making of modern japan by jansen marius b

Author:jansen, marius b [jansen, marius b]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-01-18T07:59:00+00:00

5. The Diplomacy of Imperialism

In the years after the Treaty of Shimonoseki imperialist pressures increased in East Asia. Expansion driven by industrialization seemed to be the destiny of modern states. Some might decry its costs in men and money, but more accepted those burdens as the price of national greatness. The United States, its westward expansion having reached the Pacific shore, went beyond it to take a share of Samoa, responded to a staged coup by occupying Hawaii, and after defeating Spain in 1898, extended its domination to the Philippines. The decision to take over the Philippines was not made easily or lightly, but largely for the same reasons that led the Japanese to take Korea; if the islands were left for the picking, some other power would claim them. The enthusiasm of the press before and during the war against Spain was comparable to that in Japan during the war against China. Annexation of the Philippines also brought America face to face with Japan in a new way. In Japan, no less than in many Western countries, imperialism came to occupy a central place in politics, economy, and culture.

Theorists of world politics, the geopolitical seers of the age, emphasized the importance of defense in depth. "Defense," wrote Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan, "means not merely defense of our territory, but defense of our just national interests whatever they be and wherever they are." In Japan Yamagata Aritomo expressed similar views in important state papers in which he distinguished between Japan's line of defense and its line of interest. Korea was well within the second. Imperialism also coincided with industrialization and seemed a natural by-product. A large part of the Chinese indemnity went to fund Japan's Yawata Iron and Steel Works, and that in turn increased Japanese concern for coking coal and iron ore from China. National pride was central to this process; the Tokyo Asahi editorialized that imperialism was an expression of basic national energy made manifest through the organization of the state. It might not require seizure of neighboring territory, but it did mean denying to others the exclusive appropriation of resources that were seen as vital to the economy.

These trends found expression in many ways. "Militarists" might limit their vision to political control, and many asserted that Korea and part of China were fated to come under Japanese rule. Others, "Asia-firsters" who were more sensitive to the needs of neighboring countries, deplored crude aggression, argued for closer relations with neighboring Asia, and encouraged activists who provided help to refugee reformers from Korea, China, and Southeast Asia. Enthusiasm for this position knew no barriers of class. Konoe Atsumaro, who was president of the House of Peers from 1895 to 1904 and the scion of a family whose interrelationships with the imperial house extended from the seventh century, was in this group. He sponsored a "Common Culture" (Dobun) Association to foster study and contact with China, championed Korean independence, and criticized swollen military budgets. He was also vehemently opposed to

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