He made a mess of it. Now, in the Japanese military's bushido culture, nothing was worse than a suicide attempt that failed because it was done unprofessionally, with egregious violations of sacrosanct ritual. Having become an object of ridicule and suspected of not really wanting to kill himself, Tojo died an ignominious death, being hanged for war crimes in 1948. So the lesson for our dear President: don't mess it up or folks will think you weren't really serious.