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C&D said:
German (and other foreign) military advice was one of the many things that made Japan a force to be reckoned with. I think it's a very real possibility Falkhausen could have made the Chinese command nearly as good as the Japanese. I say nearly because when it comes to divine status, the Kuomintang is not an emperor soldiers will lay down their lives for.

Japan of the 19th century was a really different thing when compared to China of the 1930's. China had been in civil war for a couple of decades already, with little sense of national unity, and (culturally, politically and economically) in decay for a couple of centuries.
When Meiji restauration began, Japan was quite the opposite with an ancient spirit of nationalism, loyalty and political stability. Military advisors and rebuilding were but a sideshow for the massive modernization of the whole society. By simply training and arming ones soldiers better you hardly get even stronger military, let alone a nation.

Kuomingtang and her army were completely corrupted and Chiang himself had only a certain percentage of it under his direct rule. Falkenhausen couldn't have made China a worthy opponent for Japan. It will take SU and/or USA to wear the Empire down before the Chinese can hope to achieve something with their armed forces.
 
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I never said that the KMT would go Blitzkrieg on the Japanese, only that with uninterrupted German military aid the Chinese would be even more difficult to beat than in OTL.
 
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trekaddict said:
Depends. I can't recall the status of the German military mission to China in TTL, but if the Japanese leave him alone and don't bully the Germans into removing it these Army reforms might go through.
Forget the High Command mission, though they did do good work; the Chinese were building up a military-industrial complex and rapidly upgrading their force.
 
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Chief Ragusa - As the saying goes, there is nothing more permanent than a temporary government intervention. That said the BEIC can't have been too surprised at the turn of events, they had buggered things up quite thoroughly.

Nathan Madien - I aim for a blend of arrogance, ambition and patience for Japanese High Command; "Of course Japan will become the premier Great Power of the Far East, it is their inevitable destiny, the only question is when best to strike."

For the infamous junior officers I remove the patience and up the arrogance; "Our enemies will not act till it's too late, and even then be utterly predictable, so lets invade everywhere right now!"

Of course this is a sweeping generalisation but it will suffice for high level overviews. :)

Faeelin - True enough, but then I plan to 'interpret' the results anyway.

Sir Humphrey - Lawrence would never do that. Become the power behind the throne of a pan-Arabian kingdom perhaps ("Here is my Grand Vizer T E Lawrence, the second most important man in my kingdom!") but not become actual King. ;)

Lord Strange - Japanese Junior Officers are the leading cause of border battles with the Soviet Union, piles, global warming, unwanted wars with China and not being able to find your keys.
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Faeelin, trekaddict, C&D, Kasakka - China and German assistance.

As Faeelin said the main German contribution was a decent arms industry and modernisation of equipment. The High Command and training were something of a sideshow in comparison to that. With another few years of German aid and a delay in full blown war things may have been different.

I base this on the Japanese dislike of armour and mechanisation, thus when facing any tank led army they were going to be in trouble. Given time and German direction a combination of large manpower, well used numbers of tanks/trucks and German taught doctrine could give China a formidable 'modern' army. Or it could give them a horrible mess with a long supply chain, untrained troops and generals with no idea what they're doing or how to use their trucks/tanks.

That said I don't see China being given the time to get all that together and, as Kasakka says, Chiang didn't have wide enough effective control or a unified nation to build on even if he did.

The current situation in this timeline is pretty much unchanged. Germany remains fixated on the French troops still occupying the Rhineland, the suddenly expanded Little Entente and, of course, Spain. Therefore China is being left to bubble along in the background, the Three Year Plan went through and German firms continue to get backing for work in China.

My thinking is that this was a long term scheme so would keep going, if anything having all the senior Nazis looking elsewhere would let the Foreign Ministry professionals get on with it faster. That said I welcome any (more accurate) correction on how the bureaucracy would act when left alone.
 
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Well, I don't think the senior Nazis would leave the bureaucracy completely alone. To a certain point, nothing in Nazi Germany was independent. The senior Nazis also apparently were big fans of bureaucratic paperwork.

El Pip said:
Lord Strange - Japanese Junior Officers are the leading cause of border battles with the Soviet Union, piles, global warming, unwanted wars with China and not being able to find your keys.
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*gasp* I was wondering who stole my keys! :mad:
 
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Nathan Madien said:
*gasp* I was wondering who stole my keys! :mad:

Well, when anything goes wrong from now on, we all have to say, those darn Japanese junior officers.
 
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Chapter LVIII: Fallout and Aftershocks Part IX - The United States of America.
Chapter LVIII: Fallout and Aftershocks Part IX - The United States of America.

Leaving the intrigues of the East behind us we come to the Americas, two continents that contain the full spectrum of reactions and consequence to the summer's events. From the indifference of Uruguay to the vast changes in Newfoundland the events of the summer provide an insight into the links, or in many cases the lack of links, between the continents. We start in North America with the United States a nation that fell somewhere between the two extremes. The biggest impacts were the first implementations of the Neutrality Act and the formal abandonment of US interests in the Treaty of Versailles. The former revealed significant holes in the Act while the latter was further proof that the concerns of Europe were not those of the United States. Considering the 1934 Neutrality Act first, it is unsurprising that such a hasty piece of legislation should contain so many flaws. Rushed through to meet the 1934 mid-term elections, it was framed in terms of political advantage rather than practical application, legislation that gave congressmen something to boast off on the campaign trail rather than giving the President a useful foreign policy tool. The flaws rapidly became apparent after President Alfred Smith invoked the Act during the first stages of the Abyssinian War, applying sanctions to both Italy and Abyssinia and preventing the sale of 'all types of arms and ammunition to both belligerents'. This embargo, combined with a very public re-statement of the 'Lusitania clause' (which warned all US citizens that they travelled on liners of combatants or vessels entering war zones at their own risk), was expected to prompt a massive fall in vessels departing for Italy, as liners stopped running and merchantmen sought out new ports.

In fact, much to the consternation of isolationist politicians, shipping boomed. Abyssinian didn't even have a coast, let alone a navy, so the ocean liner passengers continued to travel while many a savy US merchant pitched wares that, though neither weapons nor ammunition, were most certainly useful to a nation at war; oil, 'mining' explosives and industrial equipment of all types. Indeed attempts were even made to sell production rights to everything from rifles to fighters, the sale of plans and blueprints having not been mentioned in either the Act or the embargo. Given the poor state of certain areas of the Italian military it is quite possible that only Mussolini's belief in national self-sufficiency and Autarky prevented the Italian's from purchasing at least some of those manufacturing licences. Fortunately for the President and Congress the Italian declaration of war on Britain prevented further embarrassing breaches of the embargo, Britain declared a blockade and the Royal Navy promptly sealed the Suez Canal and the Straits of Gibraltar to Italian bound shipping.

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The British naval base at Gibraltar once again proved it's inestimable value during the Abyssinian War. Serving as base for the western end of the British blockade the vessels based there were at the centre of the usual controversy over neutral trading rights during a blockade.

There was, of course, a formal US complaint about the British blockade, issued to protect the general principle of unfettered US trade rather than any problems with the specific actions, but this masked the considerable confusion in both the White House and Congress. While all believed the US should be able to trade with who it wished it was also recognised that only British actions had actually enforced the intent, rather than the technical wording, of the Neutrality Act. Thus complaints were muted and limited to the exceptionally small anti-British interventionist groups, those who believed the US should intervene more on the world stage and do so against Britain and/or in favour of fascist Italy. That said the Abyssinian War embargo was extended to cover the British Empire and the Dominions, although as the British Ambassador to Washington commented 'Given what the Royal Navy blockade is seizing at Gibraltar, it is hard to believe the United States has embargoed anything at all.'

The obvious solution for the isolationists was a revised Act, one that included not just arms and ammunition but all war making equipment and material in all forms. The new Act drew on the lessons of the Abyssinian embargo and banned a great many items specifically along with the more general embargo on 'war making material'. Despite the obvious disruption caused by the assassination of President Smith in March the Act was approved, passed and signed into by the newly promoted President Garner in late June, almost two months after the Abyssinian War had ended. It was however passed in time for the escalating Spanish Civil War, or would have been if the Act covered civil wars, which it did not. Despite this revelation of yet another loop hole there was little outcry, the country was deep into convention season and politicians of all parties were more concerned with who the Presidential candidates would be than 'Another European war'. This disinterest was helped by the two factions in Spain being beholden to their backers, the Republicans to France and the Soviet Union and the Monarchists to Britain and Germany, all of whom made sure it was their factories that got the war orders, not American ones. This meant there was very little trade to actually embargo, making a revised Act a symbolic gesture that neither party had the time or interest to make.

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John Jakob Raskob, Secretary of State under President Al Smith. Owing his position to his support of Smith's run for office and his former role as Chairman of the Democratic National Committee Raskob was not a foreign policy expert and had focused the efforts of the State Department on the Americas at the expense of the rest of the world. Given such a view it is understandable that after President's Smiths assassination and the side lining of former Vice-President Garner by the party's souther hierarchy Raskob was more concerned with domestic politics and survival than events in Europe and beyond.

Taking the second point, the lack of reaction to the stand off over the Rhineland, this was perhaps more symbolic than practical. As a signatory the United States was notionally committed to enforcing Versailles and thus had made token diplomatic responses to the various breaches in previous years, however the Rhineland Crisis marked the point where even that effort was stopped. It was, perhaps, the most honest approach, main stream public and political opinion could see no realistic circumstances under which the US should involve herself in the affairs of Europe, thus continued diplomatic protests with no conviction or interest behind them merely undermined the status of a State Department statement. On that point it is interesting to contrast that approach with that of the Japanese Foreign Ministry, which continued to issue statements and notes on affairs in Europe on the flimsiest of pretexts, persevering in the belief that such pronouncements were a vital part of being seen and treated as a 'Great Power'. From that viewpoint the US silence was interpreted as a disinterest in being seen as a Great Power, a view with a not inconsiderable measure of truth. Americans being more than happy to forgo the 'prestige' of foreign adventures if it meant avoiding the other, less desirable, side effects of such actions. The candidates for both President and Congress therefore focused themselves on the many domestic issues the country faced, foreign policy fading to little more than a sideshow to the economic and social issues of the day.
 
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Hmmm, America seems to be side lining itself, while a resurgent Britain ready to hold its empire...
 
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El Pip said:
The obvious solution for the isolationists was a revised Act, one that included not just arms and ammunition but all war making equipment and material in all forms. The new Act drew on the lessons of the Abyssinian embargo and banned a great many items specifically along with the more general embargo on 'war making material'...the Act was approved, passed and signed into by the newly promoted President Garner in late June, almost two months after the Abyssinian War had ended...

The candidates for both President and Congress therefore focused themselves on the many domestic issues the country faced, foreign policy fading to little more than a sideshow to the economic and social issues of the day.

Isolationists seem to be more succesfull than in OTL, while Japan starts to look north...Most interesting update.
 
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You know, one day I will do an AAR where Roosevelt reflates the economy, lays the smackdown on Japan after the Panay Incident, and unleashes Ragnarok on the Nazi-Soviet alliance, just to mess with the inevitable "America slinks into the shadows" meme that seems somewhat omnipresent.
 
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An embargo on oil would be applied to Japan once it starts fighting a war.Enforcement of such an embargo would lead the USA and Japan on an inevitible collision course. Entirely the opposite effect of the "Neutrality" Act. But typical of ill-thoughtout Democrat proposals.
 
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Lord Strange - Without FDR, Hull or any internationalist in the White House the US is naturally going to focus inward. And in many ways why is that a bad thing? After all why should America's sons risk their lives for problems elsewhere? The US public has yet to hear a convincing answer to that question.

As for the Empire, forcefully holding onto the Dominions is probably counter-productive. Being the best option however is a solid long term plan, though it will require a bit more 'give' than some die-hard Imperialist are entirely happy with.

Karelian - As above, there is no champion of interventionism and no votes to win by supporting it, only votes to lose. For many the Abyssinian War just proved Europe is inherently violent and warlike and the US is better off safe and isolated. It's not an opinion that's going to be disproved any time soon. ;)

Faeelin - That does sound quite dull you are aware? :D

Seriously I agree it's not a radical or inventive plot idea and not one I'm especially proud of. Apart from FDR being taken out by a carpet fitter which I still think is quite cool in a dystopian version of 'Great Man Theory' kind of way.

In my defence I can only plead being young, foolish and inexperienced; the first US update was almost three years ago. Back in the days when I thought this entire AAR might last a couple of dozen updates and may take a few months to finish. If I were to set the US plot going now I would try and do something different, but alas I am committed to it now.

However I can promise the next US update (about the Presidential primaries) will feature three party politics, candidates with genuinely new ideas to save the country and a strong focus on those areas of the economy that have thrived. Acceptable?

Chief Ragusa - Are you sure there would be an embargo? If Japan heads after the Soviets rather than China I'd be far from certain if the US would actually want to embargo Japan. That would of course depend on the President to a certain extent, but even then he'd have to consider public and political opinion. How unpopular would a Soviet-Japanese war actually be?

Carlstadt Boy - Some. Industry I'm actually building and the peace time modifier is down to 15%, I can't see the British economy recovering completely that quickly. The French ports are unchanged but they did get a better (ie smaller) peace time modifier. The rest are on an 'as needed' basis, particularly Spain for reasons which will (eventually ;) ) become clear.
 
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small anti-British interventionist groups, those who believed the US should intervene more on the world stage and do so against Britain and/or in favour of fascist Italy.
Dude, good set up for War Plan Red!
 
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El Pip said:
Chief Ragusa - Are you sure there would be an embargo? If Japan heads after the Soviets rather than China I'd be far from certain if the US would actually want to embargo Japan. That would of course depend on the President to a certain extent, but even then he'd have to consider public and political opinion. How unpopular would a Soviet-Japanese war actually be?

Well, if the Soviets and Japanese are slugging it out, I don't see how it would affect the average American. It might be a case of "let's have trouble there so we don't have trouble here."

By the way, in your coverage of the upcoming Presidential election on the Republican side, will Alf Landon be a factor?

Sir Humphrey said:
Dude, good set up for War Plan Red!

Sounds somewhat extreme to me.
 
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Nathan Madien said:
Well, if the Soviets and Japanese are slugging it out, I don't see how it would affect the average American. It might be a case of "let's have trouble there so we don't have trouble here."
The consequences of such a neutral response could be much more far-reaching though. With the Soviet military hierarchy actually needed on the front line (looking for missing keys - Russian junior officer shenanigans no doubt!) and not hanging around the Kremlin, will there be a need for Stalin's command *ahem* 're-shuffle'? :p

Interesting Pip, that American industry (which despite not being much, is in real terms still quite considerable) seems to be selling it's ass to the highest bidder. Free Market Economics working it's best out of a completely belligerent N. America. Oh, to be a budding entrepreneur in 1936 TTL with a resourceful workforce and a few top notch ideas!!

Keep up the good work, and don't worry, I'm sure you'll have kicked off the big conflict by the time you've picked up your free bus pass! :D
 
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An enforced ban on raw materials including oil would disrupt Japan's economy and war effort. The Russians would not be as severely affected. The American navy and airforce would need an upgrade and increase in numbers to patrol such a large area.

Would the American electorate care? The Act is there and Presidents are supposed to enforce such. Domestic issues loom far larger as the immediate concern.
 
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Wow, the America of your time line is rather boring and uninspiring... Hope someone gets things going there. All good for the Empire, though.

Vann
 
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scubadoobie2 said:
The consequences of such a neutral response could be much more far-reaching though. With the Soviet military hierarchy actually needed on the front line (looking for missing keys - Russian junior officer shenanigans no doubt!) and not hanging around the Kremlin, will there be a need for Stalin's command *ahem* 're-shuffle'? :p

Hmm...good point. Stalin can just send people he doesn't like to be slaughtered by the Japanese.

Vann the Red said:
Wow, the America of your time line is rather boring and uninspiring... Hope someone gets things going there. All good for the Empire, though.

There isn't much for America to get all excited about right now and I am sure a certain number of Americans like it that way.
 
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