What if Japan attacked the Dutch East Indies in 1936?

[HJ Tulp]

Dale Cozort did a pretty good assessment of the POD in his Space Bats and Butterflies 3 - basically, Japan would be going out on a limb if it took the DEI alone and it could end very badly for them.

That said, in hindsight, it might be better than OTL.



Chris

Great tip, will see if I can get myself a copy.

 

[raharris1973]

Given the problems Japan faced just a few years earlier with Western reaction to Manchukuo

Which was all talky talk, no walky walk

the way the great powers intervened to retard Japanese gains in the 1905 war with Russia,

Which they really didn't do. Delusional Japanese told themselves that's what what western, particularly American mediators were doing, because Japan's leaders were putting on a brave face during the war, acting cocky to keep morale up at home and keep their bargaining position strong and hiding their real fears and concerns about human, material, and financial bleeding in the war, so they raised their public's expectations' unrealistically. When those expectations could not be met, because the military situation did not justify it - Russia could still defend itself, perhaps even regain the upper hand in the land battle, the Japanese deflect blame of their disappointed public onto the American mediator as well as the Russian enemy.

If the Dutch and the British are anywhere near as racist, the shock alone would provoke an armed response.

The race card and racial expectations lack sufficient explanatory power to guide predictions of how everybody would respond.

 

[raharris1973]

Dale Cozort did a pretty good assessment of the POD in his Space Bats and Butterflies 3 - basically, Japan would be going out on a limb if it took the DEI alone and it could end very badly for them.

Thanks for the recommendation - What did he have as the timing of the Japanese move into the DEI? August-December, 1940? Some earlier point in time?

 

[raharris1973]

Another possibility, the Japanese seize the islands in 1940. Again, the logistics would be absolute beeping nightmare, but the British and French would have other problems at this point and there would be no guarantee of the Americans providing anything beyond moral support if Japan enters the war. The Japanese might follow Scott Palter’s idea and say “look, Winston, if you let us take the Dutch East Indies (to protect them from the Nazis, of course) we’ll join the war on your side and provide military support; if you refuse, you’ll have a world war on your hands at the worst possible moment.”

Most certainly another possibility!

Japan could certainly have more chances of acquiring a motive for such a move on the East Indies, and sensing an opportunity, after the fall of the Low Countries in May 1940 than at any earlier point, it just stands to reason. Also, while not under strict, mandatory US embargoes yet, it had been under greater US condemnation, the voluntary US "moral embargo" on aviation gasoline and aircraft, and the US had cancelled the trade treaty, giving it the *option* for wider sanctions, which had to alert Japan to the possibility of worse/more effective sanctions. Plus, the US had started to loan substantial money to China, and the China Incident had dragged on now over two years more than expected, in Japanese minds, in large part because of western and Soviet connivance.

Yes, leaving the Philippines and Guam at their back in 1940 is a sub-optimal pain in the butt. But there are wide shipping channels between Japan and the DEI that run through the Japanese controlled Mandated Islands. Also, the Philippines and Guam in 1940 are not mobilized at all for war, neither indigenous forces, nor the US garrison. The Pacific Fleet is still based out of San Diego, "exercising" in Hawaii in May and June, and only that summer the Navy Dept and Administration making the decision to keep it permanently based at Pearl. America is not showing signs of readiness *yet* to get involved in a war, despite getting a bit more meddlesome.

Leaving Borneo and Malaya-Singapore at the back of a Japanese expeditionary and occupation force for the DEI is even more of a pain in the butt and sub-optimal from a security of SLOCs point of view. But Britain in spring, summer, fall 1940 has way bigger, closer problems to worry about than the DEI. There would still be narrow shipping lanes through the South China Sea from Taiwan, Guangdong, and Hainan, down through the Spratlys, to the tiny Natunas, and into the inner seas between Sumatra, Java and Borneo/Kalimantan.

Who was Scott Palter, and where could I see his proposed idea about Japan "safeguarding the Indies from the Nazis"?

There are military considerations involved too, and military questions:
a) Japanese pilots, land-based and carrier-based, had to have more combat experience at dive-bombing and air-to-air combat by spring 1940 than they had in 1936 and 1937. This should make for more capable Japanese forces. The Japanese had more experienced ground combat forces and had conducted more opposed landings, most recently, Hainan in 1939.
b) The Japanese likely had more operational aircraft carriers and larger carrier air wings in spring 1940 than 1936, yes?
c) Had the Japanese improved any of the carrier or land-based aircraft models since 1936 or 1937 by spring 1940, in terms of range, or other performance parameters?
d) What had the Dutch KM and KNIL improved in the DEI Java and outer islands between 1936 and 1940?
e) What facility improvements had the Japanese made in the Mandated Islands, especially the Palaus and southern Carolines between 1936 and 1940 - any more airfields or ports helpful for ops in the DEI direction?
f) Did Japan now holding the island of Hainan now provide land-based aircraft an ability to range as far as Dutch Borneo/Kalimantan, or not yet?
g) If not, what about Northern Indochina/Tonkin, occupied in September 1940?
h) If not that, could Japan have gotten access to airfields in southern Indochina significantly earlier than the historic date of July 1941 for forward bases to support air operations ranging Borneo/Kalimantan and possibly Sumatra?

On one hand, this would still be a logistic headache for the Japanese; on the other, it would be much better than OTL.

Exactly. It is not that it would be logistically unfeasible, it would be that the Japanese would be leaving themselves logistically exposed to counterattacks. But the kicker is they would be doing it at a time when potential adversaries were poorly placed to counterattack at all, much less counterattack with decisive near-term, medium-term effect and limited losses. It would not be an insane calculated risk. No more insane than what they actually did, assuming they could break up the fight with the USA and UK after a good first punch and stealing their purses.

I'm convinced that Japan lost a fantastic opportunity by not seizing the DEI in August-December 1940. The British were not going to intervene, the Americans were not going to intervene, and the Dutch were not going to be able to mount a sufficient defense.

Exactly. For reasons stated above.

It might mean that the trade-embargo would happened earlier, but with the DEI Japan is more able to withstand it.

Exactly. There's the idea that the US could build up the Philippines as a bee in Japan's bonnet, and declare "exclusion zones" that practically don't let Japan ship oil through, but the fact is, it would take the US years of build-up to be able to enforce any kind of blockade or meaningfully effect oil tanker traffic [other than by the important means of not having US origin tankers participate in it]. So, the US will be in a position for another two or three years from 1940 where yeah, it could corner Japan into yielding or going to war, but America would still lose the early battles of that war and force the Philippines to go through at least a brief occupation. The US War and Navy Departments, aware of their growing strength, and with Germany-first priorities, might judge it more prudent to not pour good money after bad in the surrounded Philippines and work toward defeat of Germany and building up the main Pacific fleet, by which point, who knows where diplomacy stands.

The population of the DEI was also much more palatable to the Japanese than the Vietnamese.

You're thinking more quiescent to Japanese occupiers? No Viet Minh guerrillas? To tell you the truth, the Viet Minh guerrillas were not super active or super problematic for the Japanese occupation in Indochina either, most of the time. and the Vichy didn't get in their way either. The Japanese used the facilities there and looted food and raw materials with little impediment. The Viet Minh mostly stayed underground in most parts of the country and had armed units in parts of the border region in the far north, and basically did a few raids on isolated units, puppet soldiers, and rice depots in the last months of the war. No big deal.

I have to assume the Japanese significantly misread how difficult it would be for FDR (or any US president) to persuade Congress (and the people) to act over an invasion of the DEI.

AFAICT, the Japanese considered the Dutch and Britons to be fully allied, and war against Britain would mean war against the US would be guaranteed at some point. In reality, the British government had given up any dreams of a defense of the DEI against the Japanese and categorically refused to guarentee its territorial integrity. Because of this the DEI government - which acted pretty independently from the Dutch government-in-exile- adopted a pretty much neutral stance towards Great Britain.

Regarding the two comments above. Yes, the Japanese, with regard to Southeast Asia in OTL, were both slow to recognize opportunities and potential methods of acting, and then when they decided they needed to take emergency action, jumped to conclusions about how wide the scope of that action had to be, ie it had to be Southeast Asia wide and Pacific-wide against all ABDA powers.

Both the Japanese and Germans seem to have had this attitude that "oh, the US joining the war is inevitable so it might as well be on our terms" which is certainly not how it was seen by the UK (or concerned Americans) who were trying to get the US to join the war.

Right.

 

[raharris1973]

Another possibility, the Japanese seize the islands in 1940. Again, the logistics would be absolute beeping nightmare, but the British and French would have other problems at this point and there would be no guarantee of the Americans providing anything beyond moral support if Japan enters the war. The Japanese might follow Scott Palter’s idea and say “look, Winston, if you let us take the Dutch East Indies (to protect them from the Nazis, of course) we’ll join the war on your side and provide military support; if you refuse, you’ll have a world war on your hands at the worst possible moment.”

I'm convinced that Japan lost a fantastic opportunity by not seizing the DEI in August-December 1940. The British were not going to intervene, the Americans were not going to intervene, and the Dutch were not going to be able to mount a sufficient defense. It might mean that the trade-embargo would happened earlier, but with the DEI Japan is more able to withstand it.

Most certainly another possibility!

Japan could certainly have more chances of acquiring a motive for such a move on the East Indies, and sensing an opportunity, after the fall of the Low Countries in May 1940 than at any earlier point, it just stands to reason. Also, while not under strict, mandatory US embargoes yet, it had been under greater US condemnation, the voluntary US "moral embargo" on aviation gasoline and aircraft, and the US had cancelled the trade treaty, giving it the *option* for wider sanctions, which had to alert Japan to the possibility of worse/more effective sanctions. Plus, the US had started to loan substantial money to China, and the China Incident had dragged on now over two years more than expected, in Japanese minds, in large part because of western and Soviet connivance.

Yes, leaving the Philippines and Guam at their back in 1940 is a sub-optimal pain in the butt. But there are wide shipping channels between Japan and the DEI that run through the Japanese controlled Mandated Islands. Also, the Philippines and Guam in 1940 are not mobilized at all for war, neither indigenous forces, nor the US garrison. The Pacific Fleet is still based out of San Diego, "exercising" in Hawaii in May and June, and only that summer the Navy Dept and Administration making the decision to keep it permanently based at Pearl. America is not showing signs of readiness *yet* to get involved in a war, despite getting a bit more meddlesome.

There are military considerations involved too, and military questions:
a) Japanese pilots, land-based and carrier-based, had to have more combat experience at dive-bombing and air-to-air combat by spring 1940 than they had in 1936 and 1937. This should make for more capable Japanese forces. The Japanese had more experienced ground combat forces and had conducted more opposed landings, most recently, Hainan in 1939.
b) The Japanese likely had more operational aircraft carriers and larger carrier air wings in spring 1940 than 1936, yes?
c) Had the Japanese improved any of the carrier or land-based aircraft models since 1936 or 1937 by spring 1940, in terms of range, or other performance parameters?
d) What had the Dutch KM and KNIL improved in the DEI Java and outer islands between 1936 and 1940?
e) What facility improvements had the Japanese made in the Mandated Islands, especially the Palaus and southern Carolines between 1936 and 1940 - any more airfields or ports helpful for ops in the DEI direction?
f) Did Japan now holding the island of Hainan now provide land-based aircraft an ability to range as far as Dutch Borneo/Kalimantan, or not yet?

@ChrisNuttall's bringing up of the 1940 possibility, and @HJ Tulp's bringing up his view about "lost fantastic opportunity" of a Japanese move on the DEI in August 1940, which I quote above, is a great segue or transition to my own concept for Japan taking action against the DEI 1940, just a bit earlier than you were both thinking, when the Dutch were still neutral, at about the beginning of the year.

The rationale is a neutral Japan (except for its war with China, but neutral between world power blocs after souring on Germany after Nomonhan and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact), picking a private fight with neutral, but also weak, Netherlands, in the winter of 1939-1940, when most of the other active world powers are busy with other wars and thus unlikely to interfere. Britain and France had declared war on Germany in September over the invasion of Poland and were staring down the Germans at the Westwall. Even if the front was static enough people jokingly called it "the Phoney War", the belligerents were fighting at sea, there was a blockade, and no peace talks in sight. Netherlands was both concerned for its home security, but not wanting to implicate itself with either rival belligerent side and not explicitly benefitting from their protection. Neither they, nor Britain, nor France could afford to take their eye off the ball that was Germany. From November 1939 onward, Japan's most recent and formidable enemy, the USSR, was in a war with Finland, that was dragging on into December and into the new year of 1940, making a fearing invasion of Manchuria supremely unlikely. The US? It was rarely militarily active outside its hemisphere. It was going to give the Philippines independence in under five years. It expressed anger during the Panay Incident but slinked away without fighting or sanctions after an apology and compensation/hush money. A successful fait accompli in the DEI should not see the Americans intervene. This sort of Japanese "land grab and private war while the other powers are busy" approach could be viable through the end of the Finnish War in March 1940. That war's end would unencumber the USSR and make it a bit more dangerous. But then the start of the Norway/Scandinavian campaign in April 1940 would keep the British, German, and French navies and air forces all the busier. Then when we get to May 1940 it morphs back to a campaign taking advantage of the fall of Netherlands in Europe and later the fall of France and Britain's distress, scavenging on German successes, a la Mussolini.

 

[ChrisNuttall]

Thanks for the recommendation - What did he have as the timing of the Japanese move into the DEI? August-December, 1940? Some earlier point in time?

His reasoning was that it wouldn't happen - the Japanese would be too far out on a limb even for them.

Short snippet:

A second problem: the geography means that while Japan is strong, a successful invasion of the DEI puts the British Far East colonies at the mercy of the Japanese, essentially surrounded by Japanese forces and airbases. No matter how much the Japanese say that they're only after the DEI, the fact would remain that taking the DEI was the perfect first step to taking Malaysia and the Philippines, if the US and Brits allowed it to proceed without intervening.

The geography also says that if the Japanese don't follow a DEI invasion with seizing the Philippines and Malaysia, the US and Brits can build up forces in those colonies and eventually make it impossible for the Japanese to get resources out unless the British and the US choose to let them do so.

A DEI invasion isn't a bad idea, and I'm sure the Japanese looked longingly at their maps, looking for a way to pull it off, before realizing that the geography meant it just wouldn't work.

Also, a DEI-only invasion would only solve part of Japan's resource problems. The Japanese home islands couldn't provide Japanese industry with enough raw materials in a wide range of areas, of which oil was only the most pressing. The Japanese needed tin from Burma. They needed rubber from the Malay peninsula, just to name a few shortages. If they didn't have access to the world economy, the Japanese needed access to the Southern Resource Area, all of it, not just the Dutch oil wells.

Chris

 

[ChrisNuttall]

Who was Scott Palter, and where could I see his proposed idea about Japan "safeguarding the Indies from the Nazis"?

Scott, may he rest in peace, was an old contributor to CTT. He did the Victorious Japanese Arms AH.

Victorious Japanese Arms

©2003 Final Sword Productions

The ATL I am going to propose here may seem absurdly unlikely to those who look at WW2 backwards from Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima, and Tokyo Bay. However, the participants read history forwards.

If quagmire has a meaning in historical terms, the Japanese war in China could be the poster child.

As part of a political struggle having both internal and external aspects the Japanese militarists had taken over both the government of Japan and control of Japanese forces already on the Asian mainland. Their weapons were assassinations, coup attempts, military riots and conspiracy. This produced very muddled situations in which there were no clear lines of responsibility or command. To this day we have no precise knowledge over how much control Tokyo had over events or how much control the Emperor had over either.

Be that as it may, in 1937 Japan went to war with China. The Japanese won battle after battle but could not induce Chiang to negotiate / capitulate or force the collapse of his government and forces. China was too big. It had too many people. It had no industrial heart the capture of which would force a decisive response. Chiang received just enough help from the US, UK and Soviets to keep in the field. Chinese xenophobic nationalism and endless Japanese atrocities did the rest.

In addition to a China war, the same aggressive Japanese militarists had been skirmishing with the Soviets on the borders of Manchuria and Mongolia. It is doubtful if Japan had the strength to fight the Soviets. Japan certainly lacked the strength to fight the Soviets and China while also guarding their back against the twin Anglo-Saxon navies. Japan’s only alliance of note was the anti-Comintern Pact, a nebulous declaration of intent between Japan and the European Axis, with the Soviets as the specified enemy.

Thus the news of the Nazi-Soviet Pact came as a bolt out of the blue. In OTL, the Japanese dithered through the window between this bombshell and its reversal with Barbarossa. This ATL will presume a very different response.

All polities are prone to inaction. It is always easier to get a blocking veto than to move a system to action. However, Japan seems to be at the extreme end of the spectrum. There is a history of endless deadlock / dither alternating with incredible rapid change. Thus Japan dithered from Poland to Pearl, then jumped off a cliff. Faced with a lost war, they dithered from Saipan to Nagasaki. For the last decade they have dithered through an economic winter.

Some real dates from OTL should be seen as providing context to what I will propose below:

8/25/39 – Japan protests Nazi-Soviet Pact, announces itself at liberty diplomatically

9/3/39 – Western powers declare war on Hitler

4/17/40 – US warns Japanese against attempting to take Netherlands East Indies

5/20/40 – Guderian’s panzers reach the sea at Abbeville in France

5/26/40 – fall of Bologne

5/28/40 – Belgian surrender seals fate of trapped Western army group

6/4/40 – evacuation at Dunkirk completed

6/5/40 – second phase German offensive begins

6/9/40 – Soviet-Japanese border treaty settles frontier issues in Manchuria

6/10/40 – Italy declares war on Western powers

6/13/40 – fall of Paris

6/17/40 – Petain asks for an armistice; US announces that it will not allow transfer of title on any European colonies in the Western Hemisphere

6/22/40 – Franco-German armistice

6/24/40 – Franco-Italian armistice

6/25/40 – Japanese make demands on French Indochina, send warships

7/3/40 – British attack French fleet

7/5/40 – Vichy severs relations with UK

7/18/40 – British close Burma road cutting off Chiang’s supply line through port of Rangoon

7/20/40 – FDR signs 2 Ocean Navy Bill

7/26/40 – Japanese occupation of French Indochina begun

8/6/40 – Italy invades British Somaliland

8/8/40 – Battle of Britain begins

8/9/40 – British withdraw their garrisons from Shanghai and north China

9/4/40 – US warns Japan against ‘aggression’ in Indochina

9/13/40 – Italian invasion of Egypt begun

9/2/40 – destroyers for bases deal between US and UK

9/16/40 – US draft act signed

9/22/40 – Dakar fiasco – British and Free French fail to take French West Africa

9/27/40 – Tripartite Pact between Germany, Italy and Japan

Look at this list and think it through in strategic terms. Japan is blown lose by the Nazi-Soviet Pact. The US and UK are blown lose by the collapse of the French army. By September things have begun to clarify. Germany and Japan kiss and make up. The UK survives the fall of Europe and the US begins to align itself with the UK. However there is a gap for a calendar quarter [June-July-August of 1940] where everything was in flux. A more adroit Japanese leadership could have taken advantage of this.

Let us recap the situation:

1. This is should and could logic, not a statement of probabilities. There were only a few major powers in the world of 1940. So there were only a finite number of alignments.

2. I do not propose to explore the real power relationships in Tokyo 1939-40. I regard that as unknown and unknowable. Japan essentially wrote its own self-serving history of the period. The imperial bureaucracy had weeks between the formal surrender and effective occupation to purge the files. They then served as the administration under Macarthur. So to the largest of extents we know what that continuously governing elite wanted us to.

3. For this to work I must follow the thesis that the Emperor had real power. The official account has him as a passive front for the militarists until post-Nagasaki when he forces the surrender. There is a revisionist school that makes him an active ruler and a warmongering imperialist. I will make him an active ruler but either an intelligent actor on the scene or well advised. I do not assert that this is true. However, it may not be false. Unknown but necessary for this ATL.

4. The Japanese Army would not accept ending the China war on any terms other than total victory.

5. The Japanese Army at this stage of the war would not accept a real alliance with the Soviets. They lusted for Siberia and were rabidly anti-Communist. This would change under pressure of the war in 1944-45.

6. Neither the Japanese Navy nor the US would accept a sphere of influence agreement between Japan and the US. The US had a sentimental thing about China, plus the influence of the China Lobby. FDR didn’t like Japanese militarism which he lumped with the Nazis and Fascists. The Japanese and US navies were traditional rivals who planned their forces for a war they regarded as inevitable.

7. France and Italy, while major European powers, were marginal as far as Asia and the Pacific were concerned.

8. Japan was totally economically dependent on the Anglo-Saxons and their economic dependents [Netherlands East Indies, British formal and informal empire, etc.]. Faced with any embargo the Japanese could not continue the China War.

9. The UK had the 3rd major fleet in the world. The UK had assets Japan needed for the China War [oil, tin, rubber]. With the Dutch government in London, the Netherlands East Indies were a de facto British possession.

10. The UK and Japan had been allied for twenty years. That alliance was ended when after WW1 the US essentially forced the UK to choose between the US and Japan. However, the alliance had permitted Japan to grow and prosper while advancing Japanese interests on the mainland of Asia. This allowed Japan to pursue WW1 by looting Germany of her Pacific colonies while be subsidized by the UK and then US.

11. The UK needed all its forces to fight the European Axis. It had nothing to spare for defending the Far East.

12. The UK had depended on the French Army. With its loss, the UK desperately needed help and limitation of its non-European commitments.

13. The US essentially had counted on the UK-French alliance to shield them from Hitler. FDR was now panicked that the French and British fleets would fall into German hands. The US was rearming but needed years. It also needed the UK not to fall.

The solution was obvious. On May 20th, 1940, the Emperor calls an imperial conference. The heads of both services and the major cabinet ministers are informed of the analysis above. The navy is told it has ten days to prepare the fleet for a major expedition. Destination to be announced later. The army is told to assemble four divisions of lesser troops [Koreans, Taiwanese, White Russians, Manchurians, Mongols, Chinese] plus a second corps of two Japanese divisions built around the Imperial Guard. They are to be ready to sail with the fleet. Merchant ships may be seized as needed regardless of nationality. There is to be no attempt at secrecy except for the destinations. These will be announced in ten days.

Obviously the embassies and news services in Tokyo get wind of this. No attempt is made at censorship. The Emperor allows the crisis to build for a week. He then requests that the British ambassador attend him for lunch with his military attachés. The Emperor is polite but firm. London is to be told there are two alternatives.

First, the Anglo-Japanese alliance is reinstated. Japan will declare war on the European Axis. Churchill will sever relations with Chiang’s Chinese government. In due course he will recognize whatever new [puppet] Chinese governments Japan deems appropriate. The two allies will jointly occupy the Netherlands East Indies to protect them from Axis attack [the four second rate Japanese divisions mentioned above plus whatever few garrison units the British Empire can scrape together]. The East Indies will be a joint economic zone between the two allies. China will be a predominantly Japanese economic zone but with some undefined protection for British economic interests. The Japanese carrier force will convoy the good corps to East Africa to fight Italy.

Second, the six divisions will attack the East Indies, British Borneo, Singapore and Malaya. The British Empire will have a world war at the worst possible moment.

Given this London would have no choice but to go with choice #1. The US would be upset. However, the primary US interest at this moment would be keeping the UK alive as a shield for the US. This Japan would be seen as doing.

Essentially, Japan would be on the Allied side in WW2. There would be no war in the Pacific. Japan would be an unpalatable ally. However so was Stalin. The two Japanese divisions would easily take Italian Somaliland and Eritrea [backed by six carriers]. This would remove a major danger to the UK and free up the Red Sea route. Several of the carrier air groups would then deploy to Egypt. With the extra air strength and without the need to divert 4th and 5th Indian divisions to Eritrea, Wavell and O’Conner would finish off Libya before Rommel arrives. In turn the extra air strength would make it possible to hold Crete in 1941.

Japan trades several more divisions over the next year for having the US put Japan into the Lend Lease program. Just as we financed the French Indochina War to keep France happy in NATO, we would finance Japan’s China war to keep the Japanese army and fleet fighting the Axis in the Mediterranean.

From these changes flow vast consequences:

1. The US never actually enters WW2. There is no Pearl Harbor, no German declaration of war.

2. The British and Japanese take Sicily in 1941 and south Italy in 1942. They can probably take much of the Peloponnesus and Sardinia in 1943. However, it ends there. Japan will only commit divisions in dribs and drabs while the Empire’s ground strength is limited by the large forces needed to defend the British Isles.

3. Without the US, the war in Europe burns itself out in a compromise peace sometime in 1944-45. Somewhere between Moscow and Warsaw a balance point is reached between the two land contestants. The British cannot fight Hitler without Stalin. At the price of the Franco-Belgian sub-Saharan colonies, the British agree to peace.

4. Japan never actually beats Chiang, but they do bottle him up in Chunking while destroying the Maoists.

5. So we have a world where Hitler survives, Stalin is weaker, the British Empire is stronger and Japan wins.

 

[raharris1973]

2. I do not propose to explore the real power relationships in Tokyo 1939-40. I regard that as unknown and unknowable. Japan essentially wrote its own self-serving history of the period. The imperial bureaucracy had weeks between the formal surrender and effective occupation to purge the files. They then served as the administration under Macarthur. So to the largest of extents we know what that continuously governing elite wanted us to.

3. For this to work I must follow the thesis that the Emperor had real power. The official account has him as a passive front for the militarists until post-Nagasaki when he forces the surrender. There is a revisionist school that makes him an active ruler and a warmongering imperialist. I will make him an active ruler but either an intelligent actor on the scene or well advised. I do not assert that this is true. However, it may not be false. Unknown but necessary for this ATL.

@ChrisNuttall

Quite good and creative. Well explained, even if unlikely to work in a friction free manner.

Perhaps the two most interesting allohistorical innovations the late Mr. Palter had in the piece are the two paragraphs right here. They blow wide open new flexible frontiers of Showa-era Japan what-ifs, because it rejects the received history of "militarist grassroots from below made us, and the powerless Emperor, do the bad stuff....yet the Emperor...because he's a good guy, often questioned the bad stuff, and was the key element in getting the surrender done" as a self-serving, made up fable the Japanese fabricated for the occupiers, showing a documentary record tailored, in the weeks between surrender and occupation forces arrival, to be noncontradictory with the narrative. With the received history as presented by the surrendered Japanese dismissed as an unreliable construction, but accepted by the American occupiers out of convenience, any writer is free then to present the Showa Japanese as having a leader or leadership group, possibly with the Emperor truly on top and decisive, that has a semblance of a strategy, and ability to pick and choose alternative options, even if imperfect. If we're not sure of the veracity, or even plausibility, of the scattered, murky accounts given to us of highest level Japanese decision making in real life, then we can imagine a pretty wide range of alternative Imperial decisions and not be obligated, as we so often do, to quickly dismiss them as implausible, because "that isn't how Showa Japan worked", because the fact is, in reality, we don't freakin' know and there's no way we can know.

My mind is blown for the day. This means it is a free for all on Japan what ifs.

@HJ Tulp - I really enjoyed your detailed contributions to this thread from the "Dutch side of the hill" or their "side of the shoreline". I look forward to hearing any responses you may have to my ideas and questions about possible later action action action against the DEI during the Winter War of 1939-40 in post #25 in particular, or also your evaluation/reaction to my comments comparing contrasting Japanese operations in a summer 1940 op against DEI vs. a winter 1936-37 op.