Japanese Occupied Australia

The only thing I've ever seen written about this topic was maybe 20+ years ago, before I went to Uni so I can't judge the reliability of the source. The basic thrust was that there were large proportions of the population in regional towns and cities and a reasonable amount of gun ownership. It was judged that the Australian population would not take occupation well being a mature democracy even in 1942. That the layout of the population, the nature of Australian agriculture and the number of firearms out in the country would make controlling the country very difficult and costly.
 
Firstly, cheers for the replies, guys.

What I should have put in, is post-war occupation. Say, it's 1946, or even sometime as the 1950's. Let's say that Japan offered South Australia and Tasmania to the Germans. What would live be like under the two different occupiers?

They all get run out by the various wildlife. :rolleyes:
 
Wasn't the Japanese military completely overstretched as it was in OTL? In addition to a bloody war of attrition in China and South-East Asia they have to commit more divisions to take large swaths of land in Australia (even if it is just areas of coastline where the population is concentrated that is a lot).
I am not sure it would even be logistically possible despite how lightly defended Australia was, and even if it was possible, it would mean drastically curtailing Japan's offensives in Asia to divert troops. Furthermore an occupied Australia would be ripe for an Allied reconquest, with Japans supply lines to its occupying army being incredibly vulnerable, particularly to allied submarines (which Japan had very little to counter).
 
It's also of detriment to the Japanese, as it means supplying yet another distant garrison, which means all the more targets for submarines.

I don't disagree with that.

Japan is only going to be able to occupy Australia into the 1950s if it wins WWII, which is impossible given Japan's economic inferiority to the USA. Japan would need to have an economy at least double the size of OTL to stand any chance of wining WWII and they need to make more extensive administrative preparations for a long war too so that they get the most out of what they have.

The doubled economy would include a merchant marine that was at least double the size of OTL's. That solves the shipping capacity problem for the invasion and to supply the occupation force. The administrative preparations include the implementation of a convoy system 2 years earlier to reduce shipping losses.

That still leaves the problem of finding the troops, but if Japan is richer it can afford to maintain a larger army in peacetime and expand it at a faster rate in war.

Though in that case the Japanese would attempt a full-scale invasion not one limited to occupying the north.

But the thread is supposed to be about what would the Japanese do to Australia once it was occupied. Not whether an invasion was feasible.
 
Japan is only going to be able to occupy Australia into the 1950s if it wins WWII, which is impossible given Japan's economic inferiority to the USA. Japan would need to have an economy at least double the size of OTL to stand any chance of wining WWII and they need to make more extensive administrative preparations for a long war too so that they get the most out of what they have.
Doubling the economy isn't enough, increasing it by 10 times might be, provided they could also get over their horrible stupidity. Seriously, they seemed to have no regard for how to actually run a war, they neglected radar, development, anti-submarine procedures and economic warfare. It was only due to a series of flukes, and a huge number of screw-ups by their enemies that they got even a half of what they did. With slightly different conditions f.e. PH could easily have cost the Japanese two or three times as many aircraft as it did, which would have put a serious dent in the number of Kido Butai pilots available.

But the thread is supposed to be about what would the Japanese do to Australia once it was occupied. Not whether an invasion was feasible.
Trying to keep tabs on 7 million recalcitrant, rebellions Australians, many of whom are rural and have guns? In a land they know well and you don't know at all? Possibly only the Southern USA could be a more dangerous place to try to hold. Add into that the absolutely immense coastline for gun-runners to get into and you have a place that will be the absolute bugbear of the Empire.
 
As mentioned you're not going to get a full-scale Japanese invasion of Australia c.1942 absent changes going back decades - you're looking at 10-15 div equivs on the part of the Japanese just to get to the point of starting to think seriously about it, which is essentially what was committed to the whole of the East Indies ops from 12/41 onwards - you at a bare minimum have to take China out of the equation entirely before that's happening.

Likewise though Darwin et environs are comparatively trivial pickups if done off the trot post fall of Java while things are chaotic - you wouldn't be looking at a meaningful advance inland beyond, maybe, the odd minor burn-the-village type raids if for no other reason than that doing so doesn't really accomplish anything - what infrastructure there is is mostly coastal. If doing Darwin one might as well do Broome, which is the only really major airfield between 'populated' W.Aus and Darwin, and I suppose you'd probably get a couple of fairly improv airfields in Arnhem Land as the only really significant Japanese const/engineering work. Holding that much doesn't particularly accomplish anything in a positive sense for the Japanese, but does deny use/harrassment opportunities for the Allies (and moves things further away from the places that matter to Japan) - whether it's worth the effort is I think pretty up in the air, but it is of at least some value.

So - to go back to the initial question, an actual Japanese occupation post some sort of Axis Victorious War probably looks like a constrained version of that - at least access to Darwin facilities, maybe control or access to a couple of air/seaplane bases in the middle of nowhere, probably not much if anything else because the 'else' isn't hugely relevant to a postwar Japanese zone.
 
A Japanese invasion of Australia was possible, early in the War, especially if the USNavy stayed away (no bombing of Pearl Harbour).
The Australian Army was poorly-equipped and few in number. Australians genuinely feared invasion.

To control the Australian economy, Japan only needed to occupy ports and a handful of choke-points along key railroads. No need to send significant numbers of Japanese soldiers or pice into the interior.
If a mining town or sheep station got too "uppity" simply stop trains from delivering food. After a few weeks of short rations, uppity miners will resume digging.
Surely the Japanese could find a few fascist sympathizers or greedy capitalists to manage inland choke-points. Eventually, Japan could import enough Japanese-born managers to ensure that all profits flowed towards Tokyo.

As politically unpopular as the "Brisbane Line" was ... it may have become a logistical necessity. Australia could only defend territory if it could feed troops. Troops stationed too far from farms and cities would eventually have to be abandoned, especially if the IJN harassed coastal shipping and bombed railroads.

As for guerrilla warfare ..... Hah! Hah! .... The outback is a lot like the Transval. The British Army had already proven that concentration camps work well against guerrillas. Japanese were not shy about imprisoning or killing uppity locals.
 
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Here's one I made earlier

About 6 months ago there was a thread on the possible cultural impacts of a Japanese Occupation of Australia. Though like this thread most of the debate was about the feasibility of the invasion not its consequences. This is a post I wrote about the land defences of Australia in 1942.

This is a consolidation of my earlier posts about the Australian Army in 1942. It is intended to show that Australia was weakly defended in the first half of 1942, which gave the Japanese a window of opportunity for a successful invasion. Most of the information comes from the Australian Encyclopaedia.
Deployment in Far East in December 1941

Malaya - 2 Brigades of the 8th Australian Division (22nd and 27th Brigades)
Ambon & Timor - 1 Brigade of the 8th Australian Division
Rabaul - 2/22nd Battalion
Naru & Ocean Island - A small artillery detachment
Solomons, New Ireland & Admiralties - 1st Independent Company
New Caledonia - 3rd Independent Company

Australia
1st Armoured Division with 12 tanks
1st and 2nd Cavalry Divisions of the Militia - they became the 1st and 2nd Motorised Divisions in March 1942
1st to 5th Divisions of the Militia

The Militia divisions were up to strength in men, but they did not have their full strength of weapons and equipment. Furthermore they were badly trained and organised.

The 2/40th Battalion was sent to Timor and the 2/2nd Independent Company was sent to Portuguese Timor.

Reinforcements in the First Quarter of 1942

46,000 men of 6th and 7th Australian Divisions (less 1 Brigade in Ceylon)
63,000 men of AIF who had not left Australia
33,000 men in US 41st Division and some USAAF men

Combined with the 114,000 men of the Militia there was a grand total of 256,000 soldiers in Australia by the end of March 1942. Which is more than the Japanese would be able to send. However, the British had 90,000 men in Malaya at the start of the Pacific War IIRC and received 45,000 reinforcements before it surrendered. Furthermore the Japanese were the best at Jungle warfare at this stage of the war. I'm sure they could have learnt how to survive and fight in deserts if they needed to.

Also the Japanese were able to occupy the Dutch East Indies, which had a population of 70 million in 1940 and Australia only had 7 million. So although it is a huge place they should be able to keep the civil population pacified.

Organisation on 9th April 1942

Land Headquarters
First Army
I Corps (South Queensland) - 4 Divisions (3rd Division, 5th Division, 7th Division and 1st Motor Division)
II Corps (New South Wales) - 3 Divisions (1st Division, 2nd Division and 10th Division)

Second Army (New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania) - 2 Divisions (2nd Motor Division and US 41st Division, plus Tasmania Force)

III Corps (Western Australia) - 4th Division

Northern Territory Force - 19th Brigade Group (of the 6th Division) and the Northern Territory Lines of Communication Area

Land Headquarters Reserve - One Division (1st Armoured Division, plus 2/2nd Pioneer Battalion and 2/1st Machine Gun Battalion)
Land Headquarters Troops - which may have included the Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania, Western Australia and New Guinea Line of Communication Areas

New Guinea Force - 30th Australian Brigade. Joined by 14th Australian Brigade on 14th May.

AIF (Overseas) - 2 Divisions (16th and 17th Brigades of the 6th Division in Ceylon from mid-March to early July 1942 and 9th Division in the Middle East until February 1943).

Therefore there was a total of 11 divisions in Australia on this date consisting of one armoured, 2 motor and 8 infantry divisions (1st to 5th, 7th, 10th and US 41st).

Although 12 infantry divisions (8 Militia and 4 A.I.F) were formed the maximum strength was 10 divisions. The 8th Division was destroyed by March 1942; the 10th existed between April and August 1942; the 11th Division wasn't formed until October 1942; and the 12th Division only existed for the first 15 days of January 1942. In early 1943 the Australian Army converted 6 divisions from motorised infantry to "jungle" divisions and they were not disbanded until the end of the Pacific War. The other 3 infantry divisions were disbanded between April 1944 and May 1945.

The A.I.F. had the following un-brigaded units: 4 pioneer battalions; 8 machine gun battalions; the Parachute Battalion; the Papua Infantry Battalion; 4 New Guinea infantry battalions; the Torres Strait Light Infantry Battalion; the garrison battalions; and 8 independent companies (later named commando squadrons).

Australian Armoured Forces

In May 1942 the armoured formations of the Australian Army consisted of:

1 Armoured Division (1st and 2nd Armoured Brigades plus divisional troops)
1 Motor Division - formerly the 1st Cavalry Division (1st and 2nd Motor Brigades plus division troops)
2 Motor Division - formerly the 2nd Cavalry Division (6 armoured brigade and 3 motor brigade, plus divisional troops)
3 Armoured Tank Brigade (1st, 2nd and 3rd Tank Battalions)

At the end of February 1942 there were only 12 tanks in Australia (2 British Medium Tanks built in the 1920s and 10 Light Tanks Mk VI delivered in 1937). However, between then and the end of the year 1,200 tanks were supplied by the US and 300 by the UK so that there were about 1,500 tanks in Australia at the end of 1942. This allowed the 1st and 2nd Motor Divisions to be converted into the 3rd and 2nd Armoured divisions respectively. However, a shortage of manpower forced a reduction in the size of the Armoured Corps to the following by August 1943:

1st Armoured Division (1st Armoured Brigade, 3rd Motor Brigade and divisional troops)
3rd Armoured Division (2nd Armoured Brigade and Divisional troops)
4th Armoured Brigade (1st Tank Battalion, 2/6th, 2/8th and 2/9th Armoured Regiments)
2nd and 3rd Tank Battalion Groups

Further reductions became necessary during 1943 and 1944, and by 1945 the Australian Armoured Corps had shrunk to 5 armoured regiments and one reconnaissance squadron. At the time there were also the 2/6th, 2/7th and 2/9th Cavalry (Commando) regiments, originally named Divisional Cavalry regiments.

Australian AFV Production and AFV Imports to Australia

This is the history of Australian tank production in World War II courtesy of Jane's World War II Tanks and Armoured Fighting Vehicles by Leland Ness

A handful of Vickers Medium Tanks had been purchased in the 1930s, but these were worn out by 1939. 10 Light Tanks Mk VIA were ordered in the Spring of 1936 and delivered in late 1937. A follow up order for 24 Light Tanks Mk VIB was placed on their arrival, but this was cancelled shortly after. About 5,000 Universal Carriers were built in Australia 1940-44. These were the only tanks in Australia until March 1942.

According to Ness the General Staff requirement for the AC-1 Sentinel was drawn up in November 1940 and the prototype appeared in January 1942, but only 66 Sentinel tanks were built. That is 22 between August and December 1942 and 44 between January and July 1943. However, the Australians also built 15 LP armoured cars in 1939; 245 Dingo scout cars 1942-43; 238 Rover light armoured cars 1942-43; and 5,661 Universal Carriers 1940-43.

The loss of the Dutch East Indies in March 1942 resulted in the diversion of 50 M3 light tanks and 148 Marmont-Herrington CTLS light tanks to Australia, which were taken over by the Royal Australian Armoured Corps (RAAC). The CTLS machines were only good for training, but the M3 light tanks complemented 10 that the RAAC had already received from the US for familiarisation, which came from the Australian allocation of British Lend Lease and 315 M3 light tanks (270 in 1942 and 45 in 1943) were received from this source. This source also provided 777 M3 Lee/Grant medium tanks which were delivered between March/April 1942 and the end of that year. The Australians also received British built Matilda infantry tanks which arrived from April 1942 and 304 were on strength by the end of the year and in 1944 they bought New Zealand's 33 Matilda close support tanks.

The source also says that the Americans sent 503 M3A1 scout cars, but does not give the dates. At least 97 British Staghound armoured cars were received in 1944 and the Canadians sent 171 scout cars.
 
About 6 months ago there was a thread on the possible cultural impacts of a Japanese Occupation of Australia. Though like this thread most of the debate was about the feasibility of the invasion not its consequences. This is a post I wrote about the land defences of Australia in 1942.
According to Tully and Parshall on their website, a large proportion of the defenders of Malaya......were composed of a grab-bag of hastily recruited largely ill trained native troops along with...... a smattering of new Indian brigades leavened with a smattering of British regulars. The proportion of British or Australian troops ws about 40%. The British never armed native troops as well as they armed themselves, they might have to fight them one day. The Australians, in Australia would be fighting on their home turf, with more time to prepare. Further its stated that the Japanese benefited in Malaya from brilliant staff work based on lengthy reconnaissance.
During a meeting to discuss invading Australia in February 1942 the army claimed Australia was defended by 600,000 men and that it would take 10 divisions to invade, regardless of the accuracy of this statement, operations should be governed by the military intelligence available, and either the Japanese had poor intel, or the Japanese Army, really didn't want to invade Australia and wanted to shut those Navy idiots up.
It might be fun to airily, dismiss the idea that the Japanese would have a problem with desert fighting but I believe that in reality proper planning and preparation would be necessary if the Japanese wished to avoid piss poor performance. If the Army was estimating the Australians had 600,000, they weren't well informed about conditions in Australia.

Finally its worth while mentioning, that the Japanese Army, really couldn' see the point in invading Australia.
 
Finally its worth while mentioning, that the Japanese Army, really couldn' see the point in invading Australia.

An interesting reflection on this is the suspension of disbelief necessary to wargame the Pacific biz out in a "realistic" way (say with something somewhat in-depth but comparatively accessible like WITP) - if you start from the common wargame POV that Japan is ultimately doomed and derives value from just stringing things out for as long as possible then it makes absolute sense to take and occupy the north coast of Australia (say, Exmouth to Horn Island) because the time spent preparing for and executing a counteroffensive is time not spent on hitting Sumatra, or heading into the Moluccas or etc.

Of course, if you're the actual people on the ground, then you've got the NEI, you've obtained what you set out to obtain and the peace conference should be coming right up...so there's a fairly long 'well, now what' period as the realisation that that isn't the end of the war sinks in; it isn't necessarily obvious that going after NW Australia accomplishes very much until it does, and then everything's started to go all wrong.
 
According to Tully and Parshall on their website, a large proportion of the defenders of Malaya......were composed of a grab-bag of hastily recruited largely ill trained native troops along with...... a smattering of new Indian brigades leavened with a smattering of British regulars. The proportion of British or Australian troops ws about 40%. The British never armed native troops as well as they armed themselves, they might have to fight them one day. ...snip...

That isn't true, Malaya was defended by plenty of troops who had been in country for some time before the Japanese invaded.

In 1930, just two infantry battalions were stationed in Malaya, one British and one Indian. By 1937, this had increased to three British and one Indian battalions. Reinforcement of Malaya started in September 1939 with the arrival of the 12 Indian Infantry Brigade.

The next formations to arrive in Malaya were the 6 Indian Infantry Brigade and 8 Indian Infantry Brigade which landed in Malaya in October and November 1940. They came under command of the 11 Indian Infantry Division that formed in Malaya in October 1940. These two brigades both comprised three Regular Indian Army battalions, but were short of artillery support.

The 8 Australian Infantry Division was formed in Australia on 4 July 1940 as part of the 2 Australian Imperial Force. The 22 Brigade, which had been formed in New South Wales, was deployed to Malaya on 2 February 1941. This bought the total number of field Brigades to 4.

In March and April 1941, another division was sent from India to Malaya, this formation being the 9 Indian Infantry Division, comprising the 15 and 22 Indian Infantry Brigades. This formation also comprised units from the pre-war Regular Indian Army, but again was short of artillery. On arrival in Malaya, the brigades were redistributed between the two divisions. The 6 and 15 Brigades came under command of the 11 Division, with the 8 and 22 Brigades under command of the 9 Division. This was done to balance out the experience of the formations. Two British Army battalions (2 East Surrey's and 1 Leicestershires) joined the 11 Division, one being allocated to each brigade.

With two divisions now stationed in Malaya, a corps, headquarters was required, so the III Indian Corps was formed in May 1941.

27 Brigade, 8 Australian Infantry Division arrived in Malaya in August 1941.
The 28 Indian Infantry Brigade arrived in August 1941 to act as corps reserve.
 
An interesting reflection on this is the suspension of disbelief necessary to wargame the Pacific biz out in a "realistic" way (say with something somewhat in-depth but comparatively accessible like WITP) - if you start from the common wargame POV that Japan is ultimately doomed and derives value from just stringing things out for as long as possible then it makes absolute sense to take and occupy the north coast of Australia (say, Exmouth to Horn Island) because the time spent preparing for and executing a counteroffensive is time not spent on hitting Sumatra, or heading into the Moluccas or etc.

Of course, if you're the actual people on the ground, then you've got the NEI, you've obtained what you set out to obtain and the peace conference should be coming right up...so there's a fairly long 'well, now what' period as the realisation that that isn't the end of the war sinks in; it isn't necessarily obvious that going after NW Australia accomplishes very much until it does, and then everything's started to go all wrong.
Well thats not how I think the Japanese looked at it. I think the Japanese wanted to be ranked as a !st rate power with all the features of a first rate power, including a strong industrial base powerful Military and of course colonies. Then essentially the Americans told the Japanese that they weren't, and from a Japanese perspective, declared economic war on Japan and attempted to force Japan to surrender.
The Japanese faced with what they would have seen as an existential threat. A threat to the very idea of what they expected to be, decided to fight back, having decided also that Americans would be too efente to continue to attack in the face of massive losses. ( the last bit, being somewhat ironic in the face of American justifications for using the 'Bomb'. )
The idea of gaining what you 'set out to gain' doesn't sit very well with a army that doesn't seem to want to gain Australia. The British who were not bad at gaining an empire and keeping it, frequently made a practise of giving some of what they gained back , so that they could efficiently exploit what they kept.
Without a peace conference, it is an open question whether the Japanese would have down the same.
 
That isn't true, Malaya was defended by plenty of troops who had been in country for some time before the Japanese invaded.

In 1930, just two infantry battalions were stationed in Malaya, one British and one Indian. By 1937, this had increased to three British and one Indian battalions. Reinforcement of Malaya started in September 1939 with the arrival of the 12 Indian Infantry Brigade.

The next formations to arrive in Malaya were the 6 Indian Infantry Brigade and 8 Indian Infantry Brigade which landed in Malaya in October and November 1940. They came under command of the 11 Indian Infantry Division that formed in Malaya in October 1940. These two brigades both comprised three Regular Indian Army battalions, but were short of artillery support.

The 8 Australian Infantry Division was formed in Australia on 4 July 1940 as part of the 2 Australian Imperial Force. The 22 Brigade, which had been formed in New South Wales, was deployed to Malaya on 2 February 1941. This bought the total number of field Brigades to 4.

In March and April 1941, another division was sent from India to Malaya, this formation being the 9 Indian Infantry Division, comprising the 15 and 22 Indian Infantry Brigades. This formation also comprised units from the pre-war Regular Indian Army, but again was short of artillery. On arrival in Malaya, the brigades were redistributed between the two divisions. The 6 and 15 Brigades came under command of the 11 Division, with the 8 and 22 Brigades under command of the 9 Division. This was done to balance out the experience of the formations. Two British Army battalions (2 East Surrey's and 1 Leicestershires) joined the 11 Division, one being allocated to each brigade.

With two divisions now stationed in Malaya, a corps, headquarters was required, so the III Indian Corps was formed in May 1941.

27 Brigade, 8 Australian Infantry Division arrived in Malaya in August 1941.
The 28 Indian Infantry Brigade arrived in August 1941 to act as corps reserve.
Well it is true that the combined fleets websites has the following quote
"Second, both the British garrison in Malaya, and the U.S. forces in Luzon, were composed of a grab-bag of hastily recruited, largely ill-trained native troops, along with (in Malaya) a smattering of new Indian brigades, leavened with British or American regulars. In Malaya, British or Australian troops accounted for about 40% of the force structure. "
I accidentally typed smattering twice.
http://www.combinedfleet.com/pearlops.htm

Interestingly the Wikipedia article proclaims "Due to the rapid expansion of the British Indian Army, many of the formations in the Indian divisions were ill-trained and lacked large enough cadres of experienced troops."
based on an underlying source of Orbat.com/Niehorster, III Indian Corps December 1941.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/III_Corps_(India)
The two separate claims do not seem incompatible.
 
I think 'ill trained' is a leadership problem when divisions and brigades have been in Malaya for months and in some cases years. I would think that an ill trained brigade which lands in Malaya in August should be considerably less ill trained by December and be even better by the time it makes contact with the Japanese by January, 5 months after the initial deployment.
 
What if we have Khalkin Gol go Hot and the Soviets pour into Manchuria, Xinjiang etc and Kick up support, Training and Arms for KMT, Chinese Communists etc early leading to Unified Mongolian SSR, Xinjiang SSR, Manchurian SSR, Korean SSR and a Early formed PRC/Chinese SSR?

Japan is kicked out of Korea, Manchuria and China but keep their South East Asian Island Assets.

Japan goes for Dutch East Indies but instead of declaring War on USA they Arm up for Australia as a replacement for their China ambitions using their Armies that OTL were in China and a reorientated Naval Focus and Build up.
 
If Japan gets kicked out not just of Manchuria but also Korea, I doubt they'd have enough industry left to really pose much of a threat to anyone.
 
Firstly, cheers for the replies, guys.

What I should have put in, is post-war occupation. Say, it's 1946, or even sometime as the 1950's. Let's say that Japan offered South Australia and Tasmania to the Germans. What would live be like under the two different occupiers?

If we are talking a crazy scenario like Man in the High castle, where Japan and Germany split the world, well I guess it depends on the plans each respective side would draw up. Based on what happened in OTL, White Australians under the Reich I imagine would be an incorporated population. Considering how far flung Aussie is from Berlin I can't imagine it would be of major concern. Puppet government subservient to the Reich's needs in the area, maybe where the Reich bases it's hypothetical Pacific Fleet :p

The Japanese are probably going to ethnically cleanse the nation by various means available to them. They had a tenancy to try and put the natives in charge but I don't think Aborigines are much of a cohesive group and they would probably be subject to extermination. Much of the outback would be lawless, I doubt the Japanese would bother with anything outside the cities and green zones. I can't imagine many Japanese would want to emigrate there, probably large military garrisons to manage such massive area.

That being said, the point is moot considering the impossibility of the task at hand for the Axis to score such a win.
 
Doubling the economy isn't enough, increasing it by 10 times might be, provided they could also get over their horrible stupidity. Seriously, they seemed to have no regard for how to actually run a war, they neglected radar, development, anti-submarine procedures and economic warfare. It was only due to a series of flukes, and a huge number of screw-ups by their enemies that they got even a half of what they did. With slightly different conditions f.e. PH could easily have cost the Japanese two or three times as many aircraft as it did, which would have put a serious dent in the number of Kido Butai pilots available.

If a Japanese economy ten times larger than the real world translated into a ten-fold increase in production Japan would have been the world's biggest industrial nation in the 1940s, pushing the USA into second place by a significant margin.

E.g. Japan would have built 588,220 aircraft 1941-44 compared to 261,826 by the USA.

Japan would have made 65.72 million metric tons of steel in 1938 compared to 28.805 million by the USA, though admittedly much of Americans steel making capacity was lying ide due to the depression.

But in 1944 it would have been 65.21 million metric tons to Japan and 89.642 to the USA. But IOTL Japan had the capacity to make 13.9 million tons in 1944 but this was prevented by the US Navy which was sinking the ships carrying high quality iron ore from the East Indies. If they had organised a convoy system 2 years earlier more ore ships would have been got through and steel production ITTL would have approached 139 million tons in 1944.

And Japan would have had a merchant fleet of 60 million tons, gross in December 1941 or put another way about 3 times larger than the entire British Empire's in September 1939. They would have built 17 million tons of merchant ships 1937-41 followed by: 2.7 million in 1942; 7.7 million in 1943; a staggering 17 million in 1944; and still managed 5.6 million to 15th August 1945. Even if the enemy had been able to sink 10 times the tonnage Japan would still have 15 million tons left on 15th August 1945.

If warship building had been increased in line with the increase in resources then 5 million tons of them would have been completed 1937-41. While during the period 1941-45 it would have been 20 battleships, 250 aircraft carriers, 180 cruisers, 1,170 destroyers and 1,560 submarines.

And another consequence of a Japanese economy that was 10 times bigger would be more Japanese because fewer go to the USA and a lower death rate due to the improved health of the richer Japanese nation. Therefore more manpower for the Japanese armed forces.

So IMHO a doubling of Japan's industrial and sea transport capacity means Japan still can't win a war against the USA. However, the cost of victory might be so high that the Americans decide that a negotiated, compromise peace where the Japanese keep some of their gains is preferable. A five-fold increase probably means a negotiated peace where the Japanese keep all the territory they conquered.

A ten-fold increase is overkill.
 
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