WI Japan Waits to Invade China

Geon

Donor
This discussion thread is prompted by the results in a game of Hearts of Iron II I am currently playing.

When Japan invaded China in 1937 after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident it was pretty much a "come as you are" invasion. Both sides were completely unprepared for war and the result was Japan was dragged into a quagmire that occupied the attention of a good bit of its army until the end of WWII and also was one of the reasons that the United States became involved in the war later due to its blocking of the sale of oil to Japan and scrap metal which were being used to fuel Japan's Chinese war effort. Because Japan needed these resources to continue its war it conducted an invasion of the British, Dutch, and French controlled areas of SE Asia to get the resources it needed and it attacked the U.S. at Pearl Harbor to cripple its navy so the U.S. couldn't interfere in its military objectives.

Now the question. Assume the Marco Polo Incident doesn't occur or is resolved relatively peacefully. The Japanese get the time to build up their army, and air force and better prepare for a Chinese invasion. Could they have done better and how would this affect the Pacific War?
 
Is it possible that without the Marco Polo Bridge incident, there would *be* no Second Sino-Japanese War? Not very likely, but it is ironic that it happened just as the Japanese were revaluating their China policy:

"The interesting thing is that by the spring of 1937 the Japanese government actually realized that its policy was not working. The key documents in its self-appraisal were "Implementation of policy toward China" and "Directives for a North China policy," both adopted on April 16, 1937 by the four ministers' conference (the foreign, finance, war, and navy ministries). As Iriye summarizes them (p. 517) "The documents stressed 'cultural and economic' means to bring about 'coexistence and coprosperity' between the two countries, and the need to 'view sympathetically' the Nanking government's effort to unify China. It was decided not to seek North China's autonomy or to promote separatist movements...The economic development of North China...should, according to the new directive, be carried out through the infusion of Japan's private capital as well as Chinese funds. Third powers' rights would be respected, and cooperation with Britain and the United States would be promoted." It was a remarkable reversal of policy, but made too late: Nobody in China trusted Japan any more, and Chiang Kai-shek's authority depended on taking a strong anti-Japanese stand. The Western powers too were less inclined to appease Japan than they had been a few years earlier. Any chance for reconciliation was destroyed by the Marco Polo Bridge Incident--which, incidentally, might plausibly have been avoided; unlike many of the "incidents" of the prior years, it seems to have been an accident, not something premeditated by the Japanese Army--and subsequent Sino-Japanese War." https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/dM3HAoVyc5M/8OR70VbeMW4J
 
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I don't think Japan should have waited any longer to strike China. While Japan could have generally prepared for war more effectively, China also could have gotten much stronger. In the time between Japan's OTL invasion and their "new" invasion, China's army could have easily have mobilized as well. China could have unified with the states controlled by warlords, and they could have eventually suppressed Mao's communist forces. It was Japan's OTL invasion that weakened Chiang Kai-shek's army (as well as his credibility with Chinese peasants) and that allowed for Mao to take over almost all of China. China also had more manpower so it could have eventually massed an army that surpassed Japan's capabilities. Yes, it's unlikely that China would have amassed ships or planes as advanced as Japan's, but in sense, quantity can override quality. If China was given the appropriate time, it would have been too strong for Japan to invade it and would have likely cost them the region of Manchuria. This setup is a little familiar to Germany invading the Soviet Union. If the Germans waited until 1942 to launch Operation Barbarossa, they would have a significantly smaller chance of victory. So while Japan was generally ill-prepared in it's OTL invasion, it's better safe than sorry for them to strike earlier than later, when China could potentially have been stronger.
 
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