l6o FROM ABORTIVE REVOLUTION TO OPEN WAR

we were being assassinated). Admiral Okada looked at his watch
and remarked to his brother-in-law, Matsuo, who was sleeping in
the same room : " Well, my last hour has come but I won't die in
pyjamas." Matsuo replied : " Your life is too valuable to be spared,"
and while Okada dressed, Matsuo ran downstairs and into the garden,
shouting " Banzai/9 where he was pursued and promptly killed, being
mistaken for Okada in the early-morning light.

Five of the police guards were shot and killed at the entrance and
one wounded. Okada was pushed into the servants' quarters and
shut in a closet. There he remained until the next night, wheni
Matsuo's body was removed and Okada, disguised, simply walked
out with the mourners. I should say that Matsuo was the real hero*
of the whole rebellion because, while there were plenty of brave
and loyal police who met death in trying to protect their charges,
they were acting in line of duty and Matsuo's action was
spontaneous altruism.

HIROTA REORGANIZES

March 5, 1936

Cabled to the Department that Hirota has been commanded by
the Emperor to form a cabinet. I am very much pleased because I
believe that Hirota is a strong, safe man and that while he will have
to play ball with the Army to a certain extent, I think that he will
handle foreign affairs as wisely as they can be handled, given the
domestic elements which he will have to conciliate. I think too
that he wants good relations with the United States and will do
what he is able to do in that direction—in other words, as much as
any Japanese Minister could do. If I had had the pick myself, I
know of nobody whom I would have more gladly chosen to head
the Government, with American interests in view. To have chosen
an out-and-out liberal would have been fatal because any Prime
Minister at this juncture must absolutely possess the confidence of *-
the Army and Navy if he is not to be hamstrung at the start.

To our astonishment, Hirota immediately announced the make-up-
of his new cabinet, including Yoshida as Minister for Foreign
Affairs, and the press said that Yoshida was acting as his chief of
staff in choosing the various Ministers. This seemed to us precisely
like waving a red flag at a bull because not only is Yoshida a pro-
nounced liberal but he is the son-in-law of Count Makino. But
naturally the Army wouldn't accept him for a moment, and it was
soon announced that Hirota had run into hot water and was having
difficulty in forming his cabinet and that General Terauchi, h£
choice for Minister of War, would not serve unless a radical alteration
were made in Hirota's slate.

I can't imagine why Hirota made the announcement because he
surely must have known that Yoshida would be impossible and it