Japan wins WW2, behavior and future of Co-Prosperity Sphere?

But who wants a bigger Soviet or Nazi sphere of influence?



The KMT supported by Nazis without the Allies supporting Japan could result in the Second Sino-Japanese War being won by the Republic of China, who could go on to win the Chinese Civil War. That would be interesting!

In order to get substantial shipments to China, Germany would probably have to both succeed in Barbarossa and gain control of the central Asian republics of the former Soviet Union. Alfred Rosenberg actually suggested the latter course of action.

What would be interesting, though, would be a Chinese Civil War where Germany supported the KMT and Japan supported the Communists.
 
In order to get substantial shipments to China, Germany would probably have to both succeed in Barbarossa and gain control of the central Asian republics of the former Soviet Union. Alfred Rosenberg actually suggested the latter course of action.

What would be interesting, though, would be a Chinese Civil War where Germany supported the KMT and Japan supported the Communists.

Japan supporting the Communists is moderately unlikely, given the heavyhanded suppression of all communist groups in Japan.
 

Sabot Cat

Banned
Japan supporting the Communists is moderately unlikely, given the heavyhanded suppression of all communist groups in Japan.

Indeed. Part of the slogan for their puppet regime in China was "Anti-Communist", and the first Pact they signed with Germany was the Anti-Comintern Pact. Japan supporting the communists is very unlikely.
 
Indeed. Part of the slogan for their puppet regime in China was "Anti-Communist", and the first Pact they signed with Germany was the Anti-Comintern Pact. Japan supporting the communists is very unlikely.

Realpolitiks frequently overule ideology and moral, interests first all too often.

If the KMT got actually a serious turn of luck, gaining creed, an edge, etc... The Japaneses could turn to help the reds.

Look at the politics of USA by example after WWII, some weird alliances/match up at times.

If, IF, the interests of Japan demand it, you can see an U turn perhaps..
 

katchen

Banned
The Japanese need to know when to stop conquering and occupying and when and how to get local independence movements on their side. It's a Co-Prosperity Sphere that Japan is talking, not an Empire. With the exception of islands in the Pacific, Japan always wanted to rule through local independent nations that have governments that see things their way. Rather like the US in Latin America. Even Manchukuo, while a puppet state carried all the trappings of being a separate independent country
If the Japanese played it that way, there is a good chance that Australia would not fight with Great Britain against Japan or have Aussie boys fighting to restore British colonies when the British betrayed Australia during this war on hwo occasions, notably Tobruk as well as Singapore. Australia could learn to live with a resurgent Japan.
 
The Japanese need to know when to stop conquering and occupying and when and how to get local independence movements on their side. It's a Co-Prosperity Sphere that Japan is talking, not an Empire. With the exception of islands in the Pacific, Japan always wanted to rule through local independent nations that have governments that see things their way. Rather like the US in Latin America. Even Manchukuo, while a puppet state carried all the trappings of being a separate independent country

Yeah, the operational word above is "talking". The pro-Japanese local puppet would be seen by his citizens in the same loving way, since you mention US friends in South America, as Batista, Somoza and Duvalier. It might take them some time, but in the end...
 
The only 'plausible' way for Imperial Japan to retain/gain an Asian Empire is if the Anglo-Japanese Allience and Anglo-Japanese relations stay intact/deepen into a closesr frienship throughout the 1920s, this means that during the lead up to WWII Japan sees it's place to stand by the Allies against the events in Europe.

Part of the above would presume that Imperial Japan never really goes 'milliterist' during the 1930s economic problems. Ergo, we might have to butterfly away this bust in the US, or have Imperial Japan rely a little less on foreign investment capital in this era.

In such a case the Sino-Japanese co-operation movements from the 1920s may deepen, entrenching the notion of Sino-Japanese co-operation against threats to both sercurity. Thus the Japanese play on the Nanking incident to impress upon the Chinese a need for unity, while also allowing the British special concessions.

In principe by the 1930s, the bugbear becomes the Communists. What happens if the Japanese uni-laterally decide that they support the Chinese nationalists and decide to intervine against the Communists, simulatainously supporting/legitermising the Kuomintang Government, but also supporting regional independance by graining Japanese gurantees for the various warlords/provinces of China?

The Kuomintang Government, thus gets shoehorned back to its founding roots as the notion of a 'federal entity', which perhaps the Japanese play on during the late 1920s and so sets the seeds to allow the partitioning of China along regional lines. Thus via the mid/late 1930s proposes a form of 'union of asian states'.

This becomes the grounding for a Co-prosperity sphere, that is aligned against Communism, and nominally with the Anglosphere Allies.


In such a history, Imperial Japan may never fight anyone in the WWII years, but being able to power play the colonial regimes in the DEI, Phillippines and Indochina to this notion of an 'asian sphere' might be able to get a regional support going for this 'new east'.

As the world moves into the Cold War era, the 'Asian Prosperity Sphere' might develop as a 3rd power bloc, weaker than the Allies and Soviets, but nominally aligned to the former against the latter, but strained over colonial holdings.

In the longer run, the Chinese and Japanese economic explosions may have them outlast the Soviets and today the Cold War between the 'East and West' might still be there in the background.
 
^ The problem with that idea is that Japan saw themselves as being superior to all other people in Asia, racially and genetically superior to Koreans and Chinese and southeast Asians, and they were harsh on whites in the region to show how impotent their western masters were. You'd have to massively change how Japan operates for any possibility of that scenario to work.
 
I don't think Japan winning World War II is Alien Space Bats or even implausible.

Basically: Hitler is assassinated in 1939, and because Goering distrusts Japan as an ally, the KMT continues to be in an alliance with Nazi Germany. Thus by the principle of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend", Japan becomes a part of the allies, making an alliance with the British Empire, with which they shared amicable relations and a shared dislike of the Nationalist Chinese government (because the Nationalist government revoked foreign concessions imposed by Britain on China). This would mean no 1941 pacific campaign against Allied-held territories, which might be beneficial in concentrating resources on the Second Sino-Japanese War. With the help of the UK (and probably the other Allies, considering they occupy a similar position as the Republic of China in OTL), Japan would "liberate" China from the "Nazi-sympathizing" KMT. It would not be unlike the Eight Nation Alliance during the Boxer Rebellion, atrocities and all.

The US was extremely interested in China and, in particular, with China being open to trade, which meant that the US was strongly interested in China not being dominated by foreign powers. *That* was the reason OTL that Japan got into the US bad books with its China adventurism. Japan's membership in the Axis had precisely nothing to do with it.
 
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