So, I know that the Japanese of the 1930s and 40s often floated the idea of Asian decolonization around backed up by catchy slogans like “Asia for the Asiatics” and even creating the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere (Dai Toa Kyoeiken) but it was all, of course, a farce. In reality the Japanese planned, and tried to impose their utter domination upon the peoples of Asia, not decolonizing them but rather replacing the European colonial powers with a local “home grown” one, if you will. Indeed, I’ve read that sometimes the locals in places like Indochina and Indonesia would greet the Japanese as liberators only to later realize that they were even worse than the Europeans that they had replaced. So, my question here is this: what if the Japanese actually believed in all of their propaganda and were less brutal to those they liberated from European colonialism. What if instead of raping and pillaging everywhere they went, the Japanese actually played the part of liberator and truly empowered those colonies that they freed, at least to some extent. Of course, in such a hypothetical I still expect the war with China to occur, but a huge problem for the Japanese was that the puppet states they established, such as Manchukuo or the Wang Jingwei regime, were utterly powerless and useless simply because of the Japanese brutality. But what if the Japanese didn’t treat the Chinese as inferior and brutalize them, thus making people more willing to stay loyal to the new regimes the Japanese established. I’m not saying that the Japanese have to entirely lose their sense of superiority, but instead of seeing their fellow Asians as inferior subhumans they’d maybe see them as backwards brethren that needed “guidance”, for lack of a better world. I envision a scenario in which the rape of Nanking, as well as numerous other atrocities of the sort, simply don’t take place, and thus public opinion around the world doesn’t turn as drastically against the Empire. Who knows, maybe people in the US would even sympathize with the Japanese if they were seen as truly fighting European colonialism in Asia. Americans tended to be opposed to colonialism and often sympathized with the colonized nations, including those in Asia (no, the irony of the Philippines being a de facto colony of the US at the time is not lost on me).
Sorry for the long post, and apologies if you see this proposed alternate benevolent Japan as utterly improbable to the point of not even meriting discussion. I know it’s a stretch, but I also know that before militarism took over in Japan in the late 20s and early 30s many Japanese were indeed committed to the ideals of Asian emancipation and brotherhood. Indeed, Dr Sun Yat Sen had many supporters in Japan and received direct help from the Japanese in his efforts to overthrow the Qing Dynasty (and not all of those helping him did so for purely selfish reasons of wanting to weaken China). Anyway, what do you guys think. How would the world be different if a “nicer” Japan existed at the time around and during WW2.
Sorry for the long post, and apologies if you see this proposed alternate benevolent Japan as utterly improbable to the point of not even meriting discussion. I know it’s a stretch, but I also know that before militarism took over in Japan in the late 20s and early 30s many Japanese were indeed committed to the ideals of Asian emancipation and brotherhood. Indeed, Dr Sun Yat Sen had many supporters in Japan and received direct help from the Japanese in his efforts to overthrow the Qing Dynasty (and not all of those helping him did so for purely selfish reasons of wanting to weaken China). Anyway, what do you guys think. How would the world be different if a “nicer” Japan existed at the time around and during WW2.
