TheTwenty-One Demands (Japanese:対華21ヶ条要求,romanized: Taika Nijūikkajō Yōkyū;simplified Chinese:二十一条/廿一条;traditional Chinese:二十一條/廿一條;pinyin:Èrshíyī tiáo) was a set of demands made during theFirst World War by theEmpire of Japan underPrime MinisterŌkuma Shigenobu to thegovernment of theRepublic of China on 18 January 1915. The secret demands would greatly extend Japanese control of China. Japan would keep the former German leased territory it had conquered at the start of World War I in 1914 and would be strong inManchuria andSouth Mongolia while having an expanded role in railways. The most extreme demands (in section 5) would give Japan a decisive voice in finance, policing, and government affairs. The last part would make China in effect aprotectorate of Japan, and thereby reduce Western influence.
Japan was in a strong position during the course of the war as theAllies were in a stalemate with their rivals, theCentral Powers. TheUnited Kingdom and Japan hada military alliance since 1902, and in 1914, the UK had asked Japan to enter the war. China published the secret demands, upsetting the Americans and British. They were sympathetic and forced Japan to drop section 5 in the final 1916 settlement. Japan gained little in China and lost a great deal of prestige and trust from both the United Kingdom and theUnited States.[1]
The Chinese public responded with a spontaneous nationwide boycott of Japanese goods; Japan's exports to China fell drastically. The UK was affronted and no longer trusted Japan as an ally. With the First World War underway, Japan's position was strong and the UK's was weak; nevertheless, the UK and the US forced Japan to drop the fifth set of demands that would have given Japan a large measure of control over the entire Chinese economy and ended theOpen Door Policy.[2] Japan and China reached a series of agreements which ratified the first four sets of goals on 25 May 1915.
Japan had gained a largesphere of influence innorthern China and Manchuria through its victories in theFirst Sino-Japanese War and theRusso-Japanese War, and had thus joined the ranks of the Europeanimperialist powers in their scramble to establish political and economic domination over Imperial China under theQing dynasty. With the overthrow of the Qing dynasty in theXinhai Revolution, and the subsequent establishment of the new Republic of China, Japan saw an opportunity to further expand its position in China.[3]
The German Empire was in control ofShandong province as part of theKiautschou Bay concession since 1898. With the onset of the First World War, Japan declared war against Germany on 23 August 1914. Japanese and British forces quickly seized all German holdings in the Far East, after theSiege of Tsingtao.[citation needed]
Japan, underPrime MinisterŌkuma Shigenobu andForeign MinisterKatō Takaaki, drafted the initial list of Twenty-One Demands, which were reviewed by thegenrō andEmperor Taishō, and approved by theDiet. AmbassadorHioki Eki delivered the list to PresidentYuan Shikai of theBeiyang government in a private audience on 18 January 1915,[4][5][6][7] with warnings of dire consequences if China were to reject them.
The Twenty-One Demands were divided into five groups:[8]
Knowing the negative reaction "Group 5" would cause, Japan initially tried to keep its contents secret. The Chinese government attempted to stall for as long as possible and leaked the full contents of the Twenty-One Demands to European powers in the hope that due to a perceived threat to their own political and economic spheres of interest, they would help contain Japan.
After China rejected Japan's revised proposal on 26 April 1915, thegenrō intervened and deleted ‘Group 5’ from the document, as these had proved to be the most objectionable to the Chinese government. A reduced set of "Thirteen Demands" was transmitted on May 7 in the form of an ultimatum, with a two-day deadline for response. Yuan Shikai was not in a position to risk war with Japan, and acceptedappeasement, a tactic followed by his successors. The final form of the treaty was signed by both parties on May 25, 1915.[10]
Katō Takaaki publicly admitted that the ultimatum was invited by Yuan to save face with the Chinese people in conceding to the Demands. American MinisterPaul Reinsch reported to the US State Department that the Chinese were surprised at the leniency of the ultimatum, as it demanded much less than they had already committed themselves to concede.[citation needed]
The results of the revised final (Thirteen Demands) version of the Twenty-One Demands were far more negative for Japan than positive. Without "Group 5", the new treaty gave Japan little more than it already had in China.[citation needed]
On the other hand, the United States expressed strongly negative reactions to Japan's rejection of theOpen Door Policy. In the Bryan Note issued by Secretary of StateWilliam Jennings Bryan on 13 March 1915, the U.S., while affirming Japan's "special interests" in Manchuria, Mongolia and Shandong, expressed concern over further encroachments to Chinese sovereignty.[11]
Great Britain,Japan's closest ally, expressed concern over what was perceived as Japan's overbearing, bullying approach to diplomacy, and the British Foreign Office in particular was unhappy with Japanese attempts to establish what would effectively be a Japaneseprotectorate over all of China.[12]
Afterwards, Japan and the United States looked for a compromise; as a result, theLansing–Ishii Agreement was concluded in 1917. It was approved by theParis Peace Conference in 1919.[13]
Japan continued to push for outright control over Shandong Province and won European diplomatic recognition for their claim at theTreaty of Versailles (despite the refusal of the Chinese delegation to sign the treaty). This, in turn, provoked ill-will from the United States government, as well as widespread hostility within China; a large-scale boycott against Japanese goods was just one effect. In 1922, the U.S. brokered a solution: China was awarded nominal sovereignty over all of Shandong, while in practice Japan's economic dominance continued.[14]
In China, the overall political impact of Japan's actions was highly negative, creating a considerable amount of publicill-will towards Japan, contributing to theMay Fourth Movement, and a significant upsurge innationalism.[15][16]
