The pact with the Japanese was in many ways intended as a bulwark against the Russians. Japan had already attacked the western coast of China, believing that the land was rightfully theirs and continued to attack Russia just a few years later. (Plus, don't forget their role in fighting the USA, t'was all strategy bro) State propaganda, and this is very similar to how the Nazis portrayed the Jews and many other, stylized themselves as racially more advanced than the Chinese, even using this a as an excuse to massacre them at Nanking. So yeah, it was predominantly a strategic pact. They were fascists with a different group they hated.

Check: Stefan Hübner, "Hitler and East Asia"