Kwantung Leased Territory
Kwantung Leased Territory | |||||||||
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1905–1945 | |||||||||
Flag
(1905–1945) | |||||||||
Anthem:
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Status | Leased territory (colony) of the Empire of Japan | ||||||||
Capital | Dalian | ||||||||
Governor | |||||||||
• 1905–1912 (first) | Ōshima Yoshimasa | ||||||||
• 1944–1945 (last) | Otozō Yamada | ||||||||
Historical era | Empire of Japan World War II | ||||||||
17 April 1895 | |||||||||
23 April 1895 | |||||||||
5 September 1905 | |||||||||
2 September 1945 | |||||||||
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Today part of |
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Kwantung Leased Territory | |||||||||
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Chinese name | |||||||||
Traditional Chinese | |||||||||
Simplified Chinese | 关东 | ||||||||
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Japanese name | |||||||||
Kanji | |||||||||
Kana | かんとうしゅう | ||||||||
Shinjitai | |||||||||
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The Kwantung Leased Territory (traditional Chinese and Japanese:
Japan first acquired Kwantung from the Qing Empire in perpetuity in 1895 in the Treaty of Shimonoseki after victory in the First Sino-Japanese War. Kwantung was located at the militarily and economically significant southern tip of the Liaodong Peninsula at the entrance of the Bohai Sea, and included the port city of Ryojun (Port Arthur/Lüshunkou). Japan lost Kwantung weeks later in the Triple Intervention and the Qing transferred the lease to the Russian Empire in 1898, who governed the territory as Russian Dalian and rapidly developed infrastructure and the city of Dairen (Dalniy/Dalian). Japan re-acquired the Kwantung lease from Russia in 1905 in the Treaty of Portsmouth after victory in the Russo-Japanese War, continued to rapidly develop the territory, and obtained extraterritorial rights known as the South Manchuria Railway Zone. Japan extended the lease with the Republic of China in the Twenty-One Demands and used Kwantung as a base to launch the Second Sino-Japanese War. The Kwantung Leased Territory ceased to exist following the Surrender of Japan in World War II in September 1945 when the Soviet Red Army began to administer the region until Kwantung and the Lüshun base was handed over to the People's Republic of China on 16 April 1955.
Etymology[edit]
The name "Kwantung" (traditional Chinese:
In Japanese, Kwantung is pronounced Kantō and it is often referred to as Kantō-shū to avoid confusion with the Kantō region surrounding the capital Tokyo.
History[edit]
In Qing dynasty China, the Liaodong Peninsula (simplified Chinese: 辽东
The Empire of Japan occupied the region during the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895), and under the terms of the Treaty of Shimonoseki signed by Japan and China ending the war in April 1895, Japan gained full sovereignty of the area. However, within weeks, Germany, France and Russia pressured Japan to cede the territory back to China, in what was called the Triple Intervention.[1]
In December 1897, Russian naval vessels entered Lüshunkou harbor, which they began to use as a forward base of operations for patrols off of northern China, Korea and in the Sea of Japan. The Russian Empire renamed the harbor Port Arthur. In March 1898 Russia formally leased the region for 25 years from China. The leased area extended to the northern shore of Yadang Bay on the western side of the peninsula; on the eastern side it reached Pikou; Yevgeni Ivanovich Alekseyev, chief of Russian Pacific Fleet, became the head of this territory. The peninsula north of the lease was made a neutral territory in which China agreed not to offer concessions to other countries. In 1899, Russia founded the town of Dalniy (meaning "distant" or "remote"), just north of the naval base at Port Arthur. This would later become the city of Dalian (Dairen).
In 1898 Russia began building a railroad north from Port Arthur to link Dalniy with the Chinese Eastern Railway at Harbin; this spur line was the South Manchurian Railway.
Under the Portsmouth Treaty (1905) resulting from the Russo-Japanese War, Japan replaced Russia as leaseholder. Port Arthur was renamed Ryojun (
Japan established the Kwantung Governor-general (
After the foundation of Japanese-controlled Manchukuo in 1932, Japan regarded the sovereignty of the leased territory as transferred from China to Manchukuo. A new lease agreement was contracted between Japan and the government of Manchukuo, and Japan transferred the South Manchurian Railway Zone to Manchukuo. However, Japan retained the Kwantung Leased Territory as a territory apart from the nominally-independent Manchukuo until its surrender at the end of World War II in 1945.
After World War II, the Soviet Union occupied the territory and the Soviet Navy made use of the Ryojun Naval Base. The Soviet Union turned it over to the People's Republic of China in 1955.
Administration[edit]
In a reorganization of 1919, the Kwantung Garrison was renamed the Kwantung Army and separated from the civilian administration of the territory, which was designated the Kwantung Bureau (
Economy[edit]
Massive capital investment was concentrated in Dairen (now the capital of the territory), wherein Japanese firms developed a significant industrial infrastructure, as well as creating a first class port out of the mediocre natural harbor. The facilities of the port at Dairen and its free trade port status made it the principal trade gateway to northeast China. The South Manchurian Railway Company was headquartered in Dairen, and some of the profits from its operation were channelled into transforming Dairen into a showcase city of modern city planning and modern architecture, with hospitals, universities and a large industrial zone.[4]
Demographics[edit]
In the Japanese national census of 1935, the population of the Kwantung Leased Territory was 1,034,074, of whom 168,185 were Japanese nationals. The numbers excluded military personnel. The area of the territory was 3,500 square kilometres (1,350 sq mi).
Governors[edit]
# | Name | From | To |
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1 | General Baron Yoshimasa Ōshima ( |
10 October 1905 | 26 April 1912 |
2 | Lieutenant General Yasumasa Fukushima ( |
26 April 1912 | 15 September 1914 |
3 | Lieutenant General Akira Nakamura ( |
15 September 1914 | 31 July 1917 |
4 | Lieutenant General Yujiro Nakamura ( |
31 July 1917 | 12 April 1919 |
5 | Gonsuke Hayashi ( |
12 April 1919 | 24 May 1920 |
6 | Isaburo Yamagata ( |
24 May 1920 | 8 September 1922 |
7 | Ijuin Hikokichi ( |
8 September 1922 | 19 September 1923 |
8 | Hideo Kodama ( |
26 September 1923 | 17 December 1927 |
9 | Kenjiro Kinoshita ( |
17 December 1927 | 17 August 1929 |
10 | Masahiro Ōta ( |
17 August 1929 | 16 January 1931 |
11 | Seiji Tsukamoto ( |
16 January 1931 | 11 January 1932 |
12 | Mannosuke Yamaoka ( |
11 January 1932 | 8 August 1932 |
13 | General Nobuyoshi Mutō ( |
8 August 1932 | 28 July 1933 |
14 | General Takashi Hishikari ( |
28 July 1933 | 10 December 1934 |
15 | General Jirō Minami ( |
10 December 1934 | 6 March 1936 |
16 | General Kenkichi Ueda ( |
6 March 1936 | 7 September 1939 |
17 | General Yoshijirō Umezu ( |
7 September 1939 | 18 July 1944 |
18 | General Otozō Yamada ( |
18 July 1944 | 28 August 1945 |
See also[edit]
- China–Japan relations
- Japanese colonial empire
- South Manchuria Railway
- Manchukuo
- Russian Dalian
- Russo-Japanese War
- Ryojun Guard District
Notes[edit]
References[edit]
- Coox, Alvin (1990). Nomonhan: Japan Against Russia, 1939. Stanford University Press. ISBN 0-8047-1835-0.
- Hsu, Immanuel C.Y. (1999). The Rise of Modern China. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-512504-5.
- Low, Morris (2005). Building a Modern Japan: Science, Technology, and Medicine in the Meiji Era and Beyond. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 1-4039-6832-2.
- Quigley, Harold S (2007) [1932]. Japanese Government and Politics. Thomson Press. ISBN 978-1-4067-2260-4.
- Young, Louise (1999). Japan's Total Empire: Manchuria and the Culture of Wartime Imperialism. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-21934-1.
- Young, C. Walter. The International Legal Status of the Kwantung Leased Territory (1931) online
- Kwantung Leased Territory
- Concessions in China
- Former Japanese colonies
- History of Liaoning
- Foreign relations of the Qing dynasty
- History of Manchuria
- Bohai Sea
- Yellow Sea
- 1895 establishments in China
- 1945 disestablishments in China
- 1895 establishments in the Japanese colonial empire
- 1945 disestablishments in the Japanese colonial empire
- China–Japan relations
- States and territories established in 1895