Kikujirō Ishii becomes foreign minister

On 13 October 1915 Baron Kikujirō Ishii took office as Minister for Foreign Affairs of Japan in the government of Ōkuma Shigenobu. The prime minister, who since the August cabinet reshuffle had run diplomacy himself, handed the ministry over to a career diplomat. Some chronologies of the war link this appointment with 21 September, but Japanese lists of cabinet members give 13 October as the day he took office. Ishii had been ambassador in Paris since 1912. He handed the embassy over to a chargé d’affaires on 4 September and returned home from France to take over the ministry.

The new minister was 49 and had spent his whole career in the foreign service. He was born in 1866 in Kazusa Province, in present-day Chiba Prefecture, and after studying law at Tokyo Imperial University he joined the Foreign Ministry. He served in Paris, in Chemulpo in Korea and in Beijing. During the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 he was the liaison of Japanese diplomacy with the intervention armies. In 1907–1908 he took part in the negotiations that ended in the so-called Gentlemen’s Agreement with the United States on Japanese emigration. From 1908 to 1912 he was Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs, and in 1911 he received the title of baron.

Ishii was not a figure known to the wider public. According to Japanese historians, his candidacy was backed by Katō Takaaki, the former foreign minister and leader of the governing Rikken Dōshikai party. On one important matter, however, Ishii differed from Katō. While still ambassador, he had urged the government to have Japan accede to the Pact of London of September 1914, in which Britain, France and Russia undertook not to conclude a separate peace. In his view this was the only way Japan could secure a voice at the future peace negotiations. Katō considered the alliance with Britain sufficient, and the matter stalled. Kijūrō Shidehara, later foreign minister and prime minister, became vice-minister under Ishii.

The new course brought results almost at once. On 19 October 1915 Japan acceded to the Pact of London. Ishii also sought closer relations with Russia, to which Japan was then sending arms and ammunition. In July 1916 the two states concluded a further, fourth agreement on their interests in the Far East. Ishii headed the ministry until the fall of the Ōkuma cabinet in October 1916. A year later, as special envoy in Washington, he negotiated with Secretary of State Robert Lansing an agreement on China known as the Lansing–Ishii Agreement.