I was watching that Netflix documentary WWII in color, and it mentioned that after the Pear Harbor attacks, angry mobs attacked the Japanese embassy in Washington. How bad did that get? Did the American Army help protect the diplomats of Axis countries? What about all the other embassies. I find it hard to believe that the Allies would keep embassies staffed in Tokyo and Berlin while they're being bombed constantly. At the same time, all sides recognize the importance of diplomacy, so maybe they'd take special precaution to protect enemy embassy staff.
Any insight on this?
Also, would you guys recommend that documentary? I've really enjoyed it and it seems to put a lot of emphasis on being objective, but I'd trust your opinions on it.
Normally, when two countries went to war, the enemy embassy (technically, "embassy" refers to the people and "chancery" to the grounds) would be restricted to their premises or interned, and if there was time, they would withdraw their embassies home and turn over the real estate to neutral third parties. The Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961 has current regulations, but I think they didn't change significantly in decades before that.
This is a surprising account of the US embassy in Tokyo -- they didn't leave until June 1942! This, p. 55, talks about Axis diplomats being taken out to the country in December 1941 and January 1942; it doesn't say when they were repatriated, but footnote 63 implies it might have been April 1942. I don't know why it took so long to arrange it.
In World War I, Wilson broke diplomatic relations in February 1917, before the declaration of war in April, so the embassy was already gone.
During WW2, in June 1941, Ribbentrop and Molotov negotiated safe passage of German embassy out of the Moscow in exchange of same treatment for Soviet embassy in Berlin.