If you somehow avoid a decade of Japanese aggression against China, French Indochina...
The problem is that none of this changes the US commitment to the so-called Open Door policy on China nor is FDR's absence likely to do so...![]()
The USA was committed to it, but not enough to put a sufficient deterrent force that would make Japan afraid or to do more than send mercenaries who were noted repeatedly and loudly to be mercenaries and not official representatives of the US government in any sense of the word. Of course the problem is for this to happen Japan needs to rein in its generals, otherwise the USA will follow the same track as IOTL because Japan will be unable to deliver on its promises and the USA will be under the delusion that simply cutting off oil without anything to deter Japan will somehow stave off a war.
So, we must have a more powerful leadership in the Japanese Army, leading to no invasion of indochina, no rape of nanking, etc.
True, so what we seem to have is a more isolationist Japan, which is the only way to keep the US from cutting off their oil.Yes, and such an army would never have begun the process leading to an OTL-style invasion of China, nor would it have assassinated all the PMs it disliked and thus won itself control of Japanese politics.