DBWI: North Japan was never a communist state.

As we all know, after the second World War, the Soviets forced the North Japanese to adopt communism, and this has shaped the picture of Asia for years.

What if the Democratic Republic of Japan was never communist? There wouldn't be a divided Tokyo, and they would be as united in capitalism as Korea is in communism.
 
There wouldn't have been the border crisis in the '60s if the US conquered all of the Japanese islands. We would be a lot further away from nuclear war in such a TL.

Japan would also probably be a bit richer, like West Germany was.

I just wonder how such a TL could happen, as Operation Downfall was very close to failing and only the Soviet intervention saved it from collapse.

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There wouldn't have been the border crisis in the '60s if the US conquered all of the Japanese islands. We would be a lot further away from nuclear war in such a TL.

Japan would also probably be a bit richer, like West Germany was.

I just wonder how such a TL could happen, as Operation Downfall was very close to failing and only the Soviet intervention saved it from collapse.

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Perhaps if Japan surrends before USSR invasion? Truman pondered dropping couple atom bombs to Japan. So if he decides do that instead launcihg Operation Downfall Japan might surrend.
 
Perhaps if Japan surrends before USSR invasion? Truman pondered dropping couple atom bombs to Japan. So if he decides do that instead launcihg Operation Downfall Japan might surrend.

That seems unlikely. Japan was used to getting bombed and there wasn't hardly a target left for destruction. Also, the Blitz didn't work for Hitler, so I can't see it working for Truman either.

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Well it depends on if the nukes would have a greater shock value than the normal bombing campaigns america was doing at the time, it is one thing to level a city with an extensive bombing campaign and another to instantly level it with one bomb.
 
Well it depends on if the nukes would have a greater shock value than the normal bombing campaigns america was doing at the time, it is one thing to level a city with an extensive bombing campaign and another to instantly level it with one bomb.

Japan's cities were almost completely rubble. All a nuke would do is move some dirt around. We also have to remember that the Japanese government was almost entirely made up of fanatics that would go on no matter what.

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That seems unlikely. Japan was used to getting bombed and there wasn't hardly a target left for destruction. Also, the Blitz didn't work for Hitler, so I can't see it working for Truman either.

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Kyoto wasn't bombed due to it's "cultural significance", so if Truman had decided to nuke Japan, there is one potential target. Sendai and Niigata are also potential targets as even though they were bombed, the air raids there weren't as severe as say the ones on Tokyo or Osaka or Kobe.
 
Kyoto wasn't bombed due to it's "cultural significance", so if Truman had decided to nuke Japan, there is one potential target. Sendai and Niigata are also potential targets as even though they were bombed, the air raids there weren't as severe as say the ones on Tokyo or Osaka or Kobe.

I always thought that Kyoto simply wasn't worth the effort. Would that be enough to push the radicals towards peace, or would it simply work against the US?

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I'd think, if Truman were to nuke Japan, he'd hit cities that were relatively intact due to not being hit by conventional bombs as much. Kokura comes to mind, or Hiroshima. Sendai or Niigata might get hit as well, though.
 
By some measures, South Japan is the wealthiest country in the world. All of the Kanto Plain, unless you count North Tokyo, remained in the American zone and this is where Japanese population and industry is concentrated. The Soviet Zone, again excepting North Tokyo, consisted of mostly rural and mountainous land and was not that important. They had to be heavily subsidized from the rest of the Soviet block. And even South Tokyo has the center of the city and all the cultural landmarks.

I don't see Japan becoming much wealthier with the addition of North Japan, though if nukes are used against Japanese cities that would make reconstruction more difficult.

Some Japanese institutions might change. The main change would be that the Americans would run the entire occupation, instead of the division of Japan into Soviet, British, American, and Chinese zones. The Americans making all the decisions would play out very differently. They might not agree to the restoration of the Emperor or the rebuilding of the Japanese army,both of which were done to counter the threat from North Japan. And Tokyo would definitely be the capital, as opposed the current arrangement where the Emperor is again in Kyoto and most of the government agencies and the Diet are based in Osaka.
 
One could argue that North Japan is one of the most dangerous countries in the world as Sanzo Nosaka, who ruled the Democratic Republic of Japan from it's proclaimation in 1947 to his death in 1993, pursued a hardline Stalinist approach and created arguably the most extreme form of Communism in the planet, even worse than North China and East Germany.
 
They might not agree to the restoration of the Emperor or the rebuilding of the Japanese army,both of which were done to counter the threat from North Japan.

True. Hell, Japan might have remained demilitarised. They certainly wouldn't have the draft or the Japan Defence Navy, and definitely not their two light carriers and the Harriers.
 
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It'd probably have good relations with China by now - yeah, Japan had done the most appalling things there during the war and occupation, but that was decades ago and (unless they'd had a fight since) people would stop caring as much as it went into the past. Instead, North Japan kept backing Mao for decades and the Red Bamboo after that, and many of the Chinese don't fully trust the south as an ally rather than a different imperialist.
 
Well, we wouldn't get Gamera. The best "giant flying, fire breathing Turtle, as a metaphor for capitalism" movie.

Seriously though, would the whole of Japan be so militarized, because it was divided between two diametric opposites?
 
Probably would - the US is going to want to stop the communist takeover of China and, much like Germany for the USSR, Japan's right there and a good place to get allies.
 
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