WI: 1938 US embargo Japan

US was a crucial trade partner to Japan in the pre-war period. The Japanese imported 80% of its oil from America and the importation of scrap metal was essential to its armament industry. However the US did not cut this lifeline until 1941, enabling the Japanese military to modernize and ultimately take over much of Asia.

What if Roosevelt imposed the embargo in 1938, say over the USS Panay incident? What would Japan do about it? For starters the Japanese navy was much weaker, with less carriers and unimpressive carrier aircraft. Its naval personnel were also inexperienced. The US fleet at this time was not yet headquartered in Hawaii, being anchored on the west coast, safely away from carrier attack.

It seems the US held greater advantage in 1938 than 1941. Would this force Japan to cave in to American demands because Japan was in no position to do anything about it?
 

Bearcat

Banned
Any US oil embargo causes the Japanese to play the war card. Any US-Japan war ends with Japan curbstomped.

Moving the date up three or four years means no PH. The capability just doesn't exist. Expect the war to develop along 'classical' war plan Orange lines. Massive buildup of US navy. The PI are conceded after a holdout on the Bataan Peninsula.

Japanese hope the US will charge with its BBs into the trap of the west Pacific. The US declines, preferring to hit and run and bide its time. US subs patrol the empire, but get limited results as their torpedoes suck.

Finally around Year three the advance begins in earnest as large numbers of BBs and growing numbers of carriers attack Japanese possessions in the Marshalls and Carolines. By later that year the US has isolated all IJN forces in that theater and has landed troops on Luzon. Probably no Marianas campaign as the B-29 does not exist.

Then its on to Formosa, Okinawa, and a tough bloody slog up towards Japan.

Without the B-san and the bomb, casualties will go higher. The stark US choice of year four is invasion or blockade, and either way, a lot of people will die.

Difficult to say how US involvement in Europe proceeds. I'd guess we would declare war in mid-1941, when Germany sinks the Reuben James. It could even happen earlier.
 

HJ Tulp

Donor
I'm not sure the European powers would join the embargo though. A big reason for them to join it OTL was to get on the good side of the Yanks. ATL that reason would be far less strong as there is no WWII.
 
I'm not sure the European powers would join the embargo though. A big reason for them to join it OTL was to get on the good side of the Yanks. ATL that reason would be far less strong as there is no WWII.

There is no WWII but there is a Nazi expansionist Germany that was scaring a lot of them so they they still had reason to be on the good side of US ...
 

Bearcat

Banned
There is no WWII but there is a Nazi expansionist Germany that was scaring a lot of them so they they still had reason to be on the good side of US ...

Not to mention, those with Asian colonies would still see this as 'containing' and 'deterring' further Japanese aggression.

I think only a very few people in the west had thought through the oil sanctions and realized it was actually making war in Asia certain.

At latest, and probably sooner, the destruction of rump Czechoslovakia in early '39 will cause the Europeans to align against Germany, and support the Americans in 'keeping the Japanese quiet'.
 

HJ Tulp

Donor
There is no WWII but there is a Nazi expansionist Germany that was scaring a lot of them so they they still had reason to be on the good side of US ...

Sure they had. However in 1938 getting the US on the Allied side would be nice. In 1940 it was the only way. Why would the Allies want to anger the Japanese on a US issue? Why would the Netherlands which wasn't even part of the Allies in 1938?
 
Part of the problem with upping the intensity of sanctions is that the US was responding in a step-by-step manner to increasing Japanese provocations.

Congress, and the US population, was quite isolationist, and it would be tough to get support for moving those sanctions up 3 years.

Could they move up sanctions? yes.
http://pwencycl.kgbudge.com/O/r/Origins_of_the_Pacific_War.html said:
On 11 November 1938 the Roosevelt administration imposed a "moral embargo" against Japan which, while not legally binding on American businesses, was voluntarily joined by enough exporters to effectively end export of aircraft and aeronautical technology to Japan.
...
On 10 February 1939 Japan seized Hainan and a month later laid claim to the Spratly Islands. The western powers correctly interpreted this as the opening feelers of a Japanese move south.
...
By June 1939, Gallup polls showed that 72 percent of Americans favored an embargo on war materials shipped to Japan.
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[26 July 1939] the United States served notice that it would abrogate the 1911 Treaty of Commerce and Navigation in six months. This would remove legal obstacles to formal embargoes by the United States.
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Enabling legislation for an embargo did not pass into law until July 1940, following the collapse of metropolitan France. The United States did not even increase tariffs, as required by a 1930 U.S. law regarding trade from countries with which the United States did not have a trade agreement, because the Roosevelt Administration was able to find a loophole based on an executive proclamation dating back to the Ulysses S. Grant administration! Even when the embargo legislation was finally passed, it was framed in terms of restricting exports of commodities and materiel required for the United States' own defense buildup.
...
These developments finally prompted the United States to embargo sales of scrap iron and aviation gasoline to Japan, on 22 July 1940. Both were considered critical for the United States' own defense buildup and were embargoed on that basis. Initially only gasoline with an octane rating of 87 or greater was embargoed, and only number 1 heavy melting scrap, which accounted for only 20 percent of exports to Japan. Since most Japanese aircraft engines could operate on 86-octane gasoline, the effects of the embargo were relatively mild, and the Japanese began ordering all the 86-octane gasoline they could find. Japanese gasoline purchases in the U.S. had totaled 1.2 million barrels in 1939; in the six months following the July 1940 embargo, gasoline imports from the U.S. rose to 3.4 million barrels.
...

Japan responded to events in Europe by occupying northern French Indochina and joining the Tripartite Pact in September 1940. The combination of events was probably coincidental but appeared highly provocative. The United States responded by extending the embargo to include all scrap iron.
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Matters came to a head when Japan occupied southern French Indochina on 21 July 1941. Ten days later American intelligence intercepted and decoded a message from the Japanese Foreign Ministry to diplomats abroad stating that (Prange 1981):
Commercial and economic relations between Japan and third countries, led by England and the United States, are gradually becoming so horribly strained that we cannot endure it much longer. Consequently, our Empire, to save its very life, must take measures to secure the raw materials of the South Seas....
...
This convinced American leaders that Japan's assurances that the occupation of French Indochina was not as a springboard for further conquests were false. The United States, Britain, and the Netherlands responded with a complete oil embargo.

I could easily see a much faster progression.

December 1937: Panay Incident
January 1938: Roosevelt announces the 'moral embargo' (most of a year early)
January 1939: Japan seizes Hainan (month early)
February 1939: US announces 6 month warning of withdrawal from the 1911 treaty (about 6 months early)
July 1939: Issues demand that Japan relinquish Hainan within 3 months or 'actions will be taken'.
August 1939: enabling legislation for embargoes passes (11 months early)
October 1939: US imposes first embargo, only on high-grade scrap and high octane AvGas. Japan ups purchases of the lower grade AvGas (which is what it uses, anyway). (as OTL, but 9 months early)
November 1939: Japan joins Tripartite Pact
June 1940: Germany invades France (as OTL)
July 1940: Japan occupies Vichy Indochina (or portions thereof) (2 months early)
August 1940: US tightens embargo, embargoing all scrap iron.
November 1940: Japan occupies southern Indochina; US embargoes oil.(about 8 months early)
April 1941: Japan attacks the Philippines and the DEI, but not Pearl Harbor


So, I can see a speed up of 6 months in the start of the war fairly easily. But not a whole lot more.
 
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