Who besides America could open Japan?

What country opens Japan to the outside world?

  • United Kingdom/Great Britain

    Votes: 80 67.8%
  • France

    Votes: 5 4.2%
  • German Empire

    Votes: 2 1.7%
  • Russia

    Votes: 10 8.5%
  • Spain

    Votes: 3 2.5%
  • Portugal

    Votes: 5 4.2%
  • Mexico

    Votes: 3 2.5%
  • Other

    Votes: 3 2.5%
  • Netherlands

    Votes: 7 5.9%

  • Total voters
    118
  • Poll closed .
Not even a snowballs chance for Spain, huh?
^

Spain during the 19th century wasn't the best position to enforce its will on someone else.

This, and even if they had the ability, what would be the motivation? Spain has no excess industrial capacity that needs venting, the prestige/influence to secure any gains she does make from her investment/risk from The Great Powers, ect.
 
Not short of war/conquest.
Why? The US didn't need to conquer any of Japan OTL. The Spanish weren't in the best shape in the 19th century, but seven ships was well within their capabilities. In fact the Cochinchina Campaign latter in the 1850s would involve dozens of Spanish warships.
 
Why? The US didn't need to conquer any of Japan OTL. The Spanish weren't in the best shape in the 19th century, but seven ships was well within their capabilities. In fact the Cochinchina Campaign latter in the 1850s would involve dozens of Spanish warships.
True, but Spain's colonial reach was on the decline, and any point that century after the American expedition and before, say, the British do it, Spain is either in in domestic turmoil or on the verge of it.
 
Why would the Dutch open up Japan when they already have monopoly through Dejima? Sounds self-defeating.

In 1844, H.H.F. Coops, acting as a special ambassador from the Netherlands, arrived in Nagasaki and delivered a letter from King Willem II, addressed to the "King of Japan." It discussed the Opium War, and advised the shogunate, in order to avoid a similar fate, to open up diplomatic and trade relations with other European powers. The following year, the VOC factor received a reply not from the shogun, but from the rôjû, stating that in accordance with "ancestral laws" or "ancient precedent," Japan maintained only trade relations (tsûhô) with the Netherlands and China, and diplomatic relations (tsûshin) with only Korea and Ryûkyû; as a result, the reply explained, not only was opening diplomatic relations with other nations out of the question, but further the Dutch should avoid any further attempts to engage in formal diplomatic communications with the shogunate themselves. This may have been the first time that an official shogunate document noted a distinction between tsûshin and tsûhô, and in the nature of relations with these four named polities.[32]
https://wiki.samurai-archives.com/index.php?title=Dutch_East_India_Company
 
Top