Second Russo-Japanese War?

Forgive me for asking what may have been asked before because the search function is not working yet again.

1. Could Stalin have decided to press Zhukov's victory in the Battle of Khalkin Gol and taken Manchuria and perhaps even Korea? He could set up communist republics in those areas and support Mao Tse-Tung's efforts in China. Obviously this would mean a lesser involvement in Poland on the part of Stalin; he might leave the invasion to the Germans altogether, and forgo the Russo-Finnish War. And with the USSR wrapped up in Asian affairs, Hitler just might decide to postpone Barbarossa until 1942. How possible is this scenario? And would the Pearl Harbor raid still go ahead as planned?

2. Suppose the Japanese do not lose the Battle of Khalkhin Gol. Would they invade the USSR after Hitler's declaration of war against the Soviets? Remember the fuel situation...
 
Last edited:
On the second one I wouldn't imagine even a victorious Japan would do that well in the Soviet Union, normally I'd say that a country's leadership wouldn't be dumb enough to start a war it could never win but this is WWII Japan so I find myself questioning their logic.

Could a Japan that (somehow) had the armor to pull off victories in Mongolia decide to take a shot at the Soviets? Sure, with OTL's leadership and their knack for trying to punch way above their fighting class. Would they win? Never.
 
There's a really good thread around on this topic broadly speaking already. Basically, it's all bad for Japan in the long hull.
 
There's a really good thread around on this topic broadly speaking already. Basically, it's all bad for Japan in the long hull.

Japan's overseas empire is bad for Japan in the long haul in general, add in a fight with a vastly superior power (we just switched the USA for the USSR, the latter of which shares a land border with Japan's possessions) that can laugh off everything the Japanese can throw at them and Japan's dug its own grave and given their worst enemy the shovel to finish the job with.
 
USSR not taking Manchuria and Korea was decided not in August Storm, but at Yalta and Tehran. Stalin more or less kept his territorial promises.

If the USSR gets involved with Japan earlier, perhaps he can ask for more.
 
Forgive me for asking what may have been asked before because the search function is not working yet again.

1. Could Stalin have decided to press Zhukov's victory in the Battle of Khalkin Gol and taken Manchuria and perhaps even Korea? He could set up communist republics in those areas and support Mao Tse-Tung's efforts in China. Obviously this would mean a lesser involvement in Poland on the part of Stalin; he might leave the invasion to the Germans altogether, and forgo the Russo-Finnish War. And with the USSR wrapped up in Asian affairs, Hitler just might decide to postpone Barbarossa until 1942. How possible is this scenario? And would the Pearl Harbor raid still go ahead as planned?

Keep in mind Stalin invaded Finland right after Khalkin Gol and lost a million men. The invasion of Finland was long planned as Stalin considered it a vital threat against Leningrad. If he had not invaded Finland that year or if the Finns gave up Karelia, he would have the option of expanding the war against Japan to permanently remove that threat. As it was Stalin settled for a neutrality pact in early 1941.

2. Suppose the Japanese do not lose the Battle of Khalkhin Gol. Would they invade the USSR after Hitler's declaration of war against the Soviets? Remember the fuel situation...

Logically Japan would benefit far more going after the resource rich European colonies in SE Asia than the Russian Far East. The war in China was also costly and only sustainable if the Burma road was cut. The Soviets were at one point China's most important arms supplier, but as of the 1941 Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact it had stopped helping China. There was no incentive for Japan to wage war against a still dangerous Soviet Union.
 
I wrote a small TL on this ( https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=146429&page=3) , it's currently on hiatus but it goes up to early 1940. Basically very bad for the Axis.

1. The Soviets would, eventually, wipe the floor with the Japanese. Whilst a brave and well trained army with capable officers most of the time, they were totally inferior in terms of equipment and tactics. They'd also be fighting a two front war at this point and the Chinese aren't exactly out for the count. I can see your point about Barbarossa but Hitler would probably still invade in 1941. Stalin could deploy millions of men if he wants to but he really has no need, the Soviets could probably win this outnumbered 2/1 as long as they were properly supplied. So the Soviets will still be able to keep the bulk of their forces against the much more significant threat.

2. Japan can't really 'win' Khalkin Gol their best chance is probably a stalemate where they avoid the destruction of the 23rd before war breaks out in Europe, distracting the Soviets from then on until August 1945. The Japanese invading the Soviet Union is just silly on every level when you get past cartoon diplomacy.
 
Last edited:
The problem for Japan is that despite their assumptions, they were not a Great Power. They simply didnt have the industry and GDP to support an army capable of standing up to the Russians and a large navy.

It would only be poossible to equip the army to the necessary standard (or at least to bite off a big chunk of Siberia when Russia is involved with germany) if the navy basically gets sod-all. Given the nature of Japanese military politics in the 30's, this is ASB. Any POD has to lie a lot earlier to completely change the nature of resource alocation.
 
The problem for Japan is that despite their assumptions, they were not a Great Power.

This is probably news to the soldiers in Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines in 1941.

But I guess being beaten by guys on bicycles probably says more about the British than it does about Japan's great power status.
 
This is probably news to the soldiers in Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines in 1941.

But I guess being beaten by guys on bicycles probably says more about the British than it does about Japan's great power status.

I'm sorry for the allied soldiers fighting in Singapore, Indonedia and the Philippines, but they were not elite troops but soldiers from country at peace or who had others matters in mind than keeping best troops in faraway territories from the fighting in Europe or North Africa...

The american have something as one division and a Marines regiment on the Philippines and the philippines army was in mobilization, training and reorganization.

The troops at Singapore was at best second or third rate if compare to the troops fighting in Egypt at the same time or defending the UK in Europe.

And Indonesia was defended by what was left of the Netherlands armed forces.
 
This is probably news to the soldiers in Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines in 1941.

But I guess being beaten by guys on bicycles probably says more about the British than it does about Japan's great power status.

There were really only 3 Great Powers in 1939

USA
USSR
British Empire

Major powers - Germany, Italy, French Empire, Japanese Empire


Japan simply wasnt in the Great Powers class

Briatin was in the middle of fighting Germany and Italy at the time. If it hadnt been, the British Empire would have overmatched Japan by something like twice the amount the USA did in WW2 (remembering that the USA/BE were only allocating 15% of their effort against Japan)
 

mowque

Banned
There were really only 3 Great Powers in 1939

USA
USSR
British Empire

Major powers - Germany, Italy, French Empire, Japanese Empire


Japan simply wasnt in the Great Powers class

I'd argue that you had two 'for sure' Powers. USSR and USA.

The third place was up for debate between France, Germany or the British Empire with the British having the strongest argument.
 
I'd argue that you had two 'for sure' Powers. USSR and USA.

The third place was up for debate between France, Germany or the British Empire with the British having the strongest argument.

Nope.
The British Empire (not just the UK) was both more powerful than Germany or France, had far more depth, population and resources.

Remember, the UK alone was comparable to Germany in GDP. People are always forgetting about the rest of the Empire, and the constant propaganda that Britsin was only a terribly minor partner while the USA and USSR did all the heavy lifting is just that - propaganda.

Power order is
USA
British Empire
USSR
French Empire/Germany
Italy/Japanese Empire

You have to remember that the 4 dictatorships were fighting above their weight in the early part of the war due to spending more on their military during peacetime. After a few of years of war, this advantage vanished. Which is why Germany and Japan got steamrollered in 44-45.
 
Being British, it is always nice to see recognition of the power of the British Empire upon which the sun never set but I feel that it did have some trivial weaknesses. Clearly, the USA, the British Empire and the USSR had most natural resources. However, it is interesting that Germany managed to compete with British production despite being cut off from most of the World's raw materials while Britain was able to receive both machine tools and raw materials from the USA. In fact Britain was going to run out of money by the middle of 1941 without Lend-Lease, suggesting some limits to British power.

A view based on GDP from Mark Harrison "The Economics of World War II: an Overview," in Mark Harrison, ed., The Economics of World War II: Six Great Powers in International Comparison, Cambridge University Press (1998) might be helpful
Wartime GDP of the Great Powers, 1938 to 1945 in billion Dollars and 1990 Prices

Country 1938 1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944 1945
USA 800 869 943 1094 1235 1399 1499 1474
UK 284 287 316 344 353 361 346 331
France 186 199 164 130 116 110 93 101
Italy 141 151 147 144 145 137 117 92
USSR 359 366 417 359 274 305 362 343
Germany 351 384 387 412 417 426 437 310
Austria 24 27 27 29 27 28 29 12
Japan 169 184 192 196 197 194 189 144

(help how do you post a table?)

There are alternative figures at http://www.ggdc.net/MADDISON/oriindex.htm. Those include separate data to allow us to see the effects of empire for Britain, France and Japan.

It is nearly impossible to produce meaningful figures. Japan was at war from 1937; the USSR's economy did not have prices that help to produce comparable statistics and we have the problem that Germany kept getting bigger over 1938-42. Even trying to establish the productivity of British and German industry can be complicated (Broadberry, S. N. and Burhop, Carsten (2007) Comparative productivity in British and German manufacturing before World War II: reconciling direct benchmark estimates and time series projections. Journal of Economic History, The, Vol.67 (No.2). pp. 315-349. ISSN 0022-0507, which is online at http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/683/1/WRAP_Broadberry_Comparative_productivity.pdf). There is also a thread at http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=66&t=165552&p=1464103#p1464103.

The suggestion that German military production ran higher than British early in WW2 is also a simplification. The German economy was heavily militarised in 1939 but German was investing very heavily in synthetic oil and rubber plants as well as factories for military production. The effect was that British military production was well ahead of German by 1941 and perhaps level by 1942 (according to Adam Tooze's Wages of Destruction) before German production moves ahead in 1943-4. Again it is difficult to compare as counting aircraft misses that Britain was producing heavy bombers, counting ships that Britain was producing battleships rather than mostly submarines and on the other side that Germany was producing more ammunition. How should we compare the British investment in airfields with the German Atlantic Wall? Also a major constrain on German production was shortage of skilled labour which was partly due to the size of the German army.
 
Of course we could give completely different rankings by looking at merchant ship tonnages in 1939 (GRTs).

Great Britain 16,643,904
United States 8,572,090
Japan 5,255,627
Norway 4,552,895
Germany 3,973,893
Italy 3,245,670
France 2,745,884
The Netherlands 2,728,381

While the USSR was ahead of the world in spies :)
 
Last edited:
Top