A WARNING THAT JAPAN FAILED TO H££D 985

assassinations in due course, for the Japanese Government, with all
its totalitarianism and regimentation, will never be able to control th<-
military and the fanatics as they are controlled in Germany and Italy.

From my three or ^ four talks with the new Foreign Minister,
Matsuoka, I have the impression of a loose talker but of a man who
is patently straightforward and sincere according to his lights. I
think that he genuinely wants to bring about better relations with the
United States and will do what he finds it possible to do in that
direction. But what he may find it possible to do remains to be
seen and we can only judge from facts and actions. At any rate,
he is the first Foreign Minister that I have known in Japan with
whom one can talk " off the record " with entire frankness. Arita's
habitual " caution " is not evident in Matsuoka, and when I compare
him with the sphinx Count Uchida, I see the exemplification of the
extremes of diplomatic technique.

Prince Konoye I regard as a man of weak physique, poor health,
and weak will, who was most reluctantly catapulted into his present
position owing to his family name and tradition and by the force of
irresistible circumstances. He has a mighty job on his hands and it
will be intensely interesting to see what he can do with it.

That, roughly, is the set-up at the end of August.

A WARNING THAT JAPAN FAILED TO HEED

September 2, 1940

One of my liberal Japanese friends says that he has just seen Count
Kaneko * at Hayama, and that although the old gentleman is still
suffering from kidney trouble and skin disease he intends to come
to Tokyo soon for a meeting of the Privy Council, and will call on
me then to thank me for my visit last summer. I told my friend
that I would gladly call on Count Kaneko myself if this would save
his strength.

My friend said that Count Kaneko has heard rumours that American
business men are not disposed to conduct business with Japan at
present. He assumed that this report is not true but that General
Haraguchi is going over to the United States to find out what the
trouble is. I told my friend, and asked him to repeat it to Count
Kaneko, that the depredations of the Japanese military people in
China against American business and other interests are steadily
getting worse rather than better, and that the general situation
which I explained to Count Kaneko through my friend last spring
shows the reverse of any improvement. I sketched out this situation
in some detail, and told him that American trade and business in
China which have been built up through generations are being
effectively stopped by Japanese monopolies, exchange restrictions, and
other totally illegal methods because the Japanese want to control
the whole business field economically, financially, and politically.
x Elder statesman ; former friend of Theodore Roosevelt.