>Third point: Imperialism. There's an excellent book, called "Empires on the Pacific" that discusses European and American policies in the Far East from the 1850's through WW2. We were pushing for an "Open Door" policy because we thought China and Japan were potentially great markets for American trade. Europe, OTOH, essentially raped China. Japan was smart in keeping Europe at arms length for the longest time but then joined into the "fun" in China.
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>There's imperialism.

Absolutely true .... We have learned that lesson...