The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere...what was it really supposed to be like?

Okay, we can find tons of information about what Hitler (and to a lesser extent Mussolini) envisioned for Europe and (again to a lesser extent) the wider world. But when it comes to Asia and Japan's plans it all still seems rather sketchy and at times contradictory.

We all know that Japan planned a "Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere" but the composition of said sphere doesn't seem to be mapped on the web.

From the Genocide we get this bit of info on it's composition:

The plan divided Japan's future empire into two different groups. On the hand there were the territories that were to either become part of Japan or otherwise be under its direct administration. Second were those territories that would fall under the control of a number of tightly-controlled pro-Japanese vassal states based on the model of Manchukuo, which were supposedly "independent" members of the Greater East Asian alliance.

Japanese-governed

Empire of Japan
-Japanese Home Islands including the Ryuku Islands, Southern Sakhalin, and the Kuril Islands, as well as Korea.

Kwantung Leased Territory
-Southern part of the Liaodong Peninsula.

Government-General of Formosa
-Formosa (Taiwan), Hong Kong, Macau (to be purchased from Portugal), the Philippines, the Paracel Islands, Hainan Island (to be purchased from the Chinese puppet regime).

South Seas Government Office
-Guam, Nauru, Ocean Island, the Gilbert Islands and Wake.

Melanesian Region Government-General or South Pacific Government-General
-British New Guinea, Australian New Guinea, the Admiralties, New Britain, New Ireland, the Solomon Islands, the Santa Cruz Archipelago, the Ellice Islands, the Fiji Islands, the New Hebrides, New Caledonia, the Loyalty Islands, and the Chesterfield Islands.

Eastern Pacific Government-General
-Hawaii, Howland Island, Baker Island, the Phoenix Islands, the Rain Islands, the Marquesas and Tuamotu Islands, the Society Islands, the Cook and Austral Islands, all of the Samoan Islands, and Tonga.

Australian Government-General
-All of Australia including Tasmania.

New Zealand Government-General
-New Zealand North and South Islands, Macquarie Island, as well as the rest of the Southwest Pacific.

Ceylon Government-General
-All of India below a line running approximately from Portuguese Goa to the coastline of the Bay of Bengal.

Alaska Government-General
-The Alaska Territory, the Yukon Territory, the western portion of the Northwest Territories, Alberta, British Columbia, and Washington State.

Government-General of Central America
-Guatemala, San Salvador, Honduras, British Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Maracaibo (western) portion of Venezuela, Ecuador, Cuba, Haiti, Dominica, Jamaica, and the Bahamas.

In addition, if either Mexico, Peru or Chile were to enter the war against Japan, substantial parts of these states would also be ceded to Japan.

The future of Trinidad, British and Dutch Guiana, and British and French possessions in the Leeward Islands were left open for negation with Germany after the war.

The islands north of the equator that had been seized from Germany in World War I and which were assigned to Japan as C-Class Mandates, namely the Marianas, Carolines, Marshall Islands, and several others do not figure into this project. They were the subject of earlier negotiations with the Germans and were expected to be officially ceded to Japan in return for economic and monetary compensations.


Japanese-puppetized States

Manchukuo
-Chinese Manchuria.

Mengjiang
-Outer Mongolia territories west of Manchuria.

Republic of China
-Parts of China occupied by Japan.

East Indies Kingdom
-Dutch East Indies, British Borneo, Labuan, Sarawak, Brunei, the Cocos and Christmas Islands, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, and Portuguese Timor (to be purchased).

Kingdom of Burma
-Burma proper, Assam (a province of the British Raj) and large part of Bengal.

Kingdom of Thailand
-Pre-war Thailand, also expanded with portions of British Malaya, Burma, and French Indochina during the war.

Kingdom of Malaya
-Remainder of the Malay states.

Kingdom of Cambodia
-Cambodia and French Cochinchina.

Kingdom of Annam
-Annam, Laos, and Tongking.

But elsewhere (e.g. with the excellent website and maps of Joaquín de Salas Vara de Rey http://www.terra.es/personal7/jqvaraderey/195045in.gif) I have seen plans for a "Mahamalaya" puppet state (state under Japanese influence) which consist of the remainder of Peninsular Malaya that hadn't been annexed to Thailand along with the Riau islands and Sumatra but excluding Singapore. Java and at least the southern Philippines were to be states under Japanese control and the rest of the East Indies (both the former Dutch and British East Indies) were to become Japanese colonies. In addition articles pertaining to the actual conduct of the war in the Pacific and Asia note that the Philippines had been established as a puppet "Second Republic of Philippines" (which seems to contradict the idea that the Philippines were to be directly governed by Japan as part of a Government-General of Formosa) and towards 1945 the Japanese established more states in Indochina than outlined in the Wiki article (namely Cambodia/Kampuchea (without Cochinchina), Vietnam (which did not seem to include Laos as envisioned for the Kingdom of Annam but included Cochinchina) and possibly Laos).

The plans for India also seemed to differ depending on where on the net you go. There seems to have been plans for the India (British India, the Princely States and French and Portuguese Indias) to be a puppet state as a whole but the plans outlined from the Wiki have Burma taking all of pre-1950 Assam and large parts of pre-partition Bengal (and presumably all the Princely States between Assam and Bengal) while all of India south of Goa would be attached to Ceylon and governed as a Japanese colony and no mention being made of plans for the rest of India.

Apart from that there is Mongolia with Mengjiang either being just Inner Mongolia or being Inner Mongolia plus Outer Mongolia. With Siberia and the Far East the Wiki mentions that these were not included in the plans for the Sphere but I have seen a map and mention online of discussion between Germany and Japan of dividing Asia with the Japanese preferring the 70th Meridian East (which would put most of Afghanistan and what is now western Pakistan under German control) while the Germans preferred the Yenisei River and then following the Sino-Soviet border and leaving Afghanistan and all of pre-1947 India under Japanese control.

So does anyone have any good information on what was really planned and maybe a good map or two?
 
Australian Government-General
-All of Australia including Tasmania.

New Zealand Government-General
-New Zealand North and South Islands, Macquarie Island, as well as the rest of the Southwest Pacific.

:eek:

Alaska Government-General
-The Alaska Territory, the Yukon Territory, the western portion of the Northwest Territories, Alberta, British Columbia, and Washington State.

:eek::eek:

Well, at least they weren't crazy enough to try for California... though I thought I heard that somewhere too...
 
While Japan getting Australia would have been a huge stretch and possibly ASB, there's no way I can see them getting Washington state (even if they win more battles in Alaska).
 
The Japanese were far too optimistic about their prospects, but I've never heard of them actually believing they'd get things like Washington. Australia and India were hard to believe; US territory besides some dots in Alaska is testament to how whacked out the military heads were.
 
While Japan getting Australia would have been a huge stretch and possibly ASB, there's no way I can see them getting Washington state (even if they win more battles in Alaska).

There's no way they'd win more battles in Alaska. The weather itself is enough to ensure that.
 
Well I doubt anyone believes the Japanese would actually get Washington state and so forth, but I'm just trying to determine what Japan's plans (no matter how ridiculous) actually were.
 
The super-Co-prosperity sphere we're all calling rabidly ASB?

Actually I wouldn't mind a map of it either. Some aspects of the Nazis and Mussolini's plans were ASB but we have maps of them all over the place.

More importantly though I would like if anyone who has more information on the plans could actually post them.
 
I suppose nobody knows anything more than what has been said already. Darn. Was hoping somebody would know something more or have a book or something.

Well, here is a rough map based mainly off the Wikipedia article on it. The grey boundaries are the borders between the government-general regions.

Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere I.png
 
From the old history papers I've read, the WW2!Japanese saw themselves as at the top-tier (if not the top) of the international community. And that they perceived this community as sort of mirroring the old Shogunate caste system. Thus they thought of themselves as Asia's elder brother, rather than China, and that all of it should be placed under its enlightened rule. In practice, you know the rest.
 

Cook

Banned
Australia was intended to be incorporated into the Sphere by political pressure rather than invasion.
Various proposals to attack parts of Australia were to neutralise it as a threat and base of operations, not to permanently occupy.
 
It's called Making History, and its far more simplified than Hearts of Iron, for those who just want to wade on in an conquer the world.

Hearts of Iron II isn't realistic either, just with more details and micro-management...
 
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