<P> In the days before the attack, a long 14 - part message was sent to the embassy from the Foreign Office in Tokyo (encrypted with the Type 97 cypher machine, in a cipher named PURPLE by U.S. cryptanalysts), with instructions to deliver it to Secretary of State Cordell Hull at 1: 00 p.m. Washington time . The last part arrived late Saturday night (Washington time), but because of decryption and typing delays, as well as Tokyo's failure to stress the crucial necessity of the timing, embassy personnel did not deliver the message to Secretary Hull until several hours after the attack . </P> <P> The United States had decrypted the 14th part well before the Japanese managed to, and long before embassy staff composed a clean typed copy . The final part, with its instruction for the time of delivery, had been decoded Saturday night but was not acted upon until the next morning (according to Henry Clausen). </P> <P> Ambassador Nomura asked for an appointment to see Hull at 1: 00 p.m., but later asked it be postponed to 1: 45 as the ambassador was not quite ready . Nomura and Kurusu arrived at 2: 05 p.m. and were received by Hull at 2: 20 . Nomura apologized for the delay in presenting the message . After Hull had read several pages, he asked Nomura whether the document was presented under instructions of the Japanese government; the Ambassador replied it was . After reading the full document, Hull turned to the ambassador and said: </P> <P> I must say that in all my conversations with you...during the last nine months I have never uttered one word of untruth . This is borne out absolutely by the record . In all my fifty years of public service I have never seen a document that was more crowded with infamous falsehoods and distortions--infamous falsehoods and distortions on a scale so huge that I never imagined until today that any Government on this planet was capable of uttering them . </P>

Why would an embargo on japan potentially stop its expansion in asia