The Basic Racial Issue in the Pacific War in WWII
There is a big issue that has never been discussed openly after WWII in terms of Japanese invasion of Southeast Asia during WWII.
After the Japanese-Russo War (1904-1905), the US Government or American political elites changed their view on the Empire of Japan. During the Japanese-Russo War, the US supported the Empire to stop Russian invasion of East Asia. But when the war ended while the Empire of Japan had defeated the mighty Russian fleet and troops around Manchuria and the Korean Peninsula, the US came to prepare for a future war against the Empire over the hegemony around the West Pacific Ocean.
Japanese immigrants in California and other states of America gradually faced growing racial discrimination. Anti-Japanese sentiment also grew stronger in the US without any rational reasons. It is as if some racists in the US were working behind the scene to lead the two leading countries in the Pacific to a fatal war.
Today, we don't see almost any racial hatred toward Japanese in the US society. But, Japanese immigrants to the US before WWII had to experience very difficult situations as minorities. Especially in 1930s or after the Great Depression, this anti-Japanese mind-set dangerously expanded in the US society.
That is why both the countries reinforced their navies as if preparing imminent war on the Oacific. Otherwise, both Imperial Japan and the US didn't need to build and maintain such large fleets:
The Washington Naval Treaty, also known as the Five-Power Treaty, was a treaty among the major nations that had won World War I, which by the terms of the treaty agreed to prevent an arms race by limiting naval construction. It was negotiated at the Washington Naval Conference, which was held in Washington, D.C., from November 1921 to February 1922, and signed by the governments of the United Kingdom, the United States, Japan, France, and Italy. It limited the construction of battleships, battlecruisers and aircraft carriers by the signatories. The numbers of other categories of warships, including cruisers, destroyers and submarines, were not limited by the treaty but those ships were limited to 10,000 tons displacement.
The Pacific theater battles in WWII were destined in 1920s, since the Empire of Japan needed such strong naval power only against the US as well as the UK, since Russians had lost their naval presence in East Asia since their defeat against the Empire in 1905.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Naval_Treaty
Tonnage limitations Country Capital ships Aircraft carriers British Empire 525,000 tons
(533,000 tonnes)135,000 tons
(137,000 tonnes)United States 525,000 tons
(533,000 tonnes)135,000 tons
(137,000 tonnes)Empire of Japan 315,000 tons
(320,000 tonnes)81,000 tons
(82,000 tonnes)France 175,000 tons
(178,000 tonnes)60,000 tons
(61,000 tonnes)Italy 175,000 tons
(178,000 tonnes)60,000 tons
(61,000 tonnes)
And, behind this building up of Japan's military power, there were racial issues against Japanese in the US as well as in the UK.
When the US Government froze Japanese assets in the US and imposed total embargo of crude oil, iron products, etc. for the reason that Imperial troops were fighting Chinese troops in mainland China as if intending to occupy whole China around 1941, the Imperial Government decided to occupy Southeast Asia where natural resources, including crude oil, were rich. Some anti-American politicians in Tokyo dreamed of constructing a kind of Imperial Commonwealth in East Asia that could totally compete with the US and European powers. The Imperial Japan's invasion of Southeast Asia during WWII was partly forced by racial discrimination in the US before WWII.
History textbooks used in schools in the world today should clearly state that the Empire of Japan finally attacked American naval bases in Pearl Harbor partly because of the racial issue against Japanese in the US.
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