The battle of the Yalu river
Besides the United States, the only land to fully embrace European technology when threatened by Western imperialism was Japan. Japan learned its lesson well, and by 1876 was becoming an imperial power itself, copying Western gunboat diplomacy in Korea. The first generation of the Japanese Navy consisted mostly of warships purchased from Europeans, but the Japanese Government soon applied itself to the task of ship construction and naval training.
The pay-off can be seen in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95, in which Japan and China fought for control of Korea. Both navies had westernized to a considerable degree. The Chinese Navy included 12 major warships. Japan, the newer power, had only 10, with fewer guns and weaker armour than the three Chinese battleships. But the Japanese Navy under Admiral Ito (1843-1914) was much more thoroughly trained. And China had not mastered the logistical needs of a major navy: Chinese supply was so bad that many large-calibre shells were apparently filled with cement or sand instead of explosives. The Japanese Navy seized several ports and the island of Taiwan.
It was clear that the Japanese Navy had come of age at the battle of the Yalu, fought on 17 September 1894.The Chinese fleet was protecting a troop convoy heading towards the mouth of the Yalu River. When the Japanese fleet appeared, the Chinese Admiral Ting (1836-1895) offered battle. Both fleets fought in Western style, but the Chinese appear to have been about a generation behind the Japanese. The Chinese wedge formation suggests that Admiral Ting intended to rely on ramming. The Japanese depended on the most modern available artillery, guns with calibres under 15cm (6in) but extremely rapid-firing. The Japanese, steaming in a tight line ahead, let loose a hail of fire on the Chinese vessels, damaging them badly before the Chinese got to close range. At the end of the day, only six Chinese ships were afloat and Japanese dominance of the sea remained unchallenged for the rest of the war.
The Japanese success during the war was the result of the modernization and industrialization embarked upon two decades earlier. The war demonstrated the superiority of Japanese tactics and training as a result of the adoption of a Western-style military. The Imperial Japanese Army and navy were able to inflict a string of defeats on the Chinese through foresight, endurance, strategy and power of organization. Japanese prestige rose in the eyes of the world. The victory established Japan as the dominant power in Asia.
For China, the war revealed the ineffectiveness of its government, its policies, and the corruption of the Qing administration. Traditionally China viewed Japan as a subordinate part of the Chinese cultural sphere. Although Qing China had been defeated by European powers in the 19th century, defeat at the hands of an Asian power and a former tributary state was a bitter psychological blow. Anti-foreign sentiment and agitation grew and would later culminate in the form of the Boxer Rebellion five years later. The Manchu population was devastated by the fighting during the First Sino-Japanese War and the Boxer Rebellion, with massive casualties sustained during the wars and subsequently being driven into extreme suffering and hardship in Beijing and northeast China.
Although Japan had achieved what it had set out to accomplish, mainly to end Chinese influence over Korea, Japan reluctantly had been forced to relinquish the Liaodong Peninsula, (Port Arthur), in exchange for an increased financial indemnity. The European powers (Russia especially), while having no objection to the other clauses of the treaty, did feel that Japan should not gain Port Arthur, for they had their own ambitions in that part of the world. Russia persuaded Germany and France to join her in applying diplomatic pressure on the Japanese, resulting in the Triple Intervention of 23 April 1895.
Japan succeeded in eliminating Chinese influence over Korea, but ironically, it was Russia who reaped the benefits. Korea proclaimed itself the Korean Empire announcing its independence from China. The Japanese sponsored Gabo reforms (Kabo reforms) from 1894-1896 transformed Korea: legal slavery was abolished in all forms; the yangban class lost all special privileges; outcastes were abolished; equality of law; equality of opportunity in the face of social background; marriage ages were raised, abolishing child marriage; Hangul was to be used in government documents; Korean history was introduced in schools; Ming calendar was replaced with the western (common era); education was expanded and new textbooks written.
In 1895, a pro-Russian official tried to remove the king of Korea to the Russian legation and failed, but a second attempt succeeded so for a year the King reigned from the Russian legation in Seoul. The concession to build a Seoul-Inchon railway had been granted to Japan in 1894 was revoked and granted to Russia. Russian guards guarded the king in his palace even after he left the Russian legation.
China’s defeat precipitated an increase in railway construction in the country as foreign powers demanded China make railway concessions.
In 1898, Russia signed a 25-year lease on the Liaodong Peninsula and proceeded to set up a naval station at Port Arthur. Although this infuriated the Japanese, they were more concerned with Russian encroachment toward Korea than in Manchuria. Other powers, such as France, Germany and Great Britain, took advantage of the situation in China and gained land, port, and trade concessions at the expense of the decaying Qing Empire. Tsingtao and Kiaochow was acquired by Germany, Kwang-Chou-Wan by France, and Weihaiwei and the New Territories by Great Britain.
Tensions between Russia and Japan would increase in the years after the First Sino-Japanese war. During the Boxer Rebellion an eight-member international force was sent to suppress and quell the uprising; Russia sent troops into Manchuria as part of this force. After the suppression of the Boxers the Russian government agreed to vacate the area. However, by 1903 it had actually increased the size of its forces in Manchuria. Negotiations between the two nations (1901–1904) to establish mutual recognition of respective spheres of influence (Russia over Manchuria and Japan over Korea) were repeatedly and intentionally stalled by the Russians. They felt that they were strong and confident enough not to accept any compromise and believed Japan would not dare go to war against a European power. Russia also had intentions to use Manchuria as a springboard for further expansion of its interests in the Far East. In 1903, Russian soldiers began construction of a fort at Yongnampo but stopped at Japanese protests.
In 1902 Japan formed an alliance with Britain, the terms of which stated that if Japan went to war in the Far East and that a third power entered the fight against Japan, then Britain would come to the aid of the Japanese. This was a check to prevent either Germany or France from intervening militarily in any future war with Russia. Japan sought to prevent a repetition of the Triple Intervention that deprived her of Port Arthur. The British reasons for joining the alliance were: to check the spread of Russian expansion into the Pacific area; to strengthen Britain’s hand to focus on other areas and to gain a powerful naval ally in the Pacific.
Increasing tensions between Japan and Russia as a result of Russia’s unwillingness to enter into a compromise and the prospect of Korea falling under Russia’s domination, therefore coming into conflict with and undermining Japan’s interests, compelled Japan to take action. This would be the deciding factor and catalyst that would lead to the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05.
