Chapter 20

WASHINGTON, DC OCTOBER 1942

HIS HEART RACED AT THE SHRILL RING of the phone. Preston answered with a quick “Yes Mrs. Higgins” then straightened the knot of his U.S. Army issued tie. He’d been waiting for this call for two weeks after arriving in Washington, D.C. from Fort Benning, Georgia. His orders at the completion of Officers Candidate School were simple: report for assignment to the War Department on E Street, Room 201.

Room 201 belonged to Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy appointed in April 1941 at the behest of the Secretary of War, Henry Stimson. A Wall Street veteran, McCloy had established a name for his work in the corporate and securities areas. With investment bankers pushing German bonds, McCloy spent considerable time in Europe, particularly Germany.

For his knowledge of Germany, McCloy was appointed to investigate what came to be called the Black Tom Case. During World War I, American industry became the target of Germany spies and saboteurs, resulting in the loss of lives and property. Years of litigation finally produced an agreement for compensation.

In June of 1936, McCloy traveled to Munich where Hitler’s deputy Rudolph Hess refused to sign any documents concerning events prior to the establishment of the Third Reich. Hess and Hermann Goering, the German Air Force head, asked McCloy to stay for the Olympic Games in Berlin and see the miracles of the new Germany. McCloy returned to the United States convinced the country better prepare for war.

McCloy, with his reputation as an expert on German spies, pushed for the creation of an intelligence apparatus before the United States was involved in the oncoming war. He advocated that the government, in the name of national security, could indulge in wiretaps, mail intercept, and the decoding of radio messages directed to foreign embassies in the country.

Roosevelt, needing Wall Street support for his programs to end the Depression and his planned military buildup, brought the staunchly Republican Stimson into his cabinet. By 1940, Stimson was using McCloy as his troubleshooter. McCloy had found a legal way for the president to send twenty B-17s to the British. It was McCloy who termed the United States “the arsenal of defense,” and it was the United States that kept England alive.

McCloy’s stewardship of Lend Lease brought invaluable contacts in Congress he used to advance his agenda of putting the country on a war footing. Convinced the Germans were involved in sabotage and were behind numerous labor disputes in the defense industry, McCloy sought and nurtured a relationship with FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover who increased the volume of wiretaps and mail intercepts without Justice Department approval. McCloy espoused the position that the events of the day required unusual action, even if it meant infringing on the rights of the individual.

Preston put on his solid khaki green dress jacket and checked the crease in his pants. He was happy to get out of the office and away from the mountain of facts and figures covering war production. Economics was his college major, but he had no knowledge of steel rivets or the technical aspects of mining bituminous coal. He locked the door and negotiated a warren of narrow hallways to the main corridor to find himself surrounded by shoulders stacked with gold braid and chests covered with campaign ribbons and medals. With the War Department being housed in seventeen different buildings strewn across the city, a new building to centralize operations was under construction near Arlington National Cemetery. The five-sided structure was unofficially being called the Pentagon. Independent design experts branded it a monstrosity and blight on the countryside.

The sound of pounding typewriters echoed off the granite tiled floor as he approached the outer office of room 201. Preston smartly saluted an exiting redfaced two-star general. McCloy’s main mission was to act as Stimson’s point man and troubleshooter. He had little time or inclination to deal with fools and incompetents. Ambiguous answers resulted in scores of resignations from the top-heavy general officer corps.

The cacophony of steel letters to paper was the labor of the three women secretarial pool trying to keep pace with McCloy’s reports and “take a letter” demands. The silver haired Mrs. Higgins swiveled her head away from her typewriter. “Take a seat lieutenant.”

Two oak benches occupied the right side of the room. Preston did as commanded, taking a seat closest to the door. In less than five minutes, the portal to the assistant secretary opened. Preston jumped to his feet as Charles Lindbergh passed. The Lone Eagle was in town lobbying for support to regain his commission in the Army Air Corps, having quit after receiving a public tongue lashing from President Roosevelt. From the look on the hero’s face, Preston surmised his meeting with McCloy didn’t go well.

Mrs. Higgins sang out, “Lieutenant! Time is precious.”

Preston felt his knees wobble as he gathered himself off the bench. He paused at the tri-paneled door, took a deep breath and entered. “Lieutenant Swedge reporting as ordered,” he said, snapping to attention.

McCloy sat behind an oversized desk piled with files marked “Secret” and “Eyes Only.” Still possessing the build of a wrestler, the nearly bald forty-five year old assistant secretary of war was dressed in his customary double-breasted gray suit. A Stetson hat balanced on the corner of a lawyer’s bookcase behind him. An architect’s site plan of the Pentagon hung beside windows providing a view of the Capitol. McCloy looked over the man who he had known since his birth. “No need for such nonsense,” McCloy said as he stood, extending his hand. A broad smile broke across McCloy’s face. “Military life seems to agreeing with you. Mr. Lindbergh misses it so much he’s begging to be let back in. Hell will freeze over before that happens. If the country listened to him, Japanese would be the official language on the west coast and German on the east. Surrender would have been the only option with nothing to fight with. Take a seat and keep yourself busy with this,” he said, handing a binder to the newly promoted first lieutenant, “while I finish this memo.”

Preston sat to the right of his father’s friend. A friendship so close McCloy was asked to be Preston’s godfather. McCloy in his prior life represented Sterling Swedge and Company on numerous projects. As the American counsel to I.G. Farben, McCloy was instrumental in steering the synthetic rubber and oil deal Herbert Swedge’s way.

The office was devoid of the trappings that adorned his Wall Street power center where framed press clippings touting his brokering blockbuster deals were on display to remind clients that the egregious fees they were paying produced profits that paled in comparison. Only the portrait of the current president, not the gallery of international industrial leaders and Wall Street elite, hung on the plaster walls.

Two weeks after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, McCloy held court in Herbert Swedge’s walnut lined study. With a tumbler of single malt scotch in hand and a Cuban cigar firmly planted between his teeth, McCloy berated America First, its hero Lindbergh and anyone connected to the two. After the scotch diluted his venom, McCloy strongly suggested to the Princeton senior that he enlist into the Army before being drafted. If he did, a posting to McCloy’s Washington staff would be arranged. He needed his own point man, an outsider to the military bureaucracy, someone of superior intellect and ability to understand the entire picture while appreciating the significance of each individual stroke.

Preston’s eyes widened with each succeeding paragraph he read. The subject was the relocation of 120,000 Japanese and American citizens of Japanese ancestry living in Oregon, California, and Washington to areas away from the west coast. The centers would be ringed with barbed wire and be patrolled by armed U.S. military personnel.

The Army’s chief law enforcement officer, Provost Marshall General Allen Gullion argued for mass evacuation of all Japanese on the west coast. General John DeWitt, the officer in charge of the western defense command didn’t support the call for mass evacuation. McCloy was ordered by Stimson to mediate. The debate became moot when President Roosevelt signed executive order 9066 authorizing the forced removal of Japanese American citizens and resident aliens from their homes to areas away from the west coast. McCloy was responsible for the decision since Roosevelt had delegated the matter to him through Stimson.

McCloy put the top on his fountain pen and opened a humidor sitting on his desk. He offered a cigar to Preston who waved it off. Slicing the end off the Cuban Churchill with a silver cutter engraved with his initials, he asked, “What’s your opinion?”

“There isn’t a shred of evidence that Japanese Americans have participated in any acts of sabotage or intend to do so. May I be direct?”

McCloy waved his cigar to continue. “That’s why you’re on my staff. Speak your mind.”

“General Gullion sees Japanese saboteurs under every rock, and General DeWitt’s reputation is one of being an old fool and should be put out to pasture. His position, in reality, is passing the buck. Navy Lt. Commander Kenneth Ringle is for custodial detention, but no mass evacuation and says the entire Japanese problem has been magnified out of proportion. Naval intel seems to be the most credible.”

Striking a matchstick against the side of the desk, McCloy brought the cigar to its smoky life. He flipped the match into a glass bowl sitting atop the bookcase behind the desk. “The Arizona lying on the bottom of Pearl Harbor is a testimonial to Navy intel,” he said between puffs. “The latest Army G-2 assessment suggests Tokyo’s espionage net containing Japanese aliens and first and second generation Japanese Americans is organized and working underground.”

“Any specifics?” Preston asked.

“Not that I can talk about,” McCloy said, fiddling with a paperclip. “There are parallels to Black Tom. Mark my words, the enemy will eventually engage in sabotage.”

Preston was well acquainted with “Uncle John’s” involvement with the Black Tom case. “The real threat, as I see it, comes from Germans and Italians residing in this country,” he countered. “How many Nazi sympathizers have been arrested?”

“Scores,” McCloy acknowledged as he puffed on the cigar, exhaling a cloud of smoke through his nose. “With the German and Italian populations dispersed around the country, relocation would be impossible even if we wanted to do it.”

“And, they look like you and me,” Preston quipped. “Without the time to cull these reports, I’m not sure where the Justice Department stands?”

“Deputy Attorney General Rowe is fighting tooth and nail against relocation, says we’re targeting one group, that it’s racism,” McCloy said. “James is a bleeding heart liberal New Dealer always bitching about the Constitution and the rights of the individual.”

“The issue could wind up before the Supreme Court.” Preston squirmed in his chair. McCloy and his father could always find a detour around the deepest pothole. He steeled himself.

McCloy turned and smashed the cigar into the ashtray. “This issue is putting this former Wall Street lawyer in one helluva box, but if there’s even a remote question of the country’s safety, the Constitution is just a scrap of paper. I talk to Justice Frankfurter daily. Despite his concerns, he’s on board, recognizing the nation’s survival trumps the individual.”

“Frankfurter is one of nine,” Preston said.

“The Court understands there is another way,” McCloy paused, staring at Preston. “The writ of Habeus Corpus could be suspended. Military necessity now makes almost anything possible.”

Preston recoiled. “Does Roosevelt have the capital to do it?”

McCloy banged the desk with his hand. “Lincoln did it! This is an explosive political issue with California voters scared to death of the possibility of a Japanese invasion.”

Even though McCloy said to speak his mind, Preston knew their relationship had its limits. “After the battle of Midway, the Japanese fleet doesn’t have the capability to attack Pearl Harbor no less the west coast of the United States. Japanese Americans no longer pose a threat.”

McCloy fought to control his temper. “The policy of relocation and internment will stay in place. I’ve spent more time on this issue than I care to think about. You’re going to the coast to move the process to completion. In addition, you will meet with Japanese American leaders and impress on them the need to play ball and not rock the boat with lawsuits that will go to the Supreme Court, or they’ll stay behind barbed wire until their ancestral homeland is brought to its knees.”

Preston wondered if shouldering an M-1 rifle in a combat assignment would have been worse than being involved in “Uncle John’s” machinations. “I assume that Mrs. Higgins has the required paperwork completed in the center drawer of her desk.”

“For a Princeton man, you’re surprisingly smart,” McCloy, an Amherst grad, needled as he leaned back in his chair. “Have a safe and productive trip.”