No, it has no other way of doing trailer detection and that is used to do things like change foglight, parking sensors and stability control settings to account for the trailer.
If you are in the wiring where the Sargent would go then adding a small 12v incandescent lamp across both sidelights would meet the minimum detection level, though I suspect the van will nag you about failed indicators at that point. Adding 2 further lamps across the indicator circuits would stop that.
I would double check for any wiring faults if an identical van worked, though it's possible if it was a different year the LED modules may differ and have appropriate load resistance in.