 | |
Native name | 南満州鉄道株式会社 |
|---|---|
Romanized name | Minami-Manshū Tetsudō kabushiki gaisha |
| Company type | PublicKK |
| Founded | 26 November 1906 |
| Founder | Government of Japan |
| Defunct | after theSoviet invasion of Manchuria in August 1945 |
| Headquarters | , |
Key people | Gotō Shinpei (first president) |
| Owner | Government of Japan (50%) |
| South Manchuria Railway | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese name | |||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 南滿洲鐵道 | ||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 南满洲铁道 | ||||||
| |||||||
| Japanese name | |||||||
| Kanji | 南満州鉄道 | ||||||
| Hiragana | みなみまんしゅうてつどう | ||||||
| Katakana | ミナミマンシュウテツドウ | ||||||
| |||||||
_May_1920_Schedule.jpg)
TheSouth Manchuria Railway (Japanese:南満州鉄道,romanized: Minamimanshū Tetsudō;simplified Chinese:南满洲铁道;traditional Chinese:南滿洲鐵道;pinyin:Nánmǎnzhōu Tiědào), officiallyThe South Manchuria Railway Company, Ltd. (南満州鉄道株式会社,kyujitai: 南滿洲鐵道株式會社,Minamimanshū Tetsudō Kabushikigaisha),Mantetsu (Japanese:満鉄,romanized: Mantetsu) orMantie (simplified Chinese:满铁;traditional Chinese:滿鐵;pinyin:Mǎntiě) for short, was a largeNational Policy Company [ja] of theEmpire of Japan whose primary function was the operation of railways on theDalian–Fengtian (Mukden)–Changchun (calledXinjing from 1931 to 1945) corridor in northeasternChina, as well as on several branch lines.
In 1905, after Russia's defeat in theRusso-Japanese War, this area was taken over by Japan as theSouth Manchuria Railway Zone. Mantetsu was established in 1906 to operate the railways taken over from the Russians. Subsequently, Mantetsu expanded by building new lines for itself and for Chinese-owned undertakings,[1] and after the establishment of thepuppet state ofManchukuo in 1932, it was also entrusted with the management of theManchukuo National Railway. Between 1917 and 1925, Mantetsu was also responsible for the management of theChōsen Government Railway inJapanese-occupied Korea.
However, it was also involved in nearly every aspect of the economic, cultural and political life ofManchuria,[1] from power generation to agricultural research, for which reason it was often referred to as "Japan'sEast India Company in China".Nisshō Inoue, the founder of the interwar Japanese far-right militant organization Ketsumeidan (血盟団, League of Blood), was employed byMantetsu from 1909 to 1920.
In 1945, theSoviet Unioninvaded and overran Manchukuo, and following Japan's defeat in thePacific War, Mantetsu itself was dissolved by order of theAmerican occupation authorities inoccupied Japan. The railway was operated by the Soviets for a time, and handed over toChina Railway after the establishment of thePeople's Republic of China in 1949. Fengtian has been called Shenyang since 1945, and the line from there to Dalian is today part of theShenda Railway fromChangchun to Dalian, whilst the Shenyang–Changchun section is now part of theJingha Railway; the branch lines have also been part of China Railway since then.
The main line from Changchun to Port Arthur, as Luishun was called under Russian rule, was built between 1898 and 1903 by the Russians as the southern branch of theirChinese Eastern Railway according to the1896 secret treaty and the1898 lease convention betweenQing China andImperial Russia in the aftermath of theFirst Sino-Japanese War.
Following the Japanese victory overImperial Russia in 1905 after theRusso-Japanese War and the signing of theTreaty of Portsmouth, most of the southern branch (Harbin—Port Arthur) of theChina Eastern Railway was transferred to Japanese control. The last station remaining in Russian hands was atKuanchengzi (寬城子) in modern-dayChangchun. The northernmost Japanese-controlled station was theChangchun railway station.[2][3]
Under the authorization ofEmperor Meiji, Japan then established a new semi-privately held company, the South Manchurian Railway Company (a.k.a.Mantetsu), with acapitalization of 200 millionyen to operate the railroad and to develop settlements and industries along its route.[4] The organizing committee was headed by GeneralKodama Gentarō, and after his death, by GeneralTerauchi Masatake. CountGotō Shimpei, formerly the Japanese governor ofTaiwan, was appointed the first president of the company, and the headquarters was established inTokyo before relocated toDalian in 1907.[5]
One of the first tasks of the new company was to change the railway gauge. The rail line was originally built according to the gauge of5 ft (1,524 mm), during the war it had beenconverted by the advancing Japanese troops to the Japanese3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) gauge, in order to facilitate the use of rolling stock brought from Japan. But once the new Japanese South Manchuria Railway Company took possession of the line, it had the tracks re-gauged again, now to the gauge of4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm)standard gauge,[6] presumably with an eye to connecting the system to other railways of China.
In 1907, an agreement was reached between the Japanese and Russian authorities about connecting the Japanese South Manchuria Railway with the line to the north, which remained in the hands of Russian China Far East Railway. According to the agreement, Russian gauge tracks would continue from the "Russian" Kuanchengzi Station to the "Japanese"Changchun station, and vice versa, tracks on the "gauge adapted by the South Manchuria Railway" (i.e., thestandard gauge) would continue from the Changchun Station to the Kuancheng Station.[3]
By the end of 1907, the company employed 9,000 Japanese and 4,000 Chinese. By 1910, those numbers had increased to 35,000 and 25,000 respectively.[5] The railway used a significant amount of U.S.-made rails and signaling equipment, as well as somesteam locomotives built by theAmerican Locomotive Company atDunkirk, NY. A visiting executive from theErie Railroad was quite impressed with the arrangement, and described South Manchurian Railway ca. 1913 as "the only railroad in the whole world that is like our American railroads (and they are, fairly speaking, the best)".[6]
Mantetsu quickly expanded the system inherited from Russia to staggering proportions, buildingcoal mines atFushun andYantai, and harbor facilities atAndong,Yingkou, andDalian. At each station,Mantetsu built hotels for travelers and warehouses for goods. Japanese settlers were encouraged through the construction of schools, libraries, hospitals andpublic utilities. TheMantetsu Research Wing was the centerpiece of Japan's colonial program, and instigatedagricultural research into development ofsoybean farming. Land under cultivation expanded 70% in 20 years.[7]
From 1916,Mantestu began to spin off a number of subsidiary companies, includingShowa Steel Works, Dalian Ceramics, Dalian Oil & Fat, South Manchurian Glass, as well asflour mills,sugar mills, electrical power plants,shale oil plants and chemical plants.[8]
On 31 July 1917, the management of theChosen Government Railway (Sentetsu) inJapanese-occupied Korea was transferred from the Railway Bureau of theGovernment-General of Korea to Mantetsu, which established the Mantetsu Keijō/Gyeongseong Railway Administration (Japanese:満鉄京城管理局,Mantetsu Keijō Kanrikyoku;Korean:만철 경성 관리국,Mancheol Gyeongseong Gwalliguk), and under Mantetsu control Korea's railway network was expanded rapidly. On 1 April 1925, management of Sentetsu was returned to the Railway Bureau, though Mantetsu retained control of the line along the Korea–Manchuria border from the port ofNajin in Korea toTumen in Manchuria and toSangsambong in Korea. Mantetsu called this line theNorth Chosen Line, and it remained under Mantetsu control until 1945.
Company assets rose from 163 million yen in 1908 to over a billion yen in 1930.Mantetsu was by far the largest corporation in Japan, and also its most profitable, averaging rates of return from 25 to 45 percent per year.[7] During the 1920s, Mantetsu provided for over a quarter of the Japanese government'stax revenues.[9]
Over 75% ofMantetsu's income was generated by its freight business, with the key to profitability coming from soybean exports, both to Japan proper and to Europe. Soybean production increased exponentially with increasing demand for soy oil, and for soy meal for use infertilizer andanimal feed. By 1927, half of the world's supply of soybean was from Manchuria and the efforts byMantetsu to expand production and to ship to export ports was a classic example of an extractive colonial economy dependent on a single product.[9]
In 1931, theMukden Incident occurred, where the Japanese military faked an attack on the railway by Chinese partisans as a pretext for theJapanese invasion of Manchuria.[10][11][12]
Mantetsu was also charged with a government-like role in managing the rail transportation system after the formation ofManchukuo in 1932, including management of the (theoretically independent)Manchukuo National Railway. By 1938, Mantetsu had 72 subsidiary companies, development projects in 25 urban areas and carried 17,515,000 passengers per year.[13] Between 1930 and 1940, the Japanese population of Manchukuo rose by 800,000 making ethnic Japanese the majority in many of the towns and cities served byMantetsu.Mantetsu prided itself on state-of-the-arturban planning, with modernsewer systems,public parks, and creativemodern architecture far in advance of what could be found in Japan itself. These things were possible due toMantetsu's tremendous profitability, and its political power to seize property and silence opposition and dissent at will through its political connections to the military andtotalitarian national leadership.[14]
In 1932, theKwantung Army requested that the South Manchuria Railway establish an Economic Research Team.[15]: 43 This team drafted many of Manchukuo's earlyeconomic policies and emphasized state control over the economy.[15]: 43
In 1934,Mantetsu inaugurated the "Asia Express", a high speed train from Dalian to the Manchukuo capital ofXinjing (Changchun). Reaching a top speed of 134 km/h (83 mph), the "Asia Express" was the fastest scheduled train in Asia at the time.
Changchun remained thebreak of gauge point between the Russian and standard gauges in the 1930s,[16] until the Chinese Eastern railway itself was bought byManchukuo and converted to the standard gauge in the mid-1930s.
In 1936, the company owned 466 locomotives, 554 coaches and 8134 goods wagons.[17]
In 1945, theSoviet Unioninvaded and overran Manchukuo.Rolling stock and movable equipment was looted and taken back to theSoviet Union; some was returned when theChinese Communist government came into power.Mantetsu itself was dissolved by order of theAmerican occupation authorities inoccupied Japan. ThePeople's Republic of China government later merged the northern half of the South Manchuria Railway's mainline (theRenkyō Line) with other railway lines to form the presentBeijing–Harbin railway.
In conjunction with magazine advertising by Japan Tourist Bureau (JTB), the railway attempted to create a unique food culture in Manchukuo. They offered a variety of special cuisine such as Yamato beef steak,Mongolian barbeque, andsorghum vulgare (kaoliang) confectionery in dining cars along the line and in the railway-operatedYamato Hotel. There was little uptake in the cuisine however after the fall of Manchukuo.[18]
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| Name | From | To | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Shinpei Goto | 13 November 1906 | 14 July 1908 |
| 2 | Yoshikoto Nakamura | 19 December 1908 | 18 December 1913 |
| 3 | Ryutaro Nomura | 19 December 1913 | 15 July 1914 |
| 4 | Yujiro Nakamura | 15 July 1914 | 31 July 1917 |
| 5 | Shimbei Kunisawa | 31 July 1917 | 12 April 1919 |
| 6 | Ryutaro Nomura | 12 April 1919 | 31 May 1921 |
| 7 | Senkichiro Hayakawa | 31 May 1921 | 14 October 1922 |
| 8 | Takeji Kawamura | 24 October 1922 | 22 June 1924 |
| 9 | Banichiro Yasuhiro | 22 June 1924 | 19 July 1927 |
| 10 | Jōtaro Yamamoto | 19 July 1927 | 14 August 1929 |
| 11 | Mitsugu Sengoku | 14 August 1929 | 13 June 1931 |
| 12 | Yasuya Uchida | 13 June 1931 | 6 July 1932 |
| 13 | Hakutaro Hayashi | 26 July 1932 | 2 August 1935 |
| 14 | Yōsuke Matsuoka | 2 August 1935 | 24 March 1939 |
| 15 | Takuichi Ohmura | 24 March 1939 | 14 July 1943 |
| 16 | Naoto Kobiyama | 14 July 1943 | 11 April 1945 |
| 17 | Motoki Yamazaki | 5 May 1945 | 30 September 1945 |
