Origins. Japanese expansion in East Asia began in 1931 with the invasion of Manchuria and continued in 1937 with a brutal attack on China.
Japanese invasion of China
This full-scale war between the Chinese and the Empire of Japan is often regarded as the beginning of World War II in Asia. (However, according to the Chinese Ministry of Education, it marked only a phase in a 14-year war that began with the 1931 invasion of Manchuria.)
While the United States and Japan jockeyed peaceably for influence in eastern Asia for many years, the situation changed in 1931. That year Japan took its first step toward building a Japanese empire in eastern Asia by invading Manchuria, a fertile, resource-rich province in northern China.
What countries did Japan invade during the World War II? On December 8, 1941, the United States government declared war on Japan and entered World War II. Japanese troops landed in French Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia), the Philippines, and British Singapore.
In 1910, Korea was annexed by the Empire of Japan after years of war, intimidation and political machinations; the country would be considered a part of Japan until 1945. In order to establish control over its new protectorate, the Empire of Japan waged an all-out war on Korean culture.
The previous spring Japan in fact had almost experienced a military coup. As he mulled it over, Hitler envisaged an alliance with Tokyo primarily for what it meant in the struggle against “Jewish” Bolshevism. This was to be a pact emphatically denouncing Marxist revolution.
But one of the most oppressive colonizers came from within the region: Japan. At its peak, in 1942, the Japanese Empire ruled over two hundred million people across thirteen modern-day countries, and it did so through extraordinary violence.
China had been at war with Japan since 1937 and continued the fight until the Japanese surrender in 1945. The United States advised and supported China's ground war, while basing only a few of its own units in China for operations against Japanese forces in the region and Japan itself.
Keeping Hawaii supplied, with its much larger civilian population and garrison, would have been even more difficult. In short, the Japanese simply did not possess the amphibious and logistical wherewithal to assault, capture, and hold the Hawaiian Islands.
The war in China, 1937–41
In 1931–32 the Japanese had invaded Manchuria (Northeast China) and, after overcoming ineffective Chinese resistance there, had created the Japanese-controlled puppet state of Manchukuo.
Japan had the best army, navy, and air force in the Far East. In addition to trained manpower and modern weapons, Japan had in the mandated islands a string of naval and air bases ideally located for an advance to the south.
Russo-Japanese War, (1904–05), military conflict in which a victorious Japan forced Russia to abandon its expansionist policy in East Asia, thereby becoming the first Asian power in modern times to defeat a European power.
The Chinese Nationalist (Kuomintang) government under its leader Chiang Kai-shek had to move to the interior as the Japanese invaded the great cities of the East, such as Shanghai, Beijing and Nanjing, committing many atrocities against the local populations along the way.
Conflict in Asia began well before the official start of World War II. Seeking raw materials to fuel its growing industries, Japan invaded the Chinese province of Manchuria in 1931. By 1937 Japan controlled large sections of China, and war crimes against the Chinese became commonplace.
'Japanese invasion') took place in the region around the city of Imphal, the capital of the state of Manipur in Northeast India from March until July 1944. Japanese armies attempted to destroy the Allied forces at Imphal and invade India, but were driven back into Burma with heavy losses.
At the most extreme, no attack on Pearl Harbor could have meant no US entering the war, no ships of soldiers pouring over the Atlantic, and no D-Day, all putting 'victory in Europe' in doubt. On the other side of the world, it could have meant no Pacific Theatre and no use of the atomic bomb.
In early 1942, elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) proposed an invasion of mainland Australia. This proposal was opposed by the Imperial Japanese Army and Prime Minister Hideki Tojo, who regarded it as being unfeasible, given Australia's geography and the strength of the Allied defences.
On July 26, 1941, President Franklin Roosevelt seizes all Japanese assets in the United States in retaliation for the Japanese occupation of French Indo-China. On July 24, Tokyo decided to strengthen its position in terms of its invasion of China by moving through Southeast Asia.
The Japanese bushido code of honor, coupled with effective propaganda which portrayed American soldiers as ruthless animals, prevented surrender for many Japanese soldiers. Instead of surrendering, many Japanese soldiers would kill themselves.
The U.S. destroyed far more Japanese troops than any other Allied nation. According to a report by the U.S. Army Chief of Staff, in the period between Pearl Harbor and the end of the war, the total number of Japanese troops wiped out on the Asian Front was 1.5 million.
The Soviet Union suffered the highest number of fatalities of any single nation, with estimates mostly falling between 22 and 27 million deaths. China then suffered the second greatest, at around 20 million, although these figures are less certain and often overlap with the Chinese Civil War.
China entered into diplomatic relations with Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Bangladesh and Maldives in Southeast Asia and South Asia, seven countries including Iran, Turkey and Kuwait in West Asia and the Middle East and five countries in South Pacific such as Fiji and Papua New Guinea.
Japan is forbidden by its own Constitution from having an “ army”, but it is allowed to have a “self defence force”. Global firepower ranks Germany's ARMY ( armed forces actually) as the world's 9th best military. Japan's non-army is rated the 7th best military in the world.
The Imperial Japanese Navy in World War II, at the beginning of the Pacific War in December 1941, was the third most powerful navy in the world, and the naval air service was one of the most potent air forces in the world.
After the defeat of Japan in World War II, the United States led the Allies in the occupation and rehabilitation of the Japanese state. Between 1945 and 1952, the U.S. occupying forces, led by General Douglas A. MacArthur, enacted widespread military, political, economic, and social reforms.