AHC: Japan and China both on the Axis or Allied side in WW2

[TimTurner]

Your challenge, should you choose to accept it, is for a WW2 to start in the later 1930s (preferably in 1939 on schedule) and for both China and Japan to be on the same side in said war.
What is required to be changed for this to happen? How many butterfly nets do you need to use, if any? What does the region look like post-WW2?

 

[Sekhmet_D]

The only way this is achievable is for the Second Sino Japanese War to not take place.

Someone moderate and pro China needs to be firmly ensconced within the Japanese halls of power for this change to happen - someone like Iwane Matsui perhaps.

Have Matsui promoted to Field Marshal during the early 1930s and curb the excesses of the Kwantung Army while maintaining good relations with the Kuomintang, or at least with those in the Kuomintang who are most tractable to working with Japan.

Yasuji Okamura can serve as Matsui's chief of staff and help out with the latter task as the Kuomintang thought quite highly of him (first as a valuable military adviser and then as a rare 'honourable opponent').

 

[DougM]

As noted you have to do major major work on Japan to get Japan and China on the same side. And you have to eliminate the war between the two. But if you do that then you have no reason for China to get involved at all, And not much reason to get a war between Japan and GB much less the US.
You could possibly Get Japan to go to war with the USSR again. But it is not likely China would join in. They have nothing yo gain.
And if Japan goes after south east Asia then China has good reason to oppose them as China does not want Japan to control both the areas morth and south of it.
So you can’t really get China to actively join Japan and Germany. And you have trouble getting Japab in a war vs the US and or GB without China being opposed to Japan, China may not declar was on Japan but they are sure not going to help Japan dominate all of Asia except China itself.

So this is just impossible.

 

[Avrorrange]

As noted you have to do major major work on Japan to get Japan and China on the same side. And you have to eliminate the war between the two. But if you do that then you have no reason for China to get involved at all, And not much reason to get a war between Japan and GB much less the US.
You could possibly Get Japan to go to war with the USSR again. But it is not likely China would join in. They have nothing yo gain.
And if Japan goes after south east Asia then China has good reason to oppose them as China does not want Japan to control both the areas morth and south of it.
So you can’t really get China to actively join Japan and Germany. And you have trouble getting Japab in a war vs the US and or GB without China being opposed to Japan, China may not declar was on Japan but they are sure not going to help Japan dominate all of Asia except China itself.

So this is just impossible.

The key is getting Japan on the winning side and stopping them from invading China. Eventually China would symbolically declare war on the losing side like most of the world.

 

[Sekhmet_D]

You could possibly Get Japan to go to war with the USSR again. But it is not likely China would join in. They have nothing yo gain.

Matsui's friend Sadao Araki was a firm proponent of striking north against Russia.

What if he too winds up in a position of significant power like Matsui does in my earlier suggestion, and what if Matsui and Araki somehow maneuver a fervent anti Communist like Wang Jing Wei into the Kuomintang hot seat instead of Chiang?

Matsui was no fan of Chiang by the early 1930s, and Wang was very much in favour of joining the Anti Comintern Pact with the Germans and Japanese.

A combination of these factors could very well see a China-Germany-Japan alliance striking the USSR.

 

[Pelranius]

I assume that China, for purposes of this thread, refers to an independent China with its own agency and goals?

Otherwise OTL, via Wang Jinwei's puppet government could count as "China".

 

[TimTurner]

I assume that China, for purposes of this thread, refers to an independent China with its own agency and goals?

Otherwise OTL, via Wang Jinwei's puppet government could count as "China".

Yes.

 

[The Link]

It could have happened if we put POD earlier than the late 1930s. In OTL China had been aware of its technological backwardness, and made numerous trade deals with Germany: basically China was giving the resources to Germany in exchange for advices in modernization. So, we could assume that China might choose not Germany but Japan as the one whom China could propose a deal "I'll give you resources in exchange for help in modernization". Then both of them get tempted by the opportunity to grab the european colonies during the german rampage across Europe.

Of course it would require for Japan to completely give up on the conquest of China.

 

[Fatt Shea]

It is very difficult to have Japan and China both in the axis, its like having Germany and France be on the same side in the war. Maybe it could be done if Japan manages to fully puppetise them or something like that. Since their main interests were in defeating eachother in OTL since Japan's goal was to control the resources there to create their national defence state and China's main interest was in defending their borders and rebuilding after the warlord period. So they are naturall opposed and China has very little reason to join the axis since they cannot offer much at all to China due to being blockaded by the British navy, one of the countries who supported them against Japan.

For them both joining the allies, that is easier but you'd need changes to Japanese politics starting in the early 20s to make them less millitaristic, instead trying to gain resources from China with the backing of the western powers, this would require them to be more friendly to Japan and for this to work. Then once the war starts this western friendly Japan could join the allies as a sign of good will maybe in an agreement to let them extract more from China in exchange for helping the allies. In this scenario China has no reason to join the axis as prevously discussed since they cannot help them so they may join the allies in order to try to get them to help them against Japan after the war.

 

[Retro_Reaction]

You could have China collapse completely by 1940? Vichy France firmly sides with the Germans after 1940, Japan and it's puppet China move into French Indochina to stop the Germans from moving into French Indochina under under the request of the British.