A dedicated American reporter in 1930s Japan is determined to expose that government's plan for world domination.
Nick Condon is a newspaper reporter working in Tokyo who refuses to toe the Japanese line on the expansionist policies of the anti-democratic Imperialist government. When it becomes clear to the authorities that Condon isn't going to cooperate and that he has some valuable information and contacts, they decide to get him in their clutches for some interrogations and then dispose of him.—Alfred Jingle
Nick Condon (James Cagney) is a journalist for the Tokyo Chronicler. He prints a story disclosing Japan's plan to conquer the world. The newspaper is seized by Japanese officers. Condon get the Tanaka Plan, a paper in which all the plans are laid in written. The Japanese spies who follow him think that Ollie and Edith Miller (Wallace Ford and Rosemary DeCamp) are the ones who discovered all the plan because they suddenly have a lot of money and are coming back to the USA. When Condon goes to the ship to say them farewell, he finds Edith dead. He can only see a woman's hand with a ring with a huge ruby. Back home, he finds Ollie, in a terrible condition. He gets from Ollie the Tanaka plan.
Premier Giichi Tanaka (John Emery) wants his plans to remain secret, and sends Col. Hideki Tojo (Robert Armstrong) Capt. Oshima (John Halloran) and Hijikata (Leonard Strong) to follow him everywhere. Condon loses the document with the Tanaka plan. Ollie's disappeared, and the police arrest them in terms of scandal and much noise while having a party with two girls in his apartment, which is a complete lie.
Condon meets Iris Hilliard (Sylvia Sidney), half American and half Chinese. At first, he suspects her of being the lady in the ship, then he doesn't. They fall in love. She seems to be betraying him, specially when Condon sees the ring with the ruby in her hand.
At the end, it turns out she's been sent by a politician who wants peace and was present when the Tanaka plan was devised. Condon leaves his job after ten days. When he's about to leave Japan, he meets the politician and Iris in the harbour. The politician signs the document to prove it's real. They are discovered by the Japanese army.
Iris runs away with the document in a cargo ship which will take her out of Japan. To distract the Japanese officers, Condon fights his greatest enemy and tries to reach the American Embassy. He's shot at by spies dressed in street clothes, but he's not killed. The consular adviser goes out of the Embassy and takes Condon inside still alive, and the Japanese officers can't prevent it, because they couldn't find the Tanaka document when searching Condon.
