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"...the government increased control over economic resources and in March 1938, legislative powers were delegated to the cabinet. The nation was urged to put aside its grievances, unite in loyalty to the emperor and contribute to Japan's imperial mission. Use was made of education and of other media to impress on Japan and their duty to ride East Asia of European and American influences..."
"...the government increased control over economic resources and in March 1938, legislative powers were delegated to the cabinet. The nation was urged to put aside its grievances, unite in loyalty to the emperor and contribute to Japan's imperial mission. Use was made of education and of other media to impress on Japan and their duty to ride East Asia of European and American influences..."
Japan before 1919
Japan before 1919
Following the Meiji Restoration of 1868, Japan's leaders pursued a program of modernisation, Westernisation and industrialisation
They began embracing Western technology, ideas and systems and sent missions to Europe and the United States to learn about Western methods of industry, transport, communications, banking etc.
Japan was able to advance its economy and modernise its naval and military forces: they defeated China in the Sino-Japanese War, humiliated Russia in the Russo-Japanese War, and annexed Korea.
During World War I, they fought against Germany on the side of the Allies and were recognised as one of the leading participants at the Paris Peace Conference.
At the Paris Peace Conference, they gained control of German concessions in China and were granted mandates over Germany's former North Pacific colonies - the Mariana, Caroline and Marshall Islands. However, the failure to achieve the inclusion of a racial equality clause in the Covenant of the League of Nations angered the Japanese.
Japan's Road to Dictatorship
Japan's Road to Dictatorship
In the post-war period, there were indications that Japan was developing into a more democratic-style government similar to the Western nations, which was evident in the victory of the democratic nations in the war
Japan came out of the war in good economic shape, where it went from being a debtor nation to a creditor nation.
Japan was able to capture Western markets in Asia since Britain and France were preoccupied with their struggle against Germany.
The post-war recession began to take hold of Japan's economy, affecting their trade balance
Food supplies were strained with Japan's increasing population, resulting in rice riots in some cities
Japan's international position was suffering: the failure to achieve the racial equality clause; limitations placed on naval construction in the 1922 Washington Naval Conference; and restrictions placed on Japanese immigration by the United States in its 1924 Immigration Act
Depression and Manchuria: 1929-31
Depression and Manchuria: 1929-31
The Great Depression hit Japan hard as it became dependent on imports for many of its key products including aluminium, cotton, wool, lead, iron, and steel.
Members of the patriotic societies and the military began to believe that Japan's problems of over-population, food shortages and economic stagnation could only be solved by expansion overseas
Japan was slipping towards dictatorship when terror and assassinations of politicians began to take shape, as well as the army allowing the trials of offenders to be used to discredit party-led governments
Japan's Dictatorship in the 1930s
Japan's Dictatorship in the 1930s
Different form to European dictatorships - no leading charismatic figure at the head of a single political party.
Japan became militarised and the military was in control.
Violence afflicted Japanese politics on a daily basis following the invasion of Manchuria.
With Japan's share of the world trade still low, the silk trade had never recovered and rural conditions remained tough. This was arguably a key reason for the Japanese pursuing an aggressive foreign policy in the 1930s. Also, most of Japan's armed forces came from the peasantry and were affected by this.
Two main factions: the "Control Group" and the "Imperial Way".
Japan shared the importance given to education and propaganda like European dictatorships.
Emperor Hirohito was revered and given divine status - all Japanese pledged themselves to the emperor.
Traditional Japanese values of service, respect, patriotism and unquestioning obedience were promoted, and Western ideas and values were suppressed.
Economic distress, combined with domination of government by the military, and spread of nationalist/patriotic propaganda, produced an expansionist foreign policy which was able to grow out of the earlier successes Japan had had
Hideki Tojo
Hideki Tojo
Born in Tokyo in 1884
Son of a general.
Supported Adolf Hitler, and encouraged closer links between Japan and Germany and Italy - the three Axis powers signed the Tripartite Pact in September 1940.
Appointed Japan’s Minister for War in July 1940
Became Japan’s Prime Minister in 1941 and within two months had ordered the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Tojo was also appointed Home and Foreign Minister.
In 1944 he became Chief of the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff and he ruled as dictator, only answering to Emperor Hirohito.
After Japan's defeat in the Battle of Saipan, Tojo publicly lost the Emperor's support and was forced to resign from the positions of Prime Minister and Chief of the Imperial Japanese Army on 18 July 1944.
Executed by hanging on 23 December 1948.
Emperor Hirohito
Emperor Hirohito
Born in 1901 in Tokyo, Japan. He was Japan’s longest-reigning monarch, ruling from 1926 to 1989 as emperor. Hirohito was seen as a god by the Japanese people. Japanese soldiers were loyal to him during World War II and his role in the aggressive Japanese military policy is debated by historians. After the war, the new constitution drafted by the United States transformed Japan into a constitutional monarchy so that sovereignty lay with the people instead of the emperor. Hirohito died in Tokyo on 7 January 1989.
"For Japan, [the Paris Peace Conference] really was an arrival and part of a continuing struggle to gain status as a world power. They joined the “Big Five” at Versailles along with the United States, Britain, France, and Italy. [T]he reason why they were able to do that is they participated in the occupation of German territories in Shandong in North China, as well as taking over German territories in the South Pacific, what we know today as Micronesia.
In 1919 in Versailles when they [the Japanese] proposed the Racial Equality clause[1] to be respected as an equal nation or equal race to the Western nations, this was part of their efforts to promote the idea that Japan was at least an honorary Western power. They had been experiencing anti-immigration laws in California [Alien Land Laws of 1910], Canada, the British dominions in Australia and New Zealand…
In fact, this Racial Equality clause, when it was voted on by the League Committee in April 1919, seven out of the eleven powers—including China, which was protesting Japanese imperialism—approved this Racial Equality clause, but Wilson rejected it on the claim that he needed a unanimous vote.
So what's the legacy? Japan loses out on including a Racial Equality clause, but in many ways they can point to 1919 and the 1920s and 1930s, as they further expand into China and then later into Southeast Asia, of how the United States and Western powers are very hypocritical in their moral principles and international relations. It becomes fuel for this pan-Asian order that Japan needs to liberate the rest of Asia from Western dominance, and they can point to 1919 to show how the League of Nations was founded on unjust principles."
Source 1: Excerpt is from historian Seiji Shirane’s portion of a May 2019 Carnegie Council/Macaulay Honors College panel entitled “100 Years After Versailles.” 100 Years After Versailles
[1] Also known as the Racial Equality Proposal. This proposal was not intended to create universal racial equality but rather equality among countries that were members of the League of Nations.
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