Here is the revised update
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Making Modern Asia. By 毛泽东 (Mao Zedong)
Beijing University Press, Beijing. 1965
Translated by City By the Bay Publications, California. 1969
... With the creation of the Anglo-Russo Defensive Alliance and the Franco-Russian entente, the Sino-Nipponese War of 1895 looked to be increasingly for naught. Russian domination of the Manchuria and Chosen grew more and more solidified with each passing year. The Tartar Barbarians who governed Zhōnghuá [1] during this era seemed too passively accept the slow domination of Zhōnghuá by the Europeans. The seeds of discontent against the barbarian dynasty that ruled Zhōnghuá had begun to come to fruition as the decrepit dynasty hobbled from rebellion to rebellion, the heavily reactionary and conservative rule of the Manchu’s becoming more and more unstable…
Jutaro Komura, Nihon of Foreign Affairs.
…Today the Empire of Nihon is a close friend to Zhōnghuá, but as the Sino-Nipponese War showed Nihon was just as guilty of imperialism against Zhōnghuá as the western powers. Though their advance into Manchuria and Chosen had been halted by the Anglo-Russian defensive alliance this did not put an end to their ambitions in Zhōnghuá. Nihon interests already held much sway in Fujian province and upon being denied a path into China through Manchuria the jingoists and industrialists looked south to expand its influence and strength in the south. As the Russian barbarians grew more powerful in the north deciding not to pull out their troops after who had been sent to quell the Boxer Rebellion Nihon began to politically bully the Qing government over the loss of their economic interests in northern Zhōnghuá. The Nihon secretary of Foreign Affairs, Jutaro Komura negotiated with the Qing government the leasing of the Fujian port city of Quanzhou in 1903. This move by Nihon frightened the British who already held sway in the two largest Fujian ports and feared growing Nihon competition in the region.
The British fear of Nihon aggression was misguided as political figures like Jutaro Komura knew full well that a war between Nihon, Russia, and Britain would lead to a great defeat and the undoing of all that the Meiji Restoration had worked for. The attention of Nihon’s jingoists turned increasingly towards the Philippines which for some time had existed in a state of rebellion. Tension between Spain and Nihon had grown considerably after the discovery in 1904 that a number of Nihon industrialists had been supplying Filipino revolutionaries with money and guns as well as reports of Secretary Komura meeting with Filipino revolutionary Miguel Malvar, discussing the matter of recognition of the Philippine Republic in 1905. Tension between the two powers continued to grow and the Nihon jingoists were further pushed towards taking action against Spain as Nihon-American relations increase. Governed by its Nihonophile President, Theodore Roosevelt, the United States and Japan came together over matter in Zhōnghuá based on their mutual desire for the survival of the ‘open door policy’ and their interests in keeping Zhōnghuá from being carved up by Russia and Britain. American expansionists had discussed with Germany the prospects of partitioning the Spanish Empire, but while the idea was well received by a number of German officials nothing had come of it. When the United States approached Nihon with the same prospects of partitioning the Spanish Empire, with Nihon establishing a friendly state in the Philippines or making it a colony with and a single American port as a coaling station, many in Nihon’s government eagerly looked at the opportunity that this would make. Unfortunately political matters in America’s Pacific coast state of California threatened to upset the unofficial alliance between America and Nihon. On March 1, 1905 a resolution was introduced into the California state legislature which called upon the Californian delegation in Congress to make representation to the Secretary of State and the President urging the limitation of Nihon immigration. The resolution, which called Nihon immigrants “immoral, intemperate, quarrelsome men bound to labor for pittance,” was passed unanimously by both houses of the legislature. Then on May 7th of that same year a mass meeting was held in San Francisco at which the “Japanese Korean Exclusion League” was launched. George Kennan said to the President “No proud and high spirited people will submit to such classification as that which the California Legislature has foisted upon them”. Indeed the American President agreed and would later describe his embarrassment at the foolish and offensive resolution in his autobiography. After the flare up of the anti-Nihon feelings in the summer of 1905 they would subside until April of 1906. In the months after the terrible earthquake that devastated San Francisco there occurred almost three hundred cases on Nihon immigrants. One such attack was against Professor T. Nakamura of the Imperial University of Tokyo. The anti-Nihon sentiment would only from more after the killing of five Nihon seal poachers. In Nihon the incident went largely unnoticed but in the US the media played up the barbarity of the Nihon poachers. In August of 1906 the Exclusion League renewed its call to segregate Nihon Children from “White” schools. The San Francisco School board would pass the resolution that would lead to the Nipponese-American Crisis. News of the school boards resolution soon reached Nihon and by late October the Nihon people were beginning to show great concern. Many of Nihon’s more jingoist papers called for war. Fortunately the Jingoist feelings of the press did not represent the majority of the Nihon people. Government owned papers stated that the voice of the Pacific coast peoples of the United States did not represent the voice of the entire US and that President Roosevelt was a great statesman and friend of Nihon and the issue would be solved without damaging the relationship between the two states…
…Roosevelt did not believe war would come at the moment, but he knew that the crisis was serious and, if not resolved, would become infinitely worse. While doing everything to work towards peace he began to prepare for war, first asking Acting Secretary of the navy Truman Newberry for a comparison of the American and Nihon fleets. The General board showed that in the event of war the United States held forty to twelve preponderance. The figures must have been reassuring to Roosevelt…
…Senator Eugene Hale, chairman of the Senate Committee on naval Affairs, who had been leading the charge against the construction of Leviathans became more inclined to support the construction of the ships and in late October and when asked by Roosevelt and Lieutenant Commander William S. Sims agreed to support the construction of two more Leviathan-class ships…
…The Nihon press was reflecting a quieter attitude than its American counterpart and believed in the sincerity of President Roosevelt. And while the two governments worked for peace it seemed the people of the Pacific coast were bent on driving Nihon and the United States to war. Even as the San Francisco School board refused to back down the President stated he would use all the forces in his power to protect the Nihon people. On January 8th of 1907 several Nihon nationals, reporters covering the Filipino insurrection, were shot by Spanish solders for “assisting rebel elements”…
Japanese Troops waiting for orders
… The Nihon government was outraged by the act perpetrated by the Spanish and recognized moved to recognize the republican government of the Philippines as well as blockade the archipelago. American president Roosevelt saw the opportunity to launch a political coup that would bring together the United States and Nihon, create a climate that would direct the American people’s jingoist attitude away from Nihon, and create the casus belli for a military expulsion of Spain’s presence from the Caribbean. Recognizing the Philippine Republic and offering to mediate a peaceful end to the war, the American President’s actions shook Spain whose hold on Cuba was once again being challenged by Cuban revolutionaries. The Spanish government declared war on Nihon and the United States. With the Spanish declaration of war Admiral Patricio Montojo y Pasarón moved to break the blockade only to be caught by Admiral Heihachiro Togo and Vice Admiral Shigeto Dewa. The decisive battle saw the defeat of the Spanish naval force and the opening of the archipelago to invasion by Nihon. Nihon began its invasion with a landing on Batan Island. Landings on Camiguin Island and at Vigan, Aparri, and Gonzaga in northern Luzon followed two days later. A Nihon invasion force landed 2,500 men of the 16th Division at Legazpi on southern Luzon. The Nihon forces smashed the Spanish forces that opposed them and secured Luzon and soon pushed to capture the rest of the archipelago. Though there were some calls in Spain to send the Caribbean fleet to try and face the Nihon fleet the fell on deaf ears. After a brief two month war Spain came to the peace table and recognized the Philippine Republic as well as the American conquest of Cuba (though the matter or Puerto Rico was still up in the air). As part of the treaty the government of the Republic was forced to sign the treaty which though proclaiming its independence made it a de facto protectorate of Nihon. The three articles of the treaty that guaranteed this are as followed.
Article 1.
-The Philippines Government shall engage as financial adviser to the Philippines Government a Nihon subject recommended by the Government of Nihon, and all matters concerning finance shall be dealt with after his counsel has been taken
Article 2.
- The Philippines Government shall engage as a diplomatic adviser to the Department of Foreign Affairs a foreigner recommended by the Government of Nihon, and all important matters concerning foreign relations shall be dealt with after his counsel has been taken
Article 3.
- The Philippines Government shall consult the Government of Nihon previous to concluding Treaties or Conventions with foreign Powers, and in dealing with other important diplomatic affairs such as granting of concessions to or contracts with foreigners.
The swift victory by Nihon only made the situation with the United States worse as Jingoists used it as an example of Nihon’s might. Nihon press agitation…
… Following just months after the crisis between Nihon and the United States riots broke out in Vancouver. The American President is noted for laughing at Britain’s quagmire, for Britain had spoken with a great deal of condescension towards the United States in the matter that had nearly brought it to war…
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A Fight to the Finish: America’s Imperial Ambitions. By Newton Leroy McPherson
Havana Books, Havana, January 1993
Spanish Prime Minister Camilo de Polavieja
…As “Yellow Journalism” threatened to plunge the United States and the Empire of Japan into war a godsend seemed to arise in January of 1907. The death of several Japanese citizens at the hands of Spanish troops in the Philippines enraged the Japanese people and offered the Japanese government with a target that they were happy to see the jingoist papers attack. The Japanese government recognized the Philippine Republic as well as initiating a blockade of the archipelago. President Roosevelt, who had long looked for a way to excise the Spanish from the Caribbean as a way to affirm the Rooseveltian Monroe Doctrine, recognized the Philippine Republic and offered mediation of the conflict to determine what would happen to Spanish Guam. When the Spanish government was faced with this proposition and with American interference in the internal governance of a Spanish colony they chose to declare war on the United States with Japan, more out of fear of a military coup than out of any interest to go to war with the two rising powers. The American Caribbean Fleet outnumbered and outclassed the Spanish naval force, at the Battle of Santiago de Cuba USS Leviathan and USS Goliath were able to fire on the Spanish vessels far out of the range of the Spanish land based guns that the Spanish had used as protection. The greatest irony of the naval war between the United States and Spain was that it did not have to be this way. The Spanish could have saved their navy but instead moved to have it destroyed as soon as possible. This was a calculated move by liberal Spanish Prime Minister Camilo de Polavieja (I use liberal in the loosest fashion, the man was barbaric to Cuban and Filipino revolutionaries during his time as Governor of Cuba and Governor-General of the Philippines). The war needed to be ended as quickly as possible if Polavieja’s coalition government of political reformers was to survive without being deposed by a military coup that would drag the war out for months and result in nothing less than the destruction of Spanish trade and the needles death of thousands of Spanish solders. The government wanted peace but feared it, hesitating 'like the man who ponders while waiting to be executed'. The destruction of the navy in the Caribbean and in the Far East by the Japanese, along with the early fall of the Philippines gave Polavieja the political leverage to bring Spain to the negotiating table and end the war before the army could take power. The Spanish approached Kaiser Wilhelm II to mediate the peace talks. German industrialists feared the economic impact on the German sugar market if the United States gained a hold on both Cuba and Puerto Rico, and many German militarists had great ambitions towards the Philippines. Alas even with his position as mediator Japan’s resounding victory in the east and occupation of Spain’s Pacific holdings left no room for him to try and wrangle them away. In the Caribbean though, the Kaiser as in the position to try pressure the United States into acknowledging Spanish control over the Puerto Rico. Roosevelt while a fan of the Kaiser did not appreciate his attempts to try and keep Puerto Rico out of the dominion of the United States. The Kaiser could not deny that the United States held uncontested control over the waves and after a number of his fficials told him it would not be wise to alienate the United States over the issue of Puerto Rico he chose to come down on the side of the United States when it came to the matter of Puerto Rico. With that matter settled the Treaty of Berlin was signed and Spain ceded Cuba and Puerto Rico to the United States and relinquished sovereignty over the Philippines.
The United States and its new Caribbean empire began their long and convoluted relationship. Though the Cubans had fought two failed wars of independence against Spain and had staged a third insurrection in 1906 it was deemed that they could not be self governing. In 1908, the Foraker Act gave Puerto Rico and Cuba a certain amount of civilian popular government, including a popularly elected House of Representatives, a judicial system following the American legal system that included both state courts and federal courts establishing Cuban and Puerto Rican Supreme Courts, their own United State District Courts; and a non-voting member of Congress for each, by the title of "Resident Commissioner"…
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Making Modern Asia. By 毛泽东 (Mao Zedong)
Beijing University Press, Beijing. 1965
Translated by City By the Bay Publications, California. 1969
…While Nihon fought wars and balanced relationships that would affect its future the Middle Kingdom shook off the yoke of the Manchu dynasty that had ruled it for so long. In August of 1907 the “accidental revolution” that would spell the end of Qing domination did not start as some grand uprising to overthrow the government, but rather as a protest against heavy taxation from the government. The revolutionaries besieged and unexpectedly captured the city of Qinzhou. From there the revolution spread across southern Zhōnghuá. Rebellion broke out in the city of Guangzhou and the city fell to revolutionary forces that were supported by a mutinying New Army soon to be followed by revolution in Anhui and Yunnan provinces. After the success of these initial uprisings the revolution spread just a few days after the fall of Guangzhou to revolutionary forces the New Army and revolutionaries captured the city of Changsha in Hunan province and deposed the local imperial general. On the same day Shaanxi's Tongmenghui, led by Jing Dingcheng, Qian ding, Jing Wumu and Gelaohui launched an uprising and captured Xi'an after two days of struggle. Ma Anliang fought bitterly against the revolutionaries, but after word of the death of the Emperor and the flight of the Empress to Russian occupied Manchuria in November reached him his hand was forced and Ma agreed to join the new Republic…
…In October Nanching had fallen into the hands of the New Army not long after this Shanghai was captured soon to be followed by Hangzhou. The revolution continued to grow until almost all of Zhōnghuá lay in the hands of the revolutionaries. As the majority of Zhōnghuá became part of the provisional Republic Tibet, Mongolia, and Manchuria asserted their Independence, the latter two with help from Russia. Russian support of the Khanate of Mongolia and the Empire of Mǎnzhōuguó outraged the outside world especially Germany, Nihon, and the United States who felt that the creation of Mǎnzhōuguó was a direct violation of the “open door policy”. Russia argued that it was not creating a puppet state as President Roosevelt had asserted and that Mǎnzhōuguó was purely as haven of Manchu loyalists and a hold out against the revolution throughout Zhōnghuá. Nihon and Russia came very near to war over the issue, but when it became apparent that even Russia’s allies (France, and Great Britain) were against Russian support of the Manchu state the Russians agreed to pull out their troops, being sure to leave weapons with the Manchu in hopes that the Manchu would be able to fight off any advance made against them. The Manchu military fought off an invasion by the New Army that resulted in the death of Yuan Shikai. The political turmoil that existed after the death of Yuan Shikai resulted in the necessity to stabilize the Republican government and gave Mǎnzhōuguó time to defend itself and consolidate itself…
… After Yuan’s death, it was obvious to his more conservative followers and Sun Yat-sen and his Republicans that if a suitable agreement was not made on who would be his successor, the two factions would come to blows, perhaps sparking civil war. Yuan’s supporters would not allow a Republican like Sun or Huang Xing to become president of the fragile republic. The threat of internal fighting within the New Army faction made it impossible unlikely that any of the leaders within would support one over the other and so an outsider was needed to garner support from both side; this where Liang Qichao entered the scene. Liang Qichao had been a reformist and even though he was close to the Republicans he was himself a supporter of a constitutional monarchy. Liang did not seek to be president himself, and it’s likely that the New Army Faction would not have supported him, instead he put forward that his mentor Kang Youwei, leader of the reformists during the “Hundred Day Reforms”. It was agreed upon that Kang was a suitable choice for president, mostly because he wetted the appetite of most, though not fully satisfying all. For almost three months the Republic hobbled precariously until the constitutional convention. At this point it became quite obvious that neither Kang or Liang were going to continue to support the Republic and that they were in fact moving to institute a constitution much like that of Nihon. There was an attempt by Sun to reignite the revolution to prevent this from occurring, but without the broad support of the New Army this turned into a few minor uprisings that were quick to dissipate, thus forcing Sun to flee. And so on March 20th 1908, Kang, with support of those still at the constitutional convention, declared himself the Anbang Emperor and the founder of the Lien (lotus) Dynasty. At the conventions end a German style constitution was approved and signed into being...
…The German Kaiser, the Nihon Emperor, and the American President universally recognized the new Dynasty hoping to gain a new ally against Russia and Great Britain. American, Nihon, and German investors and industrialists nourished the new dynasty assisting it with centralization and reorganization of the armed forces. The world would quake for the sleeping dragon had awoken and with the aid of the Imperial and Bald eagles would assert itself once again against its enemies…
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[1]: literally meaning Chinese Nation
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Making Modern Asia. By 毛泽东 (Mao Zedong)
Beijing University Press, Beijing. 1965
Translated by City By the Bay Publications, California. 1969
... With the creation of the Anglo-Russo Defensive Alliance and the Franco-Russian entente, the Sino-Nipponese War of 1895 looked to be increasingly for naught. Russian domination of the Manchuria and Chosen grew more and more solidified with each passing year. The Tartar Barbarians who governed Zhōnghuá [1] during this era seemed too passively accept the slow domination of Zhōnghuá by the Europeans. The seeds of discontent against the barbarian dynasty that ruled Zhōnghuá had begun to come to fruition as the decrepit dynasty hobbled from rebellion to rebellion, the heavily reactionary and conservative rule of the Manchu’s becoming more and more unstable…
Jutaro Komura, Nihon of Foreign Affairs.
…Today the Empire of Nihon is a close friend to Zhōnghuá, but as the Sino-Nipponese War showed Nihon was just as guilty of imperialism against Zhōnghuá as the western powers. Though their advance into Manchuria and Chosen had been halted by the Anglo-Russian defensive alliance this did not put an end to their ambitions in Zhōnghuá. Nihon interests already held much sway in Fujian province and upon being denied a path into China through Manchuria the jingoists and industrialists looked south to expand its influence and strength in the south. As the Russian barbarians grew more powerful in the north deciding not to pull out their troops after who had been sent to quell the Boxer Rebellion Nihon began to politically bully the Qing government over the loss of their economic interests in northern Zhōnghuá. The Nihon secretary of Foreign Affairs, Jutaro Komura negotiated with the Qing government the leasing of the Fujian port city of Quanzhou in 1903. This move by Nihon frightened the British who already held sway in the two largest Fujian ports and feared growing Nihon competition in the region.
The British fear of Nihon aggression was misguided as political figures like Jutaro Komura knew full well that a war between Nihon, Russia, and Britain would lead to a great defeat and the undoing of all that the Meiji Restoration had worked for. The attention of Nihon’s jingoists turned increasingly towards the Philippines which for some time had existed in a state of rebellion. Tension between Spain and Nihon had grown considerably after the discovery in 1904 that a number of Nihon industrialists had been supplying Filipino revolutionaries with money and guns as well as reports of Secretary Komura meeting with Filipino revolutionary Miguel Malvar, discussing the matter of recognition of the Philippine Republic in 1905. Tension between the two powers continued to grow and the Nihon jingoists were further pushed towards taking action against Spain as Nihon-American relations increase. Governed by its Nihonophile President, Theodore Roosevelt, the United States and Japan came together over matter in Zhōnghuá based on their mutual desire for the survival of the ‘open door policy’ and their interests in keeping Zhōnghuá from being carved up by Russia and Britain. American expansionists had discussed with Germany the prospects of partitioning the Spanish Empire, but while the idea was well received by a number of German officials nothing had come of it. When the United States approached Nihon with the same prospects of partitioning the Spanish Empire, with Nihon establishing a friendly state in the Philippines or making it a colony with and a single American port as a coaling station, many in Nihon’s government eagerly looked at the opportunity that this would make. Unfortunately political matters in America’s Pacific coast state of California threatened to upset the unofficial alliance between America and Nihon. On March 1, 1905 a resolution was introduced into the California state legislature which called upon the Californian delegation in Congress to make representation to the Secretary of State and the President urging the limitation of Nihon immigration. The resolution, which called Nihon immigrants “immoral, intemperate, quarrelsome men bound to labor for pittance,” was passed unanimously by both houses of the legislature. Then on May 7th of that same year a mass meeting was held in San Francisco at which the “Japanese Korean Exclusion League” was launched. George Kennan said to the President “No proud and high spirited people will submit to such classification as that which the California Legislature has foisted upon them”. Indeed the American President agreed and would later describe his embarrassment at the foolish and offensive resolution in his autobiography. After the flare up of the anti-Nihon feelings in the summer of 1905 they would subside until April of 1906. In the months after the terrible earthquake that devastated San Francisco there occurred almost three hundred cases on Nihon immigrants. One such attack was against Professor T. Nakamura of the Imperial University of Tokyo. The anti-Nihon sentiment would only from more after the killing of five Nihon seal poachers. In Nihon the incident went largely unnoticed but in the US the media played up the barbarity of the Nihon poachers. In August of 1906 the Exclusion League renewed its call to segregate Nihon Children from “White” schools. The San Francisco School board would pass the resolution that would lead to the Nipponese-American Crisis. News of the school boards resolution soon reached Nihon and by late October the Nihon people were beginning to show great concern. Many of Nihon’s more jingoist papers called for war. Fortunately the Jingoist feelings of the press did not represent the majority of the Nihon people. Government owned papers stated that the voice of the Pacific coast peoples of the United States did not represent the voice of the entire US and that President Roosevelt was a great statesman and friend of Nihon and the issue would be solved without damaging the relationship between the two states…
…Roosevelt did not believe war would come at the moment, but he knew that the crisis was serious and, if not resolved, would become infinitely worse. While doing everything to work towards peace he began to prepare for war, first asking Acting Secretary of the navy Truman Newberry for a comparison of the American and Nihon fleets. The General board showed that in the event of war the United States held forty to twelve preponderance. The figures must have been reassuring to Roosevelt…
…Senator Eugene Hale, chairman of the Senate Committee on naval Affairs, who had been leading the charge against the construction of Leviathans became more inclined to support the construction of the ships and in late October and when asked by Roosevelt and Lieutenant Commander William S. Sims agreed to support the construction of two more Leviathan-class ships…
…The Nihon press was reflecting a quieter attitude than its American counterpart and believed in the sincerity of President Roosevelt. And while the two governments worked for peace it seemed the people of the Pacific coast were bent on driving Nihon and the United States to war. Even as the San Francisco School board refused to back down the President stated he would use all the forces in his power to protect the Nihon people. On January 8th of 1907 several Nihon nationals, reporters covering the Filipino insurrection, were shot by Spanish solders for “assisting rebel elements”…
Japanese Troops waiting for orders
… The Nihon government was outraged by the act perpetrated by the Spanish and recognized moved to recognize the republican government of the Philippines as well as blockade the archipelago. American president Roosevelt saw the opportunity to launch a political coup that would bring together the United States and Nihon, create a climate that would direct the American people’s jingoist attitude away from Nihon, and create the casus belli for a military expulsion of Spain’s presence from the Caribbean. Recognizing the Philippine Republic and offering to mediate a peaceful end to the war, the American President’s actions shook Spain whose hold on Cuba was once again being challenged by Cuban revolutionaries. The Spanish government declared war on Nihon and the United States. With the Spanish declaration of war Admiral Patricio Montojo y Pasarón moved to break the blockade only to be caught by Admiral Heihachiro Togo and Vice Admiral Shigeto Dewa. The decisive battle saw the defeat of the Spanish naval force and the opening of the archipelago to invasion by Nihon. Nihon began its invasion with a landing on Batan Island. Landings on Camiguin Island and at Vigan, Aparri, and Gonzaga in northern Luzon followed two days later. A Nihon invasion force landed 2,500 men of the 16th Division at Legazpi on southern Luzon. The Nihon forces smashed the Spanish forces that opposed them and secured Luzon and soon pushed to capture the rest of the archipelago. Though there were some calls in Spain to send the Caribbean fleet to try and face the Nihon fleet the fell on deaf ears. After a brief two month war Spain came to the peace table and recognized the Philippine Republic as well as the American conquest of Cuba (though the matter or Puerto Rico was still up in the air). As part of the treaty the government of the Republic was forced to sign the treaty which though proclaiming its independence made it a de facto protectorate of Nihon. The three articles of the treaty that guaranteed this are as followed.
Article 1.
-The Philippines Government shall engage as financial adviser to the Philippines Government a Nihon subject recommended by the Government of Nihon, and all matters concerning finance shall be dealt with after his counsel has been taken
Article 2.
- The Philippines Government shall engage as a diplomatic adviser to the Department of Foreign Affairs a foreigner recommended by the Government of Nihon, and all important matters concerning foreign relations shall be dealt with after his counsel has been taken
Article 3.
- The Philippines Government shall consult the Government of Nihon previous to concluding Treaties or Conventions with foreign Powers, and in dealing with other important diplomatic affairs such as granting of concessions to or contracts with foreigners.
The swift victory by Nihon only made the situation with the United States worse as Jingoists used it as an example of Nihon’s might. Nihon press agitation…
… Following just months after the crisis between Nihon and the United States riots broke out in Vancouver. The American President is noted for laughing at Britain’s quagmire, for Britain had spoken with a great deal of condescension towards the United States in the matter that had nearly brought it to war…
--
A Fight to the Finish: America’s Imperial Ambitions. By Newton Leroy McPherson
Havana Books, Havana, January 1993
Spanish Prime Minister Camilo de Polavieja
…As “Yellow Journalism” threatened to plunge the United States and the Empire of Japan into war a godsend seemed to arise in January of 1907. The death of several Japanese citizens at the hands of Spanish troops in the Philippines enraged the Japanese people and offered the Japanese government with a target that they were happy to see the jingoist papers attack. The Japanese government recognized the Philippine Republic as well as initiating a blockade of the archipelago. President Roosevelt, who had long looked for a way to excise the Spanish from the Caribbean as a way to affirm the Rooseveltian Monroe Doctrine, recognized the Philippine Republic and offered mediation of the conflict to determine what would happen to Spanish Guam. When the Spanish government was faced with this proposition and with American interference in the internal governance of a Spanish colony they chose to declare war on the United States with Japan, more out of fear of a military coup than out of any interest to go to war with the two rising powers. The American Caribbean Fleet outnumbered and outclassed the Spanish naval force, at the Battle of Santiago de Cuba USS Leviathan and USS Goliath were able to fire on the Spanish vessels far out of the range of the Spanish land based guns that the Spanish had used as protection. The greatest irony of the naval war between the United States and Spain was that it did not have to be this way. The Spanish could have saved their navy but instead moved to have it destroyed as soon as possible. This was a calculated move by liberal Spanish Prime Minister Camilo de Polavieja (I use liberal in the loosest fashion, the man was barbaric to Cuban and Filipino revolutionaries during his time as Governor of Cuba and Governor-General of the Philippines). The war needed to be ended as quickly as possible if Polavieja’s coalition government of political reformers was to survive without being deposed by a military coup that would drag the war out for months and result in nothing less than the destruction of Spanish trade and the needles death of thousands of Spanish solders. The government wanted peace but feared it, hesitating 'like the man who ponders while waiting to be executed'. The destruction of the navy in the Caribbean and in the Far East by the Japanese, along with the early fall of the Philippines gave Polavieja the political leverage to bring Spain to the negotiating table and end the war before the army could take power. The Spanish approached Kaiser Wilhelm II to mediate the peace talks. German industrialists feared the economic impact on the German sugar market if the United States gained a hold on both Cuba and Puerto Rico, and many German militarists had great ambitions towards the Philippines. Alas even with his position as mediator Japan’s resounding victory in the east and occupation of Spain’s Pacific holdings left no room for him to try and wrangle them away. In the Caribbean though, the Kaiser as in the position to try pressure the United States into acknowledging Spanish control over the Puerto Rico. Roosevelt while a fan of the Kaiser did not appreciate his attempts to try and keep Puerto Rico out of the dominion of the United States. The Kaiser could not deny that the United States held uncontested control over the waves and after a number of his fficials told him it would not be wise to alienate the United States over the issue of Puerto Rico he chose to come down on the side of the United States when it came to the matter of Puerto Rico. With that matter settled the Treaty of Berlin was signed and Spain ceded Cuba and Puerto Rico to the United States and relinquished sovereignty over the Philippines.
The United States and its new Caribbean empire began their long and convoluted relationship. Though the Cubans had fought two failed wars of independence against Spain and had staged a third insurrection in 1906 it was deemed that they could not be self governing. In 1908, the Foraker Act gave Puerto Rico and Cuba a certain amount of civilian popular government, including a popularly elected House of Representatives, a judicial system following the American legal system that included both state courts and federal courts establishing Cuban and Puerto Rican Supreme Courts, their own United State District Courts; and a non-voting member of Congress for each, by the title of "Resident Commissioner"…
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Making Modern Asia. By 毛泽东 (Mao Zedong)
Beijing University Press, Beijing. 1965
Translated by City By the Bay Publications, California. 1969
…While Nihon fought wars and balanced relationships that would affect its future the Middle Kingdom shook off the yoke of the Manchu dynasty that had ruled it for so long. In August of 1907 the “accidental revolution” that would spell the end of Qing domination did not start as some grand uprising to overthrow the government, but rather as a protest against heavy taxation from the government. The revolutionaries besieged and unexpectedly captured the city of Qinzhou. From there the revolution spread across southern Zhōnghuá. Rebellion broke out in the city of Guangzhou and the city fell to revolutionary forces that were supported by a mutinying New Army soon to be followed by revolution in Anhui and Yunnan provinces. After the success of these initial uprisings the revolution spread just a few days after the fall of Guangzhou to revolutionary forces the New Army and revolutionaries captured the city of Changsha in Hunan province and deposed the local imperial general. On the same day Shaanxi's Tongmenghui, led by Jing Dingcheng, Qian ding, Jing Wumu and Gelaohui launched an uprising and captured Xi'an after two days of struggle. Ma Anliang fought bitterly against the revolutionaries, but after word of the death of the Emperor and the flight of the Empress to Russian occupied Manchuria in November reached him his hand was forced and Ma agreed to join the new Republic…
…In October Nanching had fallen into the hands of the New Army not long after this Shanghai was captured soon to be followed by Hangzhou. The revolution continued to grow until almost all of Zhōnghuá lay in the hands of the revolutionaries. As the majority of Zhōnghuá became part of the provisional Republic Tibet, Mongolia, and Manchuria asserted their Independence, the latter two with help from Russia. Russian support of the Khanate of Mongolia and the Empire of Mǎnzhōuguó outraged the outside world especially Germany, Nihon, and the United States who felt that the creation of Mǎnzhōuguó was a direct violation of the “open door policy”. Russia argued that it was not creating a puppet state as President Roosevelt had asserted and that Mǎnzhōuguó was purely as haven of Manchu loyalists and a hold out against the revolution throughout Zhōnghuá. Nihon and Russia came very near to war over the issue, but when it became apparent that even Russia’s allies (France, and Great Britain) were against Russian support of the Manchu state the Russians agreed to pull out their troops, being sure to leave weapons with the Manchu in hopes that the Manchu would be able to fight off any advance made against them. The Manchu military fought off an invasion by the New Army that resulted in the death of Yuan Shikai. The political turmoil that existed after the death of Yuan Shikai resulted in the necessity to stabilize the Republican government and gave Mǎnzhōuguó time to defend itself and consolidate itself…
… After Yuan’s death, it was obvious to his more conservative followers and Sun Yat-sen and his Republicans that if a suitable agreement was not made on who would be his successor, the two factions would come to blows, perhaps sparking civil war. Yuan’s supporters would not allow a Republican like Sun or Huang Xing to become president of the fragile republic. The threat of internal fighting within the New Army faction made it impossible unlikely that any of the leaders within would support one over the other and so an outsider was needed to garner support from both side; this where Liang Qichao entered the scene. Liang Qichao had been a reformist and even though he was close to the Republicans he was himself a supporter of a constitutional monarchy. Liang did not seek to be president himself, and it’s likely that the New Army Faction would not have supported him, instead he put forward that his mentor Kang Youwei, leader of the reformists during the “Hundred Day Reforms”. It was agreed upon that Kang was a suitable choice for president, mostly because he wetted the appetite of most, though not fully satisfying all. For almost three months the Republic hobbled precariously until the constitutional convention. At this point it became quite obvious that neither Kang or Liang were going to continue to support the Republic and that they were in fact moving to institute a constitution much like that of Nihon. There was an attempt by Sun to reignite the revolution to prevent this from occurring, but without the broad support of the New Army this turned into a few minor uprisings that were quick to dissipate, thus forcing Sun to flee. And so on March 20th 1908, Kang, with support of those still at the constitutional convention, declared himself the Anbang Emperor and the founder of the Lien (lotus) Dynasty. At the conventions end a German style constitution was approved and signed into being...
…The German Kaiser, the Nihon Emperor, and the American President universally recognized the new Dynasty hoping to gain a new ally against Russia and Great Britain. American, Nihon, and German investors and industrialists nourished the new dynasty assisting it with centralization and reorganization of the armed forces. The world would quake for the sleeping dragon had awoken and with the aid of the Imperial and Bald eagles would assert itself once again against its enemies…
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[1]: literally meaning Chinese Nation
