Could the Pacific War have been avoided?

By the beginning of 1941, with Japan part of the Tripartite Pact, and the U.S raw materials and fuel embargo against Japan in place, would it have been possible for Japan to have pulled back from the brink of war with the US, or would the pressure for resources have been too overwhelming?

Or, if the Japanese had put into effect a limited strike on just the Dutch East Indies, but not American possessions, would FDR have been politically able to move the American people towards war with Japan?
 

King Thomas

Banned
Possibly, if Japan had chosen to "Strike North" against the USSR.I can't imagine the USA going to war to save Communism.
 
It'd put off the US entry into the war and likely would end up being better off for Japan in the long run.

FDR was already doing his best to "create" incidents to get the US into the war. For example putting the USS Texas out on Neutrality Patrol unescorted when submarines were known to be in the neighboorhood.

It would only be a matter of time before some incident cropped up to give FDR an excuse to declare war on Germany or Japan and by extension the other.

Of course this means no Pearl Harbor, so Kimmel gets to try war plan Orange. And if the Dutch East Indies are already secured then the Phillipines are a very lonely target and the US carrier fleet is outnumbered at this point and will have to pass by a lot of ground based air.

It's all academic really, the Phillipines would still fall, even if Kimmel's whole fleet was wiped out(and unable to be floated like at Pearl) it's only a matter of time before the naval yards start pumping out the Essex class carriers.
 
Possibly, if Japan had chosen to "Strike North" against the USSR.I can't imagine the USA going to war to save Communism.

The problem with that is, there's not really any known oil that's anywhere near the reach of the Japanesse armies. The oil embargo had effectively already ended the Strike north, strike south debate.
 
But hadn't War Plan Orange already been rescinded, because of recognition of local Japanese superiority?
 
But would FDR have forgone war with Japan in the interest of trying to provoke and go to war with Nazi Germany (because, even right after Pearl Harbor it was not clear at all that Hitler would honor the Tripartite Pact and go to war with the US; the Japanese certainly wouldn't have returned the favor, had the US attacked Germany
 
As has been said elswhere, many times, the Japanese target should have been the imperial possessions of the Brits, French and Dutch.

They would have been easy meat...a short campaign ending by August 1942 at the latest with Japan holding Ceylon, Malaya, Burma, and the DEI, with India and Australasia exposed to further agression in the following years.

No way the US would have gone to war with Japan to protect European colonies and possessions.

Maybe the US would still have been drawn into the German War, but not the Pacific.
 
But no attack on the US means no attack on the Phillipines... would the Japanese have ever countenanced an American military base in the middle of their empire?
 
More to the point can America maintain a base surronded by hostile territory.

I still think Japan just declaring war against Holland and Britain would only delay US involvement. FDR was itching for any excuse to get in. How long before lend-lease convoys were reinforcing Singapore and Australia?
 
Well the PI wouldn't exactly be under siege...plenty of open water. It's a sort of half full/half empty thing. Are the PI surrounded by hostile lands or are the Japanese confronted with a massive intrusion and base for attack on the soft flank of the CoProsperity Sphere?

Singapore would be major Japanese asset, not an allied one.

Certainly the US would in this case beef up the PIs and maybe even construct another massive naval base there similar to Pearl. Certainly a perfect submarine base, and if as was likely, the ANZACs throw in their lot with the US, it's the Japanese Indonesian and Papuan lands that are in a vise.

The Japanese would have to address this issue just as soon as their 1942 conquests were assimilated and military resources consolidated...and the US would know this...

US/Japanese Pacific War in 1946 maybe?
 

HJ Tulp

Donor
As has been said elswhere, many times, the Japanese target should have been the imperial possessions of the Brits, French and Dutch.

They would have been easy meat...a short campaign ending by August 1942 at the latest with Japan holding Ceylon, Malaya, Burma, and the DEI, with India and Australasia exposed to further agression in the following years.

No way the US would have gone to war with Japan to protect European colonies and possessions.

Maybe the US would still have been drawn into the German War, but not the Pacific.


And as has been noted many, many times: the US would respond. The China lobby was similair to the Israel Lobby, damned influential. The US wouldn't allow it's own embargo to be circumvented in such a way.
 
With the Embargo in place war is all but inevitable unless Japan leaves China entirely (all but ASB at this point) or the US lifts the sanctions (similarly all but ASB). With memories of Nanking fresh in the American psyche I think even a Pres. Lindbergh would be hard pressed to lift the sanctions unless his supporters totally dominate the Legislative as well (also highly unlikely without an earlier POD).

You'd need an earlier POD that keeps the Militant Nationalists out of power in Japan or at least eliminates the invasion of China and/or pursues a northern (USSR/Mongolia) strategy rather than a southern (China/Indochina), IJN-desired one.
 
POD is 1937. The Panay incident causes more furor in the US than IOTL. Roosevelt, seeing a possible means of alleviating the current bout of recession, begins a major buildup, and demands that Japan hold itself responsible for the attack. After much debate, the Japanese decide (narrowly) to back down, with concessions to the Americans and some sort of holding action in China. In return, roosevelt guarentees Japan access to the raw materials it needs, preempting the embargo which sparked the pacific war.
 
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