Outer Mongolia and the Dream of Pan-Mongolism: Caught in a Realpolitik Power Game Betwixt Russia and China

Posted on by E Curb Nottus
Inter-ethnic relations, Regional History
Outer Mongolia, Inner Mongolia, China, early (20th. (image: tripsatasia.com)

At the onset of the 20th century nationalist feelings were on the rise in east and central Asia. For the Chinese they were fuelled by the humiliations of the First Sino-Japanese War and the intervention of foreign powers and foreigner-imposed concessions in China following the Boxer Rebellion, allied with a powerful sense of anti-Manchurism towards the ruling Qing Dynasty. To the north in Outer Mongolia, also within the realm of Qing control, nationalism was also spiking. Hastening the sense of Mongolian nationalism was the recently introduced Qing government’s policy of Sinicisation, an attempt at Han colonisation and cultural assimilation of the Mongol people (subordination of the Mongolian language to that of Chinese, exploiting Mongolian natural resources including the converting of pasture lands into agricultural production fields).

1911 Xinhai Revolution (Chinese commemorative anniversary stamp)

The spread of Chinese nationalism and aspirations to modernise China culminated in the 1911 Xinhai Revolution and the collapse of the Qing monarchy in February 1912, ushering in a new political landscape in China. While republicanism gripped China Mongol nobles and lamas took advantage of the upheaval to declare the independence of “Great Mongolia”, establishing a de facto absolute theocratic monarchy under the Bogd Khan (“holy ruler” or “emperor”). The newly established Beiyang government refused its recognition, affirming that Outer Mongolia was an integral and legitimate part of China’s territorial inheritance from the former Qing rulers. Under a 1915 agreement between Tsarist Russia and China Bogd Khan was forced to accept a status of “autonomy under Chinese suzerainty”…the deal also opened the way for Russia to colonise contiguous Tannu Tuva (an enclave within northwest Outer Mongolia which Tsarist Russia had established a protectorate over).

Bodg Khan’s Green Palace, Ulaanbaatar

Russian Civil War comes to Mongolia In 1919 Chinese troops under Xu Shuzheng occupied the Outer Mongolian capital Urga (or Niislel Khüree)⧼a̼⧽, deposing the Bogd Khan and ending Mongolia’s autonomy. Mongolian revolutionaries responded by organising themselves into a resistance group and a new political force, the Mongolian Peoples Party (MPP), emerged. The Mongol activists solicited support from the new Bolshevik government which had overthrown the Russian Romanov monarchy. Meanwhile, a White Russian (anti-communist) force under Baron von Ungern-Sternberg entered Outer Mongolia, sweeping away the occupying Chinese troops. Ungern restored the Mongol Buddhist leader to the throne while setting himself up as a warlord in Outer Mongolia. Soviet Red Army units eventually routed Ungern’s White Guards in southern Siberia and he was executed.

Roman von Ungern AKA “The Mad Baron” (image source: 2.bp.blogspot.com)

Mongolian Revolution The Mongolian Revolution that took place in 1921 was, according to Fujiko Isono, “a logical outcome of the declaration of Mongolian independence in 1911” (Isono, Fujiko. “The Mongolian Revolution of 1921.” Modern Asian Studies 10, no. 3 (1976): 375–94. http://www.jstor.org/stable/311912.). Mongolian rebels, both of a nationalist and a socialist bent, in unison with external assistance from Ungern’s cossacks and the Bolsheviks, defeated and drove out the remaining Chinese troops occupying Outer Mongolia. Nationalist Dogsomyn Bodoo was elected prime minister in the new provisional government and the monarch’s powers were limited (upon Bogd Khan’s death in 1924 the monarchy was allowed to lapse). The MPP (renamed the MPRP – Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party) proclaimed independent Outer Mongolia a People’s Republic. A power struggle between nationalists and communists ensued, from which the Soviet-backed communists emerged triumphant and Bodoo was removed from the PM post, tried as a counter-revolutionary and summarily executed in 1922.

1921 Mongolian Revolution

Mongolian sub-branch of the Soviet Great Terror The power struggle within the ruling MPRP for leadership and control continued, becoming increasingly violent and bloody. Purges of the party hierarchy and attacks on Mongolian Buddhism were stepped up…the upshot saw military strongman Khorloogiin Choibalsan gradually consolidate and then cement his hold on power in the 1930s. Having removed all of his political rivals one by one in classic Stalinist style Choibalsan waltzed into the leader’s job in 1939 uncontested.

Choibalsan with his role model, Stalin

Soviet satellite and internal terror The Choibalsan-led Mongolian communist regime freely aligned itself with Moscow to the point of becoming a puppet of the Soviet Union, with Choibalsan even taking direct orders from Stalin on internal Mongolian matters. Choibalsan identified with the Soviet supreme leader to the extent of almost cloning himself on the personality of Stalin…slavishly imitating the ruthless political style of Stalin right down to the cult of personality and the mass purging of “enemies of the Revolution” (including some former prime ministers and heads of state), show trials, gulags and executions⧼b̼⧽. Choibalsan’s unquestioning, all-the-way with the Kremlin stance entrapped Mongolia in a perpetual state of economic and political dependency on the USSR—a policy perpetuated after 1952 by Choibalsan’s Sovietphile protégé and successor Yumjaagiin Tsedenbal⧼c̼⧽—condemning the country to a client status relationship with Moscow. This dependency paradigm was only broken after the collapse of the Soviet Union, compelling Mongolia to move tentatively towards democracy, social reforms and economic liberalisation.

Channeling Genghis (Chinggis) Khan : Gigantic Ulaanbaatar statue (photo: Viator.com)

Footnote: The Pan-Mongolia pipe dream Pan-Mongolism was an irredentist idea that has been kicking round in Russian/central Asian circles since the late 19th century. It postulates the creation of a “Greater Mongolia”, a vast area comprising both Inner and Outer Mongolia, Buryatia, Dzungaria (northern half of Xinjiang), and sometimes including Transbaikal, Tuva and even Tibet, a theoretical geographical amalgam which has been described as a kind of “twentieth century Mongol Empire redux” (‘The Spectre of Pan-Mongolism’, Mongolink, 21-Feb-2017, https://mongoliainstitute.anu.edu.au/). One interested onlooker in the region who could appreciate the benefits of fostering a sense of Pan-Mongolism was imperial Japan. From the early 20th century it was eyeing off eastern Asia as an potential territorial acquisition to funnel surplus Japanese population into. The Japanese blueprint envisaged a client state stretching from Lake Baikal to Vladivostok which would include Outer Mongolia. Carving out one large united Mongolia, they reasoned, “would help exert pressure on China and create favorable grounds for the Japanese occupation of the Russian Far East” (‘Pan-Mongolia’, 29-Feb-2019, www.mongoliastore.com; (S.C.M. Paine, Imperial Rivals, (1996)). During WWI the Japanese gave to backing to Grigory Semyonov, a Russian Cossack ataman of Buryat descent with a Pan-Mongolian agenda…Semyonov’s plan was to unify Buryat-Mongolia, Khalkha-Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, but it floundered due to a Bolshevik counter-attack and seemingly also due to Khalkha Mongols’ suspicions of the Buryats (‘Buryatia: Residents Concerned about Moscow’s Intentions’, 23-Oct-2010, Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization, www.unpo.org). In the 1930s a composite, Mongol borderland state named Mengjiang was created comprising the central hub of Inner Mongolia. Supposedly an “autonomous or independent state” nominally ruled by a Mongolian nobleman Prince Demchugdongrub, it was in reality a puppet state of the Empire of Japan𓇽.

Signing of the 1945 Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship & Alliance (source: Peter Chen / endofempire.asia)

Postscript: China and its interests were not represented at the 1945 Yalta Agreement (between USSR, USA and UK), leaving Stalin with the tricky task of settling Mongolia’s future directly with Chiang Kai-shek’s Chinese republic. After tortuous negotiations with China’s premier Soong Tzu-wen Stalin brokered a deal – China would give up on its territorial claim to Outer Mongolia and (reluctantly) recognise Mongolia’s independence. In return Stalin gave the Chinese an assurance he would not (or no longer) support either the Chinese Communists or the separatists in Chinese Xinjiang⧼d̼⧽. Stalin’s accord with Chiang effectively snuffed out the last flicker of Choibalsan’s dream of achieving a Pan-Mongol state (‘Khorloogiin Choibalsan — Stalin of the steppe’, Sergei Radchenko, Engelsberg Ideas, 21-Jun-2021, www.engelbergideas.com). Moscow’s interests were well served by the outcome, geopolitically, an independent Mongolia would be a buffer for the USSR against China while also being open to influence from the Kremlin.

Modern Mongolia (admitted to the UN, 1961)

𓇽 for the Mengjiang story refer to the July 2019 post on this blog, “Mengjiang: The Empire of Japan’s Other East Asian Puppet State in Inner Mongolia” at https://www.7dayadventurer.com/2019/07/02/mengjiang-the-empire-of-japans-other-east-asian-puppet-state-in-inner-mongolia/

♧♧♧♧♧♧♧♧♧♧♧♧♧♧♧

⧼a̼⧽ later renamed Ulaanbaatar (literal meaning = “red hero”) ⧼b̼⧽ called in Mongolia, Ikh Khelmegdüülelt (“Great Repression”) ⧼c̼⧽ Tsedenbal went one subservient step further than his mentor petitioning Moscow (unsuccessfully) in the 1950s for Mongolia to be incorporated into the USSR ⧼d̼⧽ when the Chinese Communists took control of the nation in 1949 Stalin had to debate the question of who owns Mongolia all over again with Mao who doggedly argued for Outer Mongolia to be unified with Inner Mongolia but as part of the PRC. Stalin refused to budge from the position that Mongolian independence was not negotiable and in the end Mao, with the PRC then a brand new Communist state needing to establish a good relationship with the world’s leading socialist state, had to acquiesce (Radchenko)

Slaughterhouse-One: Shanghai 1933

Posted on by funambulator@live.com
Built Environment, Heritage & Conservation, Old technology, Regional History

About one kilometre north of Shanghai’s famous riverside Bund, at No. 10 Shajing Road, Hongkou District, is a most unusual building. Grey, monolithic and coldly forbidding in countenance, it is known today as Shanghai 1933 (上海1933老场坊) or “Old Millfun”…here in Shanghai’s former “International Settlement” is what was once “Slaughterhouse No. 1”, the Far East’s largest slaughterhouse.

(Source: Flickr)

The 31,700 sq m circular roof landmark building has been described as an “eerie Gotham-Deco achievement in concrete, glass and steel” (Atlas Obscura). In 2021 it is home to a fashionable collection of boutique shops, offices, restaurants and cafes, and an event venue, though for some wary locals the reputation of its past convinces them it is haunted by bad spirits (‘1933: The Slaughterhouse of Shanghai’, Monica Luau, Culture Trip, 05-Dec-2017, www.theculturetrip.com).

Architecture
The slaughterhouse was designed in the Art Deco style with Beaux-Arts and Bauhaus influences. This was a marked departure from hitherto abattoir designs which had studiously avoided any suggestion of decoration or aesthetics (‘From slaughter to laughter: the renovation of a slaughterhouse in Shanghai by IPPR’, Austin Williams, Architectural Review, 22-Oct-2018, www.architectural-review.com; ‘A Brief History of Shanghai’s Old Slaughterhouse 1933’, Emily Wetzki, that’s Shanghai, 03-Jul-2014, www.thatsmag.com). The primary building material used was poured concrete (Portland cement) imported from Britain.

🔺 “The gigantic parasol” (Photo credit: Architectural Review)

The unorthodox basic form of the Shanghai Slaughterhouse comprises an outer four-storey high square building enclosing a round inner building—with a 24-sided dome roof—the core of which is a central atrium into which light is admitted. The facade consists of iconic lattice windows with circular motifs. The stylised geometry of the lattice windows allows for much-needed ventilation and natural cooling (Williams)

🔺 A multiplicity of interlocking staircases & ramps (Source: Shanghai Art Deco)

The congested and convoluted interior presents a seemingly Byzantine confusion of elements obscuring what was in fact a revolutionary abattoir design. The interior was an Escheresque¶ maze of compartments, winding passages and corridors, scattered rooms, narrow spiral interlocking staircases, bridged walkways (26 sky bridges), twisting ramps, 50cm-thick walls, (300) Gothic columns and (four) verandahs (‘Shanghai’s charmed revealed’, Mu Qian, China Daily, 27-Oct-2011, www.chinadaily.com.cn; Williams).

🔺 Labyrinthine work of MC Escher

The “state-of-the-art” (for its day) slaughterhouse had many advanced features: the latticework exterior circulated air and, along with the extra thick walls, made the building cooler in Shanghai’s summers; safety measures were incorporated into the design – textured floors in the ramp made them slip-proof, and built-in escape niches for workers to jump into in the event of a cattle stampede (‘1933 Shanghai Slaughterhouse’, Hidden Architecture, www.hiddenarchitecture.net).

The abattoir’s design controlled the speed and flow of cattle from one area to the next. The unique multi-storey slaughterhouse made for a rational and hygienic method of working – situating the killing spaces on the highest level “allowed gravity to drain the blood, to lower the carcasses, to drop the waste, collect the hide” below. Such efficiency allowed for more than 1,200 heads of cattle, sheep and pigs to be processed in a single day (producing 130 tons of meat for human consumption) (Williams).

(Photo: Flickr)

Building history
The slaughterhouse continued to function until the 1960s, although between 1937 and 1945 it fell under the control of the occupying Japanese military. After the communist takeover of China in 1949 it officially became “Slaughterhouse # 1”. After the abattoir was closed, the building was converted into a cold storage facility and then a medicine factory.

(Source: Randomwire)

Reborn as a “creative industry zone” Abandoned in 2002, the Old Millfun building was heading for decay and destruction when it was saved in 2008 by a RMB100 million renovation [Architect: IPPR (Shanghai) – Engineering and Design Research Institute] and eventually transformation into a trendy entertainment❂ and shopping hub (Mu).

Architect: Balfours Master Architects (UK). Some sources attribute the building design to CH Stableford, Shanghai Municipal Council architect at the time (construction by Yu Hong Ki Construction Co).

________________________

✥ China before 1933 used the unit of weight, the tael applied to silver, as the unit of currency. A tael was usually equivalent to 1.3 ounces of silver

¶ bringing to mind the intricate, implausibly dense lithographic prints and drawings of Dutch graphic artist MC Escher

❂ among its upmarket tenants is the Ferrari Owners’ Club of China

Inter-war Shànghâi: A Cocktail of Espionage, Rapid Wealth Creation, Opulent Grandeur and Glamour—in a “United Nations“ of Competing Interests

Posted on by E Curb Nottus
Economic history, Economics and society,, Inter-ethnic relations, International Relations, Regional History

Shànghâi by the late 1920s, and 1930s, was an exemplar of cosmopolitanism. The city’s pluralism, including a significant interracial element, made it stand out not just from the rest of a largely homogenous China, but from just about anywhere else on the globe. A key ingredient in Shànghâi‘s cosmopolitan character at this time was the trifurcation of the city. As a consequence of the city’s vicissitudes in the 19th century, Shànghâi, notwithstanding China’s retention of sovereignty over the city, was formally divided into three sections, two of which were foreign controlled.

French Concession

The smallest section was the French Concession (Fàguó zūjiè), in the puxi (west) part of the old city (roughly corresponding to the districts of Luwan and Xuhui in contemporary Shànghâi)—best known today as a prized residential location and the stylish centre of retail fashion in the city. The French, following suit from the British, extracted a concession from the territorial governors in 1849 and engaged in extra-territorial expansion over the ensuing decades. The French Concession had a consul-general appointed from Paris and maintained its own force of gendarmes. 

(The SMC flag, with a motto which preached ‘togetherness’)

Shànghâi International Settlement

Originally both the British and the American Wàiguó rén (foreigners)—the Shanghailanders as they styled themselves—had their own separate concessions, but the two enclaves merged in 1863 to form the International Settlements. The international communities, in the main dominated by the British and to a lesser degree the Americans (but also comprising smaller communities of other nationalities, mainly Germans, Italians, Dutch and Danish) who had their own police and fire services. The British and American expats, when they felt that their highly lucrative interests were threatened (as was the case in the 1927 political crisis), did not hesitate to call in the British Army and the US Marines. Both the British/International and French jurisdictions relied heavily on local Chinese for the bulk of their forces [‘The Shanghai Settlements’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org].

Chinese Greater Shànghâi

The third and largest section was the area given over to the Chinese themselves and run by the Chinese Municipality of Greater Shànghâi. Basically, this area surrounded most of the foreign concession territory (especially to it’s south and west) and comprised the parts of Shànghâi that the British et al and the French were not interested in, having already had their pick of the prime locations for themselves, close to and along the Bund [‘The Shanghai International Settlements’, Wiki].

(Cartography: Bert Brouwenstijn, VU University, Amsterdam)

 A fourth concession, the “Japanese concession”

In effect, the large and increasing numbers of Japanese living in Shànghâi by this time (including armed garrisons), had resulted in the creation of an unofficial ”Japanese Concession”. This de facto concession was located in the Hongkew (now Hóngkôu) district of Shànghâi (just north of the Whangpoo’s (Huangpu’s) confluence with the Soochew (now Suzhou) Creek). Ultimately, after the Pearl Harbour attack, the Japanese extended its hold over the rest of Shànghâi except the French Concession which Nazi Germany allowed it’s Vichy French ‘puppet’ allies to retain (until 1943 when the Vichy were forced to hand it over to Imperial Japan).

Shànghâi, the fabled metropolis

By the early 1930s Shànghâi had established itself as one of the most exceptional and distinctively dazzling societies on earth. It’s population had hit three million (making it the fifth largest city in the world[𝕒]), of which somewhere between 50,000 and 70,000 were foreigners. The Thirties also witnesses two huge influxes of refugees into the city—European, mainly German, Jews fleeing the murderous repression of the Third Reich and reactionary White Russians fleeing Bolshevik retribution in Stalin’s Soviet Union and republics. Both of these ’stateless’ exo-groups were the fortunate beneficiaries of Shànghâi’s status as an open door city…neither passports or visas were required to enter the city [‘Shanghai in the 1930s’, World History, http://world history.us].

🔺 Sassoon’s ‘Cathay’ , a Bund icon but a slightly(sic) over-the-top self-comparison (Source: P Hibberd, The Bund Shanghai: China Faces West (2007))

Economics and architecture: A modern city

The early ‘30s, the Great Depression may have been ravaging the world but Shanghai was prospering…Shànghâi’s flourishing affluence meant rapidly made fortunes and a privileged lifestyle – for some at least within Shànghâi society…most notably and obviously for the advantaged foreigners. Businessmen such as Victor Sassoon (financier and hotelier) and the Renwick brothers (Jardine Matheson), profited from cheap local labour, laying the foundation for their fabulous stores of wealth[𝕓]. Brits like Tony Renwick and Anglophile American Stirling Fessenden also controlled the Shànghâi Municipal Council ensuring that local public policy in the Internationals’ concession would be favourable to Anglo business interests [‘Shanghai Municipal Council’, (International Settlement 1863-1941), www.links4seo.com/].

A further, external factor which allowed Shànghâi to prosper was that, unlike the rest of China which was divided up between different regional warlords, the city was monopolised by the foreign merchant class (World History). The warlords (and Republic of China leader Chang Kai-shek) were not able to penetrate this localised power base.

The Bund‘s modernity

And the wealth realised was certainly of the conspicuous kind, one glance down the Bund (Wàitān), the riverfront promenade, confirmed that. It was replete with grand financial and trading houses, hotels and nightclubs, many in elegant Art Deco or Neo-Classical style [𝕔]. The Bund symbolised the city’s new wealth and modernity – and contained Shànghâi’s version of ”Wall Street”. Shànghâi, even at this time, had more skyscrapers than anywhere outside of the US (World History). In nearby Nanking Road (now Nanjing Rd), was the commercial heart of Shànghâi, housing the leading retail merchants of the city such as the Sincere Company Ltd and Wing On. Fashion in Shànghâi echoed the city architecture’s modernity, the latest in-vogue styles were all the rage for the Shanghainese [‘Shanghai History’, Lonely Planet, www.lonelyplanet.com].

Nightlife and recreational pursuits

Shànghâi’s business nouveau rich, when they weren’t celebrating or listening to jazz music at one of the Bund’s many nightclubs, Ciro’s, Casanova’s, the Paramount Dance Hall or at the Canidrome Ballroom in the French Concession (originally a greyhound racing track!), could often be found at the Shànghâi Jockey Club racecourse betting along with thousands of others, Chinese and foreigners, on “the strange little Mongolian ponies” especially imported for racing (World History).

Espionage in Shànghâi: something of a free-for-all

With so many different nationalities in Shànghâi at the same time, all with competing and vested interests, it is hardly surprising that the city was a hotbed of espionage especially as the Thirties drew on inexorably towards world war. Spies and counter-spies abounded…most of the main players were actively working on the ground (or under it) in Shànghâi at this juncture – the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), as well intelligence units from Russia, Japan, France, Germany and the US [Bernard Wassermann, Secret War in Shanghai: Treachery, Subversion and Collaboration in the Second World War (2017, 2nd Ed.)].

In the next blog piece I will turn my attention to the other, seamier side of the Shànghâi story of the interwar period – the city’s association, you might say preoccupation, with sin and crime, another face of Shànghâi’s decadence in the Twenties and the Thirties.

Footnote: Shànghâi, location, location …
Foreign trading powers like the British had initially preferred the port of Canton[𝕕] to Shànghâi, but by the late 19th century the latter had become the big trading nations’ principal “treaty port” in the Far East. Shànghâi‘s geographical position was fundamental to its eventual prominence: it had become by this time “the central clearinghouse of waterborne trade between the entire Yangtse River system and the rest of the world”, accounting for 50% of China’s foreign trade. It’s port comprising 35 miles of wharves could accommodate >170 ships and 500 sea-going junks at a time (Wassermann).

 

Canidrome Ballroom🔺(“canine track”)

 

⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼⟼⟻⟼⟻⟼

[𝕒] behind London, New York, Paris and Berlin

[𝕓] the wealth of the Shanghai foreign elite had its genesis in the aftermath of the Opium Wars. The European and North American powers used the springboard of the “unequal treaties” to extend their existing privileges to their countries’ merchant classes. Within the designated enclaves foreigners could carry out their business in accord with their own laws, free from Chinese taxes and with the added bonus that the Chinese courts and bureaucracy couldn’t interfere with or impede their commercial activities (Wassermann).

[𝕔] the line-up on the Bund included the Jardine Matheson Building ( early opium traders), Sassoon House, (Standard) Chartered Bank, H & S Bank (now HSBC), Union Building, APC Club, the Shànghâi Club, the Cathay Hotel, Paramount Dance Hall and the French, US, German and British consulates

 [𝕕] modern day Guangzhou

 

Manchukuo: An Instrument of Imperial Expansion for the Puppet-masters of Japan

Posted on by E Curb Nottus
Comparative politics, Economic history, Inter-ethnic relations, International Relations, Military history, Political geography, Regional History

In 1931 the Manchurian component of the Japanese Imperial Army faked the sabotage of the Southern Manchurian Railroad (which was controlled by the Japanese themselves) near Mukden (present day Shenyang). The Japanese military, playing the victim, alleged it was the work of Chinese dissidents, and used the so-called Mukden Incident to launch a full-scale invasion of Manchuria✴.

Kwantung Garrison troops in Shenyang, 1931 ⇓

The military onslaught from Japan’s Kwantung Army (formerly Garrison) [関東軍, Kantogun] (AKA the Guandong Army) met with determined if largely ineffective resistance…the Chinese were under-prepared, under-equipped and not as technologically advanced militarily as the Japanese, but their defensive efforts were also undermined by Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek who ordered the local warlord Zhang Xue-liang✪ to hold back on resisting the Japanese invaders. The reason – Chang had fixed on a strategy that prioritised gaining control over the rest of the China in the civil war against Mao’s Chinese communists [‘Mukden Incident’, Encyclopaedia Britannia, (John Swift), www.britannia.com]. The Japanese military successes were followed by the creation of a Japanese “puppet state”, Manchukuoꆤ, in Manchuria in April 1932 (comprising China’s Northeast and Inner Mongolia).

Background to Manchukuo: Japanese “special interests’

Japan had pursued an aggressively interventionist policy in the region for decades before Manchukuo. Victorious wars against a diminishing Chinese empire (First Sino-Japanese War, 1894-95) and Tsarist Russia (Russo-Japanese War 1904-05) emboldened Japan’s ambitions. Japan’s spoils of war after defeating the Russians included the extension of its economic sphere of influence to southern Manchuria. Moving into ports, mines, hotels and other businesses and its takeover of Russian railroads, brought with it a big influx of Japanese settlers [‘Manchukuo’, Wikipedia, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/].

Even prior to Manchukuo’s creation, Japan had been conceded a portion of Chinese territory in the southern Liaoning Peninsula which included Dalian (renamed Darien by the Japanese). Known as the Kwantung Leased Territory, it remained in Japanese hands until 1945.

Manchukuo’s capital was Hsinking [Xīnjīng: (literally ‘new capital’)] (today reverted to its original name, Chángchūn) in Jilin province. In 1945 at the end of WWII the capital was moved to nearby Tonghua. Hsinking had the status of a “special city” under the Manchurian state, as did Harbin.

Puppet statehood

The Manchukuo state established by the Japanese militarists was initially a republic but in 1934 it was changed to a one-party constitutional monarchy, the so-called Empire of (Greater) Manchuriaᴥ. The Japanese dredged up the former boy-emperor Pu Yi (last Chinese emperor of the Qing Dynasty) to be the titular figurehead of the ’empire’. Executive power of the Manchukuo government purportedly resided with the prime ministers (Zheng Xiaoxu 1932-35 and Zhang Jinghui 1935-45). The Manchukuo PM held authority under an authoritarian–personalist dictatorship, but this was more perception than substance as real power lay firmly with the Japanese☯️.

“Emperor of Manchukuo” ⇓ (Model display of puppet emperor in palace museum)

Kwantung Army, a rogue element

The Kwantung◘ Army, the arm of the Japanese Imperial Army in Manchuria, functioned as something of a rogue element, habitually acting independently of the Japanese government and the Army General Staff in Tokyo which struggled to rein it in. The Mukden Incident (see above) and the Huanggutun Incident (see below) are two such instances of their rogue activities. Service in the Kwantung Garrison, which had its headquarters in the Manchukuo capital Hsinkingᕡ, was a recognised path for promotion in the Japanese high command…instrumental chiefs of staff Seishirō Itagaki and Hideki Tōjō were both beneficiaries of this [ibid].

Hsinking: Kwantung Army HQs ⇓

Highly politicised, the Kwantung Army adopted an extra-military role for itself in Manchuria, eg, the commanding officer of the Kwantung Army was also Manchukuo ambassador to Japan and held an extraordinary power of veto – even over the Emperor of Japan! [ibid.].

‘Race’-based stratification

Japan peopled the sparsely populated parts of Manchuria with Japanese migrants who sat atop a social pyramid with other ethnic groups in the region stratified under the Japanese. Rationing of essential foodstuffs (including rice, wheat and sugar) was administered in accordance with this racial hierarchy. The Japanese-dominated colony of more than 30 million has been characterised as more “an Auschwitz state or a concentration-camp state” than merely a “puppet state” [Yamamuro Shin’ichi, quoted in Smith, Norman. “Disguising Resistance in Manchukuo: Feminism as Anti-Colonialism in the Collected Works of Zhu Ti.” The International History Review, vol. 28, no. 3, 2006, pp. 515–536. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/40111222].

Japanese dominated Manchuria was indeed a police state, one of the most brutal in an (interwar) era of totalitarian excesses. The Manchukuo regime unleashed a systematic campaign of terror and intimidation against the local Russian and Chinese populations (including arrests without trial, “thought crimes”, organised riots and other forms of subjugation) [‘Manchuria’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org].

Artillery unit of Fengtian Clique ⇓

Resistance to Japanese domination

After the establishment of Manchukuo and the ineffective performance of the Fengtian (Liaoning) Army against the Japanese war machine, various Chinese militias were formed to carry on the resistance. The main forces comprised Anti-Japanese Volunteer Armies, backed by the KMT Nationalists and led by famous general Ma Zhanshanᕤ. Other resistance to the Japanese in the Northeast came from Communist-organised guerrilla units. The anti-Japanese militias’ campaigns, which included harrying and terrorising the Kwantung Army, lasted ten years until the Japanese Army and Airforce finally pacified Manchuria in 1942.

The brunt of the early Chinese fight-back against Japan’s imperial expansion was borne by these warlord militias and volunteer armies, but after Chiang Kai-shek was talked round to a truce with the communists and a united front against Japan in 1937 (in effect postponing the civil war to the conclusion of WWII), the Republic of China (ROC) army engaged directly with the Kwantung Army (Battles of Shanhai Pass, Rehe, Beiping-Tianjin, 2nd Battle of Héběi, Chahar Campaign, etc).

ROC flag (>1928) ⇓ 中華民國 Chunghwa Minkuo

1937: Second Sino-Japanese War

After colonising Manchuria, the Japanese military used it as a base to invade the rest of China. In 1937 the eruption of fighting between Chinese and Japanese troops near Peking (Marco Polo Bridge Incident) led to full-scale war. Antony Beevor [The Second World War, (2012)] marks this episode as being effectively the start of the Second World War (some historians date it’s origins earlier, from the Mukden Incident in 1931).

Marco Polo Bridge ⇓(Photo: The China Guide)

Siberian sideshow

Eventually the Kwantung Army, unchecked by Tokyo, overreached itself by invading Siberia, provoking the USSR into an undeclared war and several border conflicts and battles in the late 1930s. The clashes culminated in the decimation of Japanese 6th Army at the Battle of Khalkhin Gol in August 1939 [‘The Forgotten Soviet-Japanese War of 1939’, The Diplomat, (Stuart D Coleman), 28-Aug-2012, www.thediplomat.com].

1930s Tokyo ‘spin’

The Japanese came under attack in the West for establishing a harsh, totalitarian regime in Manchuria. Attempts were made to deflect the criticism by portraying the interventions in China’s northeast as a positive contribution to the restoration of regional order. Apologists for Japan, pointing to the pattern of internecine conflicts between warlords, communist insurgency and general chaotic conditions in the rest of China in the first third of the 20th century, argued that Manchuria in the same period had, courtesy of Japanese involvement, enjoyed “peace and order, progress and prosperity, (making) great strides in commercial and industrial development” [Saito, Hirosi. “A Japanese View of the Manchurian Situation.” The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 165 (1933): 159-66. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1018175].

Manzhouguo passport ⇓

Japanese spin imbued the Manchukuo regime with a pseudo-legitimacy that was almost mythic: “the ‘Manchus’ followed the ‘kingly way’ (王道 wangdao) of harmony, prosperity, and peace under the benevolent guidance and protection of imperial Japan” [Review of Sovereignty and Authenticity: Manchukuo and the East Asian Modern, (Prasenjit Duara), by John J. Stephan, The International History Review,Vol. 26, No. 1 (Mar., 2004), pp. 181-182. Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40110486]❅.

Myth-busting Manchukuo

Reconnecting with this, Japanese historians in the postwar period, tried to justify the horrors committed by the occupying Japanese army, characterising the incursion in Manchuria and Inner Mongolia as an act of ‘liberation’, prompted by motives which were ‘enlightened’. Recent research by Shin’ichi Yamamuro leads the Japanese academic to posit a view of the Manchukuo occupation that challenges the mainstream Japanese one. Yamamuro debunks the theory that right-wing Japanese military and civilian authorities were supposedly imbued with the idealism of wanting to construct a “paradise in earth” in China’s three northern provinces [Manchuria Under Japanese Dominion, (Shin’ichi Yamamuro, translated by Joshua A. Fogel), 2006; Bill Sewell. “Review of Yamamuro Shin’ichi. Manchuria under Japanese Dominion. Translated by Joshua A. Fogel. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006,” H-US-Japan Reviews, March, 2007. URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=265211196449094].

Scope of the membership of the Greater EACP Sphere ⇓

“Greater Co-operation” – code for Japanese expansion and economic domination

In 1940 Japan incorporated its Manchurian client-state into the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere (GEACS). The purported aim of GEACS was that it would be an economically self-sufficient “bloc of Asian nations led by Japan and free of Western powers”. In reality, this veneer of Pan-Asian idealism (regime motto: “five races under one union”) was a front for the Japanese militarists and nationalists to expand south and west and advance its domination of Asia [‘Manchukuo’, Wiki, loc.cit.].

A prized economic asset

Manchukuo (and the Inner Mongolia territory) was incorporated into both the Japanese war machine and the national economy. Rich in natural resources (especially coal and iron), under the Japanese Manchuria became an industrial powerhouse. Japanese citizens, who had been hard hit by the Great Depression, were enthusiastic in their support for the army’s intervention in Manchurian territory right through the period of Japanese occupancy [ibid.].

August 1945: D-day for the Japanese puppet states

August 9, 1945, the day after the second atomic bomb was dropped on Japan, the Soviet Red Army and the Mongolian Army invaded Manchuria and Inner Mongolia, which was to be the final campaign of the Second World War. In a swift operation (Manchzhurskaya Strategicheskaya Nastupatelnaya Operatsiya), Manchukuo, Mengjiang and Japanese (northern) Korea were all liberated, thus culminating in the break-up of the Japanese empire. Manchuria and Inner Mongolia were returned to China, and the Soviets set about orchestrating a communist takeover of North Korea…meanwhile Korea south of the 38th Parallel was occupied by US forces [‘Soviet invasion of Manchuria’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org].

Victorious Soviet soldiers in Harbin ⇓Photo: https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/

Footnote: ‘Manchuria’ as a geographic descriptor was first used by the Japanese in the 1600s and later adopted by Westerners in China…the Chinese themselves these days are less inclined to use the term ‘Manchuria’, preferring to describe this part of China simply as Dongbei (东北), the Northeast).

Manchurian malfeasance – for the record: these days the once imperial “puppet palace” of Manchukuo is a history museum – a reminder to Chinese and the very occasional 外国人 (foreign) visitor alike of the aberrant and abhorrent regime imposed on North-East China during the interwar period of the 20th century. Manchukuo (State of Manchuria) comprising northeastern China and part of Inner Mongolia Area: approx 1.19 million km Pop (est) 1940: 30-35 million Ethnic Mix: Han Chinese (majority), Manchus, Mongols, Huis, Koreans, Japanese, Belorussians (minorities)

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✴ in 1932 an independent inquiry with US participation, the Lytton Commission (Ritton Hōkokusho), found that both parties were at fault for the incident. In its Report which led to exposure of the Japanese duplicity, it condemned Japan for its aggression (albeit conceding it had “special interests” in the region), while also criticising China for inflaming anti-Japanese sentiments…the League of Nations subsequently demanded that Japan vacate Manchuria, Japan’s response was to give notice to withdraw unilaterally from the League (effective 1935) [‘Lytton Report’, (United States History), www.u-s-history.com]

✪ Zhang’s father, Marshal Zhang Zuolin, also a Manchurian warlord, had been assassinated by the Japanese Kwantung military in 1928, in an episode in Shenyang known as the Huanggutun incident. Zhang senior was one of the most powerful warlords in the Warlord Era, which saw local military cliques carve out territorial strongholds in different parts of China

ꆤ Manzhouguo in Chinese

ᴥ the Chinese expression for Manchukuo is 虚假帝国 (the “false empire”)

☯️ Zheng, a royalist and close collaborator of Pu Yi, had hoped that Manchukuo would become a springboard for the restoration of Qing rule in China, aims not shared by the Japanese who pressured him to resign in 1935 [‘Zheng Xiaoxu’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org]. His successor Zhang Jinghui was even more of a powerless figurehead, content to allow advisors from the Kwantung Army run the state, earning Zhang the unflattering sobriquet of the “Tofu prime minister” [‘Zhang Jinghui’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org]

◘ Kwantung means “east of Shanhaiguan”, ie, Manchuria

ᕡ the Kwantung military also maintained a peninsula naval base at Ryojun (Port Arthur)

ᕤ the charismatic general started fighting against the Japanese, was then induced to swap over to the Japanese side and finally switched back to the cause of Chinese resistance

❅ Stephan summarises Manchukuo as “a producer of beans, bandits and bunk” with the ‘kingly way’ grandiloquence falling under the third of these attributes

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