Abstract

Between the summer of 1938 and the summer of 1939, diplomatic negotiations took place between Italy, Germany and Japan, aimed at transforming the Anti- Comintern Pact, stipulated between the three powers in 1937, into a true alliance. These negotiations, however, definitively failed in August 1939 following the divisions within the Japanese government and more generally the differences in the positions of the two Axis partners and of Japan herself. The article focuses on the significance of some Italian documents, never analysed until now, which show that the Japanese Imperial Navy, but not Galeazzo Ciano, tried to reach a bilateral neutrality agreement with Italy until the day before the breakdown of the negotiations.