Chapter II: Part 2

But in other respects this bold reform created a number of serious difficulties. The _samurai_ class as a whole was plunged into great distress. A few of them, especially those from the western clans, immediately won high positions in the new government. But most of them were left to sink or swim in a strange new world. Their small pension payments soon dribbled away, and it was hard for them to find means of support. They had other grievances. A law of 1877 forbade them to wear their two swords--traditional mark of honor of the _samurai_ class. 1877, too, was the year when the _samurai_ were replaced by the new conscript army. During this critical year a serious military revolt, centering in Satsuma but joined by all the forces opposed to the new order, broke out. It was crushed by the Imperial government’s new army, made up largely of commoners and partly modernized. Thus the last challenge to the new order was defeated.

HARD TIMES FOR THE PEASANTS

The peasants had an even harder time than the _samurai_. Many local peasant revolts took place in the years up to 1877. Imperial forces suppressed them, and so prevented the peasants from indulging in mass confiscations of lands.

Yet great changes were taking place. For the peasants were no longer feudal serfs. They became landholders, and they could serve in the army. But the individual peasant secured only a very small plot of land. As a private owner, his situation was most precarious. He had to face the risks of drought or flood, pay taxes in money instead of rice, and cope with price changes in the market. His land soon had to be mortgaged, and could then be taken away by foreclosure. Indeed, many peasants quickly lost their lands in the early years of the new order. By 1892 nearly 40 per cent of the total cultivated area was worked by tenants. This proportion has persisted, while the number of part-tenants has increased.

Japanese agriculture, moreover, remained backward in technique and social organization. The landlords became parasites. Instead of working the land as a capitalist enterprise for profit, they were intent only on drawing high rents--often as much as 60 per cent. This system had far-reaching effects on Japan.

As the number of tenants grew, and the land became divided into smaller and smaller plots, the farm areas in Japan became overpopulated. Only a part of the unneeded farm workers could find a place in industry. Competing for jobs, they kept wages low. Low wages, of course, were a boon to industrial development. But what industry gained in one way it lost in another. For the farmers and the workers were too poor to buy much. The country’s purchasing power grew only very slowly. Thus the home market for factory products was limited, and industry did not develop as fast as it might otherwise have done. Very early Japan’s new factory industries had to turn to the foreign market. As the limitations on Japan’s home market have persisted down to the present time, the pressure for foreign trade expansion has grown steadily more urgent. Here is one underlying cause for Japan’s current policy of military expansion.

INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT

But changes in agriculture, as we have seen, did help to make possible the growth of a modern Japanese industry. Peasants who lost their lands, or artisans thrown out of work, became available as factory workers. Here was industry’s labor force.

Many other changes helped industry along. Foreign trade, long prohibited, had begun to grow rapidly in the ’sixties. Clan barriers to internal trade were leveled. Hundreds of different kinds of money, issued by the various clans, had circulated. These were now abolished, and a single national currency instituted. Railways were built, and telephone and telegraph systems laid down. These improvements made a freer sale and exchange of goods throughout the country possible. Thus a home market--even if a very limited one--was established.

For the introduction of modern, large-scale industry, however, two further things were needed--technique and capital. Foreign experts, acting both as direct advisers in industry and as instructors in the new technical schools, provided the first of these requirements. The second was harder to fill. The banking-trader houses and the pensioned-off lords had some capital. But it was not enough to finance the big factory projects, especially where quick profits seemed unlikely. So the Imperial government had to step in and supply the capital in most of the larger enterprises. It paid special attention to the armament industries--mining, metallurgy, shipbuilding.

NURSING INFANT INDUSTRIES

The clan bureaucrats in the government nursed the construction of this new industrial plant with extreme care and pride. Many of them fell in love with machinery and engineering technique. They worked closely with the great business houses, grafting industry on to firms that had been mainly concerned with trade or banking. The budding capitalists were not financially strong enough to develop industry by themselves. So the clan statesmen took them into partnership. It was the clan statesmen, however, who headed the combination--an important factor in Japan’s political growth, then and later.

But the clansmen did not wish to keep all industry under government control. They only wanted to see that it developed quickly. Then the businessmen could handle it, or at least all but the strategic industries. The government kept control of railways, telephones, telegraphs, arsenals and naval shipyards. But in the case of many other industries, it supplied the capital and started their development, then turned them back to the great business houses, often at very low prices. In this way the capitalists were spoon-fed by the government. Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Sumitomo and other houses obtained ready-made facilities in many fields--cotton-spinning mills, glass and cement factories, mining enterprises, shipyards. The giant Mitsubishi monopoly in commercial shipping, for example, got its start through the gift and cheap purchase of government vessels.

By 1890 some 200 steam factories were in operation in Japan. The development of a machine industry was making good headway.

VII. Who Rules Modern Japan?

We are now able to distinguish the main groups which were to rule the modern Japanese Empire. Within the quarter century from 1853 to 1877 a new leadership had emerged.

True to Japan’s history and tradition, control was concentrated in a few hands. The ruling group was composed of the clan leaders, dominating the government bureaucracy (since grown to nearly 500,000 office holders); the old feudal lords with great landed estates; and the business group--bankers, traders and industrialists.

HAND IN GLOVE

At the head of this partnership were the clan leaders, and a few representatives of the old court nobility. The clan bureaucrats, as they came to be called, held the influential posts in the new Imperial government. To a large extent, their dictatorial powers carried on the old feudal tradition. Many of them were civilians, but they also controlled the army (Choshu) and the navy (Satsuma). The business people, on the other hand, especially in the beginning, were definitely in a subordinate position. It was the government which controlled most of the early industrial enterprises, as we have seen. Not until much later, after the World War of 1914-18, did trade and industry reach a size which enabled the capitalists to make themselves felt politically.

It was the existence of the “upper crust” and the inferior status of business that largely determined the character of the new political institutions established during the Meiji era. They were designed, it is true, to serve the purposes of the whole combination of ruling groups. But at the same time the clan bureaucrats took good care to set up the machinery they needed to perpetuate their own supremacy.

CONSERVATIVES VS. LIBERALS

For a decade after the Restoration of 1868, an outright dictatorship functioned in Japan. The powers of the clansmen were almost unlimited. Within the ruling group itself, however, there were wide differences of opinion on some points. One important question was what institutional forms the new government should adopt. Headed by Itagaki (a Tosa _samurai_), the more liberal reformers wanted to set up a fully representative government modeled on the advanced Western democracies. But most of the clansmen opposed such a radical step. In the end, however, the conservatives accepted the necessity of a _written_ constitution--which they drew up themselves.

Even this concession was made grudgingly, and only after it had become absolutely necessary. But several factors worked in favor of the liberals. The prestige of Western institutions was high at this period. An article in the Emperor’s Charter Oath, moreover, was interpreted as a pledge to inaugurate a “deliberative assembly.” Quoting this pledge, the liberals started a political campaign which won considerable support. Finally, the rising capitalists needed a representative system in order to secure a real voice in the government. Despite all these advantages, in the end the liberals were outmaneuvered in the political arena. They obtained a constitution, it is true, but one which was written and imposed by the conservative clansmen. The result was not a democratic Bill of Rights but a highly autocratic document. With but few exceptions, the liberals’ failure at this time was characteristic of Japan’s later history.

THE LIBERALS LOSE

The political struggle reached its climax in the second decade after the Restoration. In the press and on the public platform, the liberals waged their campaign. In 1878 they succeeded in getting provincial assemblies with limited powers, and in 1880 local (town, city and village) assemblies. In 1881, riots followed the exposure of graft in the central administration. To save their position, the conservatives had the Emperor issue a declaration promising a National Assembly in 1890--nine years ahead.

But the political struggle did not abate. It now turned on what should be the terms of the constitution which was to establish the elective assembly. The conservatives meanwhile took strong measures against the opposition. They strictly enforced laws curbing the press. They suppressed Itagaki’s political party in 1884. In 1887 martial law was proclaimed in Tokyo, and the opposition leaders were driven from the capital. In this way the conservative bureaucrats got a free hand in drafting the new constitution and putting it over.

Hirobumi Ito, its main architect, had gone abroad in 1882 to study Western constitutional practices. He was greatly impressed by Bismarck, and took the Prussian Constitution as his model. First, certain preparatory changes were made. A nobility of five orders was established in 1884, and a Cabinet in 1885. A civil service was started, and in 1887 a Supreme War Council was set up to advise the Emperor on military and naval affairs. In 1888 Ito became president of the Privy Council, which was given authority to revise the draft constitution he had prepared. Ito’s work of framing the document was carried out “in absolute secrecy.” After it had been read in private to a small group of officials, the Emperor promulgated the new constitution on February 11, 1889. The first elections to the Imperial Diet were held in 1890.

A GIFT OF THE EMPEROR

The Constitution was a “gift” of the Emperor. It was not intended to establish popular government. Its preamble emphasized the old theocratic (priest-king) traditions of Japan. The Emperor “inherited” the right to rule “from Our Ancestors,” and ruled “in lineal succession unbroken for ages eternal.” Ito and his colleagues not only incorporated these traditional ideas into the Constitution. They made them the cornerstone of the new system of universal education, and thus instilled them in the mass of the Japanese people. Reverence for the Emperor as a divine ruler helped enormously to keep the new regime solidly in place.

Practically all the government’s powers, both civil and military, were vested in the Emperor. Vast economic power bolstered his political authority. No longer, as on occasion in feudal times, could the Emperor become penniless. For court expenses, the Imperial Family receives an annual grant of 4,500,000 yen (more than a million dollars). Its holdings in lands and blocks of shares, estimated at over one billion yen, provide a large additional income. So it is one of the wealthiest families in Japan.

THE EMPEROR MUST BE “CONSTITUTIONAL”

The Emperor’s powers are exercised on the advice of his ministers, in accordance with constitutional practice. He is not supposed to act on his own authority. Real power, therefore, resides not in the Emperor but in his advisers, acting through the agencies set up by the Constitution. On the surface, these agencies _seem_ to establish a system of representative government. There is a Cabinet, and a Diet with two houses--the House of Peers and the House of Representatives. And political parties like those of the Western democracies soon formed to contest elections in Japan.

But there the resemblance ends. There is not only the supposedly divine power of the Emperor. The democratic forms themselves are a shell, empty of the real meat of popular government. In all effective representative systems, as we well know, the legislature--particularly its lower house--has real authority. Not so under Ito’s Constitution. Ito ranged an overwhelming battery of aristocratic, bureaucratic and militarist influence in five powerful agencies of government. You can see from our chart on page 49 what these agencies were. They completely eclipsed the House of Representatives. Moreover, they often dominated the Cabinet, or disputed its authority. And through them, as much as through the Cabinet, the clansmen ruled Japan with a tight rein. Let us see how each worked out in practice.

NON-POPULAR AGENCIES OF GOVERNMENT

First, there were the Elder Statesmen (or _Genro_). They were a body completely outside the Constitution. Survivors of the early Meiji clansmen, they had prestige and experience. For several decades after 1900 they held the government in the hollow of their hands. They made and unmade Cabinets, shuffled the Premiership among themselves, decided on war and peace. Their last representative, Prince Saionji, died in November 1940 at the age of 92. So from now on there will be no more _Genro_ to be reckoned with.

Next comes the Imperial Household Ministry. Two officials here occupy key positions. The Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal holds the seals which must be affixed to state documents. And the Minister of the Imperial Household has charge of matters connected with the Imperial Family. These men are not only themselves powerful advisers of the Emperor. But appointments to see the Emperor must be made through them. So at times they have been able to bar their political opponents from reaching the Imperial ear. Usually they hold office for life or until they wish to resign.

The Privy Council is likewise a useful piece of machinery for Japan’s ruling group. It is the supreme advisory body to the Emperor. It consists of 26 life members, usually of great age. Cabinet Ministers serve as members of the Council _ex-officio_, but are outvoted by at least two to one. Among other things, the Privy Council ratifies treaties, approves amendments to the Constitution, and passes on Imperial ordinances.

The House of Peers consists of about 400 members, of whom more than 200 are drawn from the nobility, 125 are life appointees, and nearly 70 are elected from the largest taxpayers. It is an extremely aristocratic and conservative body. Yet its powers equal those of the lower house. And its members can become Premiers or Cabinet Ministers.

Lastly, the Army and Navy, with their General Staffs and their representatives on the Supreme War Council, are largely independent of civilian control. The chiefs of the General Staffs and the War and Navy Ministers have direct access to the Emperor. This means that they can go over the Premier’s head to appeal any decision of his to the Emperor. The War and Navy Ministers cannot be civilians. They must be ranking officers in active service. Since they are nominated by the Supreme War Council, the latter body can overthrow a Cabinet by simply ordering them to resign. Or it can prevent the formation of a new Cabinet which it does not like by refusing to offer nominations for the War and Navy Ministries.

THE PEOPLE’S REPRESENTATIVES

As against these aristocratic, bureaucratic and military organs of government, the popular will can be expressed only through the House of Representatives. The position of the House is very weak, especially in comparison with the normal legislature of a full-fledged democracy.

For Ito saw fit to curb the powers of the Diet’s lower house by a series of drastic restrictions. Large fixed, or non-votable, expenditures limit its control over the public purse. If appropriations are not voted, the Cabinet has the right to enforce the preceding year’s budget. Most bills are introduced not by Diet members but by the Cabinet, which also possesses an absolute veto. Moreover, the Cabinet can issue Imperial ordinances which, with few qualifications, have the force of law. It can dissolve the lower house, and thus force an election--an expensive proceeding for the deputies. And for several decades only part of the people could vote. Not until 1925 was full manhood suffrage (age 25) adopted. During elections the Home Ministry has often intimidated the voters. And popular rights are further curbed by a controlled press, a strong centralized police force, a large degree of central domination of local government, and the possibility that one may be arrested and held indefinitely without trial (because Japan has no _habeas corpus_ law).

The development of a Cabinet with independent power, responsible to the lower house of the Diet, would seem impossible under these circumstances. Entrenched positions were held by the aristocrats, the bureaucrats and the militarists. For if they did not control the Cabinet, always a necessary citadel of power, they could be sure of bringing about its downfall. A responsible Cabinet did emerge in the post-war years. But, as we shall see, this period was short-lived. After 1930, largely through the pressure of the militarists, the pendulum swung back.

VIII. Creating a Modern Empire

By 1890, when the first Diet elections were held, the foundations of a new Empire had been laid. In the few short years since 1868, the old feudal society had undergone a profound change. Agriculture was still the key to Japan’s economy, but factory industry and foreign trade were growing in importance. A strong centralized state had come into being. Modern methods were revolutionizing science, education, medicine, law and many other fields. There was an army recruited through universal service and trained in Western ways, and the beginnings of a modern navy.

JAPAN LOOKS ABROAD

The Meiji statesmen were now ready to turn their attention to foreign policy. Even before the Restoration many of the Japanese leaders had favored territorial expansion. During the years of internal reform, however, they had cautiously refrained from rash adventures abroad. A strong movement in favor of a punitive expedition to Korea had developed in 1871-73, but the dominant clan bureaucrats had skilfully prevented the outbreak of war. They had permitted a Formosan expedition in 1874, but had settled the resulting issues peacefully with China. Some small gains had been made. The Bonin Islands were annexed in 1876, and the Liuchiu Islands in 1879. A naval demonstration in 1876 secured to Japan special treaty rights in Korea, which led to more and more intervention in Korean affairs.

But these were not the foreign problems which chiefly occupied the early Meiji leaders. First and foremost, they were trying to change the unequal treaties concluded with the Western powers at the end of the Tokugawa period. These treaties, you will remember, permitted Western nationals to be tried in their own consular courts (the system of extraterritoriality), and fixed Japan’s tariff at the low rate of 5 per cent. The struggle to throw off these irksome restrictions was the central issue in Japan’s foreign relations down to 1894.

FIGHTING THE UNEQUAL TREATIES

The Japanese made many efforts to regain control of both tariffs and courts before they finally won success. An official mission under Prince Iwakura toured Western capitals in 1871-73 but failed to gain treaty revision. As other attempts also came to nothing, an intense popular resentment developed in Japan. In 1889, just when his negotiations for treaty revision were progressing favorably, a bomb tore off Count Okuma’s leg. Success was not won, however, until a new treaty was concluded with Great Britain on July 16, 1894. The other powers soon followed suit. Japan’s law courts had been modernized, and she now enforced new civil, commercial and criminal codes. In 1899, when the new treaties went into effect, all Westerners became subject to Japanese law. These treaties thus brought the extraterritorial system to an end. But they all contained tariff schedules that lasted for 12 years, so that Japan did not secure full control over her own tariffs until the treaties expired in 1911.

WAR WITH CHINA

On July 25, 1894, nine days after signature of the “equal” treaty with Great Britain, Japanese naval forces suddenly attacked and sank a transport carrying Chinese troops to Korea. War was formally declared on August 1. Thus, by an unusual coincidence, Japan was at war with China two weeks after she had won her twenty-five-year campaign for treaty revision.

Japan’s statesmen had correctly estimated the weakness of China, as well as their own degree of preparedness. They did not plunge into war on a hasty impulse. The army and navy were tuned for action. With harsh realism, the Japanese leaders unhesitatingly adopted a program of expansion by force as soon as conditions seemed favorable. Their fight for treaty revision had been a fight for equality with the Western powers. They believed that even fuller recognition of equality would come after a successful war. They were also driven by strong economic considerations. The restrictions of the narrow home market were already irking Japan’s youthful cotton textile export houses, and they were trying to pry their way into the Korean and Chinese markets. Victory in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95 opened both these markets to Japanese manufacturers. It was a significant omen of the future that the new Japan should have discovered, so early in its career, that resort to the sword might help to overcome the handicaps of its late appearance on the international scene.

We should also take note of several other results of Japan’s first modern war. The territorial gains--Formosa and the Pescadores Islands--were a welcome prize. More important was China’s formal recognition of Korean independence, which left Japan practically a free hand in the peninsula. By its new commercial treaty with China, Japan also gained the benefits of extraterritoriality and low tariff rates in that country--the system she hated so heartily when it was applied against herself, as it still was at that time. The war indemnity of nearly $180,000,000, moreover, helped Japan to expand its armaments still further in preparation for the war with Russia in 1904.

THUS FAR AND NO FARTHER

An episode which heightened Japan’s sensitiveness in her foreign relations marked the peace settlement. In the Treaty of Shimonoseki, China had agreed to cede Japan the Liaotung Peninsula in South Manchuria. Germany, Russia and France objected to this territorial cession, and backed their objections by an ultimatum to Tokyo threatening war. Japan was forced to submit, and in exchange for a slight increase in the indemnity, the territory was returned to China. More than the pre-Restoration bombardments of Kagoshima and Shimonoseki, more even than the galling yoke of the unequal treaties, this “tripartite intervention” rankled in Japanese hearts. This sense of humiliation was not lessened in 1898, when Russia secured from China a 25-year lease of the southern tip of the disputed Liaotung Peninsula and proceeded to fortify Port Arthur and join Harbin to Dairen by a new railway line.

WAR WITH RUSSIA

On the whole, however, the gains of the war had proved sufficient to justify the calculations of Japan’s leaders, and to strengthen the forces within Japan that were working toward expansion. In 1900 Japan took part as an equal with the Western powers in quelling the famous Boxer Uprising, in China, and shared in the returns from the Boxer Indemnity which they later imposed as a punishment on the Chinese. The fact that the British thought it worth while to sign an alliance with Japan in 1902 was an additional testimony to her growing prestige. Fortified by this alliance, and by strenuous efforts to build up her military and naval forces, Japan emerged successfully from her clash with Tsarist Russia in 1904-05.

The peace terms did not include the indemnity Japan coveted, largely because she was too exhausted to continue the struggle. But still there were substantial gains. Japan won a protectorate over Korea, which she converted to full annexation in 1910. The Russian leasehold at the tip of the Liaotung Peninsula was transferred to Japan, and also the Russian railway lines in South Manchuria. Finally, Russia ceded the southern half of Sakhalin Island to Japan, and granted important fishing rights in northern Pacific waters to Japanese interests.

The Treaty of Portsmouth, which set forth these terms and in which President Theodore Roosevelt mediated, established Japan as the rising power in the Far East. In 1905, three weeks before the treaty was signed, the Anglo-Japanese Alliance was extended for ten years, with provisions sanctioning Japan’s paramount interests in Korea.

END OF THE MEIJI ERA

In the decade spanned by the two wars, Japan had forged rapidly ahead in her economic development. Her foreign trade, which totaled only 265 million yen in 1895, had jumped to 810 million in 1905 (see chart, page 61). Her steam shipping had shown an even more extraordinary spurt--from 15,000 tons in 1893 to 1,552,000 tons in 1905.

On the political side, the new constitution worked out pretty much as the clan statesmen had expected. For a short time the bureaucrats had some difficulty with the Diet, where a liberal opposition threatened to develop. But they soon checked this tendency. They intimidated or bought off opposition leaders. They embarked on a policy of war and expansion--which the liberals supported. And, eventually, they organized parties headed by members of the bureaucracy itself--in the first instance, Prince Ito.

The Meiji Emperor died on July 30, 1912. During his long reign of nearly 45 years, all the great changes which we have been considering had taken place. From a weak feudal state, Japan had been transformed into a great power. Two years after Emperor Meiji’s passing, the outbreak of the World War ushered in a period of still more ambitious expansion and growth.

IX. Japan and the First World War

The World War gave Japan her great opportunity, which her leaders were quick to seize. The conditions created by World War No. 1 might have been made to order for Japan. They brought all her strategic advantages into play, and were ideally adapted to meet her economic necessities.

Japan was not compelled to fight a full-dress war. The Western powers were more than occupied on the European battlefields, so Japan was given pretty much of a free hand in the Far East. And the line-up of powers in 1914-18 added greatly to the strategic advantage of her geographic location. Britain and Russia were Japan’s allies from the outset, while the United States could not offer firm opposition to Japanese expansion. Thus Japan was able to achieve a great deal with very little effort.

Conditions on the economic side were no less favorable. As Japan’s military and naval operations during the war were relatively slight, the costs were small. On the other hand, her economic gains were exceedingly large. For next to the United States, Japan was the greatest supplier of the warring nations.

MAKING HAY WHILE THE SUN SHINES

It was the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, renewed for the third time in 1911, which gave Japan formal diplomatic cause for entering the war. On August 23, 1914 she declared war on Germany.

After a brief struggle, the German forces at the leasehold of Tsingtao, in Shantung province, surrendered on November 7. A month later the whole of Shantung province was in Japanese hands. Then followed the famous Twenty-One Demands on China. On May 25, 1915, at the point of a gun, China signed treaties and notes incorporating many of these Twenty-One Demands. Among other things these treaties confirmed Japan’s newly won position in Shantung province, and extended her railway and territorial rights in South Manchuria to the end of the century. American protests helped to block the most sweeping demands, which would have made China a Japanese protectorate. Meanwhile the Japanese navy had scoured the Pacific, and had occupied all the German islands north of the equator.

THE SECRET TREATIES OF 1917

During the early months of 1917, Japan turned to diplomacy in order to be sure that she would be able to keep her territorial gains after the war. The United States had not yet entered the war, and the military fortunes of the Allied powers in Europe were at a low ebb. Making good use of this situation, Japan negotiated secret treaties with Britain, France, Russia and Italy. Signed in February and March 1917, these agreements pledged that Japan’s claims to the German islands north of the equator and to the former German rights in Shantung would be supported at the peace conference. But the Japanese did not secure American support of these claims. In the Lansing-Ishii agreement of November 2, 1917, the United States offered merely a qualified recognition of Japan’s “special interests in China.”

The secret treaties with the Allied powers were shrewdly drawn and enabled Japan to come off victorious at the Paris Peace Conference. Her newly established position in Shantung province, as well as the extensions of her rights in South Manchuria, were accepted and written into the Versailles Treaty. The German islands north of the equator were awarded Japan as a Class C mandate, the kind of mandate which came closest to annexation. American opposition to these decisions cut no ice, mainly because of Japan’s secret agreements with the Allies. On only one big issue was Japan defeated at the conference. Her statesmen had demanded that a clause on racial equality be inserted in the peace treaty. This demand was rejected, largely because the Western powers were afraid that it would let down the bars against Japanese immigration to their countries.

FLIES IN THE OINTMENT

But despite the acceptance of her territorial gains at the peace conference, by 1919 Japan’s difficulties were increasing. A student uprising in Peking drove out the pro-Japanese Anfu clique that had controlled the Chinese government. Opposition to the Shantung award was growing in the United States, and the American navy was rapidly becoming the most powerful in the world. Two years later Japan’s position had become still weaker. A boycott was severely reducing Japanese trade in China. The costs of the naval-building race with the United States were a heavy burden. Japanese intervention in Siberia, which continued after the armed forces of the Western powers had been withdrawn, was not succeeding. And expenditure on the Siberian occupation, ultimately totaling about 800 million yen, together with the naval-building costs, was straining the Japanese budget. These various factors were discrediting the Japanese militarists at home, and liberal Japanese were beginning to speak out against them.

SLOWING DOWN JAPAN’S DRIVE

Under these conditions, the United States was able to summon the Washington Conference, at which important agreements on naval limitation and Pacific questions were reached early in 1922. By accepting a battleship ratio of 3 tons as against 5 each for Britain and the United States, Japan was relieved of the costs of the naval race. Her security in Far Eastern waters was further increased by the provision restricting fortification of island bases in the Pacific. The Four-Power Pact, signed by Britain, France, the U. S. and Japan, and pledging respect for insular possessions in the Pacific, replaced the Anglo-Japanese Alliance.

In return for these contributions to her security in Far Eastern waters, Japan made a number of important concessions. By an agreement with China, she restored Shantung province to Chinese control. Japan also signed the Nine-Power Treaty, which pledged all its signatories to respect China’s territorial and administrative integrity and the “open door”--or equal commercial opportunity for all nations--in China.

In later days, some of the provisions of these Washington Conference agreements came to be bitterly attacked in Japan, especially by military and naval extremists. It is an open question as to how far these criticisms were justified. It was chiefly the effectiveness of the Chinese boycott that forced the restoration of Shantung province. Japan’s major concession was in the Nine-Power Treaty, by which she agreed to lay down the sword and accept the results of peaceful commercial competition in China. But there was no machinery provided to enforce this treaty. The naval limitation treaty relieved Japan of the heavy costs of the 1921 naval race and at the same time, even under the 5-5-3 ratio, left her able to dominate the China coast. She was thus in a strategic position to renew her expansionist program--which she did in 1931.

WORLD WAR GAINS

Moreover, the World War settlement for Japan, as finally reached at Washington, was no empty achievement. Japan had not obtained her larger ambitions in China or Siberia, it is true. But the former German islands north of the equator--of great strategic, if not economic, importance--were now a Japanese mandate. Japan’s rights in South Manchuria had become much more firmly established. Her naval and commercial fleets had greatly expanded, she occupied a permanent seat on the Council of the League of Nations, and she was recognized as one of the half-dozen Great Powers. Japan had also made important economic gains, to which we must now turn our attention.

THE WAR BOOM

It was in the economic field, perhaps, that Japan reaped her greatest gains from the World War. For her shops and factories were kept busy supplying the belligerent countries, their colonial populations, and the American market. Her allies controlled the seas, and Japanese ships sailed all of them. This freedom of the seas was an important factor for Japan, who had become increasingly dependent on international trade.

Japan’s war boom was, in many respects, very similar to that enjoyed by the United States. The relative increase in trade was even greater. Between 1914 and 1920 Japan’s total foreign trade increased from 1,187 million yen to 4,285 million, or by nearly four times (see chart, page 61). Through 1918, moreover, exports increased much faster than imports. For Japan this meant a chance to stock up on her reserves of gold and foreign currencies, which had always been low. In the 1914-18 period, exports outran imports by 1,460 million yen. This figure contrasted with an import excess of 1,158 million yen during the preceding 20 years.

What we have said so far applies only to trade in goods. But returns on invisible trade items, such as shipping services, were also high--totaling more than 1,500 million yen for the 1914-18 period. The wartime balances for both types of trade came to more than 3,000 million yen--on the right side of the ledger. As a result, Japan’s financial reserves greatly increased. Extensive loans and investments were made in foreign countries, and large holdings in gold and foreign exchange were piled up.

Japan emerged from the war stronger financially and economically than she had ever been before. Nevertheless, she was to suffer a series of economic setbacks in the post-war period.

X. Go Liberal, Go Fascist?

Even before the war ended, there had been signs of economic distress within Japan. While the profits from the war boom were going into the pockets of a small group, a sharp rise in the cost of living had caused suffering among the masses of the people. Speculators were profiteering in rice, which soared from 20 or 25 yen to more than 50 yen on the five-bushel unit. In the summer of 1918 there were serious “rice riots,” and troops were called out to suppress the demonstrations. During the war, moreover, trade union and socialist ideas had taken root in Japan, paving the way for the growth of labor unions and left-wing parties in the post-war years.

UPS AND DOWNS

Then came the world slump in 1920-21, which led to a sudden collapse of Japan’s war boom. Partial recovery had no sooner set in than it received a sharp jolt from the disastrous earthquake of 1923. To meet these setbacks, Japan drew heavily on the financial reserves accumulated during the war. Reconstruction after the earthquake created another short-lived boom--ended by a bank panic in 1927.

Despite post-war difficulties, however, Japan managed to keep her industry on the up grade. The great advances made during the war were maintained and consolidated. In the post-war slump the number of factory workers had declined, but in 1927-28 they reached the wartime level of 2,000,000 again. Throughout the ’twenties, except for a sharp drop in 1921, Japan’s total foreign trade continued to hold the new average level of 4,000 million yen. Population leaped forward, from about 50 million persons in 1914 to 56 million in 1920, and to nearly 65 million in 1930 (see chart, page 69).

BIG BUSINESS TO THE FORE

During and after the war, Japan’s business groups had come of age. They were no longer subordinate to the other ruling forces in the state. Japan’s effort to overtake the West, as we noticed, had led to a close tie-up between government and industry. This relationship had made it easy for Japan’s great business houses to become monopolies. From the beginning they had united banking, trade and industry under one roof. Post-war developments, such as the financial crisis of 1927, had carried the process of financial concentration beyond even what was characteristic of Western countries. By this time half-a-dozen of Japan’s huge family combines, such as Mitsui and Mitsubishi, dominated Japanese economy. They had become one of the most powerful financial ruling groups in the world.

BUT INDUSTRY DEPENDS ON FOREIGN TRADE

And here we have to point out the striking paradox in Japan’s new economic society. It was still largely agricultural. In 1925 more than half the people were dependent on agriculture for their livelihood. But the peasants were too poor to buy the typical consumption goods (automobiles, for example) that were staples in the home markets of Western countries. Thus it was impossible for Japan to develop modern factory industries turning out _all_ lines of consumption goods. Only in cotton textiles, with their special export market, and in shipbuilding and metallurgy, serving the army and navy, were large-scale factories practical. In 1928 the greater part of Japan’s manufactured goods was produced in industrial units employing ten, five or even fewer workers. Firms like Mitsui and Mitsubishi, however, contracted for the output of these small-scale industrial units and then sold it, often in foreign markets.

Thus Japan, although she had made great strides in some lines of industry, had become dangerously dependent on international trade. After 1929, with the onset of the world depression, the difficulties of this situation were plain to see. Quotas and tariffs barred even Japan’s low-priced goods. Old sores rankled, particularly those affecting immigration. The Exclusion Act, passed by the American Congress over the President’s disapproval in 1924, cut the deepest. In fact, it undid most of the good effects of the generous aid America gave Japan after the earthquake in 1923.

THE LIBERALS TAKE A HAND

These post-war years, especially after 1921, witnessed a brief flowering of parliamentary democracy in Japan. None of the architects of the Constitution, least of all Ito, had foreseen this possibility. Yet in the late ’twenties it seemed as if the Cabinet might win unchallenged power, that party government would reign supreme, and that the House of Representatives would become the true seat of authority.

This change came about quite naturally, through the increasing influence of the great business houses. By 1925 the industrialists and the bankers, or their representatives, held many of the leading offices which the clansmen had formerly made their own. They held the presidency of the Privy Council, and the key posts in the Imperial Household Ministry. They were influential in the House of Peers, in the bureaucracy and even in the Army and Navy. Generals and admirals could actually be found to support the policies of party governments. All the Elder Statesmen except Prince Saionji had died. And even he, being related to the Sumitomo banking house, was in sympathy with the capitalist outlook. As Prince Saionji was the Emperor’s chief adviser on the choice of a new Premier, he occupied the most strategic position in the state. In the 1925-31 period, on his nomination, six consecutive governments were formed by party Premiers holding majorities in the Diet’s lower house.

POLITICAL PARTIES

Party influence, increasing with the growth of capitalism in Japan, reached its height during these years. At an earlier period the clan bureaucrats had manipulated the parties to suit themselves--usually with little difficulty. But as time passed, the parties formed closer and closer ties with the great business houses. Mitsubishi interests were linked with the Minseito party, Mitsui with the Seiyukai party. The Election Law was gradually amended, increasing the number of voters, until in 1925 manhood suffrage was adopted. This change forced Diet members to spend large sums in electioneering, and made them more dependent on capitalist support. Consequently, it strengthened the capitalists’ control over the Minseito and the Seiyukai. At the same time it made possible the rise of labor and left-wing parties, which began to win Diet seats.

After 1925 the Cabinets formed by the Minseito and Seiyukai parties began to have to account directly to their majorities in the House of Representatives for what they did. Parliamentary government was by no means fully established, however. An adverse vote in the lower house did not, as a rule, overthrow these Cabinets. More often they fell because of backstage maneuvers in the Privy Council or the House of Peers. Nor were their leaders and policies always liberal. For a time General Baron Tanaka was president of the Seiyukai. He represented the aggressive, militarist wing of the Choshu clan. The Seiyukai Cabinet of 1927-29, formed under his Premiership, carried out a “positive policy” of military intervention in China. Tanaka had to be a party leader in order to become Premier. But his policy showed the strength of old tendencies, even in a generally liberal era.

On the other hand, the succeeding Minseito Cabinet (1929-31) was the strongest and most liberal party government which has ever held office in Japan. It came the nearest to establishing democracy there. It also had to meet the first onslaught of the military-fascist forces that have since become so powerful. In the story of Japan’s political development, it thus represents a critical turning point of unusual significance.

SWAN SONG OF THE JAPANESE LIBERALS

The Minseito Cabinet of 1929-31 was liberal, but by no means radical. It was, in reality, a government of “big business.” Its liberalism stood out mainly in its moderate foreign policy, which contrasted sharply with Tanaka’s earlier aggressive moves. It was headed by distinguished leaders: Hamaguchi (Premier), Shidehara (Foreign Minister) and Inouye (Finance Minister).

This Cabinet labored, however, under a fatal handicap, similar to that which confronted President Hoover in our own country. For it entered office in July 1929, at the height of the post-war boom. The Wall Street crash, and the spreading world depression, immediately followed. The swift change in economic conditions during its period in office had much to do with its final overthrow.

Hamaguchi and his Cabinet aides began with a great victory on the issue of the London Naval Treaty of 1930. This treaty extended limitations to cruisers and destroyers, as well as capital ships. The army and navy die-hards opposed it bitterly. The people and the press supported the Cabinet’s fight for it. On October 1, 1930 the Privy Council ratified the treaty. The Cabinet and the people had won.

For the moment it seemed as if the Cabinet had brought the army and navy under control. Real democracy seemed possible. But the triumph was short-lived. It was the swan song of parliamentary government in Japan. In November 1930 Premier Hamaguchi was shot by an assassin; eight months later he died from his wounds. His loss seriously weakened the Cabinet, and cut down its chance of success on new issues which were developing.

THE DEPRESSION STRIKES JAPAN

By the end of 1930 the depression had struck Japan with full force. It laid the Cabinet open to attack by the rising military-fascist forces.

The most serious consequences of the depression were felt in Japan’s foreign trade. In 1929 Japan’s export-import trade stood at 4,365 million yen. In 1930 it fell to 3,016 million, and in 1931 to 2,383 million. In two years Japan’s trade was cut nearly in half. Even at that period, few Western countries suffered such a rapid and severe contraction of their foreign trade.

The effects of this decline on Japan’s economy were catastrophic. Agriculture and industry were both hard hit. The income from rice and silk declined until there was actual famine in some rural districts. Industrial unemployment mounted to three million, higher than ever before in Japan. The middle-class professionals and wage-earners suffered wage cuts, or were thrown out of work. There was general social unrest, and Marxist doctrines won a wide acceptance. Strikes in industry, and tenant conflicts in rural areas, became commonplace.

In the light of these conditions, the weaknesses of Japan’s economy stood out in bold relief. Fully half the home market consisted of poverty-stricken peasants. To put the rural population back on its feet and enable it to buy the products of industry, drastic social reforms, such as rent reductions and debt moratoria for the farmers, were obviously needed. Neither the landowners nor the great business houses were prepared to embark on such a “new deal.” The army had a different solution--aggressive expansion abroad and military-fascist repression at home.

This army program led to a finish fight with the Minseito Cabinet. And the army leaders fought--and won--their campaign in Manchuria.

THE ARMY STRIKES IN MANCHURIA

The Minseito Cabinet had been trying to pursue a “friendly policy” toward China. Baron Shidehara, the Foreign Minister, wanted friendly relations with all countries. In this way he sought to foster Japan’s foreign trade, and thus solve Japan’s economic problems. But he could not control the army, especially after the depression had cut down trade and brought unrest to Japan.

During the summer of 1931 a series of “incidents” occurred in Manchuria, in which the hand of the military was plainly to be seen. At home in Japan the army used these incidents to arouse popular support for “positive” action in defense of supposedly threatened Japanese interests. General Minami, new War Minister in the Cabinet, openly supported this propaganda campaign. Baron Shidehara attempted to reach a peaceful settlement of the Manchurian issues. But in vain. On September 18, 1931--the historic date we mentioned at the beginning of this book--the army struck in Manchuria. The “Mukden incident”--alleged blowing up of a section of the South Manchuria Railway track--served as an excuse for the Japanese army to occupy the chief Manchurian cities.

This independent _coup d’état_ by the army dealt a fatal blow to the Minseito Cabinet. Baron Shidehara was forced into the position of apologizing for the army’s actions, though he must have heartily detested them. On December 11, 1931 the Cabinet resigned.

XI. The Shadow Deepens

The fall of the Minseito Cabinet marked the end of an era. The crisis of 1930-31 had unleashed new forces. And these forces were destined to mold Japan’s policy in the decade that followed.

At their head was the army. Not _all_ of the army leaders, however. At times the “army extremists” seemed to be only a small minority. Their power rose and fell. Yet they took command of Japan’s foreign policy, and gained more and more control over her domestic policy. And as time passed, their outlook was increasingly stamped on the army as a whole.

THE ARMY EXTREMISTS

Who were the army extremists? Names are not important, except as labels of a whole group. There has been no outstanding fascist leader in Japan, such as Mussolini in Italy or Hitler in Germany. It is enough for us to note that, in the 1930-32 period, the high army leadership centered in three generals--Araki, Muto and Mazaki. This trio was supported by a powerful group of “young officers,” such as Doihara and Itagaki, who have since become ranking generals.

These men were not from the old clan aristocracy. They came mostly from the lesser clans, or from the middle classes in town and village. They knew at first hand the sufferings of the farmers and the small tradesmen. Like Mussolini and Hitler, they claimed to be the friend of the common man. They bitterly denounced the “corrupt alliance” of the political parties and the capitalists.

All this was part of their fight for political control at home. They wanted a “national socialist” reformation in Japan. By this they meant that the army, under the Emperor, should run the government. They wanted the political parties suppressed and industry run by the state--all, as they said, for the benefit of the common man.

On the home front, the army extremists have had little success. None of their glowing promises of economic “reforms” has been carried out. In the foreign field, however, their program has been largely adopted. We must now see what their aims in foreign policy were.

THE DEMAND FOR “LIVING SPACE”

At the heart of the military-fascist program in Japan, just as in Germany and Italy, lay a demand for territorial expansion. The army extremists made careful plans for a series of bold moves. First, Manchuria and Mongolia were to be conquered, then China, then the rest of Asia. In the past decade we have seen this seemingly wild and visionary program translated into reality to an extraordinary degree. In fact, the actual course of Japan’s foreign policy has followed it very closely.

With territorial expansion was linked an economic idea--that of regional self-sufficiency, or the “bloc economy.” In 1931, Manchuria was called Japan’s “economic life-line.” In 1932-33 the watchword was the “Japan-Manchoukuo economic bloc.” After 1937 the demand was for a “Japan-China-Manchoukuo bloc.” Finally, the slogan today is for a “Greater East Asia,” to include the rich territories of Indo-China, Malaya, the East Indies and the Philippines.

What the army leaders were chiefly seeking through this program was to overcome Japan’s dependence on the international market. They were proposing a basic alternative to Shidehara’s plan for the peaceful development of international trade. In 1930-31 they had seen Japan’s foreign trade suddenly collapse, plunging the country into an economic crisis. They were determined that this should not happen again. The answer, they felt, lay in extending Japan’s political control over a vast region. The markets and raw materials of such an area, they thought, would make Japan economically independent of the rest of the world.

WEIGHTING THE SCALES

The army extremists were not the only ones to share these views. They had supporters in the bureaucracy, even in the highest positions. Many naval officers also supported them, although the navy as a whole was more conservative than the army. And, despite their anti-capitalist propaganda, they had close relations with some business groups who hoped to profit from the expansion program.

Though the military-fascist leaders did not succeed in organizing a unified mass fascist party, they wielded extraordinary powers. They influenced public opinion through the Ex-Servicemen’s Association, with its three million members. They also had a host of reactionary societies to work through. Some of them were dignified patriotic societies, with members from the highest ranks of Japanese society. Others went in for espionage, strike-breaking, or outright terrorism. Finally, the army had its special powers under the Constitution, such as dictating the choice of War Minister, and going direct to the Emperor over the head of the Premier.

To all these powers the extremists now added two special techniques and used them for all they were worth. One was resorting directly to military action, without waiting for authorization from the Cabinet. Underlings in the field could plot “incidents” which committed their superior officers and the government to certain courses of action. The Manchurian occupation was largely brought about in this way.

The second technique was terrorism, or direct action, against political opponents at home. Public opinion in Japan does not automatically condemn assassination, especially if it appears to have been inspired by patriotic or disinterested motives. The list of distinguished Japanese who have been assassinated is very long--Okubo, Ito, Hara (the first commoner to become Premier), Hamaguchi, to mention a few. Since 1931 many others have been added to this list, and their deaths have all helped the military-fascists to rise to power.

AGAINST THE ARMY?

On the surface it has often seemed that the capitalists were the chief opponents of the army extremists in the political struggle of the past decade. This is only partly true. These two groups have been the strongest political forces in Japan. They have both sought to win the bureaucrats and public opinion to their side. On the other hand, they are in agreement on many points.

For the capitalists, as well as the military, are interested in territorial expansion, and have taken advantage of its results in China. Many of them favored the Manchurian invasion, because they saw that it would give the widespread social discontent in Japan a safe outlet. But at the same time, the capitalists tend to be more cautious than the army leaders in foreign policy. They do not want to take risks, or to plunge recklessly into a big war if the chances of success are slight.