US-Japan Negotiations In 1941-An Analysis Of The Process And The Reasons For The Final Rupture

As an event of crucial importance in US-Japan relation, the Pearl Harbor Attacktriggered off the Pacific War and ultimately led to the breakout of the Second World War.Seeking to avoid the war, America and Japan started a series of negotiations in 1941 whichlasted for nine months before the raid. However, as the domestic and internationalsituations changed drastically, US-Japan relation had been exacerbated during thenegotiations which eventually broke down and contributed to the inevitability of the war.The thesis starts with US-Japan relation in modern times and expounds on the two nations'policies in the Far East. Through a review of the whole process of the US-Japannegotiations in 1941, the thesis analyses the gradual intensification of US-Japan collision,and examines the reasons for the final rupture of the negotiations from diplomatic,economic, and cultural perspectives.This paper is divided into three parts. The first part, which traces the origin of theUS-Japan relation, reviews the development of the US-Japan conflict in the Far East aswell as the formation of the two states' policies in the Far East in modern era,and analysesthe differences of their policies and the factors that give rise to these differences. Thesecond part describes in details the process of the US-Japan negotiation in 1941 ere theoutbreak of the war. In spite that both America and Japan adjusted their policies to thechangeable international climate, the two countries, which were in irreconcilable conflictwith each other, failed to avoid the "fatal antagonism" between them, which led to the war.The last part of the paper analyses the factors causing the final rupture of the US-Japannegotiations.