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part of the Chinese customs system rather than keeping it as a free port. The result was that by 1914 German concessions were much more limited than they had been under the agreement of 1898 and Sino-German relations were relatively amicable. That fact did not help Germany when war broke out. The German chargé d’affaires in China sent a cable to Berlin saying “Engagement with Miss Butterfly very probable”— a message that the British, who were reading all the cables coming from the East, did not have much trouble decoding. The Chinese government was not in a position to intervene when Japan attacked, and there was nothing Germany itself could do. The kaiser had only his sympathy to spare: “God be with you! In the coming struggle I will think of you.” And so the German concessions in Shantung, the railway, the neat little port and the mines passed into Japan’s control.3

Japan talked about handing back the concessions to China, but the Chinese, not surprisingly, did not put much faith in this. During the war, Japan did what it could to ensure that it would hang on to its acquisition. Right from the start the occupation authorities had busied themselves building new railways, taking over the running of the telegraphs and the post office from the Chinese, and extracting taxes and labor from the local inhabitants. Japan achieved control of Shantung beyond anything Germany had enjoyed. 4

Japan also did its best to tie up the ineffectual Chinese government in legal and other knots. It advanced large amounts of money to China, some of which came suspiciously close to bribes, to induce Chinese officials to support its goals. Private Japanese nationalist groups, factions within the military, and financiers pursued their own goals, often at cross-purposes to their own government. Arms went to southerners rebelling against the government in Peking, which Japan had recognized. In south Manchuria and the adjoining part of eastern Mongolia, the Japanese military authorities and adventurers intrigued with rebellious warlords. The consequence was that Japanese policy in China appeared extraordinarily devious when in fact it was more often simply confused and incoherent.

At an official level, successive Japanese governments tried, rather clumsily, to get China under their control. In January 1915, the Japanese minister in Peking paid a courtesy call on China’s president. The minister talked about the close and friendly relationship of the two peoples over the centuries and said that it would be a shame if outside powers forced them apart. There were, he added, a few troublesome issues that it would be nice to settle. He then presented the astonished president with a list of twenty-one demands. If China refused to agree to them, Japan might have to take what he vaguely termed “vigorous methods.” Some of the demands simply confirmed Japan’s existing activities in China, but another set asked the Chinese government to agree in advance to whatever arrangements Japan and Germany should come to over the German concessions. Worse still was a final, secret set which would have virtually turned China into a Japanese protectorate. ( Just in case the Chinese government had second thoughts, the paper on which the Japanese presented their list had a watermark of dreadnoughts and machine guns.5)

The Chinese government stalled and quibbled on every point. It also leaked the demands, which produced nationalist protests throughout China. Japan reluctantly dropped the more drastic provisions but on May 25, 1915, forced the Chinese government to sign a treaty guaranteeing that Japan would get what it wanted in Shantung. The Chinese nationalists declared National Humiliation Day. In Tokyo, Saionji was so distressed at the blundering incompetence of his own government that he made his displeasure felt by blocking the foreign minister’s attempt to become prime minister.6

Other nations watched with concern but did little. Britain badly needed Japan’s help at sea. Japanese ships were already carrying out patrols in the Pacific, and the British hoped they might