ABSTRACT
The Second World War was more truly global than the First in the geographical scope of military conflict and in its effects on nations which were not primary belligerents. While in both wars Europe was the major theatre, in the Second, the Far East came close to Europe in significance (and in the eyes of some Americans exceeded it), largely because of Japan’s role. In 1914 Japan had entered the First World War on the Allied side chiefly in order to pursue its interests at China’s and Germany’s expense, and at Versailles Japan succeeded in gaining former German territories in the Far East and important concessions from China. From the point of view of the major powers, however, these issues were of regional rather than global significance. The same could not be said of the Second World War. Japan’s vigorous expansionist drive from 194042 displaced Western rule (at least temporarily) from a host of colonies, including French Indo-China, Hong Kong, Malaya, Singapore, British Borneo, most of Burma, Thailand, the Dutch East Indies, the Philippines, and a scattering of islands in the Western Pacific, many of them American. Japan’s eventual defeat did not check, but rather stimulated, the urge for independence among many of these territories. The overall effect of Japan’s participation was to provoke a redrawing of the political map of Asia.
