Indeed, Apple maintains stock of "foreign" devices (e.g. Japanese phones which use different payment hardware than US phone are in repair stock in the Palo Alto store). This can be a problem too, e.g. you move to the US with a Japanese iPhone which doesn't do Apple Pay in the States; if it breaks Apple will replace it with another Japanese phone only. I assume this reduces the sum of customer complaints (since most people with a Japanese phone in the US are tourists returning home).

As for the keyboard discussion below: when the mechanical layout is the same, or close, you can just change it from the preferences. I poured green tea into my powerbook 1400 in Tokyo; while waiting for a repair part I used it with an external Japanese keyboard set to US letter layout. I would get confused if I looked down so just typed with a blanket or jacket over my hands and it worked great. (Ironically that model was made in Japan, by Sony I believe, and was only serviceable by sending it to Japan. Since I was there I got to watch someone fix my machine while I waited).

I have gotten Applecare repair support in India where there were no Apple stores (at the time).