My friends and I were having a conversation last night about Japan and I brought up the believed to be fact that the island nation asked the United States to give up Hawaii (along with other U.S. possessions in the Pacific) to their empire. This would have occurred prior to the Pearl Harbor attack and I imagine sometime in the 20th century.
I swear I heard or saw this somewhere but cannot seem to find anything on the web about it. All that comes up when I search on Google with the relevant keywords is the attack on Pearl Harbor and the invasion of the Philippines.
Can you guys shed light on this issue I'm having? Maybe I'm wrong?
No, the Japanese never asked the United States to cede Hawaii during the negotiations prior to the outbreak of hostilities.
The Japanese also never sought the Philippines, Wake Island, or Guam in negotiations, all of which were invaded and occupied in short order after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Moreover, the Japanese never had any serious plans nor the capability to invade and occupy the Hawaiian islands, though the US was nonetheless gravely concerned about whether an attack was possible and took significant steps to fortify Oahu in case of invasion.
The idea of the Japanese attempting to negotiate for the Hawaiian islands would be far removed from the discussions that did take place. It's not only not in the ballpark, it's a different sport altogether. While the Hawaiian islands held strategic value from a military perspective, there was little in the way of resources or materials that the Japanese required in 1941 to advance their own interests at the time.
There were many points of contention during the negotiations in 1941:
The Japanese wanted the United States to stop providing arms and support to China in hopes that it would force the Chinese to the bargaining table; the US wanted Japan to cease its war in China and withdraw.
The US was infuriated by Japanese expansion into Indochina, which provided Japan with a position to threaten the Philippines and British/Dutch colonial holdings.
The US wanted Japan to withdraw from the Tripartite Pact it had signed aligning it with Germany and Italy. The Japanese poorly understood how serious this issue was to the Americans and believed it was a defensive alliance.
The US wanted guarantees that it would not be shut out from economic opportunities in Asia, which was a threat as Japan continued to expand. Japan wanted the US to lift its economic sanctions that were applied during negotiations as events developed and expansion continued.
In general, the United States wanted the Japanese to cease aggressive actions, and respect territorial integrity of other nations. The Japanese continued to expand to acquire more natural resources to fuel their economy and their massive war in China. The territory of Hawaii was never mentioned in the negotiations.
Almost any book about the outbreak of hostilities can confirm this. "At Dawn We Slept" by Gordon Prange is a good starting point for anyone interested in Pearl Harbor, and it includes a full treatment of the diplomatic happenings of 1940 and 1941. John Toland's "The Rising Sun" is a good text that includes more on the inner workings of the Japanese government. "Hirohito's War" by Francis Pike also includes a full accounting of the lead up to the war.