英文摘要 |
After the Jiaozhou Bay Incident of 1897, Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs formulated a very conservative diplomatic strategy to persuade the Qing government to compromise with Germany. In practice, the performance of Yano Fumio, the Minister to China, was not impressive. Hence, Odagiri Masunosuke, the acting Consul General in Shanghai, took this opportunity to persuade Cai Jun, the Circuit Intendant of Shanghai, to put forward a proposal for an alliance between China, Britain, and Japan to Liu Kunyi and Zhang Zhidong, the Viceroy of Liangjiang and Huguang respectively. A similar proposal was also raised by a British naval officer. At the same time, Kawakami Soroku, the vice director of the Japanese General Staff sent his subordinates Kamio Mitsuomi and Utsunomiya Tarō to China for lobbying Chinese officials. Under the influences of all these events, Liu Kunyi proposed the Zongli Yamen to ally with Britain and Japan, and Zhang Zhidong took the lead in presenting the idea to the Emperor. Although the central government did not agree with this proposal, pro-Japan seeds were planted in the mind of a number of Chinese officials, which had a significant impact on the Sino-Japanese relations thereafter. Because Britain had no plan to ally with China, the idea of allying with Britain disappeared soon. This mode of sending middle and junior officers for lobbying Chinese high-rank regional officials was also carried out in some other provinces such as Fujian, Sichuan, Zhili, and Fengtian. In this aspect, Japan's diplomacy towards China had achieved great success, among which the key role was not played by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or the Minister to China, but by the Consul General in Shanghai and the General Staff, which theoretically have no diplomatic responsibilities. This reveals the pluralism of Japanese diplomacy towards China. |