The roots of Japanese Militarism can be found in the Meiji Restoration (late 1860s). In brief, the Restoration ended the rule of the Shoguns which had dominated Japan for centuries. The leaders of the Meiji Restoration started to reform the system of the country, acting in the name of Japan’s emperor with the goal to restore the emperor’s powers and position – in government and in the identity of Japan. But, the leaders also kept to themselves a number of powers. Even after the Meiji Restoration a small group had the real power and ruled in the name of the emperor. While the governmental form was a constitutional monarchy with the Emperor as leader of the nation, the real power lay in the hands of the military.

Japan rapidly industrialized and modernized its military in response to Western colonial ambitions in the Western Pacific and Asia region. While the process and history is far more complex than this article can describe, it is ironic that Japan’s ambitions – apart from leadership of the Asiatic sphere – was to establish colonies of its own. Japan lacked natural resources (oil, rubber, iron), making it vulnerable to embargoes by western powers and so expansion into Asia was seen as essential for economic security, survival, and growth as Japan took its place among world powers. At the same time rising population in the Japanese home islands led to calls for “living space” for its people. Colonies were viewed as necessary to settle Japanese farmers and laborers – or simply as sources to supply natural resources, including food. One result was the development of an ideology of the “Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere” which promoted pan-Asian unity under Japanese leadership. This became the justification for imperial rule as a way to liberate Asia from Western colonialism, though the result would be a different form of colonialism.