Reading Faeelin's Legacy of Sun-Yat Sen's TL I came with the conclusion that he had Lettow-Vorbeck seizing power in Germany as a way to write a better TL for China but not at the cost of making it the worst TL possible for Europe - i.e. an Axis Victory. China is "good" as long as her cooperation is with Weimar Germany, and a TL in which the Nazis still raise to power, but after a bloody coup or a German civil war instead of the peaceful way of OTL gaves a window in which China can cut relations with the new German regime and still join the Allies in WW2. Yet, what if the most probable scenario happens - i.e. Germany goes from Weimar to the 3rd Reich peacefully, but China is in a better shape, unifies itself and throws Japan behind the Korean border?
An obvious result is that the Nazis will not change China for Japan as their ally in Asia and possible card to attack the USSR from the back; maybe the Axis is still proclaimed in the ATL, but it is a Rome-Berlin-Nanjing instead of a Rome-Berlin-Tokyo. After all, I think Hitler came close to consider the Chinese as the "aryans of Asia" instead of the Japanese, and his depiction of the Japanese in Mein Kampft isn't very kinder. After Operation Barbarossa begins, an united Nationalist China could possibly invade the Russian Far East or at least Soviet-backed Mongolia from the back door. As all those territories were former Chinese ones, the Chinese would have more reasons to take them than the Japanese. On the other hand, a weaker Japan could remain quiet or reconsider its former alliance with Britain, and the British could encourage the Japanese to attack Germany's comrade in Asia while their naval forces are diverted to Europe. And the USA would have not Pearl Harbor as a reason to join the war.
What could happen then? An Axis Victory would be horrible in general. An Allied victoy, with Japan in the Allied side and China in the defeated Axis, would be horrible for China. How could this evolve later? A Sino-German Cold War? A Western-Japanese one? Would the Chinese treat better the Russians than the Germans and protect them from their allies in case of Axis victory? Would the Allies tolerate Japanese actions in China after victory? In any case, it's clear the world would be very different today.
An obvious result is that the Nazis will not change China for Japan as their ally in Asia and possible card to attack the USSR from the back; maybe the Axis is still proclaimed in the ATL, but it is a Rome-Berlin-Nanjing instead of a Rome-Berlin-Tokyo. After all, I think Hitler came close to consider the Chinese as the "aryans of Asia" instead of the Japanese, and his depiction of the Japanese in Mein Kampft isn't very kinder. After Operation Barbarossa begins, an united Nationalist China could possibly invade the Russian Far East or at least Soviet-backed Mongolia from the back door. As all those territories were former Chinese ones, the Chinese would have more reasons to take them than the Japanese. On the other hand, a weaker Japan could remain quiet or reconsider its former alliance with Britain, and the British could encourage the Japanese to attack Germany's comrade in Asia while their naval forces are diverted to Europe. And the USA would have not Pearl Harbor as a reason to join the war.
What could happen then? An Axis Victory would be horrible in general. An Allied victoy, with Japan in the Allied side and China in the defeated Axis, would be horrible for China. How could this evolve later? A Sino-German Cold War? A Western-Japanese one? Would the Chinese treat better the Russians than the Germans and protect them from their allies in case of Axis victory? Would the Allies tolerate Japanese actions in China after victory? In any case, it's clear the world would be very different today.