The Japanese government rounded up the embassy staff and incarcerated them in what was thought to be a hotel at the time. Fortunately the American ambassador and his staff were not brutalized nor treated as criminals by the Japanese authorities. Some items of the staff members were confiscated, like radios. Other relevant equipment at the embassy was confiscated by the Japanese.

It took several months to work out plans and details to repatriate the Americans to the United States, using neutral intermediaries like the Swiss and possibly the Swedes. But eventually the Americans did make it back to the U.S. through a tortuous route leading west out of Japan, circumventing the unfriendly Soviet Union, going through Iran and then on through fascist-occupied territory and ended up in Britain where easier transport back to the U.S. could be arranged.

Similar arrangements occurred for the Japanese embassy staff in Washington D.C.