Japan's WWII foreign minister asked Holy See to avert war with U.S., documents show

Goes against the grain of the popular narrative.

If Japanese did not want war ,they should of not attacked Pearl Harbor,what is this mythical understanding lots of Japanese cling too,do not do certain thing and their wil not be adverse consequences

Japan's aggression had already started back in 1931 in the Mukden incident. The plan for Intervention by the Vatican was basically asking the U.S. and the west not to intervene so that Japan could continue to pillage China, and not have to worry about their southern advance into rich oil and rubber "colonies." The so-called alliance with the KMT was just a ploy to use Chinese against Chinese. I don't know if I would label this as a peace initiative, more like disaster mitigation.

Nah, FDR and Churchill wanted America in the war, and they were sure as sugar gonna make it happen one way or another.

Legrande,

Goes against the grain of the popular narrative

Yosuke Matsuoka was arrested as a Class-A war criminal by Douglass MacArthur's GHQ. So, the new fact that he actually made efforts to avoid war with the U.S. in the early days of WW II is something that may go against the grain of a popular belief held by general Americans that he was part of the gang of Japan 1st jingoists.

It's been 77 years since the end of WW II, but it's not too late to revisit the real cause of the war.

It is "sure as sugar" that FDR did not want war with Japan. He did not want a war on two fronts--just on one with Germany, if he could convince a largely antiwar public.

Would be interesting to see how far, if anywhere at all, this went.

I can't really see Hitler's pope having any influence over US diplomacy, though.

FDR took debriefings and directives from advisers, same as now.

The negotiations would have failed had they gone ahead. The Japanese were convinced they were the natural supreme rulers of Asia, that the emporer was a living god, and thus in no mood to compromise their grand scheme of conquering the region.

Even in the last couple of months of the war, when Japan was destroyed as a military force, the Supreme Council had intended on making harsh demands to the Americans thru the Soviets. They were detached from reality.

"Present civilization would be destroyed..."

He was wrong about that! Civilization went on to flourish afterward, thanks to Japan's utter defeat.

According to Wikipedia, Matsuoka was the one who wanted a war with US:

Matsuoka's hostility towards the United States (a vocal opponent of Japan's military campaigns) alarmed Konoe, who wanted to avoid war with the United States.

Also, he was a devoted Nazi and Fascist. Here a picture of Matsuoka with Hitler:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y%C5%8Dsuke_Matsuoka#/media/File:Matsuoka_visits_Hitler.jpg

persuade the United States to refrain from participating in the war and from conducting "provocative acts" against Japan

We could replace "Japan" with "Russia" in this statement, and it would apply to the current situation today.

Nothing is black and white, and maybe Matsuoka did have a change of heart, becoming a pacifist, but it doesn't fit the picture very well...

Quite interesting discovery and it puts in a different context many events of the war afterwards. I look forward to deeper analysis by historians about this.

History is written by the winners.

It is "sure as sugar" that FDR did not want war with Japan. He did not want a war on two fronts--just on one with Germany, if he could convince a largely antiwar public.

Maybe, maybe not. The US and particularly the US Navy had been preparing for a possible war with Japan since the 1920s. The most important technologies that allowed the US Navy to prevail in that war were all developed in the 1920s and 1930s. Not just the refinement of carrier aviation which of course was critical, but also the development of underway replenishment techniques not just for fuel but also ammunition and solid supplies (mastering underway replenishment of ammo and solid stores was a well kept secret then and not well documented even today), high pressure superheated steam propulsion plants (less space and weight and lower fuel consumption for a given horsepower, freeing up space and weight for armaments while allowing ships to sail greater distances at higher speeds than the ships of other navies at the time) and radar. When the Royal Navy returned to the Pacific in 1944 they discovered their ships struggled to keep up with the faster US Navy ships and Royal Navy ships needed to refuel much more often.

The day after the aircraft carriers Enterprise and Hornet left Pearl Harbor the first week of November 1941, almost a month to the day before the Japanese attack on Pearly Harbor, loaded with Marine Corps aircraft to reinforce the garrison on Wake Island the task force commander Admiral Halsey issued a one page op order telling the commanders and officers of the ships in the task group that any Japanese ships encountered in route were to be sunk. Since the US had not declared war on Japan the op order caused quite a bit of commotion in the wardrooms of the task force as officers debated the legality of the order. No Japanese ships were encountered and the carriers returned to Pearl Harbor the evening after the Japanese attack.

@Yrral Where do you get your information from? As Desert Tortoise quoted and I agree from all the historical papers I have read and documentaries, the US and particularly the US Navy had been preparing for a possible war with Japan since the 1920s. So ask yourself this? If you know you are going to be attacked are you going to just sit there and wait for it to happen. This is one of the reason Japan does not have a "First Strike" policy because of the result of that actions they made in the past. That could very well be the answer to your mythical misunderstanding as to why Japanese people that way.

If Japanese did not want war ,they should of not attacked Pearl Harbor,what is this mythical understanding lots of Japanese cling too,do not do certain thing and their wil not be adverse consequences

Sounds more like buyer's remorse after Japan bit off more than it could chew by starting wars in China and Southeast Asia.

Still doesn't contradict the mainstream "narrative" (read: historical fact) about how they were unequivocally the aggressors in WW2, but of course the right-wing nationalists and net uyoku will jump on this tidbit of "evidence" to claim that poor Japan did nothing wrong and were only trying to liberate Asia from Western colonialism.

OK, except for the fact that Japan was surrounded by Russia and French, Dutch, British and US colonies.

The US had no problem with colonizing Hawaii, Wake and Midway Islands and The Philippines. The French had no problems with colonized SE Asia. The British had no problems with brutally colonizing everything they could get their hands on.

Hell, the US killed thousands of Filipinos who dared to want independence from the US. How’s that for irony?

Japan had a realistic fear of being colonized. That’s why they followed the same strategy as the west - colonize to build a buffer and do what the small island monarchy of England did. Build a navy, but the western powers told Japan they weren’t allowed to build a powerful navy.

I wonder why?

So what do you do? Simply accept that real, possible fate of colonization, or resist?

Two sides to every story. If you want to debate something honestly, take the viewpoint other side and see what you come up with.

Japan was on the Allied side during WWI and a racial non-discrimination addendum was voted on in the League of Nations. It passed overwhelmingly, but President Wilson, who had no authority or role whatsoever in the League of Nations, simply “vetoed” it. Huh?

At that point, Japan saw the writing on the wall that they were not allies and needed to protect itself.

Brutality was rampant in colonization and is in war.

Wake and Midway were Terra Nullis, uninhabited and claimed by no other nation, when the US claimed them.

The difference between Russia and the U.S. is that Russia just attacks and invades. The U.S. will go out if its way to try and get you to attack to justify entering war. They need a cause and seek to create one through embargoes or other provocations.

Same desire for war. Different conscience needs.

He was wrong about that! Civilization went on to flourish afterward, thanks to Japan's utter defeat.

Not sure you can call this utterly twisted and mangled mess of steel and concreted neon lit dystopia we live in a flourishing civilisation.

quercetumToday  06:21 pm JST

The difference between Russia and the U.S. is that Russia just attacks and invades. The U.S. will go out if its way to try and get you to attack to justify entering war. They need a cause and seek to create one through embargoes or other provocations.

Same desire for war. Different conscience needs.

There is also a very significant difference, when the U.S. invades a country they may stay for some time but they always leave. Russia, when it invades not only doesn't leave they annex the country to make it their own and even ship the civilians to Russia.

What? What? What? Matsuoka asked the Pope to help stop the war Japan started?

There is also a very significant difference, when the U.S. invades a country they may stay for some time but they always leave. 

Has the US left Japan?

Russia, when it invades not only doesn't leave they annex the country to make it their own and even ship the civilians to Russia.

Are the Russians in Finland and the Finnish in Russia?

Has the US left Japan?

Japan was occupied and administered by the victorious Allies of World War II from the 1945 surrender of the Empire of Japan at the end of the war until the Treaty of San Francisco took effect in 1952.

After that the US played no part in running Japan. The Japanese and the US signed a treat, the Anpo Jyoyaku, establishing US bases in Japan to assist in Japan's self defense.

Japan had a realistic fear of being colonized. 

The Western powers made no attempt to colonize Japan.