Hypothetical Racial/Social hierarchy in a Japanese-occupied Australia?

This question is more for a concept behind a story I'm thinking of writing rather than a pure AH question, but I thought it would be interesting to get a few informed opinions on the matter.

If the Japanese managed to occupy Australia during WW2 and somehow managed to hold onto it for a considerable amount of time; long enough to put in place significant governmental structures, what kind of racial/social treatment or systems do you think would take place?

Would there be any significant attempts at a sort of apartheid/segregation? If so, would all peoples of non-Japanese descent be equally treated with disdain or would the Japanese treat the Asian-Australians or White Australians (in particular those of "Anglo" descent) better than the rest.

Would the Japanese leadership dismantle the "White Australia" Policy or will it keep it in place, simply making an exception for Japanese immigrants?

Somehow I would think the Aborigines would unfortunately suffer the most under Japanese rule, probably more so than under White Australian rule. On the other hand, it was pointed out to me by Hendryk (I think) that Taiwanese Aborigines suffered no worse in Japanese-occupied Taiwan than they did when the Guomindang came into power, so perhaps the harshness of life would not be increased dramatically.
 

CalBear

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This needs to be in ASB.

There was no possible way for the Japanese to conquer a Continental landmass.

There was no way that the Japanese would have won the war.

There is no way that, even if the first two ASB events were put in place by what would have to be a flock of ASB, that Japan would WANT to hold Australia since it would serve as a gold plated invitation to the rest of the English speaking world to have a go at Japan.
 

King Thomas

Banned
ASB, but my guess is-Japanese on the top, then white Austraians, then other races, with the poor Aboriginies at the bottom & treated even worse then before.
 
This needs to be in ASB.

There was no possible way for the Japanese to conquer a Continental landmass.

There was no way that the Japanese would have won the war.

There is no way that, even if the first two ASB events were put in place by what would have to be a flock of ASB, that Japan would WANT to hold Australia since it would serve as a gold plated invitation to the rest of the English speaking world to have a go at Japan.

For the sake of this thread, let's assume that any circumstances needed for Japan to pull this off--increased population, industry, resources--occurred.
 
Yea, ASB, that's a given, but so what? Interesting question, anyway, and much more likely to get a cogent answer here than on the fanfic...err...ASB board.

I'm not the expert you're looking for, Aoz, but here's my 0.25 yen:

IIRC from OTL Japanese occupations, the treatment of native populations was bad, and treatment of "Imperialist Colonial Occupiers" (read: whities) generally worse. I'd imagine it'd be harsh martial law, at least in the occupied coastal areas; I imagine the interior will be "free" and Japan will/can only occupy strategic coastal cities. I suspect death camps and forced labor for Aussie soldiers who "dishonorably" surrendered, rape/slavery/exploitation at the whim of the occupying force without any real fear of official reprisal, forced subservience to the "superior" Japanese for all, and a general feeling of occupation rather than any "benign colonialism".

As for the Aborigines, I can't imagine they live in sufficient numbers in the likely occupied zones, but pretty much the same as above. Perhaps with haughty disdain rather than the outright hostility the Aussies will get.
 
Yea, ASB, that's a given, but so what? Interesting question, anyway, and much more likely to get a cogent answer here than on the fanfic...err...ASB board.

I'm not the expert you're looking for, Aoz, but here's my 0.25 yen:

IIRC from OTL Japanese occupations, the treatment of native populations was bad, and treatment of "Imperialist Colonial Occupiers" (read: whities) generally worse. I'd imagine it'd be harsh martial law, at least in the occupied coastal areas; I imagine the interior will be "free" and Japan will/can only occupy strategic coastal cities. I suspect death camps and forced labor for Aussie soldiers who "dishonorably" surrendered, rape/slavery/exploitation at the whim of the occupying force without any real fear of official reprisal, forced subservience to the "superior" Japanese for all, and a general feeling of occupation rather than any "benign colonialism".

As for the Aborigines, I can't imagine they live in sufficient numbers in the likely occupied zones, but pretty much the same as above. Perhaps with haughty disdain rather than the outright hostility the Aussies will get.

Thanks for the reply, Geekhis, I'm inclined to agree. Those do seem like expected outcomes of Japanese wartime rule.

I was going to add, I doubt that Japanese occupation would be possible at all and if so if so only restricted to major populated areas. Yes, it does seem ASB in retrospect, but as Geekhis mentioned, I'm a bit suspiscious of what I'd get in the ASB forum and thought I should place it in this forum instead.

I was just curious about people opinions on the actual governance and social impacts of such a Japanese rule. I had already implied in my OP that I wasn't questioning the possibility of the Japanese actually occupying.

Read: "More for a story idea rather than an actual pure AH question" But I do understand the reactions :eek:
 
This needs to be in ASB.

There was no possible way for the Japanese to conquer a Continental landmass.

There was no way that the Japanese would have won the war.

There is no way that, even if the first two ASB events were put in place by what would have to be a flock of ASB, that Japan would WANT to hold Australia since it would serve as a gold plated invitation to the rest of the English speaking world to have a go at Japan.

Good God man, speculation like this is the heart and soul of why people like alternate history! Depending on who you talk to, any outcome to the Second World War other than Germany and Japan losing in 1945 could be off limits. If you think this is too outlandish, just don't respond.

Regarding the original post, I would second Geekhis Khan's general observation, with the additional question: In a Japanese Victory scenario, what do the Japanese really hope to get from controlling Australia? Raw Materials? Land for Japanese colonists? Slave labor? Negotiating advantages with semi-defeated enemies (Britain and the US presumably) or other powers (the USSR, Germany)? Strategic positioning? Such considerations and long-range plans for Australia in this Mega Japanese Empire would probably affect how the White majorities in the coastal areas are treated. In some outcomes they might come off far better than the aborigines.
 
The trouble with it is, its so ASB it pretty much requires a completely different world to acheive.

(1) If (we assume) something miraculous happens in the Pacific, once the Allies get through with Germany they are going to land on Japan like a ton of bricks. If the Japanese have been mistreating the Australians, japan in OTL will look a paradice compared to what will happen to them.

(2) So we need to take the British out of the equation. Lets say Churchillis killed by a suicide ASB, and Halifax surrenders to Germany. But they cant surrender the dominions, although Australia might agree to a peace. in which case, the Australians will have to be clinically insane not to align closely with the other power who can support them, the USA. Son in this case, we still get the USA landing on Japan with big heavy boots.

The only way out of the 2 above dilemmas is for Japan to be powerful enough to fend off the USA (at least, lets be generous and not make them face the rest of the Empire at the same time..:p). But if the Japanese economy was that powerful, then I cant see any reason why they would have gone to war in the first place...!! (at least, not in Oz. They would be powerful enough to win in China, and bully the Dutch at least into selling them oil)

The problem is, the conditions necessary to get there are so different from OTL as to make the scenario ASB
 
The trouble with it is, its so ASB it pretty much requires a completely different world to acheive.

(1) If (we assume) something miraculous happens in the Pacific, once the Allies get through with Germany they are going to land on Japan like a ton of bricks. If the Japanese have been mistreating the Australians, japan in OTL will look a paradice compared to what will happen to them.

(2) So we need to take the British out of the equation. Lets say Churchillis killed by a suicide ASB, and Halifax surrenders to Germany. But they cant surrender the dominions, although Australia might agree to a peace. in which case, the Australians will have to be clinically insane not to align closely with the other power who can support them, the USA. Son in this case, we still get the USA landing on Japan with big heavy boots.

The only way out of the 2 above dilemmas is for Japan to be powerful enough to fend off the USA (at least, lets be generous and not make them face the rest of the Empire at the same time..:p). But if the Japanese economy was that powerful, then I cant see any reason why they would have gone to war in the first place...!! (at least, not in Oz. They would be powerful enough to win in China, and bully the Dutch at least into selling them oil)

The problem is, the conditions necessary to get there are so different from OTL as to make the scenario ASB

Word.

Anyway, there are a couple of AH novels about (initially) successful Japanese invasions of Australia, and I don't think any of them go into any detail about longterm relations between the occupied and the occupiers (mainly, I suppose, because the US cavalry always comes to the rescue, driving the invaders out of our continent).

And these stories normally take the line that the Japanese behave like they did at Nanking, or like the Nazis did against the untermenchen.
 
Logically, the Japanese would be after the primary industries - their entire expansion was driven by economic needs, after all - which means that the areas they'd assign high importance to would not necessarily be the major population centres. Note that in the Australia of the 30s and 40s, essentially the only important parts of the country population and industry-wise are the coastal strip from Brisbane to Melbourne or Adelaide, and Perth. In terms of raw materials, however, you're looking at substantial regions of Western Australia and Queensland, along with the heavy industry and mining areas in northern NSW and in Victoria. NT is still sadly mostly useless :p

The easiest system of rule would be to coopt the existing structure. Disestablish the Commonwealth and make each state a seperate entity. IIRC the Upper House of all the parliaments of the time were appointed by the Governor, although Qld may have abolished theirs - I'd have to check. Simply make the Governors Japanese, have them appoint IJA/IJN/Zaibatsu representatives to the Upper Houses, and it's a go. It probably makes more sense for the Japanese to invest as little by way of manpower as they can get away with. I would expect the Japanese to assume racial superiority over the white population, but given that the whites made up the overwhelming majority of the population of the time and had fairly well entrenched anti-Asian and especially anti-Japanese sentiments, there could be issues. I'd expect the Japanese to have to make examples out of quite large numbers of union members in order to get anything to happen, given the fuss over pig-iron in '37. There would also probably be a pure of sorts of the left - the Communists will obviously get the chop, and both the Union movement and the Labor party were fairly left, though thoroughly racist, at the time.
 
The population of Australia in 1940 was around 7078 000. In 1940 in Western Australia there were around 25000 Aboriginals. So lets say there were 50000 in the whole of Australia. Asians, mostly Chinese, were probably around 10000.

In the 1880s there were almost 50000 Chinese around Australia. By 1940 there were just over 9000.
It seems the Australians passed laws to make things difficult for the Chinese.

So we have 7018000 million whites.

Would think the White population would have it real bad under the Japanese.
The aboriginal and Asian population not so much. Would think that half of the White population would escape to New Zealand. Another part would probably be deported by the Japanese. So in the end there would be few White left in Australia. Those would probably mostly be fighting the Japanese.

It should be noted that the Australians did keep an eye on the Japanese from late 1800's to 1945:

Communities of Japanese residents in Australia were always small before the Second World War compared with other nationalities, but they were watched closely by the Army, Navy, Security Services and Police forces who became suspicious of Japanese activities. The influence of Japanese residents far outweighed their numbers from the time they immigrated to Australia in the late nineteenth century. It was often the case that activities such as photography, purchasing of books about or maps of Australia, surveying coastlines or taking soundings of waterway were interpreted as espionage by witnesses and reported as "spying" to authorities. Those responsible for investigating and interpreting these often-circumstantial reports had difficulty reaching agreement on the significance of the evidence, and especially in taking the next step of determining the intentions of the Japanese. Some intelligence reports were worthy of the language of a spy novel. Other, more reasoned reports gave pause to Army and Navy commands and influenced some Australian policy decisions.
 
The Australian plan in case Japan invaded was to concede the North to them to buy time, move all forces and command southward and then fight it out from there (with both conventional warfare, and the massive stockpile of gaseous weapons Australia had built up in case of invasion), at least as far as I know and if it wasn't something MaCarthur made up. So Northern occupation with a divided Australia between Japan and Australia proper for a time at least is not ASB.
 
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