This has been interpreted to mean, in plain English, that Japan must dominate about a billion people in Asia and the Pacific area, and eventually rule the world. This is no new idea to the Japanese mind. This could have been written yesterday. The speeches and writings of Japanese statesmen and superpatriots in modern times reveal dozens of similar warnings of their intentions.
Six months later they did. It has been pointed out that highly organized worship of the state and its symbol, the emperor, is a comparatively recent development. The official Shinto religion has been called an instrument to bring the people into line for an all-out war effort.
The truth of the matter seems to be that the government did not create a new faith or loyalty. It merely made use of beliefs that the Japanese have held in a rather passive way for centuries. Universal schooling and cheap printing made the task easier, as did also the docility of the people and their ingrained respect for authority.
The keynote of the Japanese character is loyalty rather than freedom and individuality. To argue the merits and demerits of this philosophy is outside the scope of this pamphlet. But these beliefs and ideals of the Japanese people have made it easy for them to be led into war. In Japan the armed forces have won almost complete control of the government and the nation.
Every department of the national life—industry, commerce, agriculture, education, the press, even religion—is subject to their will. Japan was not always an out-and-out military dictatorship. For a brief period after the first World War there were indications that it was on the road to establishing representative government and was following the lead of Western nations in carrying out some badly needed social and political reforms.
The Japanese constitution of provided the framework of a nineteenth-century monarchy modeled on Prussia. At the head of the state is the emperor, assisted by his privy council. There is a cabinet, headed by the prime minister, and a parliament consisting of the House of Peers and the House of Representatives, the latter elected by the people. Actually, the emperor is a figurehead. He is worshiped, but he does not originate either policy or action.
For centuries the imperial power has been in the hands of a few nobles, soldiers, or statesmen who had the strength to use it. The makers of this system did not plan for or want popular government. But from about to the Japanese political parties gained in power, and it seemed to many observers that the cabinet and the House of Representatives might in time become the controlling elements in the government.
Critics have claimed, however, that even during this brief period there was no true republican system in Japan. If Japan is ever to have democracy in the future there must be fundamental reforms in the system by which the country is governed.
For the most part they represented big business. But they did, advocate a moderate foreign policy to further the expansion of international trade and they realized the value of remaining on friendly terms with the United States. Their period of influence reached its high point with the signing of the London Naval Treaty of A movement was on foot, however, which in the end swept away the weak machinery of representative government and launched Japan on its biggest gamble for empire.
Who were the men behind this drive? To follow the rise of military-fascist dictatorship in Japan it is necessary to understand the unique position which the armed forces occupy in the government and in, the minds and hearts of the people.
Before the rise of modem Japan, the nobles and their fighting men samurai formed the ruling class. After the old system of warrior clans was abolished and universal conscription was introduced.
The honor of bearing arms, which had always been regarded as a mark of the superior man, was extended to the entire nation. The mingling of emperor worship with the glorification of war, plus continued victories over half a century, have given the army and navy a popular prestige that will be hard to destroy.
An unusual feature of the Japanese government which the militarists have used in their rise to power is the make-up of the cabinet.
The posts of war and navy minister can be held only by a general and an admiral on the active list. So the army or the navy can prevent the formation of any cabinet that is not acceptable to them merely by refusing to fill these positions. Another dangerous feature is the division of control over civil and military affairs. The emperor is nominal commander in chief of the armed forces, and on military matters he receives advice only from high-ranking officers.
The ministers of war and the navy have direct access to the emperor and do not have to approach him through the prime minister. The modern Japanese army admired and imitated the German. Its officers regard themselves as heirs of the old samurai.
The majority of them are poor, proud of their service, and fanatically devoted to the emperor. Dangerously ignorant of the world outside Japan, they dislike foreigners and regard prosperous Japanese businessmen and politicians who have absorbed Western culture with a mixture of envy and suspicion. By there was serious discontent in the armed forces. The world-wide depression hit Japan hard, causing much privation among the poor farmers from whose ranks the army was largely recruited.
There were many failures of small businesses and serious unemployment among industrial and white-collar workers. Army officers were alarmed at the spread of Western political ideas, especially communism. Their faith in the government was shaken by the evidence of bribery, graft, and corruption in the chief political parties, and by deals between politicians and big business to the disadvantage of the mass of the people. Like the Nazis, the Japanese military fascists claimed to be friends of the common man.
To pull Japan out of the depths of the depression a vigorous program of social, economic, and political reform was needed. But the big landowners and industrialists were not prepared to accept changes which threatened their interests. The worst of these superpatriots worked with the army fanatics to organize numerous assassinations, after The victims were leading statesmen, bankers, industrialists, and even generals and admirals who advocated a moderate policy.
Discontent and revolutionary unrest were seething within the army like a volcano preparing to erupt. On September 18, the top blew off in Manchuria. Commanders of troops guarding the South Manchurian Railway faked a piece of railway sabotage as an excuse to occupy the chief Manchurian cities. This was done without the consent of the cabinet then in office, which resigned as a result. In a government headed by Admiral Saito approved the seizure of Manchuria by formally recognizing Manchukuo, a dummy empire set up by the army.
The militarists followed up their gains by the occupation of a large slice of north China in , forcing the Chinese government to sign a humiliating truce.
In February , Japan quit the League of Nations, burning its most important bridge with the outside world. In February , after two years of deceptive quiet, the army volcano erupted again, this time in a mutiny almost within the shadow of the imperial palace. Only about 1, troops, led by their captains and lieutenants, were involved. But there is good reason to suspect that some of the highest ranking generals were in sympathy with the mutineers.
The fascist-minded young officers were not in rebellion against their military superiors, but against the government. They had prepared a long death list of prominent men whose principles and actions they disapproved.
Actually they succeeded in assassinating only three high officials. The chief result was greater power for the supreme command. The outbreak of a large-scale war, in China rallied the people to the support of the militarists. All opposition to the war was suppressed. In response, the United States who has been aiding in their resources decides to cut off Japan by freezing it's trade assets and Embargo-ing the nation further cutting off their resources such as oil.
Killing 2, people stationed there as well as sinking 6 Ships docked there as well. However, because they decided to go after the Nazis first and aid Britain, they were slow in retaliating against the Japanese. Though damage to the capital city was minimal, but this in turn infuriated the Japanese military and a few months later made plans to strike at another American Pacific base on the island of Midway.
The battle of midway was like a massive Chess game, and both sides were relentless, but as the Japanese wanted to rest from bombing Midway, but this is when the USA strikes back and sank nearly all of Japan's poweful aircraft carriers as well as destroying Zeros and killing Pilots. Because of this, Japan would gradually lose momentum in the Pacific War.
They would falter in the Phillipines as well as the Defensive islands in the Marianas and Okinawa. This would force Japan's surrender in the beginning of September of , and thus ending the second World War for good. This would also begin the US occupation of Japan which would last for nearly 8 years at the end of the Korean War.
Here's that universal question. What if Japan were to win the war in the Pacific, what would Asia be like under the control of the Japanese Empire? In our reality, Japan had plans for virtually the entire East Asia region and even the Pacific Ocean. The problem was is that this infuriated a lot of other East Asian people, and who could blame them. The Japanese did horrid things to these people, though not to the extent of the Nazis did in Eastern Europe, but still it was terrible.
Another thing is that the Japanese decided to go to war after the USA embargoed them. If the Japanese ever went to war against an Allied power, their defeat would be inevitable. Japan could not have win a war against the Allies, it was too technologically inferior and had insufficient resources. What Japan would have to do is negotiate some kind of compromise with the Allies to reduce their expansion mentioned earlier so they can retain their trade agreements with the Allied Nations, even if they don't have to fight alongside them.
This would give them the resources necessary to fight against the Chinese. It is , and the Japanese have successfully established their East Asian empire, albeit smaller than they would've liked due to compromises they made with the Allies. The Japanese would also set up pleasure slave places to comfort the Japanese soldiers stationed in the occupied areas in East Asia as they did in our reality.
Though, the Japanese could still be at war with China as their influence is in the west. China could also establish a provisional capital somewhere since the other cities in China are now under the occupation of Japan. Even with some changes in an alternate reality, the Japanese would still have a hard time fighting back the Chinese. This could also get the Soviet Union involved as Mao Tse Tung could form an alliance with the nationalist party as they would have a common enemy.
However, how this would play out is difficult to say. This would depend on how the war in Europe would pan out in this alternate reality. But because the USA never declared war on Japan, they can focus their attention on Nazi Germany, so the war could end sooner than it did on our reality.
But if the war dragged on longer than anticipated, the USA could develop the Atomic Bomb, and use it on the Nazis as it was the original plan. But it depends on what happens and how the war in Europe turns out as well. Japan in an alternate modern era would be very different.
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