Background
Following the Russian October Revolution of 1917, the new Bolshevik government signed a separate peace with Germany. The collapse of the Russian front presented a tremendous problem to the Entente powers, since not only did it allow Germany to shift troops and war material from its eastern front to the west, but it also made it possible for Germany to secure the huge stockpiles of supplies that had been accumulating at Murmansk, Arkhangelsk and Vladivostok. In addition, the 50,000 man Czech Legion, fighting on the side of the Allies, was now trapped behind enemy-lines, and was attempting to fight its way out through the east to Vladivostok along the Bolshevik-held Trans-Siberian Railroad.
Faced with these concerns, Great Britain and France decided to militarily intervene in the Russian Civil War against the Bolshevik government. They had three objectives that they hoped to achieve:
- prevent the Allied war material stockpiles in Russia from falling into German hands
- rescue the Czech Legion and return it to the European front
- resurrect the Eastern Front by installing a White Russian backed government.
Severely short of troops, the British and French requested that the United States provide troops for both the North Russia Campaign and the Siberian Campaign. In July 1918, against the advice of the War Department, President Wilson agreed to send 5,000 U.S. troops as the American North Russia Expeditionary Force (aka the Polar Bear Expedition) and 10,000 U.S. troops as the American Expeditionary Force Siberia. In the same month, the Beiyang government of the Republic of China accepted an invitation by the White movement and sent 2,000 troops by August. China will later occupy Outer Mongolia and Tuva as well as send one battalion for the North Russia Campaign as part of their anti-Bolshevik efforts.
Japanese participation
In July 1918, President Wilson asked the Japanese government to supply 7,000 troops as part of an international coalition of 25,000 troops planned to support the American Expeditionary Force Siberia. After heated debate in the Diet, the administration of Prime Minister Terauchi Masatake agreed to send 12,000 troops, but under the command of Japan, rather than as part of an international coalition.Once the political decision had been reached, the Imperial Japanese Army took over full control under Chief of Staff Yui Mitsue, and by November 1918, more than 70,000 Japanese troops had occupied all ports and major towns in the Russian Maritime Provinces and Eastern Siberia. In the summer of 1918 the 5th Japanese division and the Japanese-backed Special Manchurian Detachment of Grigory Semyonov took control over Transbaikalia and founded a short-lived White Transbaikalia.
In June 1920, America and its allied coalition partners withdrew from Vladivostok after the capture and execution of White Army leader Admiral Aleksandr Kolchak by the Red Army and the evacuation of the Czech Legion. However, the Japanese decided to stay, primarily due to fears of the spread of communism so close to Japan, and Japanese controlled Korea and Manchuria. The Japanese were forced to sign the Gongota Agreement of 1920 in order to evacuate their troops peacefully from Transbaikal. It meant an unavoidable end of Grigory Semyonov's regime in October 1920.
The Japanese army provided military support to the Japanese-backed Provisional Priamur Government based in Vladivostok against the Moscow-backed Far Eastern Republic.
The continued Japanese presence concerned the United States, which suspected that Japan had territorial designs on Siberia and the Russian Far East. Subjected to intense diplomatic pressure by the United States and Great Britain, and facing increasing domestic opposition due to the economic and human cost, the administration of Prime Minister Kato Tomosaburo withdrew the Japanese forces in October 1922.
Legacy
Japan's motives in the Siberian Intervention were complex and poorly articulated. Overtly, Japan (as with the United States and the other international coalition forces) were in Siberia to safeguard stockpiled military supplies and to ‘rescue’ the Czech Legion. However, the Japanese government's intense hostility to communism, a determination to recoup historical losses to Russia, and the perceived opportunity to settle the “northern problem” in Japan's security by either creating a buffer state, or through outright territorial acquisition were also factors. However, patronage of various White Movement leaders left Japan in a poor diplomatic position vis-à-vis the government of the Soviet Union, after the Red Army eventually emerged victorious from the Russian Civil War.Japanese casualties from the Siberian Expedition included some 5,000 dead from combat or illness, and the expenses incurred were in excess of 900 million yen.
See also
- Nikolayevsk Incident
- Japanese-planned Republic of the Far East
- Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War
External links
References
- White, John Albert. The Siberian Intervention. Princeton University Press (1950)
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Last updated on Wednesday July 23, 2008 at 02:02:03 PDT (GMT -0700)
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