How long did the US occupy the former Axis countries after World War 2?

Answer 1

I believe to this day there are still air force bases in Germany (certain about this one), Japan, Italy. If you mean a large scale occupation, I would think around 2 to 3 years - that's a guess.

Answer 2

It kinda depends on how you define "occupy". Todays military bases in both Japan and Germany are offshoots of the original occupation. Widespread occupation in both cases remained at least a year or so after the cessation of hostilities and gradualy coalesced into military bases as the respective governments became able to maintain peace on their own. We still maintain a large number of bases in both countries. There was no specific "turn over the reins and leave" point as some want to occur currently in Iraq. The island of Okinawa, for example, was not returned to Japanese control until 1972, prior to that it was governed by the Americans.

Answer 3

In Western Europe four (France, Belgium) or five (Denmark, part of the Netherlands) years.

In eastern Europe the Nazis took over Austria and part of Czechoslovakia in 1938. Austria was liberated in 1945 by Americans from the west and Russians from the east. Austria was the only nation in Europe from which the Soviets withdrew their troops after WWII. All the other eastern European nations were under German occupation until the Soviet "Liberators" arrived, and then they had to do another forty-five years under the Soviet Communist system, usually with a Soviet-installed puppet regime answering to Moscow, manned by home-grown communists. So for eastern Europe the whole miserable period lasted fifty years.

In the Pacific Japan took over Manchuria in 1931, and other parts of China beginning in 1937. The Japanese had taken over Korea in 1909, French Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia) in 1941, Malaysia and Burma in late 1941, and several Pacific Island groups from Germany immediately after WWI, under the Mandate of the League of nations. The Japanese grabbed more Pacific Islands in late 1941 and early 1942, such as the Philippines, Gilberts and Solomons. Everywhere the Japanese spread their "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" they soon inspired fanatical hatred among the locals by their barbaric treatment of the people. Everybody else in Asia still despises the Japanese, not just for what they did, but for the fact that they won't admit it, and when you can force them to admit it they don't see anything wrong with it. China, Korea and Indochina were still occupied when the war ended. Fighting was still going on in the Philippines when the war ended. Some of the Pacific Islands were freed by 1943 and 1944.

Answer 4

Japan never occupied the United States. The United States has never been occupied by a foreign country since we gained independence from England.