South American navies in the treaty system

How would naval development change if South American states remained prosperous and competed with Japan and smaller European powers?

More serious naval powers would make treaty ratios much harder to negotiate because every concession to Brazil, Argentina, or Chile would prompt demands from France, Italy, Japan, Britain, and the United States.

Brazil's status relative to France, Italy, Argentina, and Chile shows how linked naval ratios expand. In this counterfactual, continuing South American construction would complicate the great powers' treatment of the Americas as an uncontested U.S. sphere. Improvements outside the treaty's central five navies would create pressure for larger or better fleets inside it. Every concession in one naval relationship could prompt a demand in another.