page_title: Anti-Comintern Pact
section_title: The effect of the German military victories in the Westfeldzug, early 1940
hierarchical_section_title: Anti-Comintern Pact / The Anti-Comintern Pact during World War II, 1939–1945 / The effect of the German military victories in the Westfeldzug, early 1940
caption_attribution_description: English: Japanese Imperial Army soldiers advance to Lang Son, in September 1940 in French Indochina.
context_page_description: The Anti-Comintern Pact, officially the Agreement against the Communist International, was an anti-Communist pact concluded between Germany and Japan on November 25, 1936, and was directed against the Communist International. It was signed by German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop and Japanese ambassador to Germany Kintomo Mushakoji. Italy, Spain and other countries joined it until November 1941.
  The Japanese signatories had hoped that the Anti-Comintern Pact would effectively be an alliance against the Soviet Union, which is certainly how the USSR perceived it. There was also a secret additional protocol which specified a joint German-Japanese policy specifically aimed against the Soviet Union. However, after the accession of Italy to the pact and especially the German-Soviet rapprochement after the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, it gained an increasingly anti-western and anti-British identity as well.
  After August 1939, Japan distanced itself from Germany as a result of the German-Soviet non-aggression pact.
context_section_description: In March 1940, Joachim von Ribbentrop once again set about mobilizing Italy, the Soviet Union and especially Japan for his vision of a four-power coalition against the British Empire. In June 1940, the overwhelming German victories in the Westfeldzug saw the defeat of France, Belgium and the Netherlands. With French Indochina and the Dutch East Indies now effectively defenseless, the Tokyo government now felt enticed to once again diplomatically approach Germany, which it had previously distanced itself from after the German quid pro quo with the USSR. The Germans had also won some support with the Japanese ambassadors in Berlin and Rome, Hiroshi Ōshima and Toshio Shiratori, who were swayed by Germany's successes in the Polish campaign and started supporting Ribbentrop's diplomatic agenda.
  Japan, concerned that Germany might actually take the side of France and the Netherlands, possibly then reshaped to be German vassal states, in the colonial question, sought to assure Germany's support for a Japanese annexation of French and Dutch colonies in South East Asia. Ribbentrop was indeed willing to support such Japanese annexations, which had been part of his initial idea regarding the four-power pact's advantages from the Japanese perspective. He painted Japanese acquisitions in East Asia as preparations for a world order where all of Afro-Eurasia would be divided between Germany, Italy, Japan and the Soviet Union. Again, Ribbentrop thus tried to realize his vision of a four-power coalition directed against the United Kingdom. With France eliminated and the Battle of Britain going in British favor, it became more and more clear that the United Kingdom, although on the backfoot, would neither seek a truce nor be knocked out by German invasion. As a result, the role of the still neutral United States and the American support for the UK became more and more important for the conduct of Germany's war effort. Ribbentrop still deluded himself that cooperation with the Soviet Union could be permanent or at least last until the war with the United Kingdom had concluded. This opinion was not shared by Adolf Hitler, who still viewed the 'Jewish-Bolshevist' Soviet Union as Germany's inevitable final enemy.
caption: Japanese advance to Lạng Sơn in French Indochina in 1940
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