Why frame the scenario as an Anglo-Sino war?

Why call this hypothetical conflict an Anglo-Sino war rather than an Anglo-Japanese war?

Because the likely theatres and Japanese-controlled participants make it a wider East Asian conflict, with China central to the struggle for bases.

The label is meant to capture a conflict extending beyond Japan itself. Fighting for bases would largely occur in China, alongside Japanese-controlled states in Manchuria, Mengjiang, Korea, and occupied Chinese territories; the Philippines might also become a theatre. Labels such as the Napoleonic Wars and the world wars show how a conflict name can encompass unequal partners rather than identify only two states. Modern viewers usually read Sino as referring specifically to China, so the period-minded label creates confusion. That ambiguity is why the scenario videos were retitled as an Anglo-Japanese war.