THE FAILURE OF
POLITICS
The rise of military independence in
international relations in the 1920’s
AIM
To explain how politics ‘failed’ in the 1920s through the increasing
power of the Military and Navy in foreign affairs, eventually resulting
in Military dominance of the state.
Military rejected the governmental stance towards the ‘new
international cooperation’ of the post-WWI period in favour of
expansion and consolidation of the Japanese position in Manchuria.
Timeline – key events
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1902
1914
1915
1919
1921
1922
1924
1927
1928
1929
1930
•  1931
•  1932
Anglo-Japanese alliance (revised 1911)
Japan enters WWI
Twenty-one Demands
Treaty of Versailles
Prime Minister Hara Kei assassinated
Washington Naval Treaty
Exclusion Act
Geneva Conference
Assassination of Zhang Zuolin
Wall Street Crash
Japan returns to Gold Standard, Depression, London
Conference
Manchurian Incident/Deception, Manchukuo formed
‘Lytton Report’, Japan leaves League of Nations, Prime
Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi assassinated.
Roadmap
•  Military Constitutional power
•  Anti-Western sentiment
•  ‘Shidehara Diplomacy’ versus the Military
•  What’s left?
Military Constitutional Power
•  Military only responsible to the Emperor
•  Tōsuiken - the ‘Right of Supreme Command’ of the
military
•  Previously not used this power due to the Meiji Oligarchs
sharing power over ministries and forming a ‘balance’,
however, turn of the 1920s removed the last of the
‘founding fathers’.
Anti-Western sentiment
•  Treaty of Versailles – 1919
•  Underlying racism – equality of all races declined
•  Exclusion from ‘Three Powers’
•  League of Nations – self-determination clause
•  1924 Exclusion Act
•  Arms Limitation Talks
•  Washington Naval Treaty – 1921
•  Ratio 5:5:3
•  London Naval Treaty – 1930
•  Ratio 10:10:7 refused
‘Shidehara Diplomacy’ versus the Imperial
Army
Kijūrō Shidehara
General Tanaka Giichi
Japan in China
•  1924 Shidehara promises non-interference in China
•  Kwantung Army independently supporting warlord Zhang Zoulin
•  Communist-Nationalist rise in China
•  1927 - Army manoeuvre Shidehara out
•  1928 – Assassination of Zhang Zoulin – backfires
•  1929 – Prime Minister Tanaka resigns, Shidehara back
Manchuria Incident - 1931
•  1931 – Manchurian Incident
•  Bomb railway
•  Aim: expand into Manchuria, consolidate hold, ‘experiment’ for
direct military rule
•  Result: Shidehara removed – failed to control Imperial Army, Prime
Minister Inukai assassinated 1932
1 March 1932
Manchoukuo
formed
1933 Japan
leaves the
League
What’s left?
•  Optimism for future of Japan - military leaders and officers
aim to bring Manchurian ‘experiment’ to Japan
•  Depression – desire for traditional
•  Bring strength and unity to the Nation without political
parties
•  Rejection of international cooperation - Involvement of the
League of Nations in the Manchurian Incident and the
formation of Manchukuo cause Japan to leave.
Bibliography
•  Barnhart, A. Michael, Japan and the World since 1868
(London, 1995).
•  Gordon, Andrew, A Modern History of Japan: From
Tokugawa Times to the Present (Oxford, 2003).
•  Hanneman, L. Mary, Japan Faces the World 1925-1952
(Harlow, 2001).
•  Iriye, Akira, Japan and the Wider World (London, 1997).
•  Nish, Ian, Japanese Foreign Policy (U.S.A, 2002).
•  Shillony, Ben-Ami, Politics and Culture in Wartime Japan
(Oxford, 1981), 1-6.
Any questions?
Flag of Manchukuo