Japan didn’t import fascism, they were always a very authoritarian society based around a singular leader using cult of personality. Shoguns ran things locally while there was an emperor for nominal governance. The military ruled for so long that Japanese culture has been shaped by it for hundreds of years. A caste system works similar to fascism, with the samurai being the favored “in” group with all others subservient to them under the auspices of “protection”.