Japan in the American common wealth

Since Japan was kinda sorta but not really in the American sphere of influence back in the 1850s -70s what if japan was made a territory or at least given a commonwealth status within the usa I can kinda sorta see it as a gigantic Hawaii in a way
 
Well that butterflies away the first and second sino japanese wars, as well as the Russo japanese war. Korea could stay under chinese dominance or more likely, would fall under Russian, British or US influence. Us imperialism in the region would be on a much larger scale due to base in Japan, particularly in china. Expect a hostile reaction from Russia. Potential issues over the rights of Japanese residents as naturalized citizens or foreigners and the preservation of daimos, the shogunate or if annexation is later, the emperor. No pacific theater in WWII, butterflies away US military involvement beyond lend-lease and hostilities with Russia May lead to the US providing no aid for them. The lack of a defeat during the Russo-Japanese war leaves Russia with more prestige and stabilizes the political situation which prevents a full-scale revolution and a Bolshevik take over. Similar system of territory-hood extended to other nations in Asia. Ethiopia will be the only no-European power to resist the Europeans militarily. In japan, increased presence of "gaijin." Violent suppression of remaining Samurai. English becomes lingua Franca of East Asia. Japan is potentially ratified as a state which sets a precedent and leads many territories such as Puerto Rico or the Philippines to follow suit. This would be a great TL. See where it takes you. best of luck:D
 

Lateknight

Banned
I strongly doubt the Japanese would accept outright annexation by a foreign power.

The Philippines didn't want to annexed by the U.S as well so we killed half a million of them. I think the same thing would happen to japan.
 
The Philippines didn't want to annexed by the U.S as well so we killed half a million of them. I think the same thing would happen to japan.

Half a million? Sorry, not enough for Japan.

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TFSmith121

Banned
The U.S. had something else on its plate

The U.S had something else on its plate in the 1860s...:rolleyes:

And interest in anything in the Pacific west of the Farallones was pretty limited...

Alaska was an opportunity and no one (essentially) lived there; Hawaii had been under strong albeit mostly unofficial influence for decades, and functions as an obvious shield to the Pacific coast ... Anything west of the Dateline or south of the equator was a liability, and seen as such.

Trying to impose any sort of legal connection on Japan in the Nineteenth Century is an ASB the size of Godzilla.

Best,
 
Frankly you might as well be asking for America to annex Britain if it somehow lost most of its navy; Japan was a cohesive nation-state long by the point of the 19th century and had what was then modern weaponry and was well into the industrialization process.

In short the whole idea is ASB.
 
Describing Japan as in 'America's sphere of influence' is more than a tad inaccurate. Sure it was Commodore Perry who opened up Japan to American foreign trade (and sunk the Shogunate's isolationist policies, leading to the spats between the Satsuma and Chosin clans versus foreign powers) but Britain, France, Russia, and the Netherlands all had pre-existing treaties and were vastly more capable of exerting influence over Japanese policy (the French in particular, though they ended up backing the wrong horse in 1868...).

The US doesn't stand a prayer of incorporating the Japanese into any American Pacific Empire.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Still plenty of land to develop and

It does make you wonder what the USA looks like, and does, without the Civil War.

Well, without the Civil War (presuming slavery is limited in the Constitution, the south buys that, the old Southwest goes the way of the old Northwest, and Eli Whitney trips over a rake or something) you might be able to make the case for slavery not becoming the economic and political force it was historically, but still have the continentaL US develop essentially as it did historically.

Even by the 1860s, that leaves plenty of land in what became the Lower 48 to develop and populate, and the last gasps of Indian sovereignty (northern and southern Great Plains, Great Basin, and Southwestern) cultures to force into the reservation system.

At that point, industrialization is going full blast in New England, the MidAtlantic, and Great Lakes/Old Northwest, so that should absorb plenty of energy as well.

Alaska may get picked up more or less as historical (the driver was from the Russian side, largely) and the economic penetration of Hawaii was in place from the whalers/missionaries three decades earlier.

Dollar diplomacy in the Caribbean, Mexico, Central America, and South America (to a degree); presumably trans-Pacific trade - the Open Door may or may not become policy.

Basically, I could see a level of engagement in the world, generally, about a decade ahead of the historical curve, absent the Civil War.

So more US diplomatic involvement in Europe and Asia, but the willingness to be involved in much more than the "punitive mission" of military engagement seems unlikely - the US was pretty content to focus on the Western Hemisphere in this era, absent the outliers like Samoa etc.

The US may take a more active role in Monroe Doctrine enforcement (I could see a US absent the Civil War being much more actively opposed to the French and Spanish interventions of the 1860s, to the extent they may not happen), which presmably leads to more of a partnership with the Latin American republics, rather than a dominant party type role.

Rough guess, absent the Civil War, "this" US in 1875 may look more like the historical US in 1885, and so on - without the civil war, however, the dominance of US politics in the Nineteenth Century by the Republicans is less likely, so there might actually be more political pluralism. A Republican-Progressive alliance in opposition to a Democrat-Populist one, and vice versa. Racial and gender politics will be interesting, certainly.

Prohibition may come in earlier, although without a lasting Republican-Progressive alliance, it may not come in at all.

Lots of ripples, obviously.

Best,
 
But we NEVER had anything called a commonweath, because we never did big empire, but only small trading empire and ethnic cleansing in North America. If you mean trade treaty at the point of a gun, that's what we did. Though also TR happily let Japan take over Korea.

WHY would start to want a war big enough to conquer Japan as incorated empire? After all, we already had enough ethnically cleansed mapturf for respect, more than we've densely settled, a century later.
 
TOTAL WHOOPS!!!! Sorry!!!

My LAME excuses are that I forgot about that because it described decolonization, the opposite of what it'd take to get Japan there, and because it was half a century later that the term appeared.

The term could be used at a later decolonization, BUT nobody has yet given any good reason why we'd such a hard thing as conquer such a far and overpopulated turf.

And really everything's Thande's fault, for he started the always wrong, and now we're all just tools in his hand, helpless... :eek:
 
TFSmith121;10232057 So more US diplomatic involvement in Europe and Asia said:
Maybe... but there were a lot of weird places that Yankees were ending up in OTL prior to the Civil War. Zanzibar's biggest (or second, after Britain) trading partner was America; Perry was toying with seizing Taiwan; etc. I don't think these things must happen, but I could see the US being more assertive in East Asia.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Given the POD basically goes back to the 1780s,

Given the POD basically goes back to the 1780s, one could posit almost anything, but the realities are that (for example) how long it took for consensus to build to the point Hawaii could be formally annexed, I kind of doubt it...

Best,
 
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