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Show MERRWROUiSD Washington, D. C. STRATEGY AGAINST JAPAN Back in 1937-38, Adm. William Leahy, now chief of staff to the White House, devised a strategy against Japan, which, if put into effect, ef-fect, might have prevented Pearl Harbor and even World War II. Today, the old Leahy strategy is being dusted off, especially on Capitol Capi-tol Hill, as the best means of finishing finish-ing the war with Japan. It would save thousands of American lives, its proponents claim, and would serve as an example of how wars can be won or prevented by naval blockade. The proposals made by Admiral Ad-miral Leahy constitute one of the most important and unwritten unwrit-ten chapters In the history of what happened shortly before the war began. Leahy, then chief of naval operations and one of the best strategists the navy has seen in years, saw all too clearly what was coming both in Europe and Asia. At that time, 1937, Japan had just begun her full-scale invasion of China, and it was Leahy's Idea to make an example of Nippon which would show Hitler and Mussolini then feeling their oats that the United States meant business and would stand four-square behind the peace machinery of the world. t Therefore, he proposed to Roosevelt Roose-velt a naval blockade of Japan in cooperation with the British fleet, using the peace machinery of the League of Nations and the nine-power nine-power pact which guarantees the sovereignty of China. Leahy argued that by keeping the U. S. Navy in the Philippines and the British fleet at Singapore, we could cut off all oil, scrap iron, copper, cotton and other war materials ma-terials from Japan. Without these, he argued, the Japanese war machine ma-chine would be powerless and would fold up in six months. Leahy figured fig-ured that the United States would lose its gunboats on the Yangtze river, but that aside from this the main U, S. fleet would not have to fire a single shot. British Start Blockade. President Roosevelt agreed. So did the British. And in the late summer sum-mer of 1937, the British actually detailed de-tailed 6 battleships, 12 cruisers and 20 destroyers to leave British home waters for Singapore. Just at that moment, however, the axis capitals capi-tals apparently got wind of what was happening, and Mussolini started his unofficial submarine campaign off .the coast of Spain which detained the British fleet at Gibraltar. The Panay Incident. At any rate, the plan to blockade Japan, following the failure of the Brussels conference in October, 1937, was dropped. But Admiral Leahy revived it again a year later, when, in December, 1938, the Japs sank the U. S. Gunboat Panay and the British Gunboat Ladybird. Leahy recognized this for what it was, a deliberate attempt by the Jap war lords to test out how much insult the United States would take, and to make Britain and the USA lose face with the Chinese. Accordingly Ac-cordingly he rushed to the state department and all one Sunday afternoon, December 13, 1938, one day after the sinking of the Panay, he urged Cordell Hull to seize this psychological moment to put the blockade of Japan into effect. The British were also willing to cooperate. And, Leahy pointed out, in another year, war, inevitably breaking out in Europe, would tie up the British fleet and they could not possibly help us in the Pacific. Russia, he also pointed out, had 60 submarines at Vladivostok, ready to help us cut off all scrap iron, all oil, all cotton and copper from Japan. Without these, he argued, the Japanese war machine would be paralyzed. Pacing the floor of Hull's office with Leahy was Hugh Wilson, ex-ambassador ex-ambassador to Germany and one of the state department's foremost ap-peasers. ap-peasers. He opposed Leahy at every ev-ery turn, finally convinced cautious Cordell Hull that Leahy was too vigorous, vig-orous, that it was best to appease Japan. Less than one year later, Hitler had invaded Poland, the British fleet was desperately needed to defend British home waters, and the fat was in the fire. From that point on there was no possible way the United States could blockade Japan though many people have never understood why we went to the opposite op-posite extreme and increased our shipments of oil and scrap iron to Japan so that she laid in tremendous reserves before Pearl Harbor. Japan Can Be Starved. But beginning with V-E Day, the possibility of blockading Japan for the first time since 1939 was completely com-pletely reversed. Since V-E Day, the British fleet is entirely free to operate oper-ate in the Pacific. So are Russian submarines. So is the whole might of the U. S. Navy, now no longer needed to watch for submarines in the Caribbean or the Atlantic. Today it is possible to throw up such a naval blockade around the main Jap islands, augmented by air patrols, that hardly a ton of raw materials could reach Jap factories. |