Japan History - World War I to World War II

Renewed contact with the West precipitated profound alteration of Japanese society. After the Boshin War of 1868, the shogun was forced to resign, and the emperor was restored to power. The subsequent "Meiji Restoration" initiated many reforms. The feudal system was abolished, and numerous Western institutions were adopted, including a Western legal system and a quasi-parliamentary constitutional government outlined in the Meiji Constitution. While many aspects of the Meiji Restoration were adopted directly from Western institutions, others, such as the dissolution of the feudal system and removal of the shogunate, were processes that had begun long before the arrival of Perry.

Russian pressure from the north appeared again after Muraviev had gained Outer Manchuria at Aigun (1858) and Peking (1860). This led to heavy Russian pressure on Sakhalin which the Japanese eventually yielded in exchange for the Kuril islands (1875). The Ryukyu Islands were similarly secured in 1879, establishing the borders within which Japan would "enter the World". In 1898, the last of the "unequal treaties" with Western powers was removed, signalling Japan's new status among the nations of the world. In a few decades, by reforming and modernizing social, educational, economic, military, political and industrial systems, the Emperor Meiji's "controlled revolution" had transformed a feudal and isolated state into a world power.

Wars with China and Russia

Japanese intellectuals of the late-Meiji period espoused the concept of a "line of advantage," an idea that would help to justify Japanese foreign policy at the turn of the century. According to this principle, embodied in the slogan fukoku kyohei, Japan would be vulnerable to aggressive Western imperialism unless it extended a line of advantage beyond its borders which would help to repel foreign incursions and strengthen the Japanese economy. Emphasis was especially placed on Japan's "preeminent interests" in the Korean Peninsula, once famously described as a "dagger pointed at the heart of Japan." It was tensions over Korea and Manchuria, respectively, that led Japan to become involved in the first Sino-Japanese War with China in 1894-1895 and the Russo-Japanese War with Russia in 1904-1905.

The war with China made Japan the world's first non-Western modern imperial power, and the one with Russia proved that a Western power could be defeated by a non-Western State, thus questioning the idea of European superiority prevailing in most countries dominated by Western powers. All sorts of political movements in different territories around the world that were oppossing European occupation or intervention, started to use Japanese victory in their propaganda and speaches. The global struggle against colonialism and imperialism benefited from Japan's experience.

For Japan and for the moment, it established the country's dominant interest in Korea, while giving it the Pescadores Islands, Formosa (now Taiwan), and the Liaodong Peninsula in Manchuria, which was eventually retroceded in the "humiliating" Triple Intervention. Over the next decade, Japan would flaunt its growing prowess, including a very significant contribution to the Eight-Nation Alliance, formed to quell China's Boxer Rebellion. Many Japanese, however, believed their new empire was still regarded as inferior by the Western powers, and they sought a means of cementing their international standing. This set the climate for growing tensions with Russia, who would continually intrude into Japan's "line of advantage" during this time.

Anglo-Japanese Alliance

To counter the powerful Russian influence in China, Japan sought an alliance with a western power. The British Empire, worried that Russia might endanger the interest it held in China and still burdened with the cost of the Boer War, shared common interest with Japan. The negotiations started in 1901. On January 30, 1902, the alliance was formally signed between Japan and the UK. Of the six major agreements, none is more important than the third article. This declared that in the event either of the nations was at war with two or more countries, the other must declare war on those countries. Surprised, Russia tried to counter this by allying with France and Germany. Germany backed down, however, and on March 16, a mutual pact was signed between France and Russia.

In 1905, after several months of bloody fighting and many Japanese victories over Tsarist Russia, the Russo-Japanese War had settled into a stalemate and U.S. President Teddy Roosevelt was called in to mediate a settlement. The resulting Treaty of Portsmouth gave generous economic and diplomatic concessions to Japan, especially in Manchuria, and was considered by observers to indicate Japanese victory in the war and official recognition of Japan as a world power. Japan was denied an indemnity, which lead to riots due to the massive amounts of public investiture and fervor in the war. Much anger was also felt at the denial of the whole of Sakhalin (Karafuto) which the Japanese felt Russia had extorted in 1875 in exchange for the Kurile Islands. Both wars gave Japan a free hand to occupy Korea, which it formally annexed in 1910.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
It uses material from the Wikipedia article "History of Japan".

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