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Empire of Japan
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This article is about the former empire. For the modern state, see Japan.
Empire of Japan
大日本帝國
Dai Nippon Teikoku
1868–1947
Flag
Imperial Seal
Motto
五箇条の御誓文
"Charter Oath"
("The Oath in Five Articles") in Meiji era
八紘一宇
"Hakkō ichiu"
("The World Under One Roof")
or
("All Eight Corners of the World") in Showa era
Anthem
"Kimigayo"
君が代
("His Imperial Majesty's Reign")
The Empire of Japan in 1942
Empire of Japan 1870–1905
Acquisitions 1905–30
Trusteeship, concession, occupied territories
Capital Tokyo
Languages Japanese
Religion De jure: none
De facto: State Shinto[nb 1]
Other: Buddhism
Government Daijō-kan[5]
(1868–1885)
Constitutional monarchy
(1890–1940, 1945-1947)[1]
One-party totalitarian military dictatorship under the Emperor (1940–1945)
Supreme Commander for the Allies (1945-1947)
Emperor
• 1868–1912 Meiji
• 1912–1926 Taishō
• 1926–1947 Shōwa (Hirohito)
Prime Minister
• 1885–1888 Itō Hirobumi
• 1946–1947 Shigeru Yoshida
Legislature Imperial Diet
• Upper house House of Peers
• Lower house House of Representatives
Historical era Meiji, Taishō, Shōwa
• Meiji Restoration January 3, 1868[6]
• Constitution adopted November 29, 1890
• First Sino-Japanese War July 25, 1894
• Russo-Japanese War February 10, 1904
• Second Sino-Japanese War and Pacific War September 18, 1931
• Surrender of Japan September 2, 1945
• Reconstituted May 2, 1947[1]
Area
• 1938[7] 1,984,000 km2 (766,000 sq mi)
Population
• 1920 est. 77,700,000a
• 1940 est. 105,200,000b
Currency Japanese yen,
Korean yen,
Taiwanese yen,
Japanese military yen
Preceded by Succeeded by
Tokugawa shogunate
Ryūkyū Kingdom
Republic of Ezo
Taiwan under Qing rule
Russian Empire
Korean Empire
German New Guinea
Dutch East Indies
Straits Settlement
British Hong Kong
Occupied Japan
Military Government of the Ryukyu Islands
Republic of China
Military Government in Korea
Soviet Civil Authority
Sakhalin Oblast
Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands
Dutch East Indies
Malayan Union
British Hong Kong
Colony of Singapore
a. 56.0 million lived in Japan proper.[8]
b. 73.1 million lived in Japan proper.[8]
History of Japan
The battleship Asahi
Periods[show]
Paleolithic before 14,000 BC
Jōmon 14,000 – 300 BC
Yayoi 300 BC – 300 AD
Kofun 300–538
Asuka 538–710
Nara 710–794
Heian 794–1185
Kamakura 1185–1333
Kenmu Restoration 1333–1336
Muromachi (Ashikaga)
Nanboku-chō
Sengoku
1336–1573
Azuchi–Momoyama
Nanban trade
1573–1603
Edo (Tokugawa)
Sakoku
Convention of Kanagawa
Bakumatsu
1603–1868
Meiji
Restoration
1868–1912
Taishō
World War I
1912–1926
Shōwa
Financial crisis
Militarism
Pacific War (World War II)
Occupation
Post-occupation
Bubble Economy
1926–1989
Heisei
Lost Decade
1989–present
Topics[hide]
Currency
Earthquakes
Economy
Education
Empire
Historiography
Military
Naval
Post-war
Glossary
Timeline
v
t
e
Empire of Japan
Official Term name
Official Term
Empire of Japan
Literal Translation name
Literal Translation
Greater Japanese Empire
[show]
v
t
e
Japanese colonial campaigns
Meiji period
Korea (1894–95)
Liaodong Peninsula (1895)
China (1899–1901)
Manchuria/Korea (1904–05)
Korea (1910)
Taishō period
Tsingtao (1914)
Siberia (1918–22)
Shōwa period
Manchuria (1931–32)
Soviet Union (1932–39)
China (1937–45)
Vietnam (1940)
Thailand (1941)
Asia-Pacific (1941-1945)
The Empire of Japan (大日本帝國, Dai Nippon Teikoku, literally "Greater Japanese Empire")[9] was the historical Japanese nation-state[nb 2] and great power that existed from the Meiji Restoration in 1868 to the enactment of the 1947 constitution of modern Japan.[1]
Japan's rapid industrialization and militarization under the slogan Fukoku Kyōhei (富國強兵, "Enrich the Country, Strengthen the Armed Forces") led to its emergence as a world power and the establishment of a colonial empire. Economic and political turmoil in the 1920s led to the rise of militarism, eventually culminating in Japan's membership in the Axis alliance and the conquest of a large part of the Asia-Pacific region.
Japan's armed forces initially achieved large-scale military successes during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) and the Pacific War. However, after suffering many defeats and following the Soviet Union's declaration of war against Japan and invasion of Manchuria, and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Empire surrendered to the Allies on August 15, 1945. A period of occupation by the Allies followed the surrender, and a new constitution was created with American involvement in 1947, officially bringing the Empire of Japan to an end. Occupation and reconstruction continued well into the 1950s, eventually forming the current nation-state whose full title is the "State of Japan" or simply rendered "Japan" in English.
The Emperors during this time, which spanned the entire Meiji and Taishō, and the lesser part of the Shōwa eras, are now known in Japan by their posthumous names, which coincide with those era names: Emperor Meiji (Mutsuhito), Emperor Taishō (Yoshihito), and Emperor Shōwa (Hirohito).
Contents
[hide]
1 Terminology
2 Background
2.1 Boshin War
3 Meiji era (1868–1912)
3.1 Re-emergence of Christianity
3.2 Political reform
3.3 Economic development
3.4 First Sino-Japanese War
3.5 Boxer Rebellion
3.6 Russo-Japanese War
3.7 Annexation of Korea
4 Taishō era (1912–1926)
4.1 World War I
4.2 Siberian Intervention
4.3 "Taishō Democracy"
5 Early Shōwa (1926–1930)
5.1 Expansion of democracy
5.2 Military and social organizations
5.3 Nationalist factors
5.4 Economic factors
6 Later Shōwa (1931–1945) – expansionism and war
6.1 Prewar expansionism
6.1.1 Manchuria
6.1.2 Second Sino-Japanese War
6.1.3 Clashes with the Soviet Union
6.2 Tripartite Pact
6.3 Pacific War
6.3.1 Japanese offensives (1941–42)
6.3.2 Path to surrender (1942–45)
6.3.3 Air raids on Japan
6.3.4 Re-entry of the Soviet Union
6.3.5 Surrender
7 After World War II
7.1 Occupation of Japan
7.2 Repatriation
7.3 War crimes
8 Influential personnel
8.1 Political
8.2 Military
9 Timeline
10 Emperors
11 See also
12 Notes
13 References
13.1 Citations
13.2 Sources
14 External links
Terminology[edit]
The historical state is frequently referred to as "the Empire of Japan" or "the Japanese Empire" or "Imperial Japan" in English. In Japanese it is referred to as Dai Nippon Teikoku (大日本帝國),[9] which translates to "Greater Japanese Empire" (Dai "Great", Nippon "Japanese", Teikoku "Empire"). This is analogous to Großdeutsches Reich, a term that translates to "Greater German Empire" in English and Dai Doitsu Teikoku (大独逸帝國) in Japanese.
This meaning is significant in terms of geography, encompassing Japan and its surrounding areas. The nomenclature Empire of Japan had existed since the anti-Tokugawa domains, Satsuma and Chōshū, which founded their new government during the Meiji Restoration, with the intention of forming a modern state to resist Western domination.
Due to its name in kanji characters and its flag, it was also given the exonym Empire of the Sun.
Background[edit]
Main article: Bakumatsu
After two centuries, the seclusion policy, or sakoku, under the shoguns of the Edo period came to an end when the country was forced open to trade by the Convention of Kanagawa in 1854. Thus, the period known as Bakumatsu began.
The following years saw increased foreign trade and interaction; commercial treaties between the Tokugawa shogunate and Western countries were signed. In large part due to the humiliating terms of these unequal treaties, the shogunate soon faced internal hostility, which materialized into a radical, xenophobic movement, the sonnō jōi (literally "Revere the Emperor, expel the barbarians").[12]
In March 1863, the Emperor issued the "order to expel barbarians". Although the shogunate had no intention of enforcing the order, it nevertheless inspired attacks against the shogunate itself and against foreigners in Japan. The Namamugi Incident during 1862 led to the murder of an Englishman, Charles Lennox Richardson, by a party of samurai from Satsuma. The British demanded reparations but were denied. While attempting to exact payment, the Royal Navy was fired on from coastal batteries near the town of Kagoshima. They responded by bombarding the port of Kagoshima in 1863. The Tokugawa government agreed to pay an indemnity for Richardson's death.[13] Shelling of foreign shipping in Shimonoseki and attacks against foreign property led to the bombardment of Shimonoseki by a multinational force in 1864.[14] The Chōshū clan also launched the failed coup known as the Kinmon incident. The Satsuma-Chōshū alliance was established in 1866 to combine their efforts to overthrow the Tokugawa bakufu. In early 1867, Emperor Kōmei died of smallpox and was replaced by his son, Crown Prince Mutsuhito (Meiji).
On November 9, 1867, Tokugawa Yoshinobu resigned from his post and authorities to the Emperor, agreeing to "be the instrument for carrying out" imperial orders.[15] The Tokugawa shogunate had ended.[16][17] However, while Yoshinobu's resignation had created a nominal void at the highest level of government, his apparatus of state continued to exist. Moreover, the shogunal government, the Tokugawa family in particular, remained a prominent force in the evolving political order and retained many executive powers,[18] a prospect hard-liners from Satsuma and Chōshū found intolerable.[19]
On January 3, 1868, Satsuma-Chōshū forces seized the imperial palace in Kyoto, and the following day had the fifteen-year-old Emperor Meiji declare his own restoration to full power. Although the majority of the imperial consultative assembly was happy with the formal declaration of direct rule by the court and tended to support a continued collaboration with the Tokugawa, Saigō Takamori threatened the assembly into abolishing the title "shogun" and ordered the confiscation of Yoshinobu's lands.[20]
On January 17, 1868, Yoshinobu declared "that he would not be bound by the proclamation of the Restoration and called on the court to rescind it".[21] On January 24, Yoshinobu decided to prepare an attack on Kyoto, occupied by Satsuma and Chōshū forces. This decision was prompted by his learning of a series of arson attacks in Edo, starting with the burning of the outworks of Edo Castle, the main Tokugawa residence.
Boshin War[edit]
Main article: Boshin War
The naval battle of Hakodate, May 1869; in the foreground, Kasuga and Kōtetsu of the Imperial Japanese Navy
The Boshin War (戊辰戦争, Boshin Sensō) was fought between January 1868 and May 1869. The alliance of samurai from southern and western domains and court officials had now secured the cooperation of the young Emperor Meiji, who ordered the dissolution of the two-hundred-year-old Tokugawa shogunate. Tokugawa Yoshinobu launched a military campaign to seize the emperor's court at Kyoto. However, the tide rapidly turned in favor of the smaller but relatively modernized imperial faction and resulted in defections of many daimyōs to the Imperial side. The Battle of Toba–Fushimi was a decisive victory in which a combined army from Chōshū, Tosa, and Satsuma domains defeated the Tokugawa army.[22] A series of battles were then fought in pursuit of supporters of the Shogunate; Edo surrendered to the Imperial forces and afterwards Yoshinobu personally surrendered. Yoshinobu was stripped of all his power by Emperor Meiji and most of Japan accepted the emperor's rule.
Pro-Tokugawa remnants, however, then retreated to northern Honshū (Ōuetsu Reppan Dōmei) and later to Ezo (present-day Hokkaidō), where they established the breakaway Republic of Ezo. An expeditionary force was dispatched by the new government and the Ezo Republic forces were overwhelmed. The siege of Hakodate came to an end in May 1869 and the remaining forces surrendered.[22]
Meiji era (1868–1912)[edit]
Main articles: Meiji period, Meiji Restoration, and Government of Meiji Japan
Emperor Meiji, the 122nd emperor of Japan
The Charter Oath was made public at the enthronement of Emperor Meiji of Japan on April 7, 1868. The Oath outlined the main aims and the course of action to be followed during Emperor Meiji's reign, setting the legal stage for Japan's modernization.[23] The Meiji leaders also aimed to boost morale and win financial support for the new government.
Japan dispatched the Iwakura Mission in 1871. The mission traveled the world in order to renegotiate the unequal treaties with the United States and European countries that Japan had been forced into during the Tokugawa shogunate, and to gather information on western social and economic systems, in order to effect the modernization of Japan. Renegotiation of the unequal treaties was universally unsuccessful, but close observation of the American and European systems inspired members on their return to bring about modernization initiatives in Japan. Japan made a territorial delimitation treaty with Russia in 1875, gaining all the Kuril islands in exchange for Sakhalin island.[24]
Prominent members of the Iwakura mission. Left to right: Kido Takayoshi, Yamaguchi Masuka, Iwakura Tomomi, Itō Hirobumi, Ōkubo Toshimichi
Several prominent writers, under the constant threat of assassination from their political foes, were influential in winning Japanese support for westernization. One such writer was Fukuzawa Yukichi, whose works included "Conditions in the West," "Leaving Asia", and "An Outline of a Theory of Civilization," which detailed Western society and his own philosophies. In the Meiji Restoration period, military and economic power was emphasized. Military strength became the means for national development and stability. Imperial Japan became the only non-Western world power and a major force in East Asia in about 40 years as a result of industrialization and economic development.
As writer Albrecht Fürst von Urach comments in his booklet "The Secret of Japan's Strength," published in 1942, during the Axis powers period:
The rise of Japan to a world power during the past 80 years is the greatest miracle in world history. The mighty empires of antiquity, the major political institutions of the Middle Ages and the early modern era, the Spanish Empire, the British Empire, all needed centuries to achieve their full strength. Japan's rise has been meteoric. After only 80 years, it is one of the few great powers that determine the fate of the world.[25]
The sudden westernization, once it was adopted, changed almost all areas of Japanese society, ranging from armaments, arts, education, etiquette, fashion, health, justice, politics, language, etc. The Japanese government sent students to Western countries to observe and learn their practices, and also paid "foreign advisors" in a variety of fields to come to Japan to educate the populace. For instance, the judicial system and constitution were largely modeled on those of Germany. The government also outlawed customs linked to Japan's feudal past, such as publicly displaying and wearing katana and the top knot, both of which were characteristic of the samurai class, which was abolished together with the caste system. This would later bring the Meiji government into conflict with the samurai.
Re-emergence of Christianity[edit]
Main articles: Christianity in Japan § Open of Japan, and History of the Catholic Church in Japan § Rediscovery and return
Ōura Church, Nagasaki, 1885
Emperor Ogimachi issued edicts to ban Catholicism in 1565 and 1568, but to little effect. Beginning in 1587 with imperial regent Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s ban on Jesuit missionaries, Christianity was repressed as a threat to national unity. Under Hideyoshi and the succeeding Tokugawa shogunate, Catholic Christianity was repressed and adherents were persecuted. After the Tokugawa shogunate banned Christianity in 1620, it ceased to exist publicly. Many Catholics went underground, becoming hidden Christians (隠れキリシタン kakure kirishitan), while others lost their lives. After Japan was opened to foreign power in 1853, many Christian clergymen were sent from Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox churches, though proselytism was still banned. Only after the Meiji Restoration, was Christianity re-established in Japan. Freedom of religion was introduced in 1871, giving all Christian communities the right to legal existence and preaching.
Eastern Orthodoxy was brought to Japan in the 19th century by St. Nicholas (baptized as Ivan Dmitrievich Kasatkin),[26] who was sent in 1861 by the Russian Orthodox Church to Hakodate, Hokkaidō as priest to a chapel of the Russian Consulate.[27] St. Nicholas of Japan made his own translation of the New Testament and some other religious books (Lenten Triodion, Pentecostarion, Feast Services, Book of Psalms, Irmologion) into Japanese.[28] Nicholas has since been glorified, (canonized as a saint), by the Patriarchate of Moscow in 1970, and is now recognized as St. Nicholas, Equal-to-the-Apostles to Japan. His commemoration day is February 16. Andronic Nikolsky, appointed the first Bishop of Kyoto and later martyred as the archbishop of Perm during the Russian Revolution, was also canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church as a Saint and Martyr in the year 2000.
Divie Bethune McCartee was the first ordained Presbyterian minister missionary to visit Japan, in 1861–1862. His gospel tract translated into Japanese was among the first Protestant literature in Japan. In 1865 McCartee moved back to Ningbo, China, but others have followed in his footsteps. There was a burst of growth of Christianity in the late 19th century when Japan re-opened its doors to the West. Protestant church growth slowed dramatically in the early 20th century under the influence of the military government during the Shōwa period.
The Mormon Church was established in Japan in 1901[29] when the first LDS Church missionaries arrived on August 12, 1901. Among them was Heber J. Grant, at the time a member of the Quorum of the Twelve, the 7th President of the Church.[30] The first baptism was on March 8, 1902, when Grant baptized Hajime Nakazawa, a former Kannushi (Shinto priest).
Political reform[edit]
Main article: Meiji Constitution
Interior of Japanese Parliament, showing Minister speaking at the tribune from which members address the House, 1915
Aritomo Yamagata, twice Prime Minister of Japan. He was one of the main architects of the military and political foundations of early modern Japan.
Kentaro Kaneko, renowned for his work on the Meiji Constitution
The idea of a written constitution had been a subject of heated debate within and without the government since the beginnings of the Meiji government. The conservative Meiji oligarchy viewed anything resembling democracy or republicanism with suspicion and trepidation, and favored a gradualist approach. The Freedom and People's Rights Movement demanded the immediate establishment of an elected national assembly, and the promulgation of a constitution.
The constitution recognized the need for change and modernization after removal of the shogunate:
We, the Successor to the prosperous Throne of Our Predecessors, do humbly and solemnly swear to the Imperial Founder of Our House and to Our other Imperial Ancestors that, in pursuance of a great policy co-extensive with the Heavens and with the Earth, We shall maintain and secure from decline the ancient form of government. ... In consideration of the progressive tendency of the course of human affairs and in parallel with the advance of civilization, We deem it expedient, in order to give clearness and distinctness to the instructions bequeathed by the Imperial Founder of Our House and by Our other Imperial Ancestors, to establish fundamental laws. ...
Imperial Japan was founded, de jure, after the 1889 signing of Constitution of the Empire of Japan. The constitution formalized much of the Empire's political structure and gave many responsibilities and powers to the Emperor.
Article 4. The Emperor is the head of the Empire, combining in Himself the rights of sovereignty, and exercises them, according to the provisions of the present Constitution.
Article 6. The Emperor gives sanction to laws, and orders them to be promulgated and executed.
Article 11. The Emperor has the supreme command of the Army and Navy.[31]
In 1890, the Imperial Diet was established in response to the Meiji Constitution. The Diet consisted of the House of Representatives of Japan and the House of Peers. Both houses opened seats for colonial people as well as Japanese. The Imperial Diet continued until 1947.[1]
Economic development[edit]
Main articles: Economy of the Empire of Japan and Economic history of Japan § 20th century
Tokyo Industrial Exhibition, 1907
The process of modernization was closely monitored and heavily subsidized by the Meiji government in close connection with a powerful clique of companies known as zaibatsu (e.g.: Mitsui and Mitsubishi).
Hand in hand, the zaibatsu and the imperial government steered the nation towards modernization. Borrowing and adapting technology from the West, Japan gradually took control of much of Asia's market for manufactured goods, beginning with textiles. The economic structure became very mercantilistic, importing raw materials and exporting finished products — a reflection of Japan's relative scarcity of raw materials.
Economic reforms included a unified modern currency based on the yen, banking, commercial and tax laws, stock exchanges, and a communications network.
The transition took time. By the 1890s however, the Meiji powers had successfully established a modern institutional framework that would transform Japan into an advanced capitalist economy. By this time, the government had largely relinquished direct control of the modernization process, primarily for budgetary reasons. Many of the former daimyōs, whose pensions had been paid in a lump sum, benefited greatly through investments they made in emerging industries.
The government was initially involved in economic modernization, providing a number of "model factories" to facilitate the transition to the modern period. After the first twenty years of the Meiji period, the industrial economy expanded rapidly until about 1920 with inputs of advanced Western technology and large private investments.
Merchant Thomas Blake Glover was a Scottish merchant in Bakumatsu and received Japan's second highest order from Emperor Meiji in recognition of his contributions to Japan's industrialization.
Japan emerged from the Tokugawa-Meiji transition as the first Asian industrialized nation. From the onset, the Meiji rulers embraced the concept of a market economy and adopted British and North American forms of free enterprise capitalism. Rapid growth and structural change characterized Japan's two periods of economic development after 1868. Initially, the economy grew only moderately and relied heavily on traditional Japanese agriculture to finance modern industrial infrastructure. By the time the Russo-Japanese War began in 1904, 65% of employment and 38% of the gross domestic product (GDP) were still based on agriculture, but modern industry had begun to expand substantially. By the late 1920s, manufacturing and mining amounted to 34% of GDP, compared with 20% for all of agriculture.[32] Transportation and communications developed to sustain heavy industrial development.
From 1894, Japan built an extensive empire that included Taiwan, Korea, Manchuria, and parts of northern China. The Japanese regarded this sphere of influence as a political and economic necessity, which prevented foreign states from strangling Japan by blocking its access to raw materials and crucial sea-lanes. Japan's large military force was regarded as essential to the empire's defense and prosperity by obtaining natural resources that the Japanese islands lacked.
First Sino-Japanese War[edit]
Main articles: First Sino-Japanese War and Taiwan under Japanese rule
First Sino-Japanese War, 1894/95. Soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army are firing their Murata Type 22 rifles.
Prior to its engagement in World War I, the Empire of Japan fought in two significant wars after its establishment following the Meiji Revolution. The first was the First Sino-Japanese War, fought in 1894 and 1895. The war revolved around the issue of control and influence over Korea under the rule of the Joseon Dynasty. A peasant rebellion led to a request by the Korean government for the Qing Dynasty to send in troops to stabilize the country. The Empire of Japan responded by sending their own force to Korea and installing a puppet government in Seoul. China objected and war ensued, a brief affair with Japanese ground troops routing Chinese forces on the Liaodong Peninsula, and the near destruction of the Chinese navy in the Battle of the Yalu River. The Treaty of Shimonoseki was signed between Japan and China, which ceded the Liaodong Peninsula and the island of Taiwan to Japan. After the peace treaty, Russia, Germany, and France forced Japan to withdraw from Liaodong Peninsula. Soon afterwards Russia occupied the Liaodong Peninsula, built the Port Arthur fortress, and based the Russian Pacific Fleet in the port. Germany occupied Jiaozhou Bay, built Tsingtao fortress and based the German East Asia Squadron in this port.
Boxer Rebellion[edit]
Main articles: Boxer Rebellion and Boxer Protocol
Japanese statesman and diplomat Komura Jutaro, 1911. Komura became Minister for Foreign Affairs under the first Katsura administration, and signed the Boxer Protocol on behalf of Japan.
In 1900, Japan and many western countries dispatched forces to China to protect their citizens and Chinese Christians from the Boxer Uprising. After the uprising, Japan and the western countries signed the Boxer Protocol with China, which permitted them to station troops on Chinese soil to protect their citizens. After the treaty, Russia continued to occupy all of Manchuria.
Russo-Japanese War[edit]
Main article: Russo-Japanese War
Japanese assault on the entrenched Russian forces, 1904
Japanese riflemen in the Russo-Japanese War
Port Arthur viewed from the Top of Gold Hill, after capitulation in 1905. From left wrecks of Russian battleships: Peresvet, Poltava, Retvizan, Pobeda and Pallada cruiser
Tadasu Hayashi was the resident minister to Great Britain. While serving in London from 1900, he worked to successfully conclude the Anglo-Japanese Alliance and signed on behalf of the government of Japan on January 30, 1902.
The Russo-Japanese War was a conflict for control of Korea and parts of Manchuria between the Russian Empire and Empire of Japan that took place from 1904 to 1905. The war is significant as it was the first modern war in which an Asian country defeated a European power. The victory greatly raised Japan's stature in the world of global politics. The war is marked by the Japanese opposition of Russian interests in Korea, Manchuria, and China, notably, the Liaodong Peninsula, controlled by the city of Port Arthur.
Originally, in the Treaty of Shimonoseki, Port Arthur had been given to Japan. This part of the treaty was overruled by Western powers, which gave the port to the Russian Empire, furthering Russian interests in the region. These interests came into conflict with Japanese interests. The war began with a surprise attack on the Russian Eastern fleet stationed at Port Arthur, which was followed by the Battle of Port Arthur. Those elements that attempted escape were defeated by the Japanese navy under Admiral Togo Heihachiro at the Battle of the Yellow Sea. Following a late start, the Russian Baltic fleet was denied passage through the British-controlled Suez Canal. The fleet arrived on the scene a year later, only to be annihilated in the Battle of Tsushima. While the ground war did not fare as poorly for the Russians, the Japanese forces were significantly more aggressive than their Russian counterparts and gained a political advantage that culminated with the Treaty of Portsmouth, negotiated in the United States by the American president Theodore Roosevelt. As a result, Russia lost the part of Sakhalin Island south of 50 degrees North latitude (which became the Karafuto Prefecture), as well as many mineral rights in Manchuria. In addition, Russia's defeat cleared the way for Japan to annex Korea outright in 1910.
Annexation of Korea[edit]
Main article: Korea under Japanese rule
National Geographic map of the empire. The Korean Peninsula was officially part of the Empire of Japan.
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, various Western countries actively competed for influence, trade, and territory in East Asia, and Japan sought to join these modern colonial powers. The newly modernised Meiji government of Japan turned to Korea, then in the sphere of influence of China's Qing Dynasty. The Japanese government initially sought to separate Korea from Qing and make Korea a Japanese satellite in order to further their security and national interests.[33]
In January 1876, following the Meiji Restoration, Japan employed gunboat diplomacy to pressure the Joseon Dynasty into signing the Japan–Korea Treaty of 1876, which granted extraterritorial rights to Japanese citizens and opened three Korean ports to Japanese trade. The rights granted to Japan under this unequal treaty,[34] were similar to those granted western powers in Japan following the visit of Commodore Perry.[34] Japanese involvement in Korea increased during the 1890s, a period of political upheaval.
Korea was occupied and declared a Japanese protectorate following the Japan–Korea Treaty of 1905. After proclaimed the founding of the Korean Empire, Korea was officially annexed in Japan through the annexation treaty in 1910.
In Korea, the period is usually described as the "Time of Japanese Forced Occupation" (Hangul: 일제 강점기; Ilje gangjeomgi, Hanja: 日帝强占期). Other terms include "Japanese Imperial Period" (Hangul: 일제시대, Ilje sidae, Hanja: 日帝時代) or "Japanese administration" (Hangul: 왜정, Wae jeong, Hanja: 倭政). In Japan, a more common description is "The Korea of Japanese rule" (日本統治時代の朝鮮, Nippon Tōchi-jidai no Chōsen). The Korean Peninsula was officially part of the Empire of Japan for 35 years, from August 29, 1910, until the formal Japanese rule ended, de jure, on September 2, 1945, upon the surrender of Japan in World War II. The 1905 and 1910 treaties were eventually declared "null and void" by both Japan and South Korea in 1965.
Taishō era (1912–1926)[edit]
Main article: Taishō period
World War I[edit]
Main article: Japan during World War I
Japan entered World War I in 1914, seizing the opportunity of Germany's distraction with the European War to expand its sphere of influence in China and the Pacific. Japan declared war on Germany on August 23, 1914. Japanese and allied British Empire forces soon moved to occupy Tsingtao fortress, the German East Asia Squadron base, German-leased territories in China's Shandong Province as well as the Marianas, Caroline, and Marshall Islands in the Pacific, which were part of German New Guinea. The swift invasion in the German territory of the Kiautschou Bay concession, and the Siege of Tsingtao proved successful. The German colonial troops surrendered on November 7, 1915. Japan then gained the German holdings.
With its Western allies, notably the United Kingdom, heavily involved in the war in Europe, Japan dispatched a Naval fleet to the Mediterranean Sea to aid allied shipping. Japan sought further to consolidate its position in China by presenting the Twenty-One Demands to China in January 1915. In the face of slow negotiations with the Chinese government, widespread anti-Japanese sentiment in China, and international condemnation, Japan withdrew the final group of demands, and treaties were signed in May 1915. The Anglo-Japanese Alliance was renewed and expanded in scope twice, in 1905 and 1911, before its demise in 1921. It was officially terminated in 1923.
Emperor Taishō, the 123rd emperor of Japan
Siberian Intervention[edit]
Main articles: Siberian Intervention and Japanese intervention in Siberia
A Japanese propaganda lithograph depicting Japanese occupation of the Russian Far East
Russian Civil War and Allied Intervention 1918-1920. Commanding Officers and Chiefs of Staff of the Allied Military Mission to Siberia, Vladivostock.
After the fall of the Tsarist regime and the later provisional regime in 1917, the new Bolshevik government signed a separate peace treaty with Germany. After this the Russians fought amongst themselves in a multi-sided civil war.
In July 1918, President Wilson asked the Japanese government to supply 7,000 troops as part of an international coalition of 25,000 troops planned to support the American Expeditionary Force Siberia. Prime Minister Terauchi Masatake agreed to send 12,000 troops but under the Japanese command rather than as part of an international coalition. The Japanese had several hidden motives for the venture, which included an intense hostility and fear of communism; a determination to recoup historical losses to Russia; and the desire to settle the "northern problem" in Japan's security, either through the creation of a buffer state or through outright territorial acquisition.
By November 1918, more than 70,000 Japanese troops under Chief of Staff Yui Mitsue had occupied all ports and major towns in the Russian Maritime Provinces and eastern Siberia. Japan received 765 Polish orphans from Siberia.[35][36]
In June 1920, around 450 Japanese civilians and 350 Japanese soldiers, along with Russian White Army supporters, were massacred by partisan forces associated with the Red Army at Nikolayevsk on the Amur River; the United States and its allied coalition partners consequently withdrew from Vladivostok after the capture and execution of White Army leader Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak by the Red Army. However, the Japanese decided to stay, primarily due to fears of the spread of Communism so close to Japan and Japanese-controlled Korea and Manchuria. The Japanese army provided military support to the Japanese-backed Provisional Priamurye Government based in Vladivostok against the Moscow-backed Far Eastern Republic.
The continued Japanese presence concerned the United States, which suspected that Japan had territorial designs on Siberia and the Russian Far East. Subjected to intense diplomatic pressure by the United States and United Kingdom, and facing increasing domestic opposition due to the economic and human cost, the administration of Prime Minister Katō Tomosaburō withdrew the Japanese forces in October 1922. Japanese casualties from the expedition were 5,000 dead from combat or illness, with the expedition costing over 900 million yen.
"Taishō Democracy"[edit]
Katō Komei
The election of Katō Komei as Prime Minister of Japan continued democratic reforms that had been advocated by influential individuals on the left. This culminated in the passage of universal male suffrage in March 1925. This bill gave all male subjects over the age of 25 the right to vote, provided they had lived in their electoral districts for at least one year and were not homeless. The electorate thereby increased from 3.3 million to 12.5 million.[37]
Early Shōwa (1926–1930)[edit]
Main article: Shōwa period
Emperor Shōwa riding Shirayuki during an Army inspection on January 8, 1938
Expansion of democracy[edit]
In 1932, Park Chun-kum was elected to the House of Representatives in the Japanese general election as the first person elected from a colonial background.[clarification needed][38] In 1935, democracy was introduced in Taiwan and in response to Taiwanese public opinion, local assemblies were established.[39] In 1942, 38 colonial people were elected to local assemblies of the Japanese homeland.[38]
Military and social organizations[edit]
Important institutional links existed between the party in government (Kōdōha) and military and political organizations, such as the Imperial Young Federation and the "Political Department" of the Kempeitai. Amongst the himitsu kessha (secret societies), the Kokuryu-kai (Black Dragon Society) and Kokka Shakai Shugi Gakumei (National Socialist League) also had close ties to the government. The Tonarigumi (residents committee) groups, the Nation Service Society (national government trade union), and Imperial Farmers Association were all allied as well. Other organizations and groups related with the government in wartime were: Double Leaf Society, Kokuhonsha, Taisei Yokusankai, Imperial Youth Corps, Keishichō (to 1945), Shintoist Rites Research Council, Treaty Faction, Fleet Faction, and Volunteer Fighting Corps.
Nationalist factors[edit]
Main articles: Statism in Shōwa Japan, Imperial Way Faction, May 15 Incident, and February 26 Incident
Japanese Pan-Asian writer Shūmei Ōkawa
Sadao Araki was an important figurehead and founder of the Army party and the most important right-wing thinker in his time. His first ideological works date from his leadership of the Kōdōha (Imperial Benevolent Rule or Action Group), opposed by the Tōseiha (Control Group) led by General Kazushige Ugaki. He linked the ancient (bushido code) and contemporary local and European fascist ideals (see Statism in Shōwa Japan), to form the ideological basis of the movement (Shōwa nationalism).
From September 1931, the Japanese were becoming more locked into the course that would lead them into the Second World War, with Araki leading the way. Totalitarianism, militarism, and expansionism were to become the rule, with fewer voices able to speak against it. In a September 23 news conference, Araki first mentioned the philosophy of "Kōdōha" (The Imperial Way Faction). The concept of Kodo linked the Emperor, the people, land, and morality as indivisible. This led to the creation of a "new" Shinto and increased Emperor worship.
Rebel troops assembled at police headquarters during the February 26 Incident.
On February 26, 1936, a coup d'état was attempted (the February 26 Incident). Launched by the ultranationalist Kōdōha faction with the military, it ultimately failed due to the intervention of the Emperor. Kōdōha members were purged from the top military positions and the Tōseiha faction gained dominance. However, both factions believed in expansionism, a strong military, and a coming war. Furthermore, Kōdōha members, while removed from the military, still had political influence within the government.
The state was being transformed to serve the Army and the Emperor. Symbolic katana swords came back into fashion as the martial embodiment of these beliefs, and the Nambu pistol became its contemporary equivalent, with the implicit message that the Army doctrine of close combat would prevail. The final objective, as envisioned by Army thinkers such as Sadao Araki and right-wing line followers, was a return to the old Shogunate system, but in the form of a contemporary Military Shogunate. In such a government the Emperor would once more be a figurehead (as in the Edo period). Real power would fall to a leader very similar to a führer or duce, though with the power less nakedly held. On the other hand, the traditionalist Navy militarists defended the Emperor and a constitutional monarchy with a significant religious aspect.
A third point of view was supported by Prince Chichibu, a brother of Emperor Shōwa, who repeatedly counseled him to implement a direct imperial rule, even if that meant suspending the constitution.[40]
With the launching of the Imperial Rule Assistance Association in 1940 by Prime minister Fumimaro Konoe, Japan would turn to a form of government that resembled totalitarianism. This unique style of government, very similar to fascism, was known as Statism in Shōwa Japan.
Economic factors[edit]
Bank run during the Shōwa financial crisis, March 1927
At same time, the zaibatsu trading groups (principally Mitsubishi, Mitsui, Sumitomo, and Yasuda) looked towards great future expansion. Their main concern was a shortage of raw materials. Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe combined social concerns with the needs of capital, and planned for expansion.
The main goals of Japan's expansionism were acquisition and protection of spheres of influence, maintenance of territorial integrity, acquisition of raw materials, and access to Asian markets. Western nations, notably Great Britain, France, and the United States, had for long exhibited great interest in the commercial opportunities in China and other parts of Asia. These opportunities had attracted Western investment because of the availability of raw materials for both domestic production and re-export to Asia. Japan desired these opportunities in planning the development of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.
The Great Depression, just as in many other countries, hindered Japan's economic growth. The Japanese Empire's main problem lay in that rapid industrial expansion had turned the country into a major manufacturing and industrial power that required raw materials; however, these had to be obtained from overseas, as there was a critical lack of natural resources on the home islands.
In the 1920s and 1930s, Japan needed to import raw materials such as iron, rubber, and oil to maintain strong economic growth. Most of these resources came from the United States. The Japanese felt that acquiring resource-rich territories would establish economic self-sufficiency and independence, and they also hoped to jump-start the nation's economy in the midst of the depression. As a result, Japan set its sights on East Asia, specifically Manchuria with its many resources; Japan needed these resources to continue its economic development and maintain national integrity.
Later Shōwa (1931–1945) – expansionism and war[edit]
Main articles: Hakkō ichiu, National Spiritual Mobilization Movement, and World War II
Prewar expansionism[edit]
Manchuria[edit]
Main articles: Japanese invasion of Manchuria and Pacification of Manchukuo
Japanese troops entering Shenyang, Northeast China during the Mukden Incident, 1931
In 1931, Japan invaded and conquered Northeast China (Manchuria) with little resistance. Japan claimed that this invasion was a liberation of the local Manchus from the Chinese, although the majority of the population were Han Chinese as a result of the large scale settlement of Chinese in Manchuria in the 19th century. Japan then established a puppet regime called Manchukuo (Chinese: 滿洲國), and installed the last Manchu Emperor of China, Puyi, as the official head of state. Jehol, a Chinese territory bordering Manchukuo, was later also taken in 1933. This puppet regime had to carry on a protracted pacification campaign against the Anti-Japanese Volunteer Armies in Manchuria. In 1936, Japan created a similar Mongolian puppet state in Inner Mongolia named Mengjiang (Chinese: 蒙疆), which was also predominantly Chinese as a result of recent Han immigration to the area. At that time, East Asians were banned from immigration to North America and Australia, but the newly established Manchukuo was open to immigration of Asians. Japan had an emigration plan to encourage colonization; the Japanese population in Manchuria subsequently grew to 850,000.[41] With rich natural resources and labor force in Manchuria, army-owned corporations turned Manchuria into a solid material support machine of Japanese Army.[42]
Second Sino-Japanese War[edit]
Main article: Second Sino-Japanese War
The Japanese occupation of Peiping (Beijing) in China, on August 13, 1937. Japanese troops are shown passing from Peiping into the Tartar City through Chen-men, the main gate leading onward to the palaces in the Forbidden City.
Japan invaded China proper in 1937, creating what was essentially a three-way war between Japan, Mao Zedong's communists, and Chiang Kai-shek's nationalists. On December 13 of that same year, the Nationalist capital of Nanking surrendered to Japanese troops. In the event known as the "Nanking Massacre", Japanese troops massacred a large number of the defending garrison. It is estimated that as many as 300,000 people, including civilians, may have been killed, although the actual numbers are uncertain and the government of the People's Republic of China has never undertaken a full accounting of the massacre. In total, an estimated 20 million Chinese, mostly civilians, were killed during World War II. A puppet state was also set up in China quickly afterwards, headed by Wang Jingwei. The Second Sino-Japanese War continued into World War II with the Communists and Nationalists in a temporary and uneasy nominal alliance against the Japanese.
Clashes with the Soviet Union[edit]
Main articles: Battle of Lake Khasan, Battles of Khalkhin Gol, and Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact
In 1938, the Japanese 19th Division entered territory claimed by the Soviet Union, leading to the Battle of Lake Khasan. This incursion was founded in the Japanese belief that the Soviet Union misinterpreted the demarcation of the boundary, as stipulated in the Treaty of Peking, between Imperial Russia and Manchu China (and subsequent supplementary agreements on demarcation), and furthermore, that the demarcation markers were tampered with.
On May 11, 1939, in the Nomonhan Incident (Battle of Khalkhin Gol), a Mongolian cavalry unit of some 70 to 90 men entered the disputed area in search of grazing for their horses, and encountered Manchukuoan cavalry, who drove them out. Two days later the Mongolian force returned and the Manchukoans were unable to evict them.
The Japanese IJA 23rd Division and other units of the Kwantung Army then became involved. Joseph Stalin ordered Stavka, the Red Army's high command, to develop a plan for a counterstrike against the Japanese. In late August, Georgy Zhukov employed encircling tactics that made skillful use of superior artillery, armor, and air forces; this offensive nearly annihilated the 23rd Division and decimated the IJA 7th Division. On September 15 an armistice was arranged. Nearly two years later, on April 13, 1941, the parties signed a Neutrality Pact, in which the Soviet Union pledged to respect the territorial integrity and inviolability of Manchukuo, while Japan agreed similarly for the Mongolian People's Republic.
Tripartite Pact[edit]
Main articles: Tripartite Pact and Axis powers
In 1938, Japan prohibited the expulsion of the Jews in Japan, Manchuria, and China in accordance with the spirit of racial equality on which Japan had insisted for many years.[43][44]
The Second Sino-Japanese War had seen tensions rise between Imperial Japan and the United States; events such as the Panay incident and the Nanking Massacre turned American public opinion against Japan. With the occupation of French Indochina in the years of 1940–41, and with the continuing war in China, the United States placed embargoes on Japan of strategic materials such as scrap metal and oil, which were vitally needed for the war effort. The Japanese were faced with the option of either withdrawing from China and losing face or seizing and securing new sources of raw materials in the resource-rich, European-controlled colonies of Southeast Asia—specifically British Malaya and the Dutch East Indies (modern-day Indonesia).
On September 27, 1940, Imperial Japan signed the Tripartite Pact with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. Their objectives were to "establish and maintain a new order of things" in their respective world regions and spheres of influence, with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy in Europe, and Imperial Japan in Asia. The signatories of this alliance become known as the Axis Powers. The pact also called for mutual protection—if any one of the member powers was attacked by a country not already at war, excluding the Soviet Union—and for technological and economic cooperation between the signatories.
Founding Ceremony of the Hakkō Ichiu Monument in 1940. It had Prince Chichibu's calligraphy of Hakkō ichiu, carved on its front side.[45]
For the sake of their own people and nation, Prime Minister Konoe formed the Taisei Yokusankai (Imperial Rule Assistance Association) on October 12, 1940, as their own ruling party in Japan, avoiding the influences of German Nazism and Italian Fascism.
Pacific War[edit]
Main article: Pacific War
In the Pacific War, many of the islands became dominions of the Empire.
Japanese offensives (1941–42)[edit]
Main articles: Attack on Pearl Harbor, South-East Asian theatre of World War II, and South West Pacific theatre of World War II
Yamashiro (Japanese battleship, 1917) in Tokyo Bay, Japan, after 1935. Behind her are the battleships Fuso and Haruna (most distant). Faintly visible in the right distance are two cruisers and an aircraft carrier.
Battle of Hong Kong, 8 December 1941, Downtown British Hong Kong under Japanese air raid
A map of the Japanese advance from 1937 to 1942
The decision by Japan to attack the United States remains controversial. Study groups in Japan had predicted ultimate disaster in a war between Japan and the U.S., and the Japanese economy was already straining to keep up with the demands from the war with China. However, the U.S. had placed an oil embargo on Japan and Japan felt that the United States' demands were unacceptable.[46] Facing an oil embargo by the United States as well as dwindling domestic reserves, the Japanese government decided to execute a plan developed by the military branch largely led by Osami Nagano and Isoroku Yamamoto to bomb the United States naval base in Hawaii, thereby bringing the United States to World War II on the side of the Allies. On September 4, 1941, the Japanese Cabinet met to consider the war plans prepared by Imperial General Headquarters, and decided:
Our Empire, for the purpose of self-defense and self-preservation, will complete preparations for war ... [and is] ... resolved to go to war with the United States, Great Britain and the Netherlands if necessary. Our Empire will concurrently take all possible diplomatic measures vis-a-vis the United States and Great Britain, and thereby endeavor to obtain our objectives ... In the event that there is no prospect of our demands being met by the first ten days of October through the diplomatic negotiations mentioned above, we will immediately decide to commence hostilities against the United States, Britain and the Netherlands.
The Imperial Japanese Navy made its surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, Oahu, Hawaii, on Sunday morning, December 7, 1941. The Pacific Fleet of the United States Navy and its defending Army Air Forces and Marine air forces sustained significant losses. The primary objective of the attack was to incapacitate the United States long enough for Japan to establish its long-planned Southeast Asian empire and defensible buffer zones. However, as Admiral Yamamoto feared, the attack produced little lasting damage to the US Navy with priority targets like the Pacific Fleet's aircraft carriers out at sea and vital shore facilities, whose destruction could have crippled the fleet on their own, were ignored. Of more serious consequences, the U.S. public saw the attack as a treacherous act and rallied against the Empire of Japan. The United States entered the European Theatre and Pacific Theater in full force. Four days later, Adolf Hitler of Nazi Germany, and Benito Mussolini of Italy declared war on the United States, merging the separate conflicts.
Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese launched offensives against Allied forces in East and Southeast Asia, with simultaneous attacks on Hong Kong, British Malaya and the Philippines.
The South-East Asian Campaign was preceded by years of propaganda and espionage activities carried out in the region by the Japanese Empire. The Japanese espoused their vision of a Greater Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere, and an Asia for Asians to the people of Southeast Asia, who had lived under European rule for generations. As a result, many inhabitants in some of the colonies (particularly Indonesia) actually sided with the Japanese invaders for anti-colonial reasons. However, the ethnic Chinese, who had witnessed the effects of a Japanese occupation in their homeland, did not side with the Japanese. The brutality of the Japanese in the newly conquered colonies would soon turn most people against them.
Japanese troops march through the streets of Labuan, Borneo in January 14, 1942.
Hong Kong surrendered to the Japanese on December 25. In Malaya the Japanese overwhelmed an Allied army composed of British, Indian, Australian and Malay forces. The Japanese were quickly able to advance down the Malayan Peninsula, forcing the Allied forces to retreat towards Singapore. The Allies lacked aircover and tanks; the Japanese had total air superiority. The sinking of HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse on December 10, 1941, led to the east coast of Malaya being exposed to Japanese landings and the elimination of British naval power in the area. By the end of January 1942, the last Allied forces crossed the strait of Johore and into Singapore.
In the Philippines, the Japanese pushed the combined Filipino-American force towards the Bataan Peninsula and later the island of Corregidor. By January 1942, General Douglas MacArthur and President Manuel L. Quezon were forced to flee in the face of Japanese advance. This marked among one of the worst defeats suffered by the Americans, leaving over 70,000 American and Filipino prisoners of war in the custody of the Japanese.
Battle of Singapore, February 1942. Victorious Japanese troops march through the city center. (Photo from Imperial War Museum)
On February 15, 1942, Singapore, due to the overwhelming superiority of Japanese forces and encirclement tactics, fell to the Japanese, causing the largest surrender of British-led military personnel in history. An estimated 80,000 Indian, Australian and British troops were taken as prisoners of war, joining 50,000 taken in the Japanese invasion of Malaya (modern day Malaysia). Many were later used as forced labour constructing the Burma Railway, the site of the infamous Bridge on the River Kwai.
Immediately following their invasion of British Malaya, the Japanese military carried out a purge of the Chinese population in Malaya and Singapore. Over the course of a month following their victory at Singapore, the Japanese are believed to have killed tens of thousands of ethnic Chinese perceived to be hostile to the new regime.
The Japanese then seized the key oil production zones of Borneo, Central Java, Malang, Cepu, Sumatra, and Dutch New Guinea of the late Dutch East Indies, defeating the Dutch forces.[47] However, Allied sabotage had made it difficult for the Japanese to restore oil production to its pre-war peak.[48]
The Japanese then consolidated their lines of supply through capturing key islands of the Pacific, including Guadalcanal.
Path to surrender (1942–45)[edit]
Japanese military strategists were keenly aware of the unfavorable discrepancy between the industrial potential of the Japanese Empire and that of the United States. Because of this they reasoned that Japanese success hinged on their ability to extend the strategic advantage gained at Pearl Harbor with additional rapid strategic victories.
The Japanese Command reasoned that only decisive destruction of the United States' Pacific Fleet and conquest of its remote outposts would ensure that the Japanese Empire would not be overwhelmed by America's industrial might. In May 1942, failure to decisively defeat the Allies at the Battle of the Coral Sea, in spite of Japanese numerical superiority, equated to a strategic defeat for Imperial Japan.
Battle of Midway. The attack by dive bombers from USS Yorktown and USS Enterprise on the Japanese aircraft carriers Soryu, Akagi and Kaga in the morning of 4 June 1942.
This setback was followed in June 1942 by the catastrophic loss of four fleet carriers at the Battle of Midway, the first decisive defeat for the Imperial Japanese Navy. It proved to be the turning point of the war as the Navy lost its offensive strategic capability and never managed to reconstruct the "'critical mass' of both large numbers of carriers and well-trained air groups".[49]
Australian land forces defeated Japanese Marines in New Guinea at the Battle of Milne Bay in September 1942, which was the first land defeat suffered by the Japanese in the Pacific. Further victories by the Allies at Guadalcanal in September 1942, and New Guinea in 1943 put the Empire of Japan on the defensive for the remainder of the war, with Guadalcanal in particular sapping their already-limited oil supplies.[48]
During 1943 and 1944, Allied forces, backed by the industrial might and vast raw material resources of the United States, advanced steadily towards Japan. The Sixth United States Army, led by General MacArthur, landed on Leyte on October 20, 1944. In the subsequent months, during the Philippines Campaign (1944–45), the combined United States forces, together with the native guerrilla units, liberated the Philippines.
By 1944, the Allies had seized or bypassed and neutralized many of Japan's strategic bases through amphibious landings and bombardment. This, coupled with the losses inflicted by Allied submarines on Japanese shipping routes began to strangle Japan's economy and undermine its ability to supply its army. By early 1945, the U.S. Marines had wrested control of the Ogasawara Islands in several hard-fought battles such as the Battle of Iwo Jima, marking the beginning of the fall of the islands of Japan.
Air raids on Japan[edit]
Main article: Air raids on Japan
The atomic bombing of Nagasaki on August 9, 1945
After securing airfields in Saipan and Guam in the summer of 1944, the United States Army Air Forces undertook an intense strategic bombing campaign, using incendiary bombs, burning Japanese cities in an effort to pulverize Japan's industry and shatter its morale. The Operation Meetinghouse raid on Tokyo on the night of March 9–10, 1945, led to the deaths of approximately 100,000 civilians. Approximately 350,000–500,000 civilians died in 66 other Japanese cities as a result of the incendiary bombing campaign on Japan. Concurrent to these attacks, Japan's vital coastal shipping operations were severely hampered with extensive aerial mining by the U.S.'s Operation Starvation. Regardless, these efforts did not succeed in persuading the Japanese military to surrender. In mid-August 1945, the United States dropped nuclear weapons on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. These atomic bombings were the first and only used against another nation in warfare. These two bombs killed approximately 120,000 to 140,000 people in a matter of minutes, and as many as a result of nuclear radiation in the following weeks, months and years. The bombs killed as many as 140,000 people in Hiroshima and 80,000 in Nagasaki by the end of 1945.
Re-entry of the Soviet Union[edit]
At the Yalta agreement, the US, the UK, and the USSR had agreed that the USSR would enter the war on Japan within three months of the defeat of Nazi Germany in Europe. This Soviet-Japanese War (1945) led to the fall of Japan's Manchurian occupation, Soviet occupation of South Sakhalin island, and a real, imminent threat of Soviet invasion of the home islands of Japan. This was a significant factor for some internal parties in the Japanese decision to surrender to the US[50] and gain some protection, rather than face simultaneous Soviet invasion as well as defeat by the US. Likewise, the superior numbers of the armies of the Soviet Union in Europe was a factor in the US decision to demonstrate the use of atomic weapons to the USSR, just as the Allied victory in Europe was evolving into division of Germany and Berlin, the division of Europe with the Iron Curtain and the subsequent Cold War.
Surrender[edit]
Main articles: Surrender of Japan, Potsdam Declaration, and Victory over Japan Day
A drawing depicting a speech in the Imperial Japanese Diet on 1 November 1945, the end of the Second World War. In the foreground there are several Allied soldiers watching the proceedings from the back of the balcony.
Having ignored (mokusatsu) the Potsdam Declaration, the Empire of Japan surrendered and ended World War II, after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and a declaration of war by the Soviet Union. In a national radio address on August 15, Emperor Hirohito announced the surrender to the Japanese people by Gyokuon-hōsō.
After World War II[edit]
Occupation of Japan[edit]
Main article: Occupation of Japan
A period known as Occupied Japan followed after the war, largely spearheaded by United States General of the Army Douglas MacArthur to revise the Japanese constitution and de-militarize Japan. The American occupation, with economic and political assistance, continued well into the 1950s. Allied forces ordered Japan to abolish the Meiji Constitution and enforce the Constitution of Japan, then rename the Empire of Japan as Japan on May 3, 1947.[1] Japan adopted a parliamentary-based political system, while the Emperor changed to symbolic status.
American General of the Army Douglas MacArthur later commended the new Japanese government that he helped establish and the new Japanese period when he was about to send the American forces to the Korean War:
The Japanese people, since the war, have undergone the greatest reformation recorded in modern history. With a commendable will, eagerness to learn, and marked capacity to understand, they have, from the ashes left in war's wake, erected in Japan an edifice dedicated to the supremacy of individual liberty and personal dignity; and in the ensuing process there has been created a truly representative government committed to the advance of political morality, freedom of economic enterprise, and social justice. Politically, economically, and socially Japan is now abreast of many free nations of the earth and will not again fail the universal trust. ... I sent all four of our occupation divisions to the Korean battlefront without the slightest qualms as to the effect of the resulting power vacuum upon Japan. The results fully justified my faith. I know of no nation more serene, orderly, and industrious, nor in which higher hopes can be entertained for future constructive service in the advance of the human race.
For historian John W. Dower, however,
In retrospect, apart from the military officer corps, the purge of alleged militarists and ultranationalists that was conducted under the Occupation had relatively small impact on the long-term composition of men of influence in the public and private sectors. The purge initially brought new blood into the political parties, but this was offset by the return of huge numbers of formerly purged conservative politicians to national as well as local politics in the early 1950s. In the bureaucracy, the purge was negligible from the outset. ... In the economic sector, the purge similarly was only mildly disruptive, affecting less than sixteen hundred individuals spread among some four hundred companies. Everywhere one looks, the corridors of power in postwar Japan are crowded with men whose talents had already been recognized during the war years, and who found the same talents highly prized in the 'new' Japan.[51]
Repatriation[edit]
Civilians and soldiers in Tawau, British North Borneo prior to their embarkation to Jesselton (Kota Kinabalu) after the surrender to Australian forces
There was a significant level of emigration to the overseas territories of the Japanese Empire during the Japanese colonial period, including Korea,[52] Taiwan, Manchuria, and Karafuto.[53] Unlike emigrants to the Americas, Japanese going to the colonies occupied a higher rather than lower social niche upon their arrival.[54]
In 1938, there were 309,000 Japanese in Taiwan.[55] By the end of World War II, there were over 850,000 Japanese in Korea[56] and more than 2 million in China,[57] most of whom were farmers in Manchukuo (the Japanese had a plan to bring in 5 million Japanese settlers into Manchukuo).[58]
In the census of December 1939, the total population of the South Pacific Mandate was 129,104, of which 77,257 were Japanese. By December 1941, Saipan had a population of more than 30,000 people, including 25,000 Japanese.[59] There were over 400,000 people living on Karafuto (southern Sakhalin) when the Soviet offensive began in early August 1945. Most were of Japanese or Korean extraction. When Japan lost the Kuril Islands, 17,000 Japanese were expelled, most from the southern islands.[60]
After World War II, most of these overseas Japanese repatriated to Japan. The Allied powers repatriated over 6 million Japanese nationals from colonies and battlefields throughout Asia.[61] Only a few remained overseas, often involuntarily, as in the case of orphans in China or prisoners of war captured by the Red Army and forced to work in Siberia.[62]
War crimes[edit]
Main articles: War crimes and Japan, Allied war crimes during World War II § Asia and the Pacific War, and International Military Tribunal for the Far East
Many political and military Japanese leaders were convicted for war crimes before the Tokyo tribunal and other Allied tribunals in Asia. However, all members of the imperial family implicated in the war, such as Emperor Shōwa and his brothers, cousins and uncles such as Prince Chichibu, Prince Fushimi Hiroyasu and Prince Asaka Yasuhiko, were exonerated from criminal prosecutions by Douglas MacArthur.
The Japanese military before and during World War II committed numerous atrocities against civilian and military personnel. Its surprise attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, prior to a declaration of war and without warning killed 2,403 neutral military personnel and civilians and wounded 1,247 others.[63][64] Large scale massacres, rapes, and looting against civilians were committed, most notably the Sook Ching and the Nanking Massacre, and the use of around 200,000 "comfort women", who were forced to serve as prostitutes for the Japanese military.[65]
The Imperial Japanese Army also engaged in the execution and harsh treatment of Allied military personnel and POWs. Biological experiments were conducted by Unit 731 on prisoners of war as well as civilians; this included the use of biological and chemical weapons authorized by Emperor Shōwa himself.[66] According to the 2002 International Symposium on the Crimes of Bacteriological Warfare, the number of people killed in Far East Asia by Japanese germ warfare and human experiments was estimated to be around 580,000.[67] The members of Unit 731, including Lieutenant General Shirō Ishii, received immunity from General MacArthur in exchange for germ warfare data based on human experimentation. The deal was concluded in 1948.[68][69]
The Imperial Japanese Army frequently used chemical weapons. Because of fear of retaliation, however, those weapons were never used against Westerners, but against other Asians judged "inferior" by imperial propaganda.[70] For example, the Emperor authorized the use of toxic gas on 375 separate occasions during the Battle of Wuhan from August to October 1938.[71]
Influential personnel[edit]
Main article: List of Japanese government and military commanders of World War II
Political[edit]
In the administration of Japan dominated by the military political movement during World War II, the civil central government was under the management of military men and their right-wing civilian allies, along with members of the nobility and Imperial Family. The Emperor was in the center of this power structure as supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial Armed Forces and head of state.
Military[edit]
L-to-R: Marshal Admiral of the Navy Heihachirō Tōgō (1848–1934), Marshal General of the Army Oku Yasukata (1847–1930), Marshal Admiral of the Navy Yoshika Inoue (1845–1929), Marshal General of the Army Kageaki Kawamura (1850–1926), at the unveiling ceremony of bronze statue of Marshal General of the Army Iwao Ōyama
The military of Imperial Japan was divided into two main branches: the Imperial Japanese Navy and the Imperial Japanese Army. To coordinate operations, the Imperial General Headquarters, headed by the Emperor, was established in 1893. Prominent generals and leaders:
Imperial Japanese Navy: Navy of the Empire of Japan
Admiral Count Itō Sukeyuki (1843–1914)
Admiral Viscount Inoue Yoshika (1845–1929)
Admiral Marquis Tōgō Heihachirō (1847–1934) Battle of Tsushima
Admiral Prince Arisugawa Takahito (1862–1913)
Admiral Baron Ijuin Gorō (1852–1921)
Admiral Prince Higashifushimi Yorihito (1867–1922)
Admiral Baron Shimamura Hayao (1858–1923)
Admiral Baron Katō Tomosaburō (1861–1923)
Admiral Prince Fushimi Hiroyasu (1876–1946)
Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto (1884–1943) Attack on Pearl Harbor, Battle of Midway
Admiral Osami Nagano (1880–1947)
Admiral Mineichi Koga (1885–1944)
Vice Admiral Chūichi Nagumo (1887–1944) Attack on Pearl Harbor, Battle of Midway[72]
Imperial Japanese Army: Army of the Empire of Japan
Marshal Prince Yamagata Aritomo: Chief of staff of the Army, Prime Minister of Japan
Marshal Prince Ōyama Iwao: Chief of staff of the Army
Marshal Prince Komatsu Akihito: Chief of staff of the Army
Marshal Prince Kotohito Kan'in: Chief of staff of the Army
Marshal Hajime Sugiyama: Chief of staff of the Army
General Viscount Kodama Gentarō: Chief of staff of the Army
General Hideki Tōjō: Prime Minister of Japan
General Yoshijirō Umezu: Chief of staff of the Army
Lieutenant General Ōshima Ken'ichi: Chief of staff of the Army, Minister of War during World War I
Timeline[edit]
1926: Emperor Taishō dies (December 25).
1927: Tanaka Giichi becomes prime minister (April 20).
1928: Emperor Shōwa is formally installed as emperor (November 10).
1929: Osachi Hamaguchi becomes prime minister (July 2).
1930: Hamaguchi is wounded in an assassination attempt (November 14).
1931: Hamaguchi dies and Wakatsuki Reijirō becomes prime minister (April 14). Japan occupies Manchuria after the Mukden Incident (September 18). Inukai Tsuyoshi becomes prime minister (December 13) and increases funding for the military in China.
1932: After an attack on Japanese monks in Shanghai (January 18), Japanese forces shell the city (January 29). Manchukuo is established with Henry Pu Yi as emperor (February 29). Inukai is assassinated during a coup attempt and Saitō Makoto becomes prime minister (May 15). Japan is censured by the League of Nations (December 7).
1933: Japan leaves the League of Nations (March 27).
1934: Keisuke Okada becomes prime minister (July 8). Japan withdraws from the Washington Naval Treaty (December 29).
1936: Coup attempt (February 26 Incident). Kōki Hirota becomes prime minister (March 9). Japan signs its first pact with Germany (November 25) and occupies Tsingtao (December 3). Mengjiang established in Inner Mongolia.
1937: Senjūrō Hayashi becomes prime minister (February 2). Prince Fumimaro Konoe becomes prime minister (June 4). Battle of Lugou Bridge (July 7). Japan captures Beijing (July 31). Japanese troops occupy Nanjing (December 13), beginning the Nanjing Massacre.
1938: Battle of Taierzhuang (March 24). Canton falls to Japanese forces (October 21).
1939: Hiranuma Kiichirō becomes prime minister (January 5). Abe Nobuyuki becomes prime minister (August 30).
1940: Mitsumasa Yonai becomes prime minister (January 16). Konoe becomes prime minister for a second term (July 22). Hundred Regiments Offensive (August–September). Japan occupies Indochina in the wake of the fall of Paris, and signs the Tripartite Pact (September 27).
1941: General Hideki Tōjō becomes prime minister (October 18). Japanese naval forces attack Pearl Harbor, Hawaii (December 7), prompting the United States to declare war on Japan (December 8). Japan conquers Hong Kong (December 25).
1942: Battle of Ambon (January 30 – February 3). Battle of Palembang (February 13–15). Singapore surrenders to Japan (February 15). Japan bombs Australia (February 19). Indian Ocean raid (March 31 – April 10). Doolittle Raid on Tokyo (April 18). Battle of the Coral Sea (May 4–8). U.S. and Filipino forces in the Battle of the Philippines (1942) surrender (May 8). Japan defeated at the Battle of Midway (June 6). Allied victory in the Battle of Milne Bay (September 5). Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands (October 25–27).
1943: Allied victory in Battle of Guadalcanal (February 9). Japan defeated at Battle of Tarawa (November 23).
1944: Tojo resigns and Kuniaki Koiso becomes prime minister (July 22). Battle of Leyte Gulf (October 23–26).
1945: U.S. bombers begin firebombing of major Japanese cities. Japan defeated at Battle of Iwo Jima (March 26). Admiral Kantarō Suzuki becomes prime minister (April 7). Japan defeated at Battle of Okinawa (June 21). U.S. drops atomic bombs on Hiroshima (August 6) and Nagasaki (August 9), The Soviet Union and Mongolia invade Japanese colonies of Manchukuo, Mengjiang (Inner Mongolia), Korea, South Sakhalin and Kuril Islands (August 9–September 2). Japan surrenders (September 2): Allied occupation begins.
1947: Constitution of Japan comes into force.[1]
Emperors[edit]
Posthumous name1
Given name2
Childhood name3
Period of reign
Era name4
Meiji Tennō
(明治天皇) Mutsuhito
(睦仁) Sachi-no-miya
(祐宮) 1868–1912
(1890–1912)5 Meiji
Taishō Tennō
(大正天皇) Yoshihito
(嘉仁) Haru-no-miya
(明宮) 1912–26 Taishō
Shōwa Tennō
(昭和天皇) Hirohito
(裕仁) Michi-no-miya
(迪宮) 1926–896 Shōwa
1 Each posthumous name was given after the respective era names as Ming and Qing Dynasties of China.
2 The Japanese imperial family name has no surname or dynastic name.
3 The Meiji Emperor was known only by the appellation Sachi-no-miya from his birth until November 11, 1860, when he was proclaimed heir apparent to Emperor Kōmei and received the personal name Mutsuhito .
4 No multiple era names were given for each reign after Meiji Emperor.
5 Constitutionally.
6 Constitutionally. The reign of the Shōwa Emperor in fact continued until 1989 since he did not abdicate after World War II. However, he lost his status as a living god and autocratic power after the 1947 constitution was adopted.
See also[edit]
Japan portal
Fascism portal
Agriculture in the Empire of Japan
Demography of Imperial Japan
Foreign commerce and shipping of Empire of Japan
Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere
Industrial production in Shōwa Japan
Germany–Japan industrial co-operation before World War II
Japanese mining and energy resources (World War II)
Japanese colonial empire
Japanese nuclear weapon program
Notes[edit]
Jump up ^ Although the Empire of Japan officially had no state religion,[2][3] Shinto played an important part for the Japanese state: As Marius Jansen, states: "The Meiji government had from the first incorporated, and in a sense created, Shinto, and utilized its tales of the divine origin of the ruling house as the core of its ritual addressed to ancestors "of ages past." As the Japanese empire grew the affirmation of a divine mission for the Japanese race was emphasized more strongly. Shinto was imposed on colonial lands in Taiwan and Korea, and public funds were utilized to build and maintain new shrines there. Shinto priests were attached to army units as chaplains, and the cult of war dead, enshrined at the Yasukuni Jinja in Tokyo, took on ever greater proportions as their number grew."[4]
Jump up ^ "During the second half of the nineteenth century, Japan's nation-builders forged the Meiji nation-state out of an older, heterogeneous Tokugawa realm, integrating semi-autonomous domain states into a unified political community."[10] "Rather than restore an ancient (and probably imaginary) center-periphery order, the Meiji Restoration hastened the creation of a new and unambiguously centralized and modern nation-state. Within a few decades of the official beginning of the nation-building project, Tokyo had become the political and economic capital of a state that replaced semi-autonomous domains with newly created prefectures subordinate to central laws and centrally appointed administrators."[11]
References[edit]
Citations[edit]
^ Jump up to: a b c d e f "Chronological table 5 1 December 1946 - 23 June 1947". National Diet Library. Retrieved September 30, 2010.
Jump up ^ Josephson, Jason Ānanda (2012). The Invention of Religion in Japan. University of Chicago Press. p. 133. ISBN 0226412342.
Jump up ^ Thomas, Jolyon Baraka (2014). Japan's Preoccupation with Religious Freedom (Ph.D.). Princeton University. p. 76.
Jump up ^ Jansen 2002, p. 669.
Jump up ^ Hunter 1984, pp. 31-32.
Jump up ^ One can date the "restoration" of imperial rule from the edict of January 3, 1868. Jansen, p.334.
Jump up ^ Harrison, Mark (2000). The Economics of World War II: Six Great Powers in International Comparison. Cambridge University Press. p. 3. ISBN 9780521785037. Retrieved 2 October 2016.
^ Jump up to: a b Taeuber, Irene B.; Beal, Edwin G. (January 1945). "The Demographic Heritage of the Japanese Empire". Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. Sage Publications. 237: 65. JSTOR 1025496. (Subscription required (help)).
^ Jump up to: a b Shillony, Ben-Ami (2013). Ben-Ami Shillony - Collected Writings. Routledge. p. 83. ISBN 1134252307.
Jump up ^ Tsutsui 2009, p. 234.
Jump up ^ Tsutsui 2009, p. 433.
Jump up ^ Hagiwara, p. 34.
Jump up ^ Jansen 2002, pp. 314–315.
Jump up ^ Hagiwara, p. 35.
Jump up ^ Satow, p. 282.
Jump up ^ Keene 2002, p. 116.
Jump up ^ Jansen 2002, pp. 310–1.
Jump up ^ Keene, pp. 120–121, and Satow, p. 283. Moreover, Satow (p. 285) speculates that Yoshinobu had agreed to an assembly of daimyōs in the hope that such a body would reinstate him.
Jump up ^ Satow, p. 286.
Jump up ^ During a recess, Saigō, who had his troops outside, "remarked that it would take only one short sword to settle the discussion" (Keene, p. 122). Original quotation (Japanese): "短刀一本あればかたづくことだ." in Hagiwara, p. 42. The word used for "dagger" was tantō.
Jump up ^ Keene 2002, p. 124.
^ Jump up to: a b Jansen 2002, p. 312.
Jump up ^ Keene, p. 340, notes that one might "describe the Oath in Five Articles as a constitution for all ages".
Jump up ^ "明治8年（1875）4月｜漸次立憲政体樹立の詔が発せられ、元老院・大審院が設置される：日本のあゆみ".
Jump up ^ The Secret of Japan's Strength www.calvin.edu
Jump up ^ Equal-to-the-Apostles St. Nicholas of Japan, Russian Orthodox Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist web-site, Washington D.C.
Jump up ^ "日本の正教会の歴史と現代 "History of Japanese Orthodox Charch and Now"" (in Japanese). The Orthodox Church in Japan. 2007-02-01. Retrieved 2007-08-25.
Jump up ^ Orthodox translation of Gospel into Japanese, Pravostok Orthodox Portal, October 2006
Jump up ^ Cite error: The named reference Country was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
Jump up ^ Heber J. Grant (2002). "The Life and Ministry of Heber J. Grant". Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Heber J. Grant. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. LDS Church publication number 35970
Jump up ^ "1889 Japanese Constitution".
Jump up ^ http://www.ggdc.nl/databases/hna/2009/data/hna_jpn_09.xls
Jump up ^ Duus, Peter (1995). The Abacus and the Sword: The Japanese Penetration of Korea, 1895–1910. Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520213616.
^ Jump up to: a b A reckless adventure in Taiwan amid Meiji Restoration turmoil, THE ASAHI SHIMBUN, Retrieved on July 22, 2007.
Jump up ^ "Question 1917年（大正6年）のロシア革命時に、シベリアに在留していたポーランド孤児を日本政府が救済したことについて調べています。". Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan. Retrieved October 3, 2010.
Jump up ^ "Polish orphans". Tsuruga city. Retrieved October 3, 2010.
Jump up ^ Hane, Mikiso, Modern Japan: A Historical Survey (Oxford: Westview Press, 1992) 234.
^ Jump up to: a b "第150回国会　政治倫理の確立及び公職選挙法改正に関する特別委員会 第12号　平成12年11月16日（木曜日）". House of Representatives of Japan. November 16, 2000. Retrieved October 10, 2009.
Jump up ^ "戦間期台湾地方選挙に関する考察". 古市利雄. 台湾研究フォーラム 【台湾研究論壇】. Archived from the original on April 11, 2008. Retrieved October 10, 2009.
Jump up ^ Herbert Bix, Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan, 2001, p. 284
Jump up ^ Kevin McDowell. Japan in Manchuria: Agricultural Emigration in the Japanese Empire, 1932-1945. University of Arizona
Jump up ^ "The Unquiet Past Seven decades on from the defeat of Japan, memories of war still divide East Asia". The Economist. 12 August 2015. Retrieved 2016-11-26.
Jump up ^ "Question 戦前の日本における対ユダヤ人政策の基本をなしたと言われる「ユダヤ人対策要綱」に関する史料はありますか。また、同要綱に関する説明文はありますか。". Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan. Retrieved October 2, 2010.
Jump up ^ "猶太人対策要綱". Five Ministers Council. Japan Center for Asian Historical Record. December 6, 1938. p. 36/42. Archived from the original on July 26, 2011. Retrieved October 2, 2010.
Jump up ^ David C. Earhart, Certain Victory, 2008, p.63
Jump up ^ Hotta, Eri (2013). Japan 1941 : Countdown to Infamy. New York: Knpf. ISBN 978-0307739742.
Jump up ^ L, Klemen (1999–2000). "Forgotten Campaign: The Dutch East Indies Campaign 1941–1942". Archived from the original on July 26, 2011.
^ Jump up to: a b [1]
Jump up ^ [2]
Jump up ^ Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman, and the Surrender of Japan Tsuyoshi Hasegawa Belknap Press (Oct. 30 2006) ISBN 978-0674022416
Jump up ^ J. W. Dower, Japan in War & Peace, New press, 1993, p. 11
Jump up ^ "Japanese Periodicals in Colonial Korea".
Jump up ^ Japanese Immigration Statistics Archived October 15, 2008, at the Wayback Machine., DiscoverNikkei.org
Jump up ^ Lankov, Andrei (March 23, 2006). "The Dawn of Modern Korea (360): Settling Down". The Korea Times. Retrieved December 18, 2006.
Jump up ^ Grajdanzev, A. J. (1 January 1942). "Formosa (Taiwan) Under Japanese Rule". Pacific Affairs. 15 (3): 311–324. doi:10.2307/2752241. JSTOR 2752241.
Jump up ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on October 13, 1999. Retrieved 2009-11-03. The Life Instability of Intermarried Japanese Women in Korea
Jump up ^ Killing of Chinese in Japan concerned, China Daily
Jump up ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on December 23, 2008. Retrieved 2008-12-20. Prasenjit Duara: The New Imperialism and the Post-Colonial Developmental State: Manchukuo in comparative perspective
Jump up ^ "A Go: Another Battle for Sapian". Archived from the original on December 23, 2008.
Jump up ^ "Page not found".
Jump up ^ When Empire Comes Home : Repatriation and Reintegration in Postwar Japan by Lori Watt, Harvard University Press
Jump up ^ "Russia Acknowledges Sending Japanese Prisoners of War to North Korea". Mosnews.com. April 1, 2005. Archived from the original on November 13, 2006. Retrieved February 23, 2007.
Jump up ^ Yuma Totani (April 1, 2009). The Tokyo War Crimes Trial: The Pursuit of Justice in the Wake of World War II. Harvard University Asia Center. p. 57.
Jump up ^ Stephen C. McCaffrey (September 22, 2004). Understanding International Law. AuthorHouse. pp. 210–229.
Jump up ^ "Abe questions sex slave 'coercion'". BBC News. March 2, 2007. Retrieved May 2, 2010.
Jump up ^ Yoshiaki Yoshimi and Seiya Matsuno, Dokugasusen Kankei Shiryō II (Materials on poison gas Warfare II), Kaisetsu, Hōkan 2, Jūgonen sensô gokuhi shiryōshū, Funi Shuppankan, 1997, pp. 25–29
Jump up ^ Daniel Barenblatt, A Plague upon Humanity, 2004, pp. xii, 173.
Jump up ^ Hal Gold, Unit 731 Testimony, 2003, p. 109.
Jump up ^ Drayton, Richard (May 10, 2005). "An Ethical Blank Cheque: British and U.S. mythology about the second world war ignores our own crimes and legitimises Anglo-American war making" Archived January 11, 2012, at the Wayback Machine.. The Guardian.
Jump up ^ Yuki Tanaka, Poison Gas, the Story Japan Would Like to Forget, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, October 1988, p. 16-17
Jump up ^ Y. Yoshimi and S. Matsuno, Dokugasusen Kankei Shiryô II, Kaisetsu, Jugonen Sensô Gokuhi Shiryoshu, 1997, p.27-29
Jump up ^ L, Klemen (1999–2000). "Vice-Admiral Chuichi Nagumo". Forgotten Campaign: The Dutch East Indies Campaign 1941–1942. Archived from the original on June 30, 2012.
Sources[edit]
Jansen, Marius; John Whitney Hall; Madoka Kanai; Denis Twitchett (1989). The Cambridge History of Japan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-22352-0.
Jansen, Marius B. (2002). The Making of Modern Japan. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press. ISBN 0-674-00334-9. OCLC 44090600
Jansen, Marius B. (1995). The Emergence of Meiji Japan. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-5214-8405-7.
Hunter, Janet (1984). Concise Dictionary of Modern Japanese History. University of California Press. ISBN 0-5200-4557-2.
Keene, Donald (2002). Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852–1912. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-12341-8. OCLC 46731178
Klemen, L. (1999–2000). "Forgotten Campaign: The Dutch East Indies Campaign 1941–1942". Archived from the original on July 26, 2011.
Takemae, Eiji (2003). The Allied Occupation of Japan. Continuum Press. ISBN 0-82641-521-0.
Tsutsui, William M. (2009). A Companion to Japanese History. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 1-405-19339-5.
Porter, Robert P. (1918). Japan: The Rise of a Modern Power. Oxford. ISBN 0-665-98994-6.
Satow, Ernest Mason (1921). A Diplomat in Japan. London. ISBN 4-925080-28-8.
Hotta, Eri (2013). Japan 1941: Countdown to Infamy. New York. ISBN 978-0307739742.
External links[edit]
Media related to Empire of Japan at Wikimedia Commons
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