WHY WE FIGHT A series of seven information films
WAR COMES TO AMERICA Information Film #7
Produced by the: WAR DEPARTMENT ARMY PICTORIAL SERVICE
For: INFORMATION AND EDUCATION DIVISION Music by: The Army Air Force Orchestra
I pledge alliance to the flag, of The United States of America,
...and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God...
...indivisible with justice and liberty for all...
...in the jungles of New Guinea,
...on the barren shores of the Aleutians...
...in the tropic heat of the Pacific Islands,
...in the sub-zero cold over the skies of Germany,
...in Burma and Iceland,
...the Philippines and Iran,
...France,
...in China and Italy,
Americans, fighting.
Fighting over an area extending seven-eights of the way around the world.
Men from the green hills of New England,
...the sun-baked plains of the Middle West,
the cotton fields of the South,
...the close-packed street of Manattan, Chicago...
...the teaming factories of Detroit, Los Angeles...
...the endless stretching distances of the Southwest...
...men from the hills and from the plains, men from the villages and the cities...
...Bookkeepers, soda jerks, mechanics,
...college student, rich man, poor man,
...beggar man, thief, doctor, lawyer,
merchant, chief, now veteran fighting men.
Yet two years ago, many had never fired a gun, Seen the ocean, or been of the ground.
Americans. Fighting for their country while half a world away from it.
Fighting for their country and more than their country.
Fighting for an idea.
An idea bigger than the country.
Without the idea, the country might only have remained a willingness.
Without the country, the idea might have remained only a dream.
Over this ocean,
1607, Jamestown...
1620, Plymouth Rock...
Here was America.
The sea, the sky, the virgin continent.
We came in search of freedom, facing Unknown dangers rather than bend...
...the knew of bow to tyranny.
Out of the native oak and pine, we built a house, a church, a watchtower.
We cleared a field and there grew up a colony of free citizens.
We carved new states out of the green wilderness.
Virginia, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Carolina.
Then came the first test in the defense of that liberty.
1775, Lexington
Our leader spoke our deepest needs.
Colonists are by the law of nature free-born, as indeed all men are!"- James Otis
It is the right of the people to alter or abolish and to institute new government."- Thomas Jefferson
These are the times that try mers souls." - Thomas Paine
...but as for me, give me liberty or give me death."- Patrick Henry
In the midst of battle it happened.
The idea grew. The idea took form.
Something new was expressed by men. A new and revolutionary doctrine.
The greatest created force in human relations.
All men are created equal."
All men are entitled to the blessings life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
That's the goal we had set for ourselves.
If it meant hanging, victory meant a world in which Americans rule themselves.
1777, Valley Forge
We fought and froze, suffered and died.
For what? For the future freedom of all Americans.
A few of us doubted and despaired, most of us prayed and endured it all.
1781, Yorktown
Now we were a free-independent nation...
...the new idea had won its first test.
Now to pass it on to future Americans.
The Constitution. The sacred charter of "We the people..."
The blood and sweat of "We the people..."
The life, liberty, and happiness of "We the people..."
The people were to rule. Not some of the people, Not the best people or the worst,
...not the rich people or the poor, but "We the people..."
All the people.
Proclaim liberty throughout all the land, unto all the inabitants thereof"
In this brotherhood America was born.
One nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
It began as 13 states along the Atlantic seaboard.
We pushed along the Allegiances, the Ohio River,
...the Mississippi, the last far range of the distant Rockies.
We carried freedom with us. No aristocratic classes here.
No King, no Nobel, or Prince.
No State Church, no courts, no parasites.
No divine right of man to rule man.
Here humanity was making a clean fresh start from scratch.
Behind we left new states. Chips of the old block, woven together by freedom.
Until finally we were one nation.
A land of hope and opportunity that had risen out of a skeptical world.
A light was shining. Freedom's light.
From every country and every climb, men saw that light and tuned their faces towards it."
Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free...
...the wretched refuge of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-toots to me.
I lift my lamp beside the golden door"
As stranger to one another we came, and built a country.
And the country built us into Americans.
The sweat of man from all nations, was poured out to build a new.
The sweat of our first Shepard, the English, the Scots,
...the Dutch, building the workshop of New England.
And the Italian in the sulfur mines of Louisiana.
Of the Frenchmen and the Swiss in the vineyards of California and New York state.
Of the Dane, the Norwegian, the Swede.
Seeding the good earth to make the mid-west bloom with grain.
Of the Pole and the Welsh.
Of the Negro harvesting cotton in the hot southern sun.
Of the Spaniard, the first to roam the great southwest...
...of the Mexican in the oil fields of Texas.
And on the ranches of New Mexico.
Of the Greek and the Portuguese harvesting the crop the ocean yielded.
Of the German with his technical skills.
Of the Hungarian and the Russian.
Of the Irish, the Slav and the Chinese working side by side.
The sweat of Americans, and a great nation was built.
Yes, the sweat of all nations built America and the blood.
For the blood of Americans has been freely shed.
Five times in our history, have we withstood The challenge to the idea that made our nation.
The idea for all men of life, liberty and the pursuit happiness.
The idea that made us, the people we are.
Let's take a look at ourselves, before we went into this war.
Well, first of all, we're a working people, on the land, at a workbench, at a desk.
And we're an inventive people. The lightening rod,
...the cotton gin, the telegraph,
...the blessed anaesthesia of ether,
...the rotary printing press, the telephone,
...electric welding, the incandescent lamp,
...submarine, steam turbine,
the motor driven airplane, the x-ray tube,
the gyroscope compass, the sewing machine,
...and television. All these, and countless more bear witness to our invent ness.
And this intentness and enterprise,
plus our hard-won democratic ideals for the greatest good for the greatest number,
...created for the average man the highest standard of living in the world.
32 and a half million registered automobiles,
Two-thirds of all the automobiles there are in the world.
We demand the highest standards in sanitation,
...purity of food, medical care.
Our hospitals are marvels for the world to copy.
We want the best for the average man, woman and child.
Particularly child. We have reduced the hazard of being born,
From then on we protect, foster and generally spoil the majority of our children.
But it doesn't seem to hurt them much. They go to school,
...all kinds of schools. To kindergarten,
...public schools, private schools, trade schools,
...high schools, to 25,000 high schools,
...and to college.
In the last war, 20% of all the men in the armed forces had been to high school or college.
In this war, 63%.
We're a great two-weeks vacation people.
We hunt and we fish, up north and down south,
...back east, out west. When the season opens, we hunt and fish.
We're a sports-loving people.
And we're probably the travel ingest nation in all history...
...we love to go places.
We have the cars, we have the roads, we have the scenery.
We don't need passports, but sometimes we need alibis.
We sleep by the road, we eat by the road.
The foreigner is enchanted and amazed at what we like to put on our stomach's.
And we're a great joining people, we join clubs.
Fraternities, unions, federations.
Shove a blank at us, we'll sign up.
Radios, we have on in the living room,
...the dining room,
...the bedroom,
...the bathroom, in our cars,
...in our hands and up our sleeves.
Music. We couldn't be without it.
The Press? Yes, it's the biggest.
But most important, it's the freest on earth.
Over 12,000 newspapers, with all shades of opinions.
Books on ever-conceivable subject. And more than 6000 different magazines.
Not counting the comics.
Churches? We have every denomination on earth.
60 million of us, regularly attend.
And no one dares tell us, which one to go to.
We elect our own neighbors to govern us.
We believe in individual enterprise and opportunities, for men and women alike.
We make mistakes, we see the results.
We correct the mistakes.
We skyrocket into false prosperities,
...and then plummet down into false needless depressions.
But in spite of everything, we never lose our faith in the future.
We believe in the future, we build for the future.
Yes, we build for the future and the future always catches up with us.
Before we're done building, we've developed something new, and have to start rebuilding.
That's roughly the kind of people we are.
Boasting, easy-going, sentimental, but underneath,
...passionately dedicated to the ideals our forefathers passed on to us.
The liberty and dignity of man.
We've made great material progress, but Spiritually we're still in the frontier days.
Yet deep down in us, there is a yearning for peace and good-will toward men.
Somehow we feel, that if men thru their minds towards the fields of peace,
...as they have towards the fields of transportation,
...communication or aviation,
...wars would soon be old-fashioned as the horse and buggy days.
We hate war. We know that in war, it is the common man who does the paying.
The suffering, the dying. We bend over backwards to avoid it.
But let our freedoms be endanger, and we'll pay and suffer and fight to the last man.
That is the American. That is the way of living, For which we fight today.
Why?
Is that fight necessary? Did we want war?
In 1917, before most of you fighting men were born,
our fathers fought the first World War to make the world safe for democracies, for the common man.
They fought a good fight and won it.
There was to be no more war in their time, and their childrers time.
Faithful to our treaty obligations, we destroyed much of our naval tonnage.
Our army went on a reducing diet, until it became little more than a skeleton.
For us, war was to be outlawed. For us, Europe was far away.
And as for Asia, well that was really out of this world.
Where everything looked like it was torn from the National Geographic.
Yet in this remote spot in Asia, in 1931,
...while most of you were playing ball in the sand lots,
...this war started.
Without warning, Japan invaded Manchuria.
Once again, men who where peaceful, became slaves of the men who where violent.
In Washington D.C. Our Secretary of State, made a most vigorous protest.
The American Government, does not intend to recognize any situation
...treaty or agreement, which may be brought about by means of aggression.
But we the people, hadrt much time to think about Manchuria,
...we were wrestling with the worst depression in our history.
Some of us were out of jobs. Some of us stood in bread lines.
Some of us suffered homemade aggression.
Some of us were choked with dust.
Some of us had no place to go.
Two years later, in 1933, while most of you Were graduating from High School,
...we read that a funny little man called Hitler, had come into power in Germany.
We heard that a thing called the Nazi Party had taken over.
Today we rule Germany, tomorrow, the world!"
What kind of talk was that?
It must only be hot air.
In 1935, about the time you had your first date,
We read that strutting Mussolini had attacked far of Ethiopia.
The disease seemed to be spreading, so Congress assembled, to insulate us against the growing
friction of war.
"We want no war. We'll have no war, say in defense of our own people for our own honor."
Toward this end, our chosen representatives Passed the Neutrality Act.
No nation at war, could buy manufactured arms or munitions from the United States.
In 1936, when you were running around in jalopies,
...we were disturbed by news from Spain.
In our news reels we saw German and Italian air forces and armies...
...fighting in Spain and wondered what they were doing there.
For the first time we saw great cities squashed flat.
Civilians bombed and killed.
In November of 1936, the American Institute of Public Opinion,
...known as the gallop poll,
...asked a representative of a cross-section of the American people,
If another war develops in Europe,
...should America take part again?"
NO! 95%
We the people had spoken. Nineteen out of twenty had said, "Include us out!"
...to further insulate ourselves, we added a cash and carry amendment to the Neutrality Act.
Not only wouldn't we sell munitions, we wouldn't sell anything at all.
Not even a spool of thread, unless warring powers sent their own ships and paid cash on the line.
In 1937 the Press services received a flash from Asia...
...launch all out China war... intensive.
Yes, the Japs were turning Asia into a slaughterhouse.
But for us, Asia was still far away.
In September of 1937, the gallop poll asked us,
In the present fight between Japs and China, are your...
...sympathies with either side?"
With China 43%, with Japan 2%
Undecided 55%.
We hadrt made up our minds about China.
Our Neutrality Act, barred sales of armaments only to nations at war.
The Japanese had not declared war, so we went right on selling scrap iron and gasoline to Japan.
In March of 1938, Hitler had not declared war either.
But his goose-stepping army suddenly smashed in and occupied all the soil of Austria.
Six months later, Hitler and his stooge met the anxious democracy at Munich.
Hitler promised peace in our time, if Britain And France would give him that part of
Czechoslovakia know as the Sudetenland.
Britain and France gave him that part of Czechoslovakia hoping...
...to avert war.
Now we had his word. Peace in our time.
At home we began to hear strange headlines.
Extra! Extra! F.B.I. Captures Nazi spy ring!
We sat in our theatres unbelieving, as motion pictures exposed Nazi espionage in America.
Dear Gentlemen, we know that if America is to be free,
...we must destroy the chain that ties the whole misery...
...of American politics together. And that is the United States Constitution.
Could these things really be?
Yes these subversive acts, were happening in real life, everyday.
German-American bands organized for the purpose of destroying us,
...marched under our very noses.
I pledge undivided allegiance to the flag of The United States of America.
As a republic for which it stand, under one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
In our Press we read the news from abroad, that Nazis were spending millions...
...arming Germany to the teeth.
We read that the Tokyo diet was Appropriating tremendous sums,
...converting Japan into one vast munitions plant.
We watched these supposedly poor, have-not nations, spend huge sums for armament,
...and we wondered why.
Arrogantly, they told us why.
They had declared war on us long before the shooting had started.
We have actually been at war since the day when we lifted the flag of our revolution
against the democratic world!" ...- Mussolini
The Germans are a noble and unique race to whom the earth was given by the Grace of God." Hitler
The world must come to look up to our emperor as the great ruler of all nations." Lord Hotta
When the people of these three nations, elected To follow their leaders, death incorporated...
They organized to smash personal freedom,
...equality of man,
...freedom of speech,
...freedom of religion.
Organized to smash the very principals that made us the people we are.
So in December 1938, when the gallop poll asked us,
Should the United Sates increase the strength of its Army, Navy and Air Force?"
We answered YES 85%
It was time to look to our defense.
Gentlemen this is the Military Affairs Committee House of Representatives,
...meeting for the purpose of considering
...national defense.
The Navy is asking for an increase of 25%,
...in authorized Naval tonnage, in view of the grave international situation.
Congress, reflecting the voice of the people,
...appropriated the largest sum for military use, ever voted during peace in American history.
We didn't dream that a few years later it would look like peanuts.
On March 14, 1939, Adolf Hitler broke the pledge he made at Munich.
He took over all the rest of Czechoslovakia.
There would be no more peace in our time.
April 7, 1939. As we here in America observe Good Friday.
Extra paper, extra paper! Italy attacks Albania!"
The picture was becoming clear. The conquering forces of violence were...
...being set loose in the world.
In a last desperate effort to avert a World War,
President Roosevelt sent messages to Hitler and Mussolini
...asking their promise to respect the independence of 33 countries.
To Adolf Hitler, this message was a huge joke, as he repeated the names.
This was the only answer that the President received.
On September 1, 1939, the Nazi army smashed into Poland.
Warsaw
England and France had a treaty with Poland. Would they act now?
At home, we listened:
Adolf Hitler's all out attack on Poland,
...makes the long-dreaded European war a certainty."
Prime Minister Chamberlain of Great Britain gave the Nazi leader...
...a zero hour for withdrawing his troops from Poland."
That zero hour ends now. At this time we transfer you to London...
...for an important announcement by the British Prime Minister."
Up to the very last, it would have been quite possible to have arranged a...
...peaceable and honorable settlement, between Germany and Poland."
But Hitler would not have it."
In a situation, in which no word given by...
...Germany's ruler could be trusted,
...and no people or its country could feel itself safe, had become intolerable."
Now may God bless you all,
...and may he defend the right. For it is evil things we should be fighting against,
and against them I am certain, that the right will prevail."
Six hours after Great Britain declared war on Nazi Germany,
...the Republic of France followed. All France is in a mail-storm of activity.
The Maginot Line has already opened fire on the Germans.
World War Two has begun.
At home we were asked:
What country do you consider responsible for causing this war?
Germany 82%
We Americans had no doubt who started it, Also we began to fear that this warm...
...was going concern us.
President Roosevelt, called a special session of Congress
to reconsider the embargo against selling munitions.
"I have asked the Congress to reassemble in extraordinary session,
...in order that it may consider and act on,
...changes in our Neutrality Law."
The men of Congress wrestled with their beliefs and our future.
They debated and they argued.
"The arms embargo is far too great a security,
...to American peace, to permit its surrender...
...without a last-ditch fight."
The embargo act, as it now stands,
is one-sided and works entirely to the advantage of one side.
Therefore the embargo act should be modified."
We the people also argued and debated, whether we should sell arms and munitions.
When the question was put to us, we had an answer.
Should we change the neutrality act so we can sell war supplies?
YES 57%
Shortly after, our Representatives changed the Neutrality Act.
ARMS EMBARGO REPEALED Arms for sale, but come and get them
We lifted the embargo on arms and munitions.
Now we would sell, if purchasers would pay and take the stuff away in their own ships.
American ships were still barred from combat zones.
Meanwhile on the other side of the globe.
Japan was busy trying to bomb, shoot and Terrorize the Chinese into submission.
We began to realize that if Japan conquered 400 million Chinese,
...she might become so strong as to run us right out of the Pacific.
You will remember that two years earlier in September 1937,
...when we were asked: In the present fight between Japan and China,
...are your sympathies with either side?
Only 43% were with China, most of us were undecided.
In June 1939, when we were asked the same question:
74% said we were with China.
Now our minds were made up.
When we loaded our scrap-iron on Japanese ships, our citizens protested.
Let Mr. Acheson, Assistant Secretary of State, tell us the inside of the story.
So until the middle of 1940, the restriction of exports to Japan,
...took the form of moral embargos of air-planes and direct munitions."
Then Congress passed the Export Control Act."
And increasing cut offs of scrap iron, aviation Gasoline and other strategic items followed."
Exports were curtailed to the limit, which those responsible for our defense were willing to risk."
It was a fearful responsibility."
On one side was the possibility, in fact the probability...
...that one day these materials might be used against us."
On the other side was the possibility, in fact the probability,
...to cut them off, would provoke an attack which we were not then prepared to resist."
Finally in the summer of 1941,
...as it was becoming clear, that Japan was turning its back on every possibility
of reconciliation and adjustment, and was determined on her great gamble of conquest.
...all exports ceased.
April 9, 1940, the leaders of Nazi Germany Shifted their war machine into high gear.
They overran into Denmark, they smashed into Norway.
On May 10, 1940, they blitzed into Holland and Belgium.
The Nazis are marching ahead at the fastest speed a conquering army has moved in all history.
All roads in France are choked with slow-moving masses of refugees.
Nazi dive-bombers are bombing countless of thousands of defenseless woman and children.
Good-evening everybody. Tonight it seems clearly apparent that...
...the first great phase of the war in the west has been won by Germany.
The army of French and British has made a valiant battle in its effort to...
...retreat to Dunkerque where there is some slight chance that...
...some part of it can be evacuated."
Adolf Hitler's mechanized forces are racing towards Paris...
...as French resistance collapses."
On this tenth day of June, of nineteen hundred and forty
...the hand that held the dagger, has struck it into the back of its neighbor."
This is William L. Shivers, speaking from the forest of Campaign,
...where Adolf Hitler today is handing his Armistice terms to France.
It is 3: 15 p. M. Adolf Hitler strides slowly to the little clearing.
I can see his face. It is grave, solemn, yet brimming with revenge.
Off to one side, is a large statue of Marshall Foch.
Hitler does not appear to see it.
Now we see the French walking down the avenue,
Lead by General Huntziger.
Hitler and the other German leaders rise, as the French enter.
General Keitel reads the preamble to the German Armistice's Terms.
This whole ceremony is over in a quarter of an hour.
Conquering armies now stood on the shores of the Atlantic.
Fire!"
The danger was suddenly close. Countries conquered by...
...the Nazis had possession outside of Europe. Some of these possessions were in America.
Would the Nazi demand the French Naval units at Martinique?
Would the Nazis move into the Dutch oil fields of Curacao?
Would the Nazis seize the French Naval base At Dakar for invasion of South America?
Already in Brazil, there were over 1 million Germans who lived exactly...
...as they did in Germany.
Twelve hundred German schools, with Nazi textbooks and Nazi teachers.
Nazi newspapers. Gliding clubs had been established.
Also in Brazil, there were 260 thousand Japanese taking orders from Japan.
In Ecuador, within easy bombing range of the Panama Canal,
German airlines had been established. German pilots were reserve officers of the Luftwaffe.
The German transport planes, had bomb racks already built in.
In Argentina, German athletic clubs, similar to the Hitler Youth Movement,
...had been organized exclusively for Germans.
Here was a Fifth Column ready to take over.
Havana Conference for the defense of The Americas. July 22, 1940.
Havana, we met with 20 other American Republics.
There must not be a shadow of a doubt anywhere,
...as to the determination of the American nations,
...not to permit the invasion of their hemisphere of the armed forces...
...of any power or any possible combination of powers."
Twenty American nations stood firm.
The Americans would not let any European colony in this hemisphere...
...to be transferred to a non-American power.
We said KEEP OUT. We meant it.
We must increase production facilities for everything needed...
...for the Army and Navy for National Defense.
I believe that this nation should plan at this time,
...that will provide us with 50 thousand military and naval planes.
To protect our shores, we authorized construction of a two-ocean Navy.
The greatest the world has ever known. At least it would be the greatest Navy,
...when completed in 1944.
But then, in 1940 it was only a paper Navy.
Our fighting forces at that time, consisted of an army of 187 thousand men,
...a navy of 120 thousand, and this dot was the air corps 22,387 strong.
All told, 330,000 men.
We had makeshift equipment.
Stove pipes for canons.
Bags of flour for bombs.
Trucks were labeled Tanks.
Our infantry had exactly 488 machine guns.
We possessed 235 pieces of field artillery.
Ten light and eighteen medium tanks.
That was the army of The United States in May in 1940,
...the month in which the Nazis overran France.
...so we called on the minute-men. The National Guard of the 48th State.
And placed them into Federal Service.
And most important, Congress passed the Selective Service Act.
For the first time in our history, we began Mobilizing an army while still at peace.
"The first number is serial number 158."
"The second number which has just been drawn is 192."
It wasrt too soon. Time was running out.
The Nazis had begun their shattering blitz on Britain.
"Hello America. This is Edward Morella speaking from London."
There were more German planes over the coast of Britain today, then at anytime since the war began."
Anti air-craft guns were in action along the south-east coast today,
...back on Main Street U. S.A."
Daily we followed Britairs life-struggle. For if Britain died,
...we would be in grave peril.
Our first line of defense in the Atlantic, the British Fleet,
...might go to Nazi Germany.
We would be unprotected. Our shores, our people, our homes, in danger.
Britain must not fall!
In our harbors idle and rotting lay ancient destroyers.
They had been built for WW I, but this was WW II.
And this gave us an idea. Fifty tired, over-aged destroyers were re-vitalized,
...transferred to Great Britain.
In return, we acquired further protection of our shores,
...we received a chain of bases stretching from Newfoundland to British Guiana.
...these bases threw a steel wall around the Caribbean.
These bases gave new safety to the Panama Canal.
It was now clear to the aggressors that we were conscience...
...of the threat they represented to our country.
Mr. Berle, Assistant Secretary of State, will tell us how they got together and tried to scare us of.
From 1936 on, it became increasingly clear to the world,
...that Germany, Italy and Japan, were pursuing a common...
...pattern of aggression, both in Europe and in the Far East."
On September 27, 1940,
...these three powers signed the so-called Pact of Berlin."
Or Tripartite Pact."
A treaty of far-reaching alliance.
By that treaty, it was provided that the three countries would assist one another with,
...all political, economic and military means...
...when one of the powers were attacked, note particularly the use of the word "attacked"...
...by a power not then involved in the European war, or in the Chinese/Japanese conflict."
The last of these provisions were aimed directly at the United States."
Tokyo celebrates.
Rome cheered.
Berlin heiled itself hoarse.
It was clear now that the 3 axis's countries stood against us.
More anxious than ever, we watched the life and death struggle for the possession...
...of the skies over Britain.
Despite the propaganda and confusion in the recent months,
...it is now obvious that England is losing the war.
England will not only survive, England will win!
So, when we were asked:
Should we keep out of war or aid Britain even at the risk of war?
Aid Britain even at the risk of war 68%
Thus the march of conquest at the self-termed Master Racists
...changed our national attitude from 1936
...when only one out of twenty Americans thought we would be involved in war.
To 1941, when 14 out of 20 Americans were will to risk war, if war was necessary...
...to insure axis defeat.
I ask this Congress for authority and funds,
...sufficient to manufacture additional munitions and war supplied of many kinds,
...to be turned over to those nations who are now in actual war,
...with aggressor nations."
Our useful and immediate role is to act as an arsenal...
...for them as well as for ourselves."
We shall send in ever-increasing Numbers of ships,
...planes, tanks, guns. That is our purpose, and our pledge."
By an overwhelming majority, Congress passed Lend-lease.
Bill number 1776. Another Declaration of independence,
...independence from tyranny, 1941 style.
On April 6, 1941, the Nazi juggernaut overran into Yugoslavia and Greece.
On June 22, 1941 the success-crazed Nazis took their longest step toward world conquest.
Without any declaration of war, they blitzed into Russia.
We were determined not to let down any nations defending themselves...
...against unprovoked attack.
So we extend land-lease to these new victims.
Now the land-lease products of our factories were being unloaded...
...in the bombed ports of Great Britain,
...at the Red Sea Ports for the British in Africa.
Lend-lease was being hauled over the Burma road to China.
Lend-lease was piling up in Murmansk and Iran for Russia.
Why did we supply war materials to the countries defending themselves from against axis aggression?
Was it for our natural sympathies for people unwilling to lose their freedoms?
Was it our ancient antagonism to conquerors imposing their rule on others by force?
Yes partly. But principally it was because the American people,
...had become certain, that they were on the list of free nations to be conquered.
"Two worlds are in conflict - two philosophies of life. One of these two worlds must break asunder"
And we were the leading example of that free world that Hitler was committed to breaking asunder.
What would have been our defensive position if the aggressors had succeeded in...
...conquering Britain, Russia, and China?
German conquests of Europe and Africa,
...would bring all their raw-materials, plus their entire industrial development...
...under one control.
Of the 2 Billion people in the world, the Nazis would rule roughly one-quarter
The 500 million people of Europe and Africa, forced into slavery to labor for Germany.
German conquest of Russia, would add the vast raw materials...
...and the production facilities of another of the worlds industrial areas.
And of the world's people, another 2 hundred million would be added to the Nazi labor pile.
Japanese conquest of the Orient.
Would pour into their factories the almost unlimited resources of that area.
And of the people's of the earth, a thousand million...
...would come under their rule.
Slaves for their industrial machines.
We in North and South America would be left with the raw material of three-tenths of the earth's surface.
Against the axis with the resources of seven-tenths.
We would have one industrial region, against their three industrial regions.
We would have one-eighth of the world's Population against their seven-eighths.
If we, together with the nations of North and South America,
...could mobilize 30 millions fully equipped men,
...the axis could mobilize 200 million.
Thus an Axis victory in Europe and Asia would leave us alone and virtually surrounded.
Facing enemies ten times stronger than ourselves.
These are the reasons that lead us, the American people
to change the Neutrality Act.
To send aid to Britain, to Russia, to China,
...to make ourselves the arsenal of democracy.
These are the reasons why now, the first American troops...
...set forth into the Atlantic.
To occupy new bases in Greenland and Iceland.
With the consent of their local governments.
In our hands, bases of defense, in Nazis hands, bases of death.
The Germans opened unrestricted submarine warfare.
If today, the Navy should make secure the seas,
...for the delivery of our munitions to Great Britain,
...it will render as great a service to our country,
...and to the preservation of American freedom,
...as it has ever rendered in all its glorious history."
"We want those cargoes protected."
An aroused Congress repealed the entire Neutrality Act.
We armed our merchants. And for the first time they steamed into combat zones to deliver land-lease.
While this was going on in the Atlantic, the Japs, by so-called agreement...
...with the proper government of defeated France, moved into Indo China.
There were now only two threats to their plan for their conquest of greater East Asia.
First was their northern neighbor, Russia.
The only military power within striking distance of Japan.
The Nazis were taking care of Russia.
The second threat to Japanese conquest was us.
Japanese southward expansion was too dangerous to attempt with our bases still standing in the
Philippines and our supply lines open to Wake, to Midway and Hawaii.
We were in their way, we had to be removed, but the Japanese way.
Off to Washington went Special Ambassador Kuruso.
And on what the Japs said was a mission of peace.
But carefully synchronized with his departure, was a departure of a Jap task force.
Under sealed orders, not on a mission of peace.
On November 14th, Mr. Kuruso arrived in San Francisco, smiling his...
...toothy smile as he sang the old song of Japanese friendship.
The Japanese were peace-loving people. Their whole policy was devoted to...
...the establishment of permanent peace in Asia.
Our aid to China, was delaying the establishment of that peace.
Our refusal to sell them oil and scrap was interfering with the establishment of that peace.
Our objections to them taking over the East Indies, greater East Asia was...
...an interruption in the establishment of that peace. All they wanted was peace.
On November 17, Mr. Kuruso and Japanese...
...Ambassador Namura were received by the President, in the presence of...
...The Secretary of State Cordell Hull.
It very quickly became clear, that the Japanese had brought no new proposals...
...and that the Japanese intended to continue their campaign to conquer China...
...and all East Asia.
On November 26th, our Secretary of State presented the Japanese with the bases of peaceful agreement...
...between the two nations.
The proposal was forwarded to Tokyo. The Japs had to stall for time.
But only a short time. A task force was nearing its goal.
Sunday, December 7, 1941
One p. M., eastern standard time,
...the Japanese Ambassadors are expected at the State Department
to keep a one o'clock appointment that they had requested in order to present their...
...answers to our proposals.
One O five p. M. The Japanese planes are approaching Hawaii.
One ten p. M. The Japanese emissaries telephone to postpone their appointment until 1:45.
1:20 p. M.
2:00 p. M. The Japanese envoys smiling and correct, arrive at the State Department.
2:20 p. M.
Japanese planes had been sowing death and destruction for an hour on...
...American outposts in the Pacific, when the Japanese envoy presented a memorandum to Mr. Hull.
"Here is the memorandum presented to me."
As you can see, it is quite a lengthy document."
I read it horridly, discovering it contained a recycled...
...macho accusations against the United States."
Charging it among other things with quote:
Scheming for the extension of the war."
Preparing to attack Germany and Italy."
Trying to establish a new order in Europe."
And ignoring Japars sacrifices in the China Affair."
Menacing the Empire's existence itself."
And disparaging its honor and prestige."
After reading the note, I said to the Japan Ambassadors...
...I have never seen a document so crowded with infamous falsehoods and distortion...
...on a scale so huge, that I never would have imagined...
...that any government on this planet was capable of uttering them."
I ask that Congress declare, that since the unprovoked...
...and dastardly attack by Japan...
...on Sunday, December 7, 1941...
...a state of war has existed between the Untied States and the Japanese Empire."
Victory of the democracies can only be complete with the utter defeat of...
...the war machines of Germany and Japan." C. G. Marshall.