Retain the Anglo-Japanese, no Pacific War?

The more accurate comparison would be to the French Gendarmes, which the Kempeitai were originally supposed to be a Japanese equivalent of. The ability of the military to appoint its own ministers probably contributed to the steady increase in nastiness of the Kempeitai.
 
The original premise of the thread appears to have been forgotten.

Would retaining the Anglo-Japanese alliance have meant no Pacific War?

Unless someone can explain why Great Britain would forfeit ties to the US and most of the British Commonwealth in return for a treacherous and minor ally from WWI the answer would have to be negative.

Minor because Japan's support during WWI was indeed minor, consisting largely of seizing what was assigned to Japan, certainly paling in comparison to either the Canadian or Australian efforts during the war.

Treacherous because Japan was constantly in touch with Germany, ready to betray the alliance if it seemed likely to be profitable and always willing to try and extort more out of the Entente in the interim.




Amusingly the Germans never realized the significance of their secret proposals to Japan somehow always being public knowledge in short order.
 
The Pacific War would still occur. The British would never be able to rein in the Japanese, but certainly would not let them draw the British into a war with the US. A lot centers with trade both with British trade and the US and with the potential Chinese market.

The British Admiralty had identified the Japanese as a potential rival in the Far East as early as 1919. They had also begun withholding military information and research from the Japanese.

The whole deal about the 'spring' of Japanese democracy while true probably is more like an 'indian summer'. The modernization of Japan lead to a population explosion and Japan was searching for both land and markets to settle and exploit. The only way for it to compete in the Chinese market against the more powerful British and American companies is to seek to close exclude them from the market by annexing China.
 
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