Scott Reynolds schrieb:

> >>>The answer is quite simple. Japan lost the war. Britain not.
> >>
> >>I don't think so. What is to prevent Japan from organizing its own
> >>Commonwealth of Nations and inviting its former colonies to join?
> >>Nothing but the fact that the answer would be a resounding no from every
> >>country receiving such an invitation.
> >
> > I guess this is not an option for Japan.
> 
> But why not? Think about it. Why can't Japan start organizing such an
> organization today?

I guess this depends on the behaviour of the Japanese forces in their 
former colonies and occupied coutries and their behaviour after the war.

And additionaly after the end of WWII Japan was not able to determine 
its own politics for a while. But I'm not an expert in the US 
occupation policy in Japan, so this might have been diferent. 

> > Maybe this could have been an
> > option, if Japan would not have started the war in the Pacific or if
> > it would at least have won it.
> 
> Of course if Japan had won she could have forced all her colonies to
> continue to belong to the Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere. But
> the point I was getting at is that none of the colonies would have
> wanted to remain members voluntarily.

I agree. The Japanese behaviour in the occupied countries didn't help 
very much.

> > And I think, that the former Japanese
> > Colonies, would still have some kind of ties to Japan, if Japan
> > wouldn't have lost the war.
> 
> One might as well speak of what might have happened if space aliens had
> landed and taken over the earth. Japan never had the slightest chance of
> "winning" the war she started.

Maybe. Maybe not. I guess we'll never have a chance to find it out.

> >>By the same token, what is to prevent current members of the British
> >>Commonwealth of Nations from pulling out of the organization, especially
> >>the ones that are sovereign nations in their own right? It seems to me
> >>that the Commonwealth members choose to remain in the organization
> >>because they perceive doing so to be in their own interest.
> >
> > Yes, but what would be, if Britain would have lost the war. I don't
> > think, that the Commonwealth would have survived a German victory in
> > WWII.
> 
> Right. In that case the Commonwealth members would not have had the
> choice to choosing whether to remain members or not.

Silvio
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Sometimes I feel the strong urge to march east...