Is Pearl Harbor avoided if the USA doesn't control the Philippines?

The Spanish can sell Philippines before 1898 not after or during. Of course they can still sell the Philippines after but The buyer would have to fight a war just to get de facto control for a span of a decade or more just like what the US did in OTL.

Just dont know if other countries would have been hawkish enough and bold enough to take that risk absent of Germany.

I read about Germany wanting to buy the Philippines in Dreadnought by Raymond K. Massie. IIRC Kaiser Wilhelm was livid when the Americans beat Germany to them.
 
US interests in China were really more of the driving force of US policy towards Japan than the Philippines were. American businesses viewed China as a major market that they wanted to keep open, while China was also the standard destination for American missionary groups (who would then report back to their home congregations, giving a perceived connection to many of the parishioners). That gave the "China Lobby" both significant economic and political clout; the US was basically the driving force behind the various international sanctions imposed on the Japanese (the British and especially the Dutch didn't particularly care about China, but saw it as a small price to pay to keep the Americans happy).

Even without the Philippines ever having been American, there would be a significant US naval presence; the East India Squadron was established in 1835, and the squadron that defeated the Spanish in the Battle of Manila Bay was the American naval force already stationed in Asia before the war broke out.
 
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