 1941, America stopped shipping goods to Japan. The many goods America shipped to Japan were vital because it was more of an underdeveloped country and couldn't get the good themselves. As provided in Document D, more than 70% of Japan's oil came from the United States. When that drastically changed it provided a valuable explanation to why Japan declared war.

By the early morning of December 7, 1941 the Japanese Naval force led by Admiral Nagumo had parked his fleet of 6 aircraft carriers 230 nautical miles off the north coast of the Hawaiian Islands completely undetected. The fleet had approximately 423 aircraft with a final destination of Pearl Harbor. At 600 a.m. the first wave of 180 aircraft were launch to attach the sleeping Hawaiian bay. At 702 a.m. an Army radar station sights the aircraft inbound and report to their direct officer who is aware of a squadron of B-17’s due in from the west coast and write off the sighting am friendly forces. This was the first of many mistakes that would become evident within the hour.

Introduction: December 7 1941 marked a significant date, when the Japanese launched a surprise attack on the United States Naval base, Pearl Harbour. The day after the attack, on December 8 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt presented his Infamy Speech to American civilians stating that; “Yesterday, December 7th 1941, a date which will live in infamy, the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan. I asked that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on December 7 1941”. The purpose of this report is to show that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had no prior knowledge about the surprise attack supported by historical evidence in comparison to Robert Stinnett’s thoughts, the American journalist and former sailor that knew about the Japanese planning a attack on Pearl Harbour in advance.

In 1939 the U.S. began an embargo of aircraft and aircraft part against Japan (document c). In July 1941 the United States freezes all Japan assets and bank accounts (document c). Then came August 1941 when U.S imposed an embargo on oil shipment to Japan (document c). The United States had stopped all its trading with the necessities Japan needed. Japan had developed anger with each embargo U.S. had made which lead them to attack Pearl Harbor. In 1937 more than 70% if the oil Japan received was from U.S. (document d). In 1941 oil Japan had received from U.S. by degrees decreased to less than 40% (document d). 341 tons of oil dropped after America throughout time stopped trade with Japan (document d). This shows that the U.S. was trying to weaken Japan economy, so Japan responded by attacking Pearl

Although the naval ships in Hawaii went unprotected, commercial ships did not. On November 25th shipping via the North Pacific was banned. The South Pacific was the now the only transpacific route approved for U.S and Allied ships to use. This is highly suspicious given the Japanese fleet was said to have set sail toward Hawaii the same day this policy was ordered. Some argue that F.D.R did this to protect commercial ships from becoming collateral damage to the Japanese fleet. Others said he made this call to ensure that the Japanese fleet went undetected and that the attack on Pearl Harbor would be successful. Whichever theory one chooses to believe as to why F.D.R made this call, it is apparent that the U.S indeed was at least aware of an attack on the Pacific, if not the precise location and that they took certain measures to protect commercial ships but not naval ones (Pearl Harbor: Hawaii).

21: The impact of the Embargo Act in 1807 was on American shipping and markets,

In January 1941, reports were received that Japan might attack Pearl Harbor but military officials ignored these reports. They considered attacks on the Philippines and other European countries to be more likely, underestimating Japan’s ability to conceal preparations for such an operation. Due to the success of the cryptanalysis machine called, Magic, American leaders started breaking Japanese military operational codes. The codes that were deciphered showed Japan was likely to take some type of military action (Irive). At that time, Japan had only a 12-month supply of petroleum to fuel its economy and war operations left. So the U.S. anticipated Japan would act quickly! The only questions that could not be answered were when and where (Woods). Pearl Harbor had been a major naval base since before 1898. In early

Roosevelt barred the withdrawal of all Japanese funds from American banks. This was the last straw for Japan(Rice 49-52)

During the Imperial Conference of December 1, 1941, Prime Minister Tojo announced that “The United States not only refused to make even one concession” but that “At the same time, the United States, Great Britain, the Netherlands, and China increased their economic and military pressure against us” (87). This gave Japan no choice but to begin a war with the U.S., Japan, and the Netherlands. Additionally, Foreign Minister Togo emphasized that Japan could not accept the proposal made by the U.S. because the conditions would hinder and put at risk the success of the Japanese Empire. In order for Japan to not only continue working towards establishing a New Order for East Asia, but to also maintain their position on an international level, war was the necessary step to take because if they continued to try to negotiate then they would most definitely have regressed.

Before any of this occurred, in 1930 the United States should have taken action against Japan, but never did. They didn’t like Japan’s attitude towards China and other countries. Again, in 1940, the United States should have done something, but this time not military action. The United States tried to negotiate peace, with Japan, but nothing ever got going (Danforth, 1). Neither side could agree on one thing because they thought of them as “still a country with similar goals” and it ended in a stalemate, causing tensions to run high. This was a dangerous end to talks because Japan was already in the second World War. The United States should have and many people were expecting something to happen, but were completely oblivious to the attack on the morning of December 7, 1941. Several people were convinced that President Roosevelt had been putting pressure on Japan to make an attack on the United States, but evidence suggests otherwise (Vidyalankar, 847-856). When George Washington was president, he declared that the United States would stay out of foreign conflicts, but this was broken before World War II so that had no effect on the president’s decision making. President Roosevelt

"In very exceptional cases, they made no mention of their plans or movements to any of their embassies, so that, in these instances, there were no codes to decipher. The attack on Pearl Harbour was such a case" (Ford,

World War II, along with its numerous battles, brought great tension between two of the strongest countries during the 1940s: the United States and Japan. Conflict between these two countries started with Japan’s push past Chinese borders into Manchuria in search of the natural resources Japan lacks. At first, the United States avoided military action with Japan by waging economic warfare on them. This economic pressure included the passing of the Neutrality Act, which prohibited the sale of weapons to nations at war (Nash 513). Additionally, the United States placed oil embargoes on Japan hoping it would force Japan to shut down military operations in China. Japan, at a critical decision point, decided to bomb the American naval base

The writers and director of Pearl Harbor did, however, have some parts of history correct in their film. Steve Biodrowski states “that U.S. military intelligence should perhaps have done a better job of predicting the attack.” Which is very true and realistic because according to the book; Reflections of Pearl Harbor: An Oral History of December 7, 1941: “The Japanese government began transmitting a fourteen-part encoded message that reached those in charge in Washington, DC, just prior to the scheduled

attacked the US. This shows that the proper chance to avoid war with Japan was given, and that