HISTORY PAPER

Foreign Affairs in the l920's

During the l920's Congress and President Harding attempted to balance isolationism with independent internationalism—in other words, a foreign policy of semi-isolation. This approach involved the recognition of responsibility in helping solve world problems out of self-interest, but never to the point of becoming involved in military action.

 Some scholars argued the disastrous failure of Wilson and Congress' inability to pass the Treaty of Versailles, and join the League of Nations, undermined the ability of European powers to aggressively check the policies, activities, and events occurring in the world that led to World War II. The U.S. unofficially attended conferences on white slavery, the opium trade, and international labor standards—as long as they were in a consultancy capacity.

 President Harding's Secretary of State, Charles Evans Hughes, attempted to push the U.S. into the World Court and internationalism between 1921 and l935 when it failed for the last time. To Secretary Hughes's credit, he respected the necessity of international law and warned America could not retreat completely. With few options, he pursued a foreign policy described as independent internationalism with two goals:

a. Limiting the possibility of war through non-military means, using treaties and conferences to bring about disarmament lessening the likelihood of war.

b. The penetration of American economic power to penetrate countries and using this dominance to influence their foreign policy. Often referred to as Pax Americana, putting American financial resources in positions to control critical areas of the world.

Recognition of the potential impact of economic and natural resources on the world's stage occurred during WWI. The U.S. dipped deeply into its funds to help float the allied powers to victory during WWI.

Indeed, oil had transformed wood-burning fleets to modern oil-burning navies. Oil became as precious as "blood," creating a need that created high tensions and anxieties from the end of WWI to World War II. European and Asian allies immediately understood this importance to military power and rushed to control the giant oil fields in the Middle East—Palestine and Mesopotamia. Indeed, by l919, Britain had cornered 50% of the world's oil reserves. Countries were not happy with this, included the U.S., who badgered France and Britain into allowing the United States into the oil consortium by l928.

 C. Washington Conference l921:

An example of Hughes' attempt at disarmament was the so-called Five Power Treaty, consisting of the U.S., Britain, Japan, Italy, and France. Under the treaty, the U.S. agreed to destroy 30 ships and asked Britain and Japan to follow suit, as a gesture of goodwill. The agreement also established a ratio of 5—5—3—1.7—1.7, regulating the size of each country's navy. Japan was not happy, but as long as the U.S. agreed not to establish further military bases in the Pacific, Guam, and the Philippines, and maintained the open door, they could live with it. The smaller ratios for Japan and France made the French even unhappier. Secretary Hughes had several other conferences resulting in the Four Power and Nine-Power Treaties—all designed to regulate the size of navies for major countries navies with the hope of disarmament.

Perhaps the most glaring act of self-delusion American foreign policy during the 1920s was the Kellogg-Briand Pact (1928). France and the United States wanted nations to formally pledge to reject war as an instrument of national policy to resolve differences. French Foreign Minister Aristide Briand and Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg brokered the Pact. Only a defensive response to being attacked was acceptable. It offers an easy way out for the 28 signatories. Ultimately ineffective and dismissed as an "international kiss" and "a letter to Santa Claus."

Japan and the road to Pearl Harbor

Since the l860s, when Commodore Perry visited the Rising Sun, the Japanese looked highly on American civilization, especially during the early part of the 20th century. They believe it was a first-class culture with a strong military.

During the l920's, Japan even modeled its cultural renaissance after the roaring 20s. They loved jazz, had the flappers [moja, women and the men the mobo]. They enjoyed golf, baseball, and movies. However, it is essential to point out this affection was more prevalent in urban Japanese cities than in the rural countryside.

Still, as much as Japan wanted to imitate America, particularly in its growth as a significant economic and military power, there always existed ambivalence and tensions between the two countries.

Indeed these problems and tensions with are present decades before Japan attacks Pearl Harbor (December 7, l941):

a. The issue of "contiguity" (the state of being contiguous; contact or proximity).

b. Spanish-America War(1898) and America's annexation of Hawaii

c. Despite Japan's prowess in the Russo-Japanese war (1904-1905), it only received the Sakhalin Islands.

d. The Gentleman's Agreement (1908) attempted to establish Jim Crow on the American West Coast.

e. During the Treaty of Versailles (1919), the Western countries spurned Japan's

request for a declaration of race equality.

f. The perception by America and some allies that Japan entered WWI only to further its ambitions to create a New Eastern Order. Indeed, one critical reason was Japan's geo-economic limitations and lack of natural resources (land).

g. The Japanese chaffed at the general lack of American aid and support during the Tokyo-Yokohama Earthquake 1923.

h. The National Origins Act of 1924, which the United States allotted Japan a minimal number of immigrants, infuriated the Japanese. In response, Japan warned the United States of "grave consequences." The Japanese were very racially sensitive declared the bill "National Humiliation Day" in Japan.

 Following the National Origins Act (1924), a decade of Japanese aggression begins:

a. Japan argued that, like America's use of the Monroe Doctrine in Latin and South America, they too had special contiguity with countries in the Pacific and Asia, especially Southern Manchuria and Eastern Mongolia.

b. As early as l915, Japan attempted to force this notion on Chinese Manchuria through the "twenty-one" demands. However, the U.S. forced Japan to withdraw almost all in the Washington Conference (1921).

c. As early as l921, America settled on Japan as a rival, not a friend. Indeed books were written predicting an eventual war with Japan.

d. Despite Japan's retreat in l921, it continued to pursue the country's "New Eastern Order."

However, Japan faced two problems to become a world power ("New Eastern Order"):

a. The vast countryside rejected modernization and Western culture. Increasingly, Japanese fundamentalists denounced everything modern and western as corrupt.

b. Moreover, the lack of Japan's natural resources hampered the country's economic expansion. Increasingly, the Japanese military criticized their business approach to advancing Japan's goal of becoming a world power. During the 1920s, the army went into rural areas proselytizing and recruiting poor Japanese youth to help "make Japan great again." The great depression aided the military's goal, which ravaged the Japanese economy two years earlier than the United States. The suffering further widened the opportunity for the ultra-nationalistic military to dominate Japan.

The Japanese Military 1931 to 1941:

a. By l931, the military caste had recruited thousands of poor, rural Japanese males as young as 14, desperately wanting to belong to something special. Through military indoctrination, they became soldiers fanatically believing they owed their lives to the military.

b. The military caste replaced the business leaders and the Diet (Japanese Parliament) as the dominant force in government. The military declared the path to greatness as a world power would come through military expansion, not a business.The annexation and seizure of territory would guarantee Japan's greatness by being "self-sufficient."

c. In l929, Russia's invasion and appropriation of China's Manchuria, rich with minerals and fertile land, influenced the Japanese military to pursue the same policy.

The final events leading to Pearl Harbor:

a. In l931, the Japanese attacked the rich, coal, soybean, iron, and timber-rich Manchuria. They installed the puppet government of "Manchukuo" and sent Japanese settlers to begin harvesting these resources.

b. In l935, the Japanese informed the United States it wanted out of the 5—5—3—1.7—1.7 disarmament treaty of l921.

c. Two years later, the Japanese fabricated another excuse to attack Manchuria again. The attack on Nanking, China, was brutal, barbaric, sparing neither men, women, or children. It is a brutal, barbaric attack on Chinese men, women, and children centered in the area called Nanking. The attack killed more than 300,000 Chinese, inflicting death, torture, and sexual pleasure against defenseless Chinese women. Historically, the act compared the Nazi extermination of Jews in brutality and sexual depravity, a few years later (see pictures at the end of the notes).

d. During WWII, the Japanese forced 200,000 Korean women to be their sex slaves inflicting every conceivable sadistic act on their so-called comfort women. Korean women who survived were emotionally dead. See YouTube's video on the Rape of Nanking and Korea.

e. In the same year, the Japanese sink a small American naval boat, the Panay in December, l937, killing two soldiers and wounding 30. Japan apologizes and offers to pay 2 million in reparations. However, it became a pattern with the Japanese, expanding in the Pacific, while apologizing for violating the open door policy.

f. On December 7, l941, the Japanese executed a long-planned attack on the American fleet at Pearl Harbor.

g. America immediately declares war on Japan.

The following are pictures of Japanese soldiers during the attack on Nanking from Iris Chang's, The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II