Japanese Diplomat to US Describes Desperate Last Days Before Pearl Harbor // Memoir of Saburo Kurusu @VoicesofthePast

Japanese Diplomat to US Describes Desperate Last Days Before Pearl Harbor // Memoir of Saburo Kurusu @VoicesofthePast

Uploaded January 2021 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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Extracts taken from "The Desperate Diplomat: Saburo Kurusu's Memoir of the Weeks before Pearl Harbor"
Edited by: J. Garry Clifford, Masako R. Okura
University of Missouri Press, Nov 1, 2019
https://upress.missouri.edu/9780826222015/the-desperate-diplomat/

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We try to use copyright free images at all times. However if we have used any of your artwork or maps then please don't hesitate to contact me and we’ll be more than happy to give the appropriate credit.

Big thanks to the Prelinger Archives and archive.org

Image credits:

Photo of Subaro's son by Geo47 - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=28993162

Tatami mats 内閣府, CC BY 4.0 creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

FDR Photograph: Leon A. Perskiedigitization: FDR Presidential Library & Museum, CC BY 2.0 creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Diet Building By Wiiii - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10972089

Plane By Marc Grossman - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15575787

Pearl Harbor By PH2 Thompson, USN - U.S. DefenseImagery photo VIRIN: DN-SC-87-04122, Public Domain, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9928598

Japanese Embassy by SimonP at the English language Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0 creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/, via Wikimedia Commons

Japanese Diplomat to US Describes Desperate Last Days Before Pearl Harbor // Memoir of Saburo Kurusu

$The Justinian Plague: First Pandemic? // Procopius (541-542) // Byzantine Primary Source In the year 541 death fell upon the Byzantine Empire. Brought across the sea by rats on trading boats from the ports of Egypt, the Justinian Plague swept through its namesakes empire, leaving 25-50 million people dead before it had run its full course. At its worst 5000 people were dying in Constantinople a day. This is an extract from Procopius History of The Wars in which he details the spread of the disease, and how it thoroughly and mercilessly destroyed men. How do we actually know about history? Voices of the Past is a channel dedicated to recreating the original accounts from the people who lived through events, or who lived far closer to them than we do today. We do this word for word, with an accompanying soundtrack of rousing music and images. — Thanks for watching! Don’t forget to subscribe for new videos every single week! & Let us know in the comments what you’d like to see covered in the future. — Become a patron for as little as a dollar a month & help keep this project going:- https://www.patreon.com/historytimeUK — Don’t forget to subscribe to our primary channel History Time, where we make full length historical documentaries:- https://www.youtube.com/historytime — History Time is now a podcast. You can find us wherever you get your podcasts from. —Join our community on social media:- Twitter:- https://twitter.com/HistoryTimeUK/ Facebook:- https://www.facebook.com/HistoryTimeOfficial/ Instagram:- https://www.instagram.com/historytime_ig/ — Music courtesy of:- - Epidemic Sound - Joss Edwards Music:- https://soundcloud.com/jossedwardsmusic Kevin MacLeod — Voice actor & editor:- David Kelly Weve compiled a reading list of our favourite history books via the Amazon influencer program. If you do choose to purchase any of these incredible sources of information then Amazon will send us a tiny fraction of the earnings (as long as you do it through the link) (this means more and better content in the future) Ill keep adding to and updating the list as time goes on:- https://www.amazon.com/shop/historytime Are you a budding artist, writer, illustrator, cartographer, or music producer? Send us an email! No matter how professional you are or even if you’re just starting out, we can always use new music and images in my videos. Get in touch! I’d love to hear from you. We try to use copyright free images at all times. However if we have used any of your artwork or maps then please dont hesitate to contact me and we’ll be more than happy to give the appropriate credit. Source: The Internet History Sourcebook.$

Caesar on the Druids // Roman Primary Source (58-49 BC)

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$The Tsunami of 365 // Ammianus Marcellinus // Roman Primary Source An ancient disaster. Here we have Marcellus Ammianus account of the tsunami that followed the great earthquake of 365 in Crete. Still commemorated in Alexandria three centuries on as a day of horror, the tsunami devastated the coastline of the southern Mediterranean, across Libya and Egypt. How do we actually know about history? Voices of the Past is a channel dedicated to recreating the original accounts from the people who lived through events, or who lived far closer to them than we do today. We do this word for word, with an accompanying soundtrack of rousing music and images. — Thanks for watching! Don’t forget to subscribe for new videos every single week! & Let us know in the comments what you’d like to see covered in the future. — Become a patron for as little as a dollar a month & help keep this project going:- https://www.patreon.com/historytimeUK — Don’t forget to subscribe to our primary channel History Time, where we make full length historical documentaries:- https://www.youtube.com/historytime — History Time is now a podcast. You can find us wherever you get your podcasts from. —Join our community on social media:- Twitter:- https://twitter.com/HistoryTimeUK/ Facebook:- https://www.facebook.com/HistoryTimeOfficial/ Instagram:- https://www.instagram.com/historytime_ig/ — Music courtesy of:- - Epidemic Sound - Joss Edwards Music:- https://soundcloud.com/jossedwardsmusic Kevin MacLeod — Voice actor & editor:- David Kelly Weve compiled a reading list of our favourite history books via the Amazon influencer program. If you do choose to purchase any of these incredible sources of information then Amazon will send us a tiny fraction of the earnings (as long as you do it through the link) (this means more and better content in the future) Ill keep adding to and updating the list as time goes on:- https://www.amazon.com/shop/historytime Are you a budding artist, writer, illustrator, cartographer, or music producer? Send us an email! No matter how professional you are or even if you’re just starting out, we can always use new music and images in my videos. Get in touch! I’d love to hear from you. We try to use copyright free images at all times. However if we have used any of your artwork or maps then please dont hesitate to contact me and we’ll be more than happy to give the appropriate credit.$ $Caesar on Britain // Roman Primary Source (58-49 BC) In 60 BC Rome was not yet an empire, but soon it would be. The momentous events of the next decades, many of which were put into motion by the famed politician Julius Caesar, were some of the most important and formative of the Western World. We tell this story directly from the words of Caesar himself. Starting with his masterpiece ‘Commentaries on the Gallic Wars’ - first published over two thousand years ago yet still widely read all over the world today. This is an extract from Julius Caesars Commentaries on the Gallic Wars, first published between 58 and 49 BC. How do we actually know about history? Voices of the Past is a channel dedicated to recreating the original accounts from the people who lived through events, or who lived far closer to them than we do today. We do this word for word, with an accompanying soundtrack of rousing music and images. — Become a patron for as little as a dollar a month & help keep this project going:- https://www.patreon.com/historytimeUK — Don’t forget to subscribe to our primary channel History Time, where we make full length historical documentaries:- https://www.youtube.com/historytime — History Time is now a podcast. You can find us wherever you get your podcasts from. —Join our community on social media:- Twitter:- https://twitter.com/HistoryTimeUK/ Facebook:- https://www.facebook.com/HistoryTimeOfficial/ Instagram:- https://www.instagram.com/historytime_ig/ — Music courtesy of:- - Epidemic Sound - Joss Edwards Music:- https://soundcloud.com/jossedwardsmusic Derek & Brandon Fiechter Kevin MacLeod — Voice actor & editor:- David Kelly Weve compiled a reading list of our favourite history books via the Amazon influencer program. If you do choose to purchase any of these incredible sources of information then Amazon will send us a tiny fraction of the earnings (as long as you do it through the link) (this means more and better content in the future) Ill keep adding to and updating the list as time goes on:- https://www.amazon.com/shop/historytime Are you a budding artist, writer, illustrator, cartographer, or music producer? Send us an email! No matter how professional you are or even if you’re just starting out, we can always use new music and images in my videos. Get in touch! I’d love to hear from you. We try to use copyright free images at all times. However if we have used any of your artwork or maps then please dont hesitate to contact me and we’ll be more than happy to give the appropriate credit. Thanks to the Internet History Sourcebook.$ $Xenophon & The Ruins of Assyria // Ancient Greek Primary Source General of the elite Greek mercenary army The Ten Thousand, student of Socrates, effusive historian; Xenophon (431 - 354 BC) was a monumental figure in ancient Greek history. Here we have an extract from his Magnus Opus, The Anabasis in which he describes encountering the ruins of two ancient cities as he and his men crossed Persia on their long journey home after taking part in a Persian civil war. He calls these cities Larisa and Mespila. Today they are generally assumed to have been ancient Assyrian cities, perhaps Nimrud and Nineveh, destroyed centuries earlier as the Neo-Assyrian Empire collapsed under the weight of its subject peoples, amongst them the Persian Achaemenids. Inspiring the famous Shelley poem Ozymandias, Xenophon describes the vast proportions of these ancient ruins; long deserted, looming large against the desert, a ruined shadow of a vast forgotten empire. How do we actually know about history? Voices of the Past is a channel dedicated to recreating the original accounts from the people who lived through events, or who lived far closer to them than we do today. We do this word for word, with an accompanying soundtrack of rousing music and images. — Thanks for watching! Don’t forget to subscribe for new videos every single week! & Let us know in the comments what you’d like to see covered in the future. — Become a patron for as little as a dollar a month & help keep this project going:- https://www.patreon.com/historytimeUK — Don’t forget to subscribe to our primary channel History Time, where we make full length historical documentaries:- https://www.youtube.com/historytime — History Time is now a podcast. You can find us wherever you get your podcasts from. —Join our community on social media:- Twitter:- https://twitter.com/HistoryTimeUK/ Facebook:- https://www.facebook.com/HistoryTimeOfficial/ Instagram:- https://www.instagram.com/historytime_ig/ — Music courtesy of:- - Epidemic Sound - Joss Edwards Music:- https://soundcloud.com/jossedwardsmusic Kevin MacLeod — Voice actor & editor:- David Kelly Weve compiled a reading list of our favourite history books via the Amazon influencer program. If you do choose to purchase any of these incredible sources of information then Amazon will send us a tiny fraction of the earnings (as long as you do it through the link) (this means more and better content in the future) Ill keep adding to and updating the list as time goes on:- https://www.amazon.com/shop/historytime Are you a budding artist, writer, illustrator, cartographer, or music producer? Send us an email! No matter how professional you are or even if you’re just starting out, we can always use new music and images in my videos. Get in touch! I’d love to hear from you. We try to use copyright free images at all times. However if we have used any of your artwork or maps then please dont hesitate to contact me and we’ll be more than happy to give the appropriate credit.$

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Japanese Diplomat to US Describes Desperate Last Days Before Pearl Harbor // Memoir of Saburo Kurusu