VALDEZ, Kathryn Bernadette E.

11823267 JPSTATE A52

The Pacific War was inevitable because with Japan did not like the idea of the United States
allowing them to be isolated diplomatically, so they withdrew from the League of nations and the
Washington Treaty System and decided to draw closer to the European fascist powers. In 1936,
they concluded the Anti-Comintern Pact and in 1940, they signed the Tripartite Pact with Italy
and Germany. In 1938, Konoe called for an all-out campaign to “annihilate” the nationalist regime
and after the Nanking rape and massacre, Japanese leadership pushed ahead justifying their goals
with Pan-Asian slogans and the vision of a Greater East Asia Coprosperity Sphere from which all
vestiges of Western imperialism would be erased. According to Pyle (1996, p. 191), the
Manchurian Incident already proved to be a turning point for Japan in which they “abandoned the
general policy of cooperation with the powers…, and chose to pursue its own destiny in East Asia,
to trust its own strength to protect and advance its interests.” I believe that after Konoe called for
an all-out campaign and as they continued to accept Japanese leadership in creating an Asian
community of nations, free from the Americans, it further strengthened them to achieve their goal
of completely erasing Western imperialism. Regarding the signing of the Tripartite Pact, it was
perceived by Matsuoka that the American reaction was strong due to the fact that President
Franklin D. Roosevelt forbade shipment of iron scrap to Japan and imposed oil embargo on Japan
after their troops entered IndoChina. The negotiations between Secretary of State Cordell Hull and
Ambassador Nomura Kichisaburo failed. The Japanese leaders decided not to turn back and
continued to take risks and as mentioned by Matsuoka, “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.” With
America’s actions towards Japan, and them becoming an emerging power and as a threat to Japan,
war would really be inevitable because Japan wanted to maintain the title of being a first-class
country and they had a goal of erasing Western imperialism and the purpose of the war was to
create a “new world order” that would “enable all nations and races to assume their proper place
in the world, and all peoples to be at peace in their own sphere.”

One of the causes why wars occur would be because of certain disagreements between two
parties. The most common causes of war, according to Goodman (2019), would be the following
-- economic gain; territorial gain, as seen during the colonial period for super powers would want
to expand their territories; civil war; nationalism; and the like. I believe that international and
external conditions in the 1930s made WWII inevitable because as seen in Japan’s case, they did
face numerous international and external conditions that pushed them to having a certain goal and
made war the conclusion to that and made war as a tool to be able to achieve that goal. In Japan’s
case, as the “leading race” of Asia, they wanted erase the Western imperialism and they wanted to
create a “new world order” because it enables all nations to assume their proper place in the world
and to be at peace in their own sphere.

References:
Goodman, P. (2019 February 5). The 8 Main Reasons for War. Retrieved from
https://owlcation.com/social-sciences/The-Main-Reasons-For-War
Pyle, K.B. The Making of Modern Japan (pp. 191-203), second edition. Lexington, MA: D.C
Heath and Company, 1996