After the shock, the eyes of all the cabinet members shifted to their emperor, and then followed by their emperor's majesty's gaze focused on Tojo's shiny bald head.

"This can't be ......!"

After a few seconds of silence, Tojo slammed to his feet and shouted. But the only thing that responded to him was the skeptical eyes of everyone present.

"Tojo Kiyo...... Sit down. ”

Hirohito's voice was a little dry, although it was still the same tone that he always had a weak voice, but everyone present felt the anger contained in it.

This time, Hirohito was really angry.

He has seen everything the army has done in recent years, and he has also seen many things that go against his personal philosophy and character. However, as the sole monarch of the Japanese Empire, he also had to take into account the interests of Japan, so many times he adopted an attitude of acquiescence and connivance towards the military.

History has evaluated him as a rubber stamp, which is a testament to the success of Hirohito's personal disguise. As the only person in Japan who could influence the opinions of the military department at that time, Hirohito's authority in his hands was absolutely beyond ordinary people's imagination. The Japanese Emperor Hirohito is definitely not a pretext used by the army to bewitch the people, let alone a puppet that has been set up in the air.

In that environment in Japan at that time, the mythical status of the emperor in the hearts of the Japanese people had reached the highest point in history, and no one dared to overthrow the emperor, and it was dangerous to even have such an idea, even if he showed a trace of horses, those fanatical officers and soldiers would make him die in an instant. Hirohito is not a puppet, he is a real juggernaut. Although the officers of the Shaozhuang faction in the Japanese army repeatedly ignored his orders, wantonly created incidents, and took the opportunity to expand the war. However, when those young men were making those preparations, they were worried that they would be counterattacked by Hirohito. In fact, as long as Hirohito issued an imperial decree afterwards, even the lieutenant generals had to obediently perform the road of self-dissection, not to mention those little Nakasa Shaoza.

However, most of the transgressions were forgiven by Hirohito afterwards, and the perpetrators were not punished but were even rewarded by Hirohito, and the only few who were punished were for the failure of the operation rather than for their disobedience to the holy will. This is a kind of naked connivance, and Hirohito gave the young officers a clear hint that as long as they succeed in the end, let Japan gain vested interests, and do anything they can be forgiven by him. Of course, everything must be within his control, and if it is too outrageous, he will intervene.

Hirohito was the greatest performing artist among the leaders of World War II, and he succeeded in establishing in the hearts of people a transcendent image of the world, a puppet who seemed helpless against the army, a wooden god. He succeeded in paving the way for him to finally escape punishment. After the end of World War II, he used a little bit of Yu to capture the old man and combine it with the well-designed puppet image, and MacArthur, the number one American performance artist, was also tricked, patting his chest and awe-inspiring Hirohito's name from the list of Tokyo trials.

But this time, Hirohito finally couldn't help but throw away his disguise and was really angry, and the army had stabbed him with a big leak this time.

It's not that he doesn't believe in his army, it's that there are really too many similar records in the military. The military seems to have developed the habit of cutting first and then playing, and every time they can't get it out of their way, they think of reporting to him. Now that the assassination of the German Führer was so big, Hirohito felt the need to sober up the wooden heads of those soldiers, and it was time to pull the military halter.

"Your Majesty, I vouch for with my life and honour that the Army has not made any plans to assassinate the German Führer at all. I ask Your Majesty to allow me to personally investigate this matter, and if it is later found that it is indeed the responsibility of the Army, I am willing to apologize for the guilt by disembowelment before the Emperor. ”

Tojo left his seat and fell to the ground and pleaded with Hirohito.

"Can I trust the Army? Would the Germans have detained the mission in violation of diplomatic norms if they did not have conclusive evidence? ”

Hirohito glanced coldly at Tojo, who was kneeling on the ground, and then turned to Matsuoka, who was frowning at the paper.

"Matsuoka, what do you think about this matter, and how should we deal with it?"

"Well, Your Majesty, judging from this document, Xia Guan feels that the matter is not as serious as we thought before."

Matsuoka replied respectfully.

"Oh?"

Hirohito raised his eyebrows in surprise.

When he first heard the news, even he was dumbfounded on the spot. There should be no more serious diplomatic incident in the world, Matsuoka would say that it is not as troublesome as imagined, is this guy scared stupid?

"Your Majesty, Prime Minister, please listen to the lower official explain to you."

Matsuoka nodded to Hirohito and Konoe, then took the document and spoke slowly.

"Indeed, in terms of the seriousness of the problem, this incident really exceeded our expectations, and it was an extremely serious diplomatic incident, and could even be a reason for a declaration of war. But ......"

Speaking of this, Matsuoka stared at Tojo, who was still lying on the ground, and said.

"I believe what Minister Tojo said that it is impossible for the Army to be involved in any assassination of the German Führer. Although the Army often takes matters into its own hands in some respects, it is impossible for them to act recklessly in such matters.

What's more, participating in this kind of thing will not only not get any benefits for the army, but in turn will bring great trouble to the army.

This time, it was two highly decorated senior generals who were leading the team, and they would not have agreed to the Army's involvement in such an incident that would cause serious damage to Japan. What's more, those two generals had a good impression of Germany, how could they agree to assassinate the German Führer. ”

"Minister Matsuoka, what you said cannot be proven yet, and perhaps the Ministry of War has its own considerations. They have done this kind of thing more than once, think about it in Manchukuo...... I won't talk about those things here. And now, the protest of the Germans is in your hands, and the two army generals have also been confirmed to be seized in the hands of the Germans. What I don't understand now is that if they hadn't been involved, would the Germans have framed them at the risk of having their diplomatic relations undermined? What's more, this time it was their Führer who was involved. If there is no conclusive evidence, will they be bold enough to find innocent Japanese envoys to take the blame? You must know that once the truth of this kind of thing is revealed, it will not only cause a rupture in the relations between the two countries, but also make them a laughing stock in the international community. ”

Admiral Yoshida rubbed his temples unhurriedly and said slowly.

"Admiral Yoshida! How can you say such irresponsible words! ”

Tojo, who was lying on the ground, couldn't help but shout angrily.

"Hear me out, guys!"

Matsuoka said, waving his hand.

"Yoshida-sama's words are very reasonable, and the Germans will not risk destroying the diplomatic relations between the two countries by taking the liberty of detaining our envoys. In particular, this matter involves their Führer, and they will not allow their Führer's honor to be compromised. Being assassinated was not something that could be honored, so it was impossible for the Germans to lie about it. Now, we can confirm that the German Führer was indeed assassinated, and that Japanese soldiers were involved in the assassination. If there really had been no plan for the assassination of the German Führer on the part of the army, I can only think of one conclusion at the moment. There must have been a very serious misunderstanding in this incident, and the personnel of the Japanese mission must have been involved in this serious assassination for some unexpected reason. ”

"You say it's a complete misunderstanding? So why haven't the Germans released our detainees, and why are they now sending this protest? ”

Yoshida tilted his head and asked coldly.

"As I said earlier, it must be a very serious misunderstanding, a misunderstanding that the mission personnel themselves cannot explain clearly. Of course, all this reasoning is based on the fact that the Army was not involved. Once again, I would like to ask Your Excellency Tojo if you have heard anything about it in the Army, or if you have noticed anything unusual about the two generals before they set off. ”

"Absolutely not, there has never been any anti-German rhetoric in the Army. And those two generals, whom I personally sent them on, both of them have been looking forward to this visit for a long time, and both are full of confidence in the completion of this mission. ”

Tojo replied loudly.

"What mission?"

Yoshida interjected slowly.

"Of course, it's a mission to observe the new tactics and weapons used by European armies, Lord Yoshida, what do you want to say!"

Tojo glared at Yoshida angrily.

"Alright, stop arguing pointlessly. Tojo-kiyo, sit down. ”

Hirohito suddenly said coldly on the side, and the army and navy immediately shut up, and then the Japanese emperor turned to Matsuoka.

"I don't think it's likely that the Army would be bold enough to do such a thing. I think Matsuoka's argument is more realistic, and all of this may have been caused by a misunderstanding. But how do we deal with this now, and do you have any preliminary plans? ”

"Your Majesty."

Matsuoka said after bowing slightly to Hirohito.

"That's what I'm going to say next. As I said earlier, this matter is not as serious as we thought, and it is also because of this reason. The Germans may have felt suspicious about the situation, and they were not sure of their minds, which is why they sent this telegram of representation instead of a public letter of protest. ”

"You're saying it's not a protest?"

Tojo, who had just climbed back into his seat, widened his eyes.

"Yes, this is not a letter of protest, but a diplomatic representation, and it was not the German Foreign Office but the German High Command that issued it"

The guard, who had been squinting at the problem, nodded and said, "I see, this shows that the Germans are willing to negotiate with us to resolve this matter." Otherwise, they would have been able to openly protest to Japan in the world, and if they did, there would be no chance of salvage in the relations between Japan and Germany. ”

"Your Excellency Prime Minister is right, and that's the basis for what I said earlier. The Germans have signaled to us that there is a good chance of de-escalation, it just depends on how we react. ”

Matsuoka said loudly.

"Then what do you think Your Excellency should do now?"

Tojo finally breathed a sigh of relief, and he was now full of gratitude to Foreign Minister Matsuoka who pulled him.

"Your Majesty, ladies and gentlemen. Judging from my more than 10 years of experience in diplomacy, the first thing we need to do now is to get in touch with the Germans as soon as possible. However, judging by the news from Toshio Shiratori, the ambassador to Italy, he was not in a position to negotiate with the Germans at all. The Germans must have felt that there was nothing to talk about with an ambassador to Italy. According to international practice, Ambassador Shiratori is indeed not qualified to intervene in an incident of this level. Therefore, we should now send a special national mission to deal specifically with Germany on this matter. ”

"But now it takes at least three weeks to send an envoy from home to Germany, and I am worried about what will happen to the attitude of the Germans during this event."

Konoe said with a worried expression.

"That's what I've thought of too, Your Excellency Prime Minister. We can send people directly from Europe, and I think Ambassador Hiroshi Oshima in Berlin is the best person to head the mission, because he has a very good relationship with the Germans, not only does he speak German fluently, but he also has a deep understanding of the German character and customs, and he also contributed a lot to this visit of the Army Observer Mission. Moreover, he had established personal friendships with many German officials, and he was the only person I knew who knew how to deal with the Germans, and he should have been able to take on this difficult mission. I think Toshio Shiratori can be the deputy head of the mission, he also knows Germany very well, and he was the first to get the news of this incident, and he should know more about it than we do. The rest of the mission was drawn from the Imperial Embassies in Italy and Berlin, and they were all very good diplomatics, and I am sure of their abilities. ”

"So what is the ultimate mission of this mission, and should we determine whether it should be determined?"

Yoshida asked slowly.

"Make every effort to resolve this incident, explain the misunderstanding to the German side, and then do our best to eliminate the impact and ease relations between the two countries."

Matsuoka replied loudly.

"Everything must be done in the light of the great cause of the Imperial State, and relations between Germany and Japan must be eased to the point where they were originally intended. If possible, we would take advantage of this negotiation to exchange questions with Germany concerning the Alliance. ”

The guard chimed in.

"Yes, if all this is due to a misunderstanding, Germany will definitely apologize and compensate us for it when the misunderstanding is resolved. We are taking this opportunity to push for the conclusion of the Triple Alliance. The Germans had made such a great diplomatic mistake that the initiative in negotiations would thus be transferred from Germany to our Imperial Japan. Moreover, we can use this to add some more favorable conditions to the treaty for the Empire. ”

Matsuoka said excitedly.

"Ladies and gentlemen, though we are here to be sure that the whole thing was caused by a misunderstanding. However, if it is discovered during the negotiations that we were indeed involved in the assassination, what should we do? ”

Yoshida asked with a frown.

"I don't think I need to dwell on this issue anymore."

Tojo said loudly through gritted teeth.

"Well, if things are really as Yoshida said, there are really Japanese soldiers involved in this matter. Then, we should still focus on the southward expansion of the Reich, and we must maintain good relations with Germany. ”

Konoe was a little unhappy, he was tired of the Admiralty's stalking.

"However, if it is really our fault, the German side will not give up, and if the Germans demand reparations from the Reich, do you have a plan to deal with it."

Yoshida still said without humility or arrogance.

"If, as you say, the German-Japanese relationship can be salvaged with compensation, I think it's worth paying any price. As long as it does not affect the Empire's Asian strategy, we can agree to everything, and our most basic goal is that Germany will continue to maintain good relations with the Empire of Japan. ”

Matsuoka finished speaking and looked at Konoe.

"Yes, as I said before, everything must be based on the Empire's southward strategy, and as long as we can calm down the impact of this on the southward strategy, it is acceptable for us to pay some price. However, what will happen to the specifics, it is too early for us to say anything. Wait until the mission and Germany have formally begun negotiations before discussing them. Now, everything is subject to His Majesty's discretion. ”

After saying that, Fumiro Konoe turned his face to Hirohito.

After listening to Konoe's words, Hirohito nodded slowly, and then said solemnly.

"I agree with Matsuoka and the Prime Minister. Let the Ministry of Foreign Affairs take full charge of this matter, and the entire Cabinet must fully cooperate with the work of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. ”

After saying that, Hirohito stood up.

"Obey the commandments of God."

The cabinet ministers hurriedly stood up and bowed to Hirohito.

"Your Majesty, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will definitely go all out to complete its mission and will not disappoint Your Majesty."

Matsuoka replied respectfully with his head down.