Was JRI controlled by the Americans or the Japanese?

I thought JRI was an (kind of) abandoned Hawaiian island, which was abandoned when not many tourists came in the tourism boom of the 50s/60s (as shown by the unfinished resort, airport terminal building, and small airport), and the U. S. military kept a sort of 'presence' on the island by putting little unmanned bases there, but this is (correct me if I'm wrong a Mitsubishi Zero (?) with Japanese insignias.

 

the plane is a japanese one, as are the "pillbox" bunkers, but the marston mat runway, and various anti-aircraft artillery is all american.
I'd say it was likely initially invaded by the japanese, but then the americans took over it.
the plane in the hangar could very well be one that was captured.

it should also be mentioned that there was at least some european occupation prior to WWII, hence the 17th century fortress, the brick tunnel dated "1931" and a lot of other various older looking architecture.

 

That, plus the Hawaii license plates, has interesting alternate historical implications. Perhaps the U.S. Navy wasn't developed enough to keep the Japanese Empire out of Hawaii, but the Army was able to kick them out after a protracted battle

 

The Hawaii plates are strange as JRI doesn't resemble Hawaii whatsoever.

The road signs on JRI are also on the left side of the road too, and Hawaii, much like the rest of the USA (with the exception of the Virgin Islands) drives on the right.

There is an unused asset for a placeholder "japanese town" in the JRI files that is extremely lowpoly, but it makes me think that at one point they were considering setting JRI's remaster in Japan, but scrapped that idea at some point in development, instead reverting to the abandoned industrial island theme it originally had, and leaving the previously used Hawaii plates as the default.

 

I can't find anything I disagree with. Thanks!

 

Im pretty sure JRI was fully intented to be a Japanese Island, but was probably changed to a Hawaiian island shortly before release because of a few reasons:
-The community would rip them to shreds if a japanese island wasn't designed to be a giant drift mountain
-Japanese plates wouldnt needed japanese characters, im guessing this could have either poised an issue with the license plates or wasnt realized until it was too late, although im not fully sure on this one since there are plenty of license plate mods using custom characters
-There where very few japanese vehicles in game when it was released, and even fewer that where on the correct side for japanese roads
-It was designed to replace Dry Rock Island, which was an american island featuring american style militairy housing and industry buildings, therefor it would make sense for its predecessor to also be american
-Adding to the license plate topic, signs would also need japanese characters to feel fitting, this could lead to translation issues and require additional fixing, this added to the fact that at the time there where no beamng devs from japan or surrounding areas (to the best of my knowledge) meant that an accurate japanese island would be a little out of the question