The World's Sole Superpower - A Neutral Japan AAR (TFH)

[KhunWasut]

Hello everyone! Welcome to my first-ever HoI3 AAR. First of all, I’m really sorry some broken English (English is my second language) and for the relative compactness of the AAR because this play wasn’t intended to be an AAR at the first place, but as the game progressed I was very satisfied with what I have done, and I saved the game at critical periods (but no savescumming), so I couldn’t help but sharing the alternate history of Japan’s struggle on the World’s stage.

DISCLAIMER: I’m not Japanese, but for the style of this AAR, I’ll pretend to be someone in charge and will use the first person ‘We’. If I have done anything to offend anyone, please kindly let me know and I will be happy to edit the sensitive parts.

THE GAME: Hearts of Iron 3 - Their Finest Hours
PLAYING AS: Japan
START DATE: 1936
MODS: Nope
DIFFICULTY: Normal
HOUSE RULE: Will not join any factions!!

INDEX

1. Introduction
2. Initial Preparations
3. War with Nationalist China
4. War with the Chinese Warlord States
5. January 26, 1941 - The Conflict With the West Begins
6. May 7, 1941 - The Conflict With the West Escalates
7. Struggles Against the Allies Continue

 

[KhunWasut]

THE PLAN

1. Conquer Nationalist China first, then the warlord states, uniting the Chinese territories under the Japanese banner
2. Conquest of Southeast Asia, starting from Siam, then declare war on the Allies for their Southeast Asian holdings
3. Make my way slowly to Europe, take London and conquer the United Kingdom
4. Declare war on the Axis while they are occupied with Barbarossa. Launch a major amphibious assault into mainland Europe (Just like the Allies’ D-Day landings, except this will be done by IJA instead )
5. Conquer Germany and Italy before the Soviets do, and man the troops at the Soviet border in Europe
6. Own nukes
7. Declare war on Soviet Union, quickly finish them with the help of nukes and two-front rush on their VPs.
8. Prepare the troops, ships, and airplane for the invasion of the United States of America. We shall march to Washington and dictate our peace terms!
9. WORLD CONQUEST!!

Well, originally, I expected myself to be able to achieve only up to Plan 3, as I thought mounting a D-Day style attack on Germany as Japan alone is a bit risky and I might fail. Let’s see how far I can go!

 

[KhunWasut]

INTRODUCTION


Just before the end of Tokugawa Shogunate, a proud nation of Japan was greatly humiliated by the American’s gunboat diplomacy of Commodore Perry’s fleet, right in the doorstep of the Shogunate’s capital of Edo. As a result, she was forced to abandon the old ‘Sakoku’ ways and open up her country for Western trade. This event was a great blow to the Japanese minds, for Japan only realized, because of this, how outdated their military was and how the Western ‘barbarians’ unhonorably enforce their unequal demands upon our face.

Despite this embarassment, Japan had no choices but to accept the terms, but only for the time being. Not long afterwards, dissents among the more progressive elements of the Japanese society led to the Meiji Restoration, which brought about a tremendous change upon Japan. A prominent state ideology during the Meiji period, ‘Fukoku Kyohei’ - Enrich the State, Strengthen the Military, has transformed Japan from a nation bullied by Western imperialism into an imperialist nation herself - as shown in the actual history during the First Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War, where Japan didn’t only emerge victorious, but victories against the supposedly powerful China and Russia also shocked the whole World who didn’t expect Japan’s rise to be this sudden.

We were proud of those great victories, but they came with a great price! We cannot forget the actions of those vile French, Germans, and Russians during their so-called ‘Triple Intervention’, when they robbed us what we were rightfully deserved - the Liaodong Peninsula. Also, more importantly, the Western powers rejected our fair request of the ‘Racial Equality’ clause to be included in the League of Nations. These events prove that the Western powers still see us as inferiors despite a great progress we have made, and no matter how we try to play nice with them, they would never give up that kind of thought.

And today, 18 years after the end of the First World War, the time is ripe for us to show the Western powers that we are no inferior to them. Their days are numbered, and the rise of our great empire to become the leading player in the World is inevitable!

 

[germandjinn]

BANZAI! FOR THE EMPEROR!

 

[KhunWasut]

BANZAI! FOR THE EMPEROR!

TENNO HEIKA BANZAI!!

 

[KhunWasut]

INITIAL PREPARATIONS

A quick overview of our nation in 1936. We start with holdings on the 4 main islands of Honshu, Shikoku, Kyushu, and Hokkaido. Beside those islands, we also have the entire Korean peninsula, some territory in Northern China, the island of Taiwan, the Kurils, and the southern half of Sakhalin. Manchukuo is our puppet state that we have created prior. Our Pacific islands were obtained as a reward for us joining the First World War on the Entente's side. Although a victor, the vile Americans denied us our right to annex the former German holding in Tsingtao, for they themselves also have business interests in China.

We are the island nation, so a modern and powerful navy is essential. The first thing we will do starting today is start building the ships that will be the envy of all the other navies of the World, and to maintain our edge in those sophisticated technologies. Also, if we are to catch up with those Western powers, expanding our industrial capacity would bring us closer to being on par with them.

We would also improve our infantry and our industry technologies, along with some land battle doctrines, as we are relatively outdated in those doctrines. Soon, our army shall be amongst the best-equiped and best-trained in the World. Meanwhile, a technological advantage for our navy is also important. Admiral Yamamoto has pressed the government to invest in aircraft carriers. Although the ones we are building are probably out of date, but the production will help us gaining the much-needed practical knowledge in building those advanced ships, which will be helpful in the long run when the conflict with Western powers is inevitable.

Our cabinet, although unwaveringly loyal to the Emperor, is not optimal for our nation’s dire need of raw materials. We need someone who would be able to secure resources for our country to keep our industry running at full efficiency.

The Western powers are not to be trusted, as the history has proved, they tried every way to deny our rightful place under the Sun. To the north, the huge Russian land is menacing, and their government, though not the same kind as the one we defeated in 1905, is still hostile to us - they would spread the evil idea of ‘Communism’ that would undermine our Emperor’s reign. To our south, the colonies of France and Great Britain host a combined navy so powerful that could threaten our maritime lifeline. Their dominance of rare materials is also bad for us, who greatly need them to keep our machines running.

However, our spies from Paris have just reported back to us that the situation in France isn’t so good, so that’s actually good for us. We would encourage more espionage activities in France as we expect the least counterespionage from them amongst all the major powers. We will let the world know of France’s threat to World peace due to their huge colonial empire. We believe the Germans and the Italians would well receive our propaganda for sure.


Although one day war with the West will come for sure, for now we are not strong enough to deal with them all at once. We need to be careful in our diplomacy. Across the Pacific, there lies a big nation of the United States of America. Although we cannot forget what they did to shove the unequal demand into our face in 1854, we can’t make them enemy for now! They are very rich in resources, so they would be best treated as a trade partner, and building up a good relation with them is desirable, for we need their metals and rare materials. This kind of logic also applies to the Russians to a lesser extent, as they are also rich in metals. Moreover, the USSR shares a short section of land border with us in Korea, so we do not need to send a long convoy voyage to trade with them, which reduces the risk of the enemy raid of our convoys in case of war.

We do not interest in trading with colonial powers like Britain or France, however, as their territories are relatively close to our homeland, and are far away from their mainland. These lands in Asia should belong to an Asian power like ours, not them!!

 

[sebas379]

We can never have too many Japan AARs on this forum, its a nation with so many options, so count me in!
Good luck with your first AAR, I'm looking forward to see the direction you will take.

 

[KhunWasut]

WAR WITH NATIONALIST CHINA

2 years later, we have strengthened ourselves to some degrees - our infantry are upgraded to the latest ammunitions and doctrines, while we also have commissioned a new carrier fleet. Back a year ago, some generals in Kwantung Army have suggested to the government that Japan should feign an incident and use it as a causus belli to declare war on Kuomintang China, but our minister or armanent rejected the idea, citing that the troops were undergoing a major equipment upgrade, and some special forces were being trained from the garrison units ferried from Manchuria and Korea. Moreover, we were also undergoing an armor project, where we were building 2 experimental light armor brigades to gain our knowhow in tank building, so we did not have enough resources to build extra marine units. However, in 1938, the goverment revisited the general’s idea and back the plan. We are in for war!! Let this be the first step toward our grand empire!

Due to the lack of marine units, we cannot finish the war quickly as planned. However, the Kwantung Army was massively reorganized - most of the triangular infantry divisions were transformed into a rectangular infantry division with attached artillery brigades. The North China Army (army group level) was eliminated and the number of army level command was reduced to just one to attempt to save on our supplies, which will be bad during our attack, but otherwise our army was organized into an army of 5 corps of INF-INF-INF-ART, each of which contains 5 divisions.

While the Kwantung Army is stationed near the Chinese border, our great empire is also investing in a project that trains special marine force for future amphibious operations. Moreover, we are also engaged in an experimental light tank project to give us the knowhow of how to build tanks. These will come in handy in the future, and it's for the good of our empire.

The added artillery brigades were extremely helpful in our war efforts, coupled with fully upgraded divisions to the latest 1938 technologies and doctrines, we were able to push our way into China with ease. Our battle plan is just charging through the enemy and encircle the enemy capital at Nanjing.

As we know that this war is not going to be lightning fast, the government called on a spy ring in major Chinese cities to perform subversive activities to shatter the Chinese people’s will and reduce their unity. (Well this photo showed that I was increasing threat, but I did indeed reduce their unity )

Not so long after this, Nanjing and Shanghai was captured, and China had no choice but to surrender to our great might. TENNO HEIKA BANZAI!!

 

[KhunWasut]

We can never have too many Japan AARs on this forum, its a nation with so many options, so count me in!
Good luck with your first AAR, I'm looking forward to see the direction you will take.

That's why I love playing Japan! Like you said, there are so many options to take! Thank you

 

[KhunWasut]

WAR WITH THE CHINESE WARLORD STATES (NO PHOTOS)


Our triumph over China was a major morale boost to our invincible soldiers, for we have just conquered a nation that was a dominant force in Asia for over a millennium, but Japan has proved that she learnt the lessons her recent history well and was modernized in time to be able to survive any external threats, and our people’s great resolve and great loyalty to the Emperor have made this stunning victory possible! The Western powers will surely be shocked by what’s going on in Asia!

Diplomacy-wise, we align ourselves away from the Axis and toward the Allies, because despite our conquest of China, our resource situation still didn’t improve, and keeping a warm relation with the USA is essential to prevent them from embargoing us.

Due to our recent conquest, we now border the British at Hong Kong, and the United Kingdom now surpass France as Japan’s highest threat. We didn’t order our spy ring in Britain to raise the threat beforehand (the primary goal of Japanese spy ring in Britain was to steal their advanced blueprints), so now we need to change the priority to increase their threat, so that our neutrality, now at 7%, could be reduced to zero. Our current peace will only be temporary! Once the neutrality reached zero, Guangxi will be our next target due to their industry potential that is best among the remaining Chinese warlord states.

We reorganize our troops again and 3 INF-INF-INF-ART corps were diverted down south close to Guangxi’s 3 victory points, while the other 2 were assigned to border Yan’an, the capital of Communist China. Now that our neutrality reached zero, it’s time for war again!

With our great might, Guangxi and Communist China fell quickly, and we will not waste any time for peace! We subsequently declare war on Xibei San Ma and Yunnan. Despite they are vastly outnumbered, the conquest of both states took very long time due to their poor infrastructure and great distances between the provinces, but nevertheless, their fates were sealed and their territories were quickly incorporated into our mainland Asia holdings.

To keep our army experienced and industry running at high efficiency, the government decide to keep continuing the war by declaring war on Tibet and Siam. The war with Siam saw the first use of our marine corps in amphibious landing operations in Southern Thailand. Not long after the declaration of war, Tibet and Siam were brought into the fold of our growing empire. However, after the end of war of these 2 small nations, there were no other independent nations in proximity left for us to conquer - by now, the war in Europe broke out and France has fallen, and a new rump state of Vichy France now controls Indochina. Although appearing weak, their independence is guaranteed by the Germans. Philippines is a puppet of an American behemoth. The East Indies remains in a weak Dutch hands, but declaring war on them would drag the British and her powerful Royal Navy into the conflict as well. To our west, Xinjiang has already joined the Comintern, and declaring war on them would drag the Russians in as well.

What should we do?

 

[KhunWasut]

JANUARY 26, 1941 - THE CONFLICT WITH THE WEST BEGINS

We have consolidated our gains in Asia. Meanwhile, the German Blitzkrieg resulted in they controlling a good chunk of continental Europe. The situation of the Allies in Europe looks bleak. Only the United Kingdom stands alone defending the combined might of the Axis military, but the British are by no means weak - they still have their most important asset - the Royal Navy - at their disposal, and they are surely able to cause us big troubles!

Our diplomatic situations with the two main trade partners - The USA and The Soviet Union. Although we have warm relations with both of them, they certainly view us in distrust - they both feel we are threatening.

Considering the current diplomatic situations, there are no easy conquests left for Japan anymore while our stockpile of metals and rare materials are running dangerously low. Not only that, our treasury is also running out of money as well, so our trade links with the Americans and the Soviets will soon be broken, further worsening our resource situation. A decision has to be made, and a new conquest is necessary, but against whom?

Philippines? - We need to trade with the USA to survive, and our navy is not good enough to challenge the USN in the Pacific yet. We don’t want to trigger a long war with them early since they will surely outproduce us. Unless a swift victory against them is possible, there will be no war against the USA for the foreseeable future.

Xinjiang? - We couldn’t risk the war with the Soviets right now! Not only that we would lose our vital trade link, but we don’t have enough men to defend our borders! We will definitely be overrun.

The East Indies? - The Royal Navy is definitely a threat, but their globe-spanning empire means their ships are spread out, and our navy may stand a chance against them. The British and her dominions, as well as her Western European allies such as France, Belgium, and the Netherlands, are currently at war with the Axis, so that is tempting, but there’s a better option

Vichy French Indochina? - Although Germany is guaranteeing their independence and declaring war on them would mean declaring war on a power that just quickly made her way in Europe through her ‘Blitzkrieg’ tactics, but Germany is very far away from our land, and our navy is superior to them, so they have a limited power projection capabilities in Asia. Moreover, there’s another benefit - since it would also take us a long time to reach mainland Europe, this conflict will keep us in war for very long, and war with a power like Germany enables us to enact a strong ‘Heavy Industry Emphasis’ law to speed up our war production.

After a long meeting of cabinet members, the Japanese Government has issued a declaration of war on Vichy France, with the goal of taking their territory of Indochina in hope to solve our low rare material stockpile. Shortly thereafter, Germany also declared war on us. Well, that’s expected. Japan is now in a long period of war, but with our people’s strength, determination, and loyalty to the Emperor, we shall prevail! TENNO HEIKA BANZAI!

We already ordered our navy to patrol the coasts of Indochina, which would greatly disrupt their supply convoys from Europe. We also have a marine corps of 5 MAR-MAR-MAR-ENG divisions stationed in nearby Hainan island, ready for actions.

The second operation of the IJA Marines would be an amphibious landing in the port of Haiphong, with the plan to rush key rare-producing provinces and ports, and Indochina was soon overrun just like the other nations we have conquered, but this time, due to the German protection, we couldn’t annex their territory, so we will occupy them for the time being. Due to our dire resource situation, we set the occupation policy to ‘Full Occupation’ for maximum resources.

 

[KhunWasut]

MAY 7, 1941 - THE CONFLICT WITH THE WEST ESCALATES

Even Indochina is now thoroughly occupied, our rare material situation still doesn’t improve considerably, and our eyes now turn to the resource-rich Dutch East Indies, and strategic positions in Indochina are in our hands, the time has come for a declaration of war on the Western Allies. They will soon succumb to our great might!

With the 1st Marine Corps stationed in Southern Thailand, we launched a 2-pronged attack in coordination with our navy patrolling Singapore Straits. Meanwhile, the 2nd Marine Corps, already converged in Saigon, were tasked to capture the vital Singapore. Within days of war declaration, Singapore has fallen to our hands and the Malay peninsula was overrun - our strategic position in mainland Southeast Asia is now secured!

With Singapore captured, it was used as a springboard for our 2nd Marine Corps to launch our assault into Java, an island rich in rare materials. However, another important reason in quickly invading Java was the control of vital strategic resources. Since we are not in any factions, we can’t influence anyone to give us accesses to those vital resources, so we need to control them ourselves. There are 3 strategic resources on Java island alone - Gold, Chinchona, and Rubber (although a rubber province was already taken on Malay peninsula). The addition of gold into our strategic resources pool was welcomed, because we are also running low on money. With gold, we could continue to make money and continue trading with our key trading partners - the USA and the Soviet Union, which helps solving our metal problem as well.

 

[KhunWasut]

1942 - STRUGGLES AGAINST THE ALLIES CONTINUE

The key resource areas of the Dutch East Indies are now under our control, including a refinery on Sumatra. By now, we have triggered 3 key strategic effects - Taiwan Strait, Gulf of Tonkin, and Makassar Strait, boosting our leadership points and our research efficiency by a great deal. This, for sure, will win the war for us, for the Emperor!

(OP's note: The Chihli Gulf is supposed to trigger as well as I occupy all the required province, but it doesn't trigger in this game. I don't know why, but missing that juicy 20% research efficiency hurts my progress significantly)

Meanwhile, the Royal Australian Navy continued to be a nuisance. The government cabinet holds a meeting on the fate of Australia and New Zealand, and unanimously agreed that they should be made our puppet states, as they are so far away for our direct control to be effective, and our navy is most needed around the Singapore Straits to fend off the Royal Navy. By now, our marine troops has expanded into 4 corps, with extra artillery brigades added to each forming MAR-MAR-MAR-ENG-ART divisions. With our fast coastal assaults on key Australian and New Zealander cities, they were quickly brought into our puppet states to watch over the Southern Pacific for us.

With threats on Southern Pacific neutralized, we could focus our missions on India now. The bad infrastructure made our land troops being able to push only to as far as Culcutta. However, our navy, through strings of victories at sea, can now push far into Ceylon, and our Marine Corps, freed from the duty in Oceania, were brought to the India front and assault key islands of the Indian Ocean, paving our way towards Africa.

Meanwhile, the Italians, not currently at war with us, now control Suez canal. We don’t want to declare war on them for now as that would put more burden on our navy, and we want to concentrate on taking London and knock the major powers out of the Allies faction, so the high command in Tokyo agreed on the plan to hop around Africa from Ceylon - Seychelles - South Africa - Lagos - Casablanca (then under Vichy France), and we plan to use the port of Casablanca as a final stage for our preparation on the assault of the British Isles.

 

[sebas379]

Conquests are rolling along swiftly. Soon the allies will be no more.
The reason you didnt get the gulf strategic effects is because they require you to be part of a faction. A bit silly but thats how thwy are coded unfortunatly.

 

[Forster]

You are doing really well. I will follow this.

 

[Iwo Jima]

I made smth simular in HOI2 (you can see it my sign). Although, HOI3 has very restricted diplomatic options, so its not so funny to play diplomacy here. In HOI2 I could form my own union, but in HOI3 I haven't seen such things.

Anyway, single Japan is a great challenge. Good luck!