Japanese punitive expedition to Taiwan in 1874
The Japanese punitive expedition to Taiwan in 1874 ( Japanese 台湾 出兵 Taiwan Shuppei ), also known as the Mudan incident ( Chinese 牡丹 社 事件 ) in Taiwan and mainland China , was a punitive action by Japanese military forces that resulted in the murder of 54 crew members of a merchant ship on the Ryūkyū Islands by the indigenous people, the Paiwan , on the southwestern tip of Taiwan in December 1871.
It represented the first overseas deployment of the Japanese army and navy .
The Meiji government of Japan has asked the Chinese government that the Paiwan leaders responsible for the murder should be punished.
The Japanese Foreign Minister Soejima Taneomi traveled to Beijing and was received in an audience by the Qing Emperor Tongzhi , which in itself amounted to a diplomatic triumph. Claims for damages were denied on the grounds that China did not exercise effective power over the indigenous peoples in Taiwan . The US military advisor to the Japanese government, Charles Le Gendre , urged Japan to take matters into their own hands.
The Japanese government agreed and in May 1874 sent an expedition of 3,600 soldiers, led by Saigō Tsugumichi , to Taiwan. Also ōkubo toshimichi was one of the proponents of military punitive expedition. Ships left Nagasaki on May 17 and troops landed in Taiwan on May 22. The number of victims among the Paiwan is said to have been 30, the Japanese lost about 12 men in battle, but 531 to disease.
Although the expedition officially served to punish the indigenous peoples for beheading Okinawan traders, the Meiji government had other purposes. On the one hand, attempts were made to force the Chinese to formally recognize Japanese sovereignty over the Ryūkyū Islands and, on the other hand, to admit their lack of effective control over Taiwan. It was also a test of the capabilities of the Japanese military for a future invasion of Taiwan.
Domestically, it satisfied those who pressed for a more aggressive foreign policy and who were angry about the government's refusal to invade Korea in 1873.
The expedition took place shortly after the Saga Rebellion led by Saigō Tsugumichi, Saigō Takamori 's younger brother and largely comprised of previous samurai of the saga and the daimyat Satsuma .
The Japanese withdrew from Taiwan after the Qing government promised compensation of 500,000 kuping tael . Japan's cost of the campaign, in contrast, amounted to an estimated five million ryō , which corresponded to the Chinese tael 1: 1.
literature
- Smits, Gregory (1999). "Visions of Ryūkyū: Identity and Ideology in Early-Modern Thought and Politics." Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Reinhard Zöllner: History of Japan: from 1800 to the present . In: UTB for Science: Uni Pocket Books . tape 2683 . Schöningh, Paderborn 2006, ISBN 3-8252-2683-2 , pp. 220 (457 p., Limited preview in Google Book search).