Japan takes the Philippines, does Europe intervene?

Just want to respond to this. Philippines was under Spain at the time hideyoshi was in power in Japan. Does this mean Spain paid tribute to Japan? Because philippines as a nation or philippine national identity doesn't exist yet in the 1590s.

Like I said, the whole thing could be a fiction. More likely, I suspect, Hideyoshi rather optimistically interpreted diplomatic gifts or gestures as "tribute" in order to make his position seem more impressive to the recipients of his letter.

Otherwise, just how thorough was Spain's control over the Philippines at this time? It seems to me that some regions maintained something close to autonomy for many years. One of these chiefdoms (or whatever they were) might have sent tribute to Hideyoshi, and he either interpreted, or spun, this fact to make his position look better. I may be wrong about this, of course.
 
Like I said, the whole thing could be a fiction. More likely, I suspect, Hideyoshi rather optimistically interpreted diplomatic gifts or gestures as "tribute" in order to make his position seem more impressive to the recipients of his letter.

Otherwise, just how thorough was Spain's control over the Philippines at this time? It seems to me that some regions maintained something close to autonomy for many years. One of these chiefdoms (or whatever they were) might have sent tribute to Hideyoshi, and he either interpreted, or spun, this fact to make his position look better. I may be wrong about this, of course.

Furthermore, Toyotomi's experiences in life allowed him to be more...imaginative. If I remember correctly Toyotomi's family used to be the servants under Nobunaga. He has achieved things far greater than anything he has expected. When he tells his old mother "We'll live in Peking by winter", he means it. The man probably did think the diplomatic gifts as tributes.
 
Like I said, the whole thing could be a fiction. More likely, I suspect, Hideyoshi rather optimistically interpreted diplomatic gifts or gestures as "tribute" in order to make his position seem more impressive to the recipients of his letter.

Otherwise, just how thorough was Spain's control over the Philippines at this time? It seems to me that some regions maintained something close to autonomy for many years. One of these chiefdoms (or whatever they were) might have sent tribute to Hideyoshi, and he either interpreted, or spun, this fact to make his position look better. I may be wrong about this, of course.

It is quite possible that the Moros may have sent. But from the Moros stand point, it is a waste of resources since the Japanese have no power projection that far with the Moros still upto date with the current technology of the times.

Another possibility is that Spanish donation can be considered tribute.

Or another possibility are the Japanese colonists in the Philippines giving tribute to Japan.

although looking around I found this:
"Some Japanese ships visited the Philippines in the 1570s in order to export Japanese silver and import Philippine gold. Later, increasing imports of silver from New World sources resulted in Japanese exports to the Philippines shifting from silver to consumer goods. In the 1580s, the Spanish traders were troubled to some extent by Japanese pirates, but peaceful trading relations were established between the Philippines and Japan by 1590.

Japan's kampaku (regent), Toyotomi Hideyoshi, demanded unsuccessfully on several occasions that the Philippines submit to Japan's suzerainty."


Schottenhammer 2008, p. 151
Yu-Jose 1999, p. http://books.google.com/books?id=kbWv-pZy5H0C&pg=PA1
 
The War in the Pacific could be quite different, if - there had been no Spanish - American War.
Though it's hard to know how Spain could have coped with an 'empire'? How would the Spanish Civil War affected it?

Without a Spanish American War, most likely there won't be a Civil War, the tremendous amount of psycho-political damage the war caused will not appear.

Spain would have coped as it always had, sort of. Puerto Rico and Cuba seemed to be on the verge of normality, what with Puerto Rico getting its autonomy charter in 1897 and a similar project on-going for Cuba. As for the Philippines, I don't really know.
 
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