The Japanese always had an appreciation for their Army and Navy, but the influence of Wilsonian, Communist and Anarchist fads right after WWI is undeniable.
Notably, the Japanese public never had a grassroots enthusiasm for WWI or for the Siberian intervention. Citizens and politicians felt free to call overseas operations a waste of money. The Japanese government backed down from the 21 Demands and kept backing down for the next 15 years until 1931. They withdrew from Siberia, Shandong and eventually even northern Sakhalin island. And the public thought this was fine. This is quite different from the conformist, ultra-patriotic attitudes of the Russo-Japanese War or 1930s or 1940s Japan.
The occupation regime in Korea also mellowed in the 1920s compared to the 1910s.
As Japan moved from the 20s to the 30s, the national zeitgeist evolved with escalating ultra-patriotism and suppression of left-wing dissent. This was actually a counter-current to the widening of the suffrage that happened in the 1920s.
Assassinations of opponents of military agendas, increasingly aggressive lobbying by the services, and elite and public tolerance for lawlessness at home and a broad that presented itself as "patriotic" were key parts of Japan's transformation from the country signing the Washington Treaty of 1922 to the country leaving the League of Nations in 1923.
Could Japanese militarists/navalists have nipped in the bud entirely the intermezzo of "Shidehara diplomacy" and "Taisho Democracy" and acquiescence to the Wilsonian vision?
Motivated by fear of democracy, socialism and pacifism, could the militarists and novelists of Japan begun campaigns of intimidation and heavy propaganda successfully such that the Japanese public and elite think withdrawing from Shandong or Siberia, or Naval Limitation, are so traitorous that Japanese politicians fear to take those steps.
One way this could happen, though I don't know how exactly to bring it about, would be for grassroots "gekokujo" to take root in the services several years earlier.
Possibly easier, however, in this late teens early 20s era, would be for the Japanese "deep state" to cultivate repression and ultra-patriotism deliberately, encouraging the forces of order to take matters into their own hands. This would have to stem from Yamagata Aritomo, who still dominated the Army until 1922, taking a different and more creative approach to counter what he considered unwelcome trends.
In OTL Yamagata was a reactionary and a militarist, disturbed by democracy, socialism and arms control, but while decrying this, he didn't encourage any radical lawbreaking to counter those trends and they got a chance to play out. However, that is not how things went down in all countries after WWI. Although they did not succeed, the Germans had Freikorps and radical right wing populist movements and attempted coups by volks like Wolfgang Kapp and Adolf Hitler between 1919 and 1923. Italian Fascism began to gain steam from 1919-20. The Italian elite was panicked enough by leftism and frustrated enough at denial of nationalistic aims that tolerated the March on Rome and Mussolini's takeover.
Can we have something in any way parallel in early 1920s Japan, causing the country to spend the decade involved in arms buildups, local hot wars and "Cold War" with other great power(s)?
What do you think?
Notably, the Japanese public never had a grassroots enthusiasm for WWI or for the Siberian intervention. Citizens and politicians felt free to call overseas operations a waste of money. The Japanese government backed down from the 21 Demands and kept backing down for the next 15 years until 1931. They withdrew from Siberia, Shandong and eventually even northern Sakhalin island. And the public thought this was fine. This is quite different from the conformist, ultra-patriotic attitudes of the Russo-Japanese War or 1930s or 1940s Japan.
The occupation regime in Korea also mellowed in the 1920s compared to the 1910s.
As Japan moved from the 20s to the 30s, the national zeitgeist evolved with escalating ultra-patriotism and suppression of left-wing dissent. This was actually a counter-current to the widening of the suffrage that happened in the 1920s.
Assassinations of opponents of military agendas, increasingly aggressive lobbying by the services, and elite and public tolerance for lawlessness at home and a broad that presented itself as "patriotic" were key parts of Japan's transformation from the country signing the Washington Treaty of 1922 to the country leaving the League of Nations in 1923.
Could Japanese militarists/navalists have nipped in the bud entirely the intermezzo of "Shidehara diplomacy" and "Taisho Democracy" and acquiescence to the Wilsonian vision?
Motivated by fear of democracy, socialism and pacifism, could the militarists and novelists of Japan begun campaigns of intimidation and heavy propaganda successfully such that the Japanese public and elite think withdrawing from Shandong or Siberia, or Naval Limitation, are so traitorous that Japanese politicians fear to take those steps.
One way this could happen, though I don't know how exactly to bring it about, would be for grassroots "gekokujo" to take root in the services several years earlier.
Possibly easier, however, in this late teens early 20s era, would be for the Japanese "deep state" to cultivate repression and ultra-patriotism deliberately, encouraging the forces of order to take matters into their own hands. This would have to stem from Yamagata Aritomo, who still dominated the Army until 1922, taking a different and more creative approach to counter what he considered unwelcome trends.
In OTL Yamagata was a reactionary and a militarist, disturbed by democracy, socialism and arms control, but while decrying this, he didn't encourage any radical lawbreaking to counter those trends and they got a chance to play out. However, that is not how things went down in all countries after WWI. Although they did not succeed, the Germans had Freikorps and radical right wing populist movements and attempted coups by volks like Wolfgang Kapp and Adolf Hitler between 1919 and 1923. Italian Fascism began to gain steam from 1919-20. The Italian elite was panicked enough by leftism and frustrated enough at denial of nationalistic aims that tolerated the March on Rome and Mussolini's takeover.
Can we have something in any way parallel in early 1920s Japan, causing the country to spend the decade involved in arms buildups, local hot wars and "Cold War" with other great power(s)?
What do you think?