Militarist Policy—Liaotung Peninsula—Intervention of Three Powers—Leases
of Chinese Territory by Germany, Russia, Great Britain and
France—Spheres of Interest.
The origin of the activity displayed by Japan in the reorganization of
her army and navy, the efficiency of which was so strikingly
demonstrated in the war with China, may be traced to the military
tendencies of the two clans which had practically governed the country
since the Restoration. It was the military strength of these clans which
was, as we have seen, the determining factor in the struggle preceding
the Restoration; it was this, again, that carried the new Government
safely through the earlier internal troubles, and enabled it to pursue
successfully in the face of many difficulties its policy of gradual
reform. In the process of surmounting these difficulties, and even more,
perhaps, in the very work of reconstruction, in so far as this related
to naval and military reorganization, it was only natural that the
tendencies in question should be developed. Other influences which
worked in the same direction were the desire to attain equality with
Western Powers, to assert the independence of the nation, still
impaired, in public opinion, by offensive Treaty stipulations, and the
wish to be in a position to act vigorously in matters concerning the
nation’s intercourse with its neighbours on the continent of Asia. Even,
therefore, before the war with China something very near to a militarist
spirit had become apparent in administrative circles. The signal success
achieved by both army and navy in the course of the campaign favoured
the growth of this feeling. It became clear to all attentive observers
that henceforth the existence of a militarist party in the country was a
factor to be reckoned with in any estimate of the future course of
Japanese policy. The leading exponents of this militarist policy were,
of course, to be found amongst naval and military officers, but their
views were shared by the Japanese statesmen who had taken a prominent
part in military reforms; by others, whose declarations on foreign
policy from time to time were tinged with a Chauvinism that deepened
with the increase of Japan’s position in the world; and by a section of
the Japanese Press.
During the Shimonoséki negotiations the influence of the military party,
fresh from its success in the war, had been exerted to secure an even
larger cession of territory on the mainland than that eventually agreed
upon. The discussions which took place on this point between the
military leaders and the Japanese plenipotentiary, the late Prince Itō,
whose enemies could never accuse him of any leaning towards Chauvinism,
resembled those which took place between Bismarck and von Moltke at the
close of the Franco-German war of 1870. In this instance Prince Itō’s
more moderate views prevailed, with the result recorded in the Treaty.
Had the Japanese Government been gifted with a prescience enabling it to
anticipate the series of aggressive acts on the part of European Powers
for which its attempt to annex territory on the Chinese mainland gave
the signal, the attempt might, possibly, never have been made. Had it
even foreseen the determined opposition of certain European Powers to
the cession of even this extent of Chinese territory on the mainland, it
is probable that its demands would have undergone still further
modification. The ambition of the German Emperor to play a more active
part in foreign questions, and to secure for Germany an influence abroad
commensurate, as it seemed to him, with its dignity as an Empire, not to
mention the steps he was taking about this time to give effect to his
intentions by commencing the construction of what was soon to become a
powerful navy, had not escaped the attention of Japanese Ministers. Nor
had his warning in regard to what he described as the Yellow Peril
passed unnoticed. Of the general trend of European diplomacy they were
not ignorant, but of its special bearing on Far Eastern matters they
were, apparently, not fully aware, in spite of the indication of
Russia’s interest in Manchuria furnished by her Circular Note to the
Great Powers in February, 1895, and the warning of impending trouble
said to have been given by Germany to Japan in the following month
before the armistice was concluded. The possible extension to the Far
East of the mischievous activity of the Kaiser, the designs of Russia,
and the results which might be expected to follow the conclusion of the
recent Entente between that Power and France, were points that seem to
have been insufficiently realized.
The Treaty of Shimonoséki was signed, as we have seen, on the 17th
April. Eight days later the Russian and French Ministers in Tōkiō
presented to the Japanese Minister for Foreign Affairs (the late Count
Mutsu) identical Notes advising the Japanese Government “to renounce the
definite possession of the Liaotung peninsula,” on the ground that “its
possession by Japan would be a menace to Peking, and render illusory the
independence of Korea.” On the same day a similar Note was presented by
the German Minister. For the sudden intervention of these three Powers
the Japanese Government was unprepared. The quickness with which it
followed the signature of the Treaty, no less than the form of procedure
adopted, left no doubt as to the serious intentions of the Powers
concerned; while the association of Germany in the matter lent an
ominous weight to the protest. Convinced that this was no idle threat,
and realizing the futility of opposing a demand made by the three chief
military Powers of Europe, the Japanese Government at once gave way, and
consented to relinquish this portion of Chinese territory in return for
an additional indemnity of 30,000,000 Kuping taels, equivalent to about
£6,000,000. A Convention to this effect was signed at Peking on November
8th, 1895. It provided for the payment of the additional indemnity by
the 25th of that month, and for the evacuation of the Liaotung peninsula
to be completed within three months from that date.
The mention of “the Liaotung peninsula” in the protest of the three
Powers is the first we hear of the term. It was not used by the Chinese,
nor did it occur in the Shimonoséki Treaty. There the ceded territory is
called “the southern portion of the province of Fêng-t’ien” (otherwise
known as Shengking, and Moukden, though the latter is really the name of
the provincial Capital), the Treaty frontier (never delimited) running
roughly from Yingkow on the river Liao to the Yalu river, and to the
north of the towns of Fenghwangcheng and Haicheng. But the Chinese used
the term Liaotung, which means “East of the river Liao,” in a vague way
to signify the territory which lies to the left of that river; and
foreign geographers, in ignorance of the meaning of the term, had
applied it to the bay into which the river flows, which appears in
atlases as the “Liaotung Gulf.” When the intervention took place, it was
probably found convenient to make use in the Notes of protest of a term
already given in foreign atlases to the bay that forms the western
boundary of the territory in question. Hence the adoption of the term
“the Liaotung peninsula,” which was an error in geographical
nomenclature. Once adopted, or, as may be said, invented, the
convenience of the term led to its employment again when the
Russo-Chinese Agreement for the lease of Port Arthur was made in 1898,
though the territory then leased was limited to what is now known as the
peninsula of Kwantung. It reappears in the additional Russo-Chinese
Agreement of the same year. From that time the term seems to have passed
into general use, for we find it in the Portsmouth Treaty of 1905.
The intervention of the three Powers had far-reaching consequences, none
of which, in all probability, were foreseen at the time by any of the
Governments concerned, though each may have felt that it had established
a claim to the goodwill of China. Four months after Japan had agreed to
the retrocession of the territory ceded to her by the Shimonoséki Treaty
Russia, who had been the prime mover in the matter, proceeded to lay
China under further obligations by rendering her financial assistance
which facilitated the liberation of her territory. This took the form of
a Chinese loan of £15,000,000, floated in Paris under Russia’s
guarantee.
In January, 1896, one of the consequences above mentioned was seen in
the settlement of various questions which the French Government had been
pressing on the attention of the Government of China for some time.
These questions related to the rectification of the Tonkin frontier, and
to railway and mining concessions in the provinces of Yunnan, Kwangsi
and Kwantung. This was only an instalment of the recompense for her
services which France was to obtain. The arrangement with France
regarding the Tonkin frontier constituted a breach of the Burma
Convention of 1886, and of a later Convention of 1894, regulating the
boundaries separating British and Chinese territories, which provided,
_inter alia_, that no portion of two small States assigned to China
should be alienated to any other Power without previous agreement with
Great Britain. The dispute which arose over this question was eventually
settled—as between Great Britain and France—by the joint Declaration of
January 15th, 1896, fixing the boundary between the possessions, or
spheres of influence, of the two Powers as far as the Chinese frontier,
and arranging for all privileges conceded by China in the provinces of
Yunnan and Szechwan to the two Powers, respectively, under their
Agreements with China of 1894 and 1895 to be made common to both Powers
and their nationals; and—as between Great Britain and China—by an
Agreement signed on February 4th, 1897, modifying the previous boundary
in favour of Great Britain, and opening the West river, which flows into
the sea at Canton, to foreign trade.
Russia was the next to profit. She had already decided in 1892 to
construct what is now the Trans-Siberian Railway with the object of
linking up the eastern and western extremities of the Empire, and thus
aiding the development of Siberia, as well as strengthening her position
on the Pacific coast. The line, as then projected, was to run from
Chiliabinsk in the Ural Mountains to the south-western shore of Lake
Baikal, and from the south-eastern shore of the lake to Vladivostok,
following for some distance the course of the Amur river; communication
across the lake to be maintained by vessels specially constructed for
the purpose. Work was commenced at both ends of the railway, and when
the Shimonoséki Treaty was signed the line had been finished as far east
as Chita, a town south-east of Lake Baikal, and within two hundred miles
of the Chinese frontier.
The war between China and Japan had served a useful purpose for Russia
in revealing both the weakness of China and the strength and ambitions
of Japan. To check these ambitions in the direction of Manchuria, and
forestall Japan by establishing herself in the coveted territory, was
the task to which she now directed her energies. In the preliminary step
by which the retrocession of the Liaotung peninsula was effected she
was, as we have seen, aided by both France and Germany. Between the
latter and herself some sort of roughly formulated understanding seems
to have been arrived at, described by Reventlow in his _Deutschland’s
Auswärtige Politik_ as a secret agreement between the Kaiser and the
Tsar, the results of which were to be seen later. With France she worked
throughout in the closest accord in the development of the new line of
policy she had marked out for herself in the Far East, to which Belgian
financiers also lent their co-operation. In return for Russia’s support
in European affairs, as arranged by the Entente concluded between the
two countries, France, for her part, was only too willing to encourage
Russian aims in the Far East; and she was the more ready to do so, since
this course assured her of reciprocal help in the prosecution of her own
interests in China. Russia had been the connecting link between the
three Powers whose intervention had restored the Liaotung peninsula to
China. It was the relations she continued to maintain with her two
associates after that incident—in the one case an informal
understanding, in the other definite concerted action—which shaped the
course of subsequent events in the Far East.
In _Ma Mission en Chine_, M. Gérard, who was French Minister in Peking
during the period 1893–7, gives an account of the secret negotiations
with China by means of which Russia succeeded in forestalling Japan in
Manchuria. His book supplies the key to a correct understanding of the
course of events, and throws much light on the political situation at
the time of which he speaks. We learn how close was the accord then
maintained between France and Russia; how skilfully Russia made use of
the complaisant attitude of her two associates; and with what
unscrupulous determination to compass her ends she traded on the
weakness of China, on the claims she had established on the latter’s
goodwill, and on the vanity and corruption of Chinese officials.
In May, 1896, according to M. Gérard, a secret Treaty was signed at St.
Petersburg by Prince Lobanoff, then Minister for Foreign Affairs, and Li
Hung Chang, Viceroy of Chihli, who had been sent to Russia as China’s
representative at the Coronation of the late Tsar Nicholas II. The full
text of this Treaty has never been published, but it promised to China
Russian protection against Japan; China, in return for this guarantee of
assistance, granting to Russia the privilege of using, in time of war,
the harbours of Ta-lien Wan, in the Kwantung peninsula, and Kiaochow, in
the province of Shantung, as bases for her fleet. Three months later
(August 27th) a secret Railway Agreement was signed at St. Petersburg by
Li Hung Chang and the representatives of the Russo-Chinese Bank. This
institution, half the capital of which was French, had been created at
the end of the previous year. M. Gérard explains that, in consequence of
so large a portion of the bank’s capital being furnished by a French
syndicate, the French Government insisted on receiving definite
information regarding the negotiations in question. His statements
regarding the French financial interest in the Russo-Chinese Bank are
confirmed by other writers: by Chéradame, in his interesting book, _Le
Monde et La Guerre Russo-Japonaise_, and by Débidour in _Histoire
Diplomatique de l’Europe_. We learn also from M. Gérard that the Chinese
Government had contributed, under the title of a deposit, 5,000,000
taels to the capital of the bank, explaining at the time, in answer to
enquiries, that this sum represented China’s share of the cost of
construction of the Chinese Eastern Railway; that for the building of
this line a company called the Chinese Eastern Railway Company was
formed, which, although Russo-Chinese in name, was a purely Russian
concern; and that it was agreed that on the completion of the line in
question the sum “deposited” by China should be returned to her. He adds
that the President of the bank was Prince Ouchtomsky, who afterwards
visited Peking at the head of a Russian Mission.
Both the Treaty and the Railway Agreement were ratified by the Chinese
Government on the 18th September, and came into force on that date. The
popular rumour which credited the Russian Minister in Peking with the
negotiation of these two instruments was, it appears, due to the
presence of M. Cassini at the Chinese Capital, where it was considered
necessary for him to remain in order to secure their ratification by
China. As a glance at a map of North-Eastern Asia will show, the Railway
Agreement constituted a concession of the greatest importance to Russia.
The Chinese Eastern Railway, the name of the new line which Russia
obtained leave to construct, became the eastern section of the
Trans-Siberian Railway, connecting Lake Baikal with Vladivostok,
Russia’s outlet to the Pacific. The new line, which would traverse
Northern Manchuria via Kharbin, Tsitsihar and Hailar, would shorten the
distance by more than 300 miles. Moreover, the more level country
through which the line was to pass presented few engineering
difficulties, as compared with the Amur route, a fact which would
greatly diminish the period and the cost of construction. The Agreement
was subsequently rendered complete in every detail by the elaboration of
what were termed the Statutes of the Chinese Eastern Railway. These were
confirmed by the Tsar on the 4th December in the same year. Although
these Statutes (given in Rockhill’s _Treaties and Conventions_) provided
that the President of this railway company should be Chinese, the
stipulation was purely nominal. The Chinese Eastern Railway, like the
Russo-Chinese Bank, was an exclusively Russian undertaking, the raising
of the capital required, as well as the construction of the line, being
entirely in Russian hands.
Meanwhile the Kaiser, who personally directed the foreign policy of
Germany, was forming plans for claiming his share of reward for the
triple intervention, and he had, it appears, already approached the
Peking Government on this subject, though without any success. What,
assuming its existence, was the nature of the understanding arrived at
between the Courts of St. Petersburg and Berlin in regard to Far Eastern
affairs will probably remain for ever a State secret. In any case,
however, it is clear, from his own repeated declarations as to Germany’s
need for “a place in the sun,” and from the proceedings of the German
Minister at Peking, that he was bent on obtaining a foothold of some
sort in China, whence Germany’s future expansion in the Far East might
be conveniently developed. His opportunity came in 1897. In the autumn
of that year two German missionaries were murdered in the province of
Shantung. A few weeks later a German force landed in that province at
Kiaochow, one of the two harbours the use of which in time of war Russia
had acquired eighteen months before under her secret Treaty with China.
M. Gérard in his book above mentioned states that the German Emperor had
before the departure of the German ships on this errand informed the
Tsar by telegraph of his intentions, and, receiving no reply objecting
to the proposed step, took the Tsar’s silence for consent. Germany’s
occupation of this strategic position, which had the further advantage
of being in a region of the Chinese mainland sufficiently distant from
points where other foreign interests were centred to obviate objections
on the part of other Powers, and, at the same time, ensure an ample and
undisturbed field for German enterprise, was confirmed by a Treaty
concluded with China on March 6th, 1898. By this Treaty China granted to
Germany a lease for ninety-nine years of the port of Kiaochow and a
considerable stretch of “hinterland.” Germany also acquired under it
certain rights of railway construction in the neighbourhood of the port.
The author of _Japan: The Rise of a Modern Power_, tells us, on the
authority of a statement said to have been made by Prince Henry of
Hohenzollern, that the Kaiser’s next step was to invite the Tsar to take
Port Arthur and Ta-lien Wan. Whatever truth there may be in the
statement attributed to Prince Henry—M. Gérard thinks the suggestion may
have been made in the telegram announcing his own intentions—the fact
remains that Germany’s abrupt action resulted in an immediate scramble
on the part of several European Powers for various portions of Chinese
territory. Russia led the way in these undignified proceedings, for
which a harsher word might with justice be substituted. Two months after
the occupation of Kiaochow by Germany, Russian men-of-war anchored in
Port Arthur. Thither they were followed by British cruisers, and for a
moment it looked as if history would repeat itself, and that Russia
might have to reckon with British interference in her designs. Other
counsels, however, prevailed. The British ships were withdrawn, and on
March 27th, three weeks after the conclusion of the Kiaochow Agreement,
a similar Treaty was signed at Peking by Li Hung Chang and the Russian
Chargé d’Affaires. This Treaty, the text of which was not published by
the Russian Government, provided for the lease to Russia of Port Arthur,
Ta-lien Wan and adjacent waters for a period of twenty-five years,
renewable by arrangement at the expiration of the term. It was further
agreed that the right to construct the Chinese Eastern Railway across
Northern Manchuria, secured by Russia under the secret Railway Agreement
of August 27th, 1896, should be extended so as to include the
construction of branch lines from a point on that railway to Ta-lien Wan
and other places in the Liaotung peninsula. The Treaty also provided for
a subsequent definition of the boundaries of the leased area and—a point
of some importance in the light of after events—of a neutral strip of
territory separating the Chinese and Russian spheres. Port Arthur,
moreover, was declared to be a naval port, and as such closed to all
vessels save those of the two contracting parties. Subsequently, on May
7th, a supplementary Agreement, signed at St. Petersburg, defined the
boundaries of the leased area, and arranged for their delimitation.
It was not long before France, whose services to China at the time of
the triple intervention had, as we have seen, already met with
recognition in the shape of the prompt settlement of various outstanding
questions, obtained, in her turn, a territorial concession of the same
nature—though, perhaps, not so important—as those granted to Germany and
Russia. By a Convention signed at Peking on May 27th, 1898, China
granted to her a ninety-nine years’ lease for the purpose of a naval
station and coaling depôt of the Bay of Kwang-chow and adjacent
territory in the peninsula of Leichow, together with the right to
construct a railway connecting the bay with the peninsula. The area of
this concession was in the province of Kwangsi, which adjoins the French
territory of Tonkin.
Unlike the three Powers associated in the triple intervention, whose
subsequent action justifies the supposition that they regarded
themselves as brokers entitled to a commission for services rendered,
Great Britain had no special claim on the goodwill of China.
Nevertheless, she joined in the scramble for Chinese territory. A
Convention, signed at Peking on June 9th, 1898, gave her an extension of
territory at Hongkong under lease for a period of ninety-nine years, the
reason assigned for the concession being that this extension was
necessary for the proper protection and defence of that colony. Three
weeks later (July 1st), by another Convention, signed also at Peking, it
was agreed that the Chinese Government, “in order to provide Great
Britain with a suitable naval harbour and for the protection of British
commerce in the neighbouring seas,” should lease to her Weihaiwei and
the adjacent waters “for so long a period as Port Arthur shall remain in
the occupation of Russia.” The area thus leased comprised the island of
Liu-kung, and all other islands in the bay of Weihaiwei.
In defence of Great Britain’s action it may fairly be pleaded that her
interests in China, and in the Far East generally, which were more
extensive than those of any other Power, with the possible exception of
Japan, made it necessary for her Government to take prompt measures to
counteract the effect of any proceedings on the part of other Powers
which might be prejudicial to those interests. The political situation
created in the Far East by the actions of the three Powers associated in
the triple intervention was the reverse of reassuring. Russia’s
occupation of Port Arthur was in direct contradiction to the grounds of
the joint protest against the annexation of the Liaotung peninsula by
Japan. Neither with France nor with Russia at that time were our
relations what they afterwards became. Between British and Russian
policy there was a scarcely veiled antagonism, while the French and
ourselves had long been rivals in China, as elsewhere. The concerted
action of these two Powers, not to speak of their support by a third,
whose exact relation to her associates was dubious, was thus calculated
to give rise to apprehensions which would doubtless have been increased
had British Ministers then known all that has since come to light.
Additional gravity was given to Germany’s sudden appearance on the scene
in a new rôle by, to use M. Gérard’s words, her “occupation by force and
at a moment of complete peace of a port belonging to the Empire the
integrity of whose territory she claimed to have safeguarded against
Japan.” Under these circumstances the British Government may well have
felt that it was justified in regarding these proceedings as fraught
with possibilities of injury to British interests and prestige, and in
adopting what in the light of these occurrences might reasonably be held
to assume the character of precautionary measures. Such, beyond a doubt,
was the general interpretation given by impartial observers to Great
Britain’s action in arranging for her occupation of Weihaiwei. It was,
as the terms of the Agreement clearly indicated, a direct counter-move
to Russia’s occupation of Port Arthur. As such it was welcomed by Japan,
who, when the time for the evacuation of Weihaiwei arrived, willingly
handed it over to the Power who was shortly to become her ally.