Bankrupting the Enemy: The U.S. Financial Siege of Japan Before Pearl Harbor Paperback – February 15, 2023

Ed Miller is a retired top financial and foreign trade executive turned historian. It would be hard to imagine a better background for an exploration of U.S. economic steps against Japan in the years before Pearl Harbor (and 1941 especially), and it would be equally hard to imagine anyone doing a better job. He has cast a very clear and bright spotlight beam on an important part of the story of the process by which the Pacific War came to be initiated in 1941, a part never nearly so adequately illuminated before this.The story is complex and technical, and Miller does a masterful job of following multiple interwoven strands and clarifying their relationships, while explaining the technicalities in accessible terms. He explains the rather scattered and uncoordinated process by which the Roosevelt Administration came to impose a pervasive financial freeze and a total embargo of oil shipments within days of one another in July 1941. He shows how and why it was the freeze that was in fact the more fatal blow -- a fact appreciated at the time by the Japanese themselves. The freeze meant that in practice the Japanese were shut out not only from oil purchases but from virtually all purchases of any kind, not only in America but throughout the world. And he explains clearly how the mechanisms of the freeze and the various stages of embargoes worked, making it clear why some of the earlier stages were in fact largely ineffective or symbolic.Miller explores in detail -- for the first time anywhere, to my knowledge -- the extent of American knowledge and ignorance regarding Japan's actual financial and physical resources. The United States had very little in the way of formal intelligence gathering and analysis on the eve of Pearl Harbor -- certainly nothing resembling the CIA. Nevertheless, in certain respects U.S. officials did not do so badly in their estimates, allowing for active Japanese efforts to deceive and mislead them. Yet he also shows that there was no real effort to assess the impacts of embargoes or a freeze on the life of Japan. It would have been a big undertaking in those distant, pre-computer days, and the government of that era simply did not have the resources to conduct such analyses. In addition, of course, much more attention was focused on Germany, a greater threat than Japan.If Miller's spotlight beam is exceptionally clear and bright it also quite narrow. It could scarcely be otherwise -- the book would be impossibly long and complex if it covered all aspects of the story in comparable depth. But the reader must bear its limitations in mind, especially as Miller does little to point them out.First, although Miller concentrates almost exclusively on the Washington story, he does not really cover all of it. He probes the workings of the Executive Branch and its internal politics in what I feel confident will prove to be definitive detail, but largely neglects the outside influences that bore on it. Polls of the period -- which he does not mention -- clearly show a public growing more and more hostile to Japan and its aggressions in Asia, and restive about their government's response. Prominent and influential newspapers and commentators, also largely ignored, stridently urged action and berated the administration for its perceived failings. On Capitol Hill, powerful figures increasingly threatened to act if the administration failed to. The book would have benefited from a much more thorough analysis of these forces and their effects, or at very minimum, more acknowledgement of their presence.Nor does Miller speak more than very passingly of the considerations of geo-strategy and military operations, nor of the issues of allied relationships and solidarity. Yet the record is clear that President Roosevelt and his chief advisors focused far more on these than on those of economics and trade -- and that the Japanese leaders did too.Miller's bibliography cites the volume on "The Final Confrontation," (ISBN 0231080247) from the massive series of translations from and informed commentaries on the Japanese series on "Japan's Road to the Pacific War" (Taiheiyo senso e no michi) edited by James William Morley. But it is not clear what use he made of it, or a few other works he cites relating to the Japanese end of the game, for the picture he gives of Tokyo and its workings is not only narrow but one-dimensional. There were at least as many plots and counter-plots in Tokyo as in Washington, and no equivalent of a Franklin Roosevelt to even partly referee them.In particular, there is no real analysis of the role that the embargoes and freeze played in Japanese decisions. Right from the beginning, Japanese conservative historians have consistently sought to make the United States the driver of events in 1941, with Japan following the rule that, "He must needs go that the devil drives." A certain segment of American historians advance similar views, and Miller in effect joins them. There is no question that some influential Japanese cited the trade cutoffs of the end of July as part of their rationale for war. Yet as the Morely volume makes clear, there were powerful voices urging war with the United States before the freeze and oil embargo, and some who indeed made it clear that they were actually courting such moves in order to solidify their case for war.It is certainly possible that the United States could have appeased Japan as late as September or perhaps even October in 1941, and the price of appeasement would have included allowing free trade, as Miller says. But the price would most surely have included a very great deal more, and he says nothing of that. In any event, to imagine that Roosevelt's failure to do his utmost to appease Japan at whatever price makes him guilty of causing the war is surely unbalanced. Miller does not say this, and I doubt very much that he intends it, but it is the impression that his book is very liable to leave, if read in isolation.This is not the first book one should read in seeking to understand the causes of the Pacific War and the process by which it came about, and certainly not the only one. But it most certainly is one that should be read. Ed Miller has done a great service in writing it.

I devoured this book.....I’ve yet to fully digest it, however.I was looking for a comprehensive description of the trade and financial embargoes against Japan prior to Pearl Harbor. I got the financial aspects of it in excruciating detail, but the various trade embargoes were only mentioned briefly and their genesis practically ignored.BUT , if you want how money and specie were used as a deliberate and effective weapon against Japan, this is the best exposition I’ve ever read. A lot of detail and a lot of dates and names. Thoroughly researched and annotated, everything is here. I think an undergraduate degree in finances would help in your immediate enjoyment of the book; a financial layperson, such as myself, had to struggle. But in my opinion, it was worth the effort.

Not much to say except that this book is a must read for everyone who is interested in the origins of the Pacific War or World War II.Author Miller does an excellent job of depicting Japan's vulnerable economy, desperately needing foreign exchange but being dependent on silk as its mainstay in foreign trade. Japan possessed (& possesses) few natural resources and was forced to import its oil, iron ore, metal scrap, and almost all products needed to grow its economy or carry on a war.The US played the role of spoiler, attempting to hold Japan's economic survival hostage to its international good behavior (as seen by Roosevelt), and the leaders of Japan could not allow that to continue for many reasons, not the least of which was the belief in Japan's destiny to rule the East. The activities of Acheson under Roosevelt's guidance are fascinating, and the reader is carried along as in a suspense novel leading toward a catastrophic conclusion. The author blends facts and figures with activities and policies with amazing ease.My only criticism stems from the missing links to external events and the fears and attitudes of others. For example, the freeze of July, 1941, closely followed the invasion of the Soviet Union by Germany, and there is substantial evidence that Roosevelt sought open hostilities with Japan while the Russians were still in the field. By November, 1941, many in Roosevelt's administration felt that Moscow was imperiled and that the Russians could soon collapse, leaving Britain and the US to face Germany alone and the very distinct probability that Japan would then choose to honor the Tripartite Pact and enter the fray at the most opportune moment. Without going into a full discussion of Pearl Harbor, there is nonetheless much evidence that Roosevelt was aware that an attack was coming, but felt the US could weather the blows. This book records the tightening of the screws on Japan until Japan launched its attack before the Soviet Union was defeated (although, of course, it never was) because of economic reasons rather than political ones. One wonders if Roosevelt had not taken the tack he did and begun supplying the Soviet Union with critical items in the winter of 1941, would Germany have prevailed? I think not, but there is no arguing that the assistance of the US to Britain and Russia was vastly more helpful sooner than later.At any rate, Acheson's activities are more understandable in this light, as is the ever-increasing economic and diplomatic pressure on Japan by the US up to Pearl Harbor.So in the end, it was the economic situation that caused the Japanese to attack when they did, not the political attitudes or timing due to the other events in World War II. In effect, Roosevelt launched a spoiling attack against Japan using economics that was very effective in changing the timing of events more to the US's advantage. That is the reason this book is so important, and it is recommended to all serious students of World War II.