Amur League

Symbol of the Amur covenant

The Black Dragon Society ( jap. 黒龍会 , Kokuryukai , Eng. Black Dragon Society , dt. Also Black Dragon Association or the Black Dragon Society ) was a prominent paramilitary, ultranationalist ( uyoku ) grouping in the Empire of Japan . In 2008 the organization was re-established under the old name.

history

Founder of the Amur Association Uchida Ryōhei

The Kokuryūkai was founded in 1901 by Uchida Ryōhei , who was a member of the Gen'yōsha and thus served as a model. The group's name comes from the Amur River , whose Chinese characters ( Chinese  黑龍江 , Pinyin hēilóng jiāng  - "River of the Black Dragon") are read as Kokuryū-kō in Japanese . The group's stated aim was to drive the Russian Empire out of East Asia south of the Amur.

In the beginning, the Kokuryūkai decidedly distanced themselves from the criminal machinations of the Gen'yōsha . This paid off as cabinet ministers and professional secret agents were soon among its members. Over time, however, she too turned criminal acts as a means to an end.

To spread her positions she published several magazines: the Kokuryū ( 黒 竜 , dt. "Amur"), the Ajia Jiron ( 亜 細 亜 時 論 , dt. "Asian critique of time"), the Kaihō ( 解放 , dt. "Liberation, emancipation "), The Tōa Geppō ( 東 亜 月報 , dt." East Asian monthly report "). The Kaihō was banned because of extremism and the Tōa Geppō , as the successor to the Kokuryū , was also published in Korea and China due to its printing in Chinese spelling ( Kambun ). An English-language magazine was also published with The Asian Review . She was supported by various large Japanese companies, including banks and trading houses.

The federal government ran an espionage training facility from which it sent agents to the secret service to monitor Russian activities in Russia, Manchuria , Korea and the Chinese Empire . It put pressure on Japanese politicians to adopt a foreign policy of strength. As part of her Pan-Asianism , she also financially supported revolutionaries such as Sun Yat-sen in China and Emilio Aguinaldo in the Philippines .

During the Russo-Japanese War , the Japanese annexation of Korea and the Siberian Intervention , the Imperial Japanese Army used the Kokuryūkai network for espionage, sabotage and assassination attempts. She organized Manchurian guerrilla units from Chinese warlords - the best known of them was Chang Tso-lin - and bandit leaders who fought against the Russians. The Amur Bund, together with the army, also carried out successful psychological warfare, spread false information and propaganda, but also offered itself as a translator for the army.

The Kokuryūkai also supported the spy Akashi Motojirō , who, however, was not a member of the federal government. He carried out operations in China, Manchuria and Siberia and established contacts with Muslims in Central Asia. The Amur Bund also had close contact, including alliances with various Buddhist sects in Asia.

During the 1920s and 1930s, the Kokuryūkai developed into a regular political organization and publicly attacked liberal and leftist ideology. Although it never had more than a few dozen members, it included senior government officials, the military and business leaders, who gave it greater political clout than most other ultra-nationalist groups.

The Kokuryūkai also expanded worldwide in the 1930s, placing agents in Ethiopia , Turkey , Morocco , Southeast Asia , South America , Europe and the United States .

The founder of the Kuomintang and the Republic of China (1912–1949) Sun Yat-sen in Tokyo with members of the Kokuryūkai 1900.

The Kokuryūkai was dissolved by the US occupation authorities in 1946 . However, the organization was re-established in 1961 as Kokuryū Kurabu (Amur Club), but never had more than 150 members. In 2008 it took on the old name again. Today it is mainly active in Japan, South Korea , North Korea , the People's Republic of China and Russia and runs some martial arts clubs, literary clubs and other political institutions. She describes herself as the "Japanese spearhead" in Pan-Asianism . Japanese nationalism is not only promoted, but seen as a central element of the ideology. There are connections to Nippon Kaigi . The current leader is from the Tanaka family.

United States

The Kokuryūkai was exploited by the US tabloids and government agencies in a sensationalist or propagandistic way. Lurid novels and short stories emerged that linked the association with all sorts of criminal activities, and government agencies used their existence to prove a " fifth column " among Americans of Japanese descent and ultimately as a reason for the internment of Americans of Japanese descent .

The organization was also identified by the FBI as a supporter of black, nationalist organizations charged with sedition in 1942, most notably Mittie Maud Lena Gordon's Peace Movement for Ethiopia , but also the Brotherhood of Liberty for the Black People of America and the Nation of Islam .

On March 27, 1942, the FBI arrested 139 suspected Amur Association members in the San Joaquin Valley , California .

literature

• Frank Jacob (ed.): Secret societies: cultural historical social studies. Secret Societies: Comparative Studies in Culture, Society and History . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2012, ISBN 978-3-8260-4908-8
• Frank Jacob: The Thule Society and the Kokuryûkai: Secret Societies in Global-Historical Comparison . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2013, ISBN 978-3-8260-4909-5 (also dissertation at the University of Erlangen as secret societies in Germany and Japan )
• Norman Polmar, Thomas B. Allen: The Encyclopedia of Espionage . Gramercy Books, New York 1998, ISBN 0-517-20269-7
• Richard Deacon: A History of the Japanese Secret Service . Berkley Publishing Company, New York 1983, ISBN 0-425-07458-7

See also

• Kotaro Yoshida

Web links

• The "Black-Dragon" Statement of Japanese Policy in China as a Result of the European War. (written in 1914.) (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Sven Saaler: Pan-Asianism in Japan of the Meiji and Taishô periods: roots, development and application of an ideology . In: Iwo Amelung, Matthias Koch, Joachim Kurtz, Eun-Jeung Lee, Sven Saaler (eds.): Discourses of self-assertion in Asia: China - Japan - Korea . iudicum, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-89129-845-5 , p. 146–147 ( Google Books - German Institute for Japanese Studies (ed.): Monographs Volume 34 ).
2. ↑ 黒龍語学校におけるロシア語教育のレベルの高さについては,ロシア関係の書籍を専門に出版しているナウカから刊行された, 「日本人とロシア語-ロシア語教育の歴史」 (日本ロシア文学会） に 詳述 さ れ て い る
3. ^ Brian Daizen Victoria: Zen War Stories . Routledge Curson, New York 2003, ISBN 0-7007-1581-9 , p. 61
4. ↑ 黒龍語学校におけるロシア語教育のレベルの高さについては,ロシア関係の書籍を専門に出版しているナウカから刊行された, 「日本人とロシア語-ロシア語教育の歴史」 (日本ロシア文学会） に 詳述 さ れ て い る
5. ↑ 田中健 之 の 救国 提 言 - Yahoo! ブ ロ グ. Retrieved September 2, 2018 (Japanese). 
6. ↑ US At War: Takahashi's Blacks . In: Time . October 5, 1942 ( time.com ).
7. ^ Chronology of 1942 San Francisco War Events. In: The Virtual Museum of the City of San Francisco. Retrieved May 20, 2010 . 

Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . Thus, Uchida is the family name, Ryōhei the first name.