Recently, I have become interested in war and have been focusing on World War II (1939-1945). I am mainly interested in war around the Asia-Pacific region, and I have learned about the Japanese Empire along with it. This is how it started:

In World War I, Japan was on the side of America, Britain, France, and the USSR, known as the Allies. However, when the peace treaty was drawn, Japan felt like it did not have enough land, so in 1940, a year or so after World War II broke out, Japan, along with Italy and Germany, signed the Tripartite act, and joined together to form the Axis. Japan had a short war with Russia over the province of Manchuria, known as the Russo-Japanese War, and Japan won the war. On September 8, 1931, Japan won Manchuria due to the Mudken Incident, which happened due to bombing on a Manchurian railroad. Soon the Japanese spilled into China and attacked the Capital, Nanking, in 1937. In 1939, World War II broke out, and Japan signed the Tripartite act in 1940 (See above). Yet on December 7, 1941, Japan launched a sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, in Hawaii. This brought the US into the war. In May 1942, the US had a major victory over the Japanese in the Coral Sea, and by June 1942, the US won the Battle of Midway as well, and the Japanese Empire was coming to an end. By 1944, Burma was liberated by the British, and by 1945, the Japanese surrendered due to the two Atomic Bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki (Code names “Little Boy” and “Fat Man”). That was the end of the Japanese Empire.