U.S. policy changed at end of 1937

"War in China July 7, 1937, to July 7, 1938" map of "Last Weeks Fighting" with Panay location Dec. 12, 1937, from Time July 1938 - bg

Pacific map, from ILN 1941/10/25

USS Panay from navsource

USS Yorktown - Fast Carriers

Man and Woman of the Year, from Time, Jan. 1938

P-40s over Trinidad, from National Geographic 1942/06

Nov. 24 - Japan troops landed at Hangshow Bay near Shanghai

• Chinese retreated to Nanking
  

Dec. 13 - fall of Nanking - 200,000 killed

Dec. 12 - U.S. gunboat Panay attacked by Japan planes

• helping evacuate civilians and Standard Oil tankers from Nanking
  
• 2 Americans killed, incl San Diego sailor Charles Ensminger
  
• 3 other American ships attacked; British ambassador's car strafed in Nanking
  
• newsreel eyewitness evidence

Panay & Nanking caused FDR to act:

• Jan. 3 speech to Congress
  
• proposed joint British-American naval blockade of Japan, but rejected by British
  
• Capt. Royal Ingersoll sent to London - beginning of coordination between US & British navys
  
• Jan. 10, '38 - House rejected Ludlow Amendment - victory for FDR
  
• Feb. - Plan Orange revised - blockade of Japan added
• FDR transfered part of Atlantic fleet to Pacific
• FDR asked how to freeze Jap assets - 1933 Trading with Enemy Act
  
• but Ludlow Amendment, Reorganization Bill fights made FDR cautious
  
• Sumner Welles plan for international meeting
  

Jan. 21, 1938 - March of Time released Inside Nazi Germany

Feb. 20, 1938 - Hitler announced support for Japan.

• new foreign minister von Ribbentrop
  
• formal recognition of Manchukuo in May
  

China war became internationalized like Spain.

U.S. public opinion more willing to take strong stand against Japan rather than Germany.

• no appeasement in Asia like in Europe
  

May 17 - Vinson-Trammel Naval Expansion Act

• this was second VT act - 1st was in 1934
  
• $1B expansion of 2-ocean navy over 10 years - 69 new ships
  
• authorized increase of 40,000 tons for carriers (Hornet, Essex)
  
• to join 3 existing carriers (Saratoga, Lexington, Ranger)
  
• and 2 under construction (Yorktown, Enterprise) done by spring 1939
  
• and 3000 planes
  
• expansion of bases and ports - San Diego to become "Gibraltar of Pacific"
  
• Aug - fortification of Midway, Wake, Guam
  

newsreels: "Pacific Armada" including USS Lexington (Feb. 4, 1932) and Akron and Pacific storm (Feb. 18, 1932)

August 1938 - Korean border skirmish Japan vs. Soviet troops

• but truce ended potential conflict
  

by 1938, Japan conquered eastern third of China.

• Chiang moved to Chungking
  
• puppet govt established at Nanking by March 1940 under Wang Ching-wei
  

March 1938 - Japanese general mobilization law

• total war to free Asia from colonization and communism

China Lobby emerged in U.S.

• Henry Luce - made Chiang Time's "Man & Wife of Year" Jan '38
• Stanley Hornbeck - in State Dept - impt of economic aid
  
• Henry Morgenthau - loan of $25m to China as credit - approv'd Dec. 1938
  
• T.V. Soong - head of Universal Trading Corp. - paid agents
  
• Thomas Corcoran - (who represented Tongsun Park in '70s)
  
• James McHugh - U.S. naval attache in Chungking
  
• Claire Chennault - retired AF 1936

Secret Air War in China

• covert operations approved by FDR
  
• Chennault organized volunteer Flying Tigers
  
• led to development of more powerful P-40 ag more maneuverable Zero
  
• his info sent to War Dept, but not distributed to pilots in Philippines, to dive from above
  
• 1940 plan for 500 plane AF in China, bomb Japan with incindiaries
  
• but this "sneak attack" plan not approved by Stimson, Marshall
  
• Apr. 1941 - FDR secret Executive Order created AVG
  
• 100 planes & pilots and loan of $50m
  
• Chennault stayed in China - 14th AF, CAT - later became Air America

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