At this point in the series we have tried to give some sense and introduction to the currents of history that led the political, economic, and military stew that was the Asia-Pacific region in the mid-19th century. Some of the key elements include (and certainly not limited to):

• The Opium Wars in China (1839 and 1857) and the fallout of these conflicts;
• The U.S. fleet’s arrival in Tokyo Bay (1853) which led to the Treaty of Kanagawa which, not immediately, but eventually led to a more open posture of Japan to the world after 200 years of isolation; and
• A self-view within Japan that in terms of culture, ethics, learning and more they were ready to be leaders in the Asian sphere

Via Dutch traders, Japan was aware of the Opium Wars in China, the unequal treaties that forced foreign trade upon China, and what the foreign powers were willing to do via military advantage. It became aware of how unprepared it was should these same foreign powers turn to Japan with the same intent. Concerned by Western incursions into Asia, particularly the Opium Wars’ impact on China and Commodore Perry’s forced opening of Japan, the Japanese sought firsthand intelligence on how China was handling the situation and the policies it adopted.

To that end, after two centuries of self-imposed isolation, in 1862, the Tokugawa Shogunate sent the sailing ship Senzai Maru to Shanghai as an unprecedented official mission by the shogunate to investigate trade and diplomatic conditions in China and learn from the Chinese experience with Western powers. The mission also hoped to open commercial and possibly diplomatic ties with China, which had been suspended for over 2 centuries. 

The journey had a profound impact on Japan’s internal deliberations and future direction. The lessons learned in Shanghai, particularly witnessing the vulnerability of a closed-off nation to Western imperial powers, helped shift Japanese policy from isolationism to a reformist approach. This critical understanding contributed to the climate that enabled the eventual overthrow of the Tokugawa Shogunate 

From Tokugawa to Meiji

The Tokugawa shogunate had established itself in the early 17th century. Under its rule, the shōgun governed Japan. About 180 lords, known as daimyōs, ruled autonomous realms under the shōgun. There was an Emperor, but the shōgun ruled. He set the tone and established a code of behavior for the nobility in 1605. Under the code, the emperor was required to devote his time to scholarship and the arts and was confined to the palace in Kyoto. Later, at the arrival of Western colonial powers as trading partners, a new power dynamic was introduced and with that an era of change. The western powers played the regional daimyōs against one another, who positioned themselves in regard to the Shogun (but not in ways always discernable for ill or for good). All the while the Emperor remained in Kyoto as something akin to a cultural icon of the ideals of Japan.

By the early 19th century the changing dynamic brought about within Japan led to a period of high inflation while at the same time samurai stipends were fixed. The same effects were felt among the feudal peasants but not among the ruling class and the merchants. All of this led to a crisis of authority. The Shogun, daimyōs, and their administrators (bakufu) appeared militarily weak, diplomatically incompetent, and unable or unwilling to defend Japan’s sovereignty against western manipulation. This triggered debate over who truly possessed legitimate authority to act in Japan’s name.

Some of the more powerful leading daimyōs invoked the Emperor as the source of ultimate legitimacy and as a rallying point against the controls and constraints of the bakufu. It was couched as a restoration of ancient practice but it was really a reinvention of imperial authority. As unrest spread a large number of young samurai, known as shishi or “men of high purpose”, began to meet and speak against the shogunate. The shishi revered the Emperor and rallied people to their side with the slogan “Revere the Emperor, Expel the Barbarians.” In January 1868, these shishi executed a coup d’état and seized the Imperial Palace in Kyoto, announced the abolishment of the Shogunate, and declared authority restored to the Emperor who adopted the reign name Meiji, meaning “enlightened rule”. There was a short civil war (Boshin War) that ended with the defeat of Tokugawa loyalists and the formal end of the Shogunate by 1869.

Long story, told short, these were the animating force that brought about the Meiji Reforms and ultimately the Meiji Constitution.

Japanese leaders realized they needed to modernize to avoid the humiliation suffered by China during the First and Second Opium Wars. After the old Tokugawa shogunate was overthrown during the Meiji Restoration, Japan initiated structural reforms resulting in rapid modernization, industrialization, militarization and imperialism modeled after the imperialistic Western powers. 

The Meiji Restoration

It is important to understand that Meiji restoration was not, as claimed, a movement to restore ancient imperial rule. In reality it dismantled the existing means of governance, repurposed the bakufu, centralized power far beyond anything previously known in the history of Japan. The focal point of the restoration was the Meiji Emperor. He became the formal head of state and the symbolic center of loyalty and identity. But the real power lay with a small oligarchy of former samurai from the more powerful pre-Meiji domains: Satsuma, Chōshū, Tosa, and Hizen. The Tokugawa institutions were not completely discarded; many were adapted including the bureaucratic governance, legal codification, and the elites of the domains were incorporated into the positions wherein their expertise could be used, their ambitions controlled, and their wallets enhanced.

In the early Meiji period (1870s) the oligarchs and councils were the decision makers but the Emperor was cautiously used as the moral center of the coming changes. Some of the early and rapid reforms meant to consolidate power and control included the abolition of domains, end of samurai privileges, start of military conscription, national taxation, and education reforms.

Slowly the Emperor became the sacred focal point of the modern nation-state. This was enhanced even further when Shinto became the official “religion” of the nation. In 1889 the Meiji Constitution framed national sovereignty as emanating from the emperor – this was the notion of kokutai which held that national sovereignty and the emperor were identical.

The transition from Tokugawa to Meiji was not a popular uprising, nor a simple return to ancient rule, but a carefully managed elite revolution that used the emperor as a legitimating symbol to dismantle the old order and construct a modern state. A state that was preparing to face the challenge of western imperialism that had dismantled China.

Meiji and the Foundation of Expansionism

Under the Constitution, the emperor was no longer merely a symbol of unity. He was redefined not only as he kokutai, but as the moral center of the nation and the living embodiment of Japan’s historical destiny. This shift was crucial. Expansion could now be framed not as policy choice, but as moral obligation.

All of this was held to reside in the emperor by divine lineage. As such, the emperor possessed supreme command of the army and navy and authority over diplomacy and war. This structure had two consequences: military autonomy from civilian government and expansionist decisions could be justified as expressions of imperial will rather than partisan ambition. Once these actions were linked to the emperor’s sacred authority, opposition became disloyalty, not disagreement.

Sacred Nationalism

Long tradition held that the emperor was a descendant of Amaterasu, the Sun goddess. This belief was not part of Confucianism or Buddhism, but was grounded in Shinto, Japan’s indigenous religion that pre-dated history. Shinto is focused on reverence for nature, ancestors, and spirits called kami. Shinto emphasizes purity, harmony, gratitude, and sincere living rather than strict dogma or the teachings of a single founder.  The Emperor was considered an embodied kami. 

During the Meiji period Shinto was transformed into what is referred to as “State Shinto.”  This was the government-promoted, nationalist ideology that fused Shinto traditions with state power, establishing the Emperor as a divine figure descended from the sun goddess, fostering national unity, and demanding loyalty through shrines and education, effectively making Shinto a quasi-official religion to support the goals of Imperial Japan. State Shinto transformed loyalty to the emperor into religious devotion. Under this veneer, expansion became a sacred mission and a fulfillment of Japan’s divine role in history. That divinely appointed role was the moral leadership to bring order and enlightenment to Asia under imperial benevolence.

Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives. Source Credit: “The Meiji Restoration and the rise of the Japanese Empire 1868–1931” | Office of the Historian, Department of State.

The post title might cause you to wonder if there is a veiled reference to the 1998 movie, “There’s Something About Mary.” Nothing veiled about it. The basic plot of the movie is the infatuation of a host of suitors for a woman named Mary: Ted, Patrick, Dom, Norm (aka Tucker) and Brett. I would explain the plot but it is way too complicated – funny, but complicated. The basic plot of this post is that “China” is wooed and pursued by a host of suitors: Japan, Britain, France, Holland, Germany, Russia, and the United States. The plot is complicated but not by any means a comedy. But it is an element in the origins of the Asia-Pacific War.

Why was everyone interested in China? She is the mysterious woman whose charms and beauty were the speculation of Western Europe since the writings of Marco Polo. China and the Indies were the goal of the Spanish and Portuguese expeditions westward into the uncharted ocean regions where “beyond here, there be dragons.” The Americas got in the way, so they went the other way around Africa and in time reached India, Malaya, the Philippines, China and Japan. For the historical record let me add a completely unnecessary note: in 1291, 250 years before those expeditions, Pope Nicholas IV sent the Franciscan John of Montecorvino on mission to the Great Khan in response to a diplomatic inquiry from Great Khan Khubilai carried by the Nestorian monk Rabban Sauma.  Traveling on the “silk road” through India Montecorvino reached Beijing (the new capital of the Mongol empire) in 1294; by then a new emperor had ascended—Termur or Emperor Chengzong. The first Portuguese traders arrived 200 years later.

Where was I? …Why was everyone interested in China? The great lure of China has not only been for its exotic exports but the possibilities of exports to China with their population in the millions. In the mid-19th century Britain had a massive trade deficit with China, as they imported huge amounts of tea, silk, and porcelain but China wanted little in return. An import/product was needed that would balance the trade relationship. Unfortunately the British East India company began the importation of opium from India. It became the commodity that reversed the cash flow, paying for Chinese goods but causing widespread addiction in China.

The Opium Wars

The Chinese Qing government, China’s last imperial dynasty, a centralized bureaucratic state ruled by the Manchu people, seeing the social and economic devastation, banned opium in 1839. They confiscated and destroyed over 20,000 chests of British opium in Guangzhou (Canton), the merchants demanded compensation, viewing it as an attack on property. Their demand was backed by the British government who further demanded “free trade” and an end to China’s restrictive Canton system which limited each foreign nation’s traders to one port and imposed strict rules for transactions. The conflict was fundamentally about sovereignty – China asserting its right to control its own internal affairs versus Britain’s assertion of international trade rights and extraterritoriality for its citizens.

The First Opium War between Great Britain and China was fought from 1839 to 1842. After defeating the Chinese in a series of naval conflicts, the British were in a position to make a large number of demands from the weaker Qing Government of China and obtained them in the Anglo-Chinese Treaty of Nanjing. Not to be outdone, U.S. negotiators sought to conclude a similar treaty with the Chinese, to guarantee the United States many of the favorable terms awarded the British. The Chinese readily agreed in an effort to keep all foreigners on the same footing.

The 1844 Treaty of Wangxia replicated many of the key terms of the Treaty of Nanjing. Most importantly, it established five treaty ports as open for Chinese-Western trade (Guangzhou, Xiamen, Fuzhou, Ningbo, and Shanghai). These treaty ports became key crossroads for Western and Chinese culture, as they were the first locations where foreigners and foreign trading operations could own land in China.

In the 1850s, the United States and the European powers grew increasingly dissatisfied with both the terms of their treaties with China, and the Qing Government’s failure to adhere to them. The British forced the issue by attacking the Chinese port cities of Guangzhou and Tianjin in the Second Opium War (1857–1858). Under the most-favored-nation clause, all of the foreign powers operating in China were permitted to seek the same concessions of China that Great Britain achieved by force. As a result, France, Russia, and the United States all signed treaties with China at Tianjin in quick succession in 1858.

The agreements reached between the Western powers and China following the Opium Wars came to be known as the “unequal treaties” because in practice they gave foreigners privileged status and extracted concessions from the Chinese. Ironically, the Qing Government had fully supported the clauses on extraterritoriality and most-favored nation status in the first treaties in order to keep the foreigners in line. This treaty system also marked a new direction for Chinese contact with the outside world. For years, the Chinese had conducted their foreign policy through the tribute system, in which foreign powers wishing to trade with China were required first to bring a tribute to the emperor, acknowledging the superiority of Chinese culture and the ultimate authority of the Chinese ruler. Unlike China’s neighbors, the European powers ultimately refused to make these acknowledgements in order to trade, and they demanded instead that China adhere to Western diplomatic practices, such as the creation of treaties. Although the unequal treaties and the use of the most-favored-nation clause were effective in creating and maintaining open trade with China, both were also important factors in building animosity and resentment toward Western imperialism.

The Open Door Policy

Secretary of State John Hay first articulated the concept of the “Open Door” in China in a series of notes in 1899–1900. These Open Door Notes aimed to secure international agreement to the U.S. policy of promoting equal opportunity for international trade and commerce in China, and respect for China’s administrative and territorial integrity. British and American policies toward China had long operated under similar principles, but once Hay put them into writing, the “Open Door” became the official U.S. policy towards the Far East in the first half of the 20th century.

The great powers that had an interest in China, included Great Britain, France, Russia, Germany, and Japan. These nations maintained significant physical and commercial presences in China, and were protective of their various spheres of influence and trading privileges there, and elsewhere in Asia.

Secretary Hay proposed a free, open market and equal trading opportunity for merchants of all nationalities operating in China, based in part on the most favored nation clauses already established in the Treaties of Wangxia and Tianjin. Hay argued that establishing equal access to commerce would benefit American traders and the U.S. economy, and hoped that the Open Door would also prevent disputes between the powers operating in China. For the United States, which held relatively little political clout and no territory in China, the principle of non-discrimination in commercial activity was particularly important. Hay called for each of the powers active in China to do away with economic advantages for their own citizens within their spheres of influence, and also suggested that the Chinese tariffs apply universally and be collected by the Chinese themselves. Although the other powers may not have agreed fully with these ideas, none openly opposed them.

In a relatively short “ballet” of negotiations, Hay was able to get all the interested nations to agree in principle. Together, the Open Door Notes served the important purpose of outlining U.S. policy toward China and expressing U.S. hopes for cooperation with the other foreign powers with a stake in the region. They were of lasting importance in U.S.-East Asian relations, and contributed to the idea of a Sino-American “special relationship.”

The articulation of the Open Door policy represented the growing American interest and involvement in East Asia at the turn of the century. Ironically, Hay articulated the Open Door policy at a time when the U.S. Government was doing everything in its power to close the door on Chinese immigration to the United States. This effectively stifled opportunities for Chinese merchants and workers in the United States.

Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives. Source Credit: “The Opening to China Part I: the First Opium War, the United States, and the Treaty of Wangxia, 1839–1844” and “Secretary of State John Hay and the Open Door in China, 1899–1900” | Office of the Historian, Department of State.

U.S. merchants had been sailing to China since the first U.S. merchant, Empress of China, departed from New York on February 22, 1784. In its wake came a steady flow of merchants in search of wealth. During the first decades of the 19th century, U.S. merchants amassed sizable fortunes. As this trade grew, U.S. traders built a small outpost in China and their interactions with Chinese subjects became more complex and occasionally contentious. The U.S. Government realized that it had to establish formal diplomatic ties in order to protect the interests of its citizens. In the wake of war between Britain and China, and the subsequent opening of diplomatic relations between those two countries, the United States moved to negotiate its own treaty with the Chinese Government. The resulting agreement, the Treaty of Wangxia, was ratified in 1844, and soon thereafter U.S. ministers and consuls took up residence in China’s capital and port cities.

Making the journey to China and maintaining the U.S. presence there also required a network of ports extending across the Pacific Ocean, and as such, the China trade soon drove the United States to expand its presence throughout the Pacific region.  At its root, Perry’s primary mission was to establish a foothold that would strengthen the U.S. position for trade and diplomacy in the region. In other words, the United States opened relations with Japan in large part to enhance its status in China. On a smaller scale, as U.S. merchants began to stop at many of the Pacific Islands to replenish supplies and acquire goods to trade with Chinese merchants, the U.S. Government appointed consuls to several of these places. For example, consulates were established in Fiji in 1844, Samoa in 1856, and the Marshall Islands in 1881. The U.S. presence in Hawai’i grew out of the need for a substantial base of operations in the Pacific to support U.S. interests in China. Ultimately this need became so great, and the U.S. presence so large, that the United States annexed the islands in 1898.

The process of U.S. maritime expansion in the Pacific eventually became a goal in and of itself, culminating in the acquisition of the Philippines from Spain in 1898. The Spanish-American War began with a dispute over Cuba, but a rising tide of interest in an overseas empire among U.S. leaders, such as President William McKinley and future President Theodore Roosevelt, helped expand the conflict to Spanish possessions in Asia. After a swift victory over Spain, the United States set up a temporary military administration to govern the islands and promote their political, economic, and social development. The United States established full colonial rule over the Philippines in 1900 during the Philippine-American War.

U.S. expansion across the Pacific fundamentally changed the global position of the United States. In 1800, the United States held closely to George Washington’s advice to avoid “entangling alliances” while pursuing foreign relations based upon trade. By 1900, the United States was a recognized world power with substantial commercial, political, and military interests and territorial holdings throughout the Pacific region. Maritime expansion led to the proclamation of an Open Door policy for China and set the stage for much greater involvement in local and regional politics and trade during the early 20th century.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Between Admiral Perry’s arrival in Tokyo Bay in the summer of 1853 and the beginning of the 20th century, there are a lot of major events, changes, and nascent problems that are being birthed into the world.

Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives. Source Credit: “The United States and the Opening to Japan, 1853” and “United States Maritime Expansion across the Pacific during the 19th Century” | Office of the Historian, Department of State.

Commodore Perry’s mission was not the first American overture to the Japanese. In the 1830s, the Far Eastern squadron of the U.S. Navy sent several missions from its regional base in Guangzhou (Canton), China, but in each case, the Japanese did not permit them to land, and they lacked the authority from the U.S. Government to force the issue. In 1851, President Millard Fillmore authorized a formal naval expedition to Japan to return shipwrecked Japanese sailors and request that Americans stranded in Japan be returned to the United States. 

Perry first sailed to the Ryukyus and the Bonin Islands southwest and southeast of the main Japanese islands, claiming territory for the United States, and demanding that the people in both places assist him. He then sailed north to Edo (Tokyo) Bay, carrying a letter from the U.S. President addressed to the Emperor of Japan. By addressing the letter to the Emperor, the United States demonstrated its lack of knowledge about the Japanese government and society. At that time, the Japanese emperor was little more than a figurehead, and the true leadership of Japan was in the hands of the Tokugawa Shogunate.

His mission was to complete an agreement with the Japanese Government for the protection of shipwrecked or stranded Americans and to open one or more ports for supplies and refueling. The following spring, Perry returned with an even larger squadron to receive Japan’s answer. 

The Japanese grudgingly agreed to Perry’s demands, and the two sides signed the Treaty of Kanagawa on March 31, 1854. According to the terms of the treaty, Japan would protect stranded seamen and open two ports for refueling and provisioning American ships: Shimoda and Hakodate. Japan also gave the United States the right to appoint consuls to live in these port cities, a privilege not previously granted to foreign nations. This treaty was not a commercial treaty, and it did not guarantee the right to trade with Japan. Still, in addition to providing for distressed American ships in Japanese waters, it contained a most-favored-nation clause, so that all future concessions Japan granted to other foreign powers would also be granted to the United States. As a result, Perry’s treaty provided an opening that would allow future American contact and trade with Japan.

There were several reasons why the United States became interested in revitalizing contact between Japan and the West in the mid-19th century. First, the combination of the opening of Chinese ports to regular trade and the annexation of California, creating an American port on the Pacific, ensured that there would be a steady stream of maritime traffic between North America and Asia. Then, as American traders in the Pacific replaced sailing ships with steam ships, they needed to secure coaling stations, where they could stop to take on provisions and fuel while making the long trip from the United States to China. The combination of its advantageous geographic position and rumors that Japan held vast deposits of coal increased the appeal of establishing commercial and diplomatic contacts with the Japanese. Additionally, the American whaling industry had pushed into the North Pacific by the mid-18th century, and sought safe harbors, assistance in case of shipwrecks, and reliable supply stations. In the years leading up to the Perry mission, a number of American sailors found themselves shipwrecked and stranded on Japanese shores, and tales of their mistreatment at the hands of the unwelcoming Japanese spread through the merchant community and across the United States.

The same combination of economic considerations and belief in Manifest Destiny that motivated U.S. expansion across the North American continent also drove American merchants and missionaries to journey across the Pacific. At the time, many Americans believed that they had a special responsibility to modernize and civilize the Chinese and Japanese. In the case of Japan, missionaries felt that Protestant Christianity would be accepted where Catholicism had generally been rejected. Other Americans argued that, even if the Japanese were unreceptive to Western ideals, forcing them to interact and trade with the world was a necessity that would ultimately benefit both nations.

Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives.Source Credit: “The United States and the Opening to Japan, 1853” | Office of the Historian, Department of State.