Ōkuma becomes acting foreign minister
- Category:
- Politics
- Date:
- 10 August 1915
- Author:
- Natalia
- Tags:
- Japan, China, Great Britain
On 10 August 1915 Emperor Yoshihito approved the reshuffled government of Japan. It remained headed by the 77-year-old Prime Minister Shigenobu Ōkuma, who after the departure of Takaaki Katō also took over the foreign affairs portfolio. The reshuffle was forced by a corruption scandal involving the former home minister Kanetake Ōura, after which the whole cabinet had resigned at the end of July. The Emperor, however, wanted Ōkuma to carry on governing, and the Prime Minister decided to replace only some of the ministers.
The changes affected four ministries. The new home minister was Kitokurō Ichiki, an official with no party affiliation; the new finance minister, in place of Reijirō Wakatsuki, was Tokitoshi Taketomi of the ruling Rikken Dōshikai party; and the new navy minister, in place of Admiral Rokurō Yashiro, was Admiral Tomosaburō Katō, no relation of the outgoing head of diplomacy. The other ministers kept their posts.
An old hand at diplomacy
Ōkuma was no novice at the foreign ministry. He had already headed it in 1888–1889, when he negotiated the revision of the unequal treaties with the Western powers. Their terms infuriated the nationalists: on 18 October 1889 a member of the secret Black Ocean Society threw a bomb at his carriage, and Ōkuma lost his right leg. He was foreign minister again in 1896–1897 and in 1898, during his first, brief premiership. In 1882 he founded a school in Tokyo from which Waseda University grew.
A temporary solution
Combining the two posts was treated as temporary from the start. An elderly head of government could not conduct the day-to-day diplomacy of a country that was at war with Germany and had recently signed treaties with China that aroused widespread resentment in Peking. The change also meant a weakening of Katō’s independent course so far, which had irritated the elder statesmen, the genrō, led by Field Marshal Aritomo Yamagata.
Ōkuma held the post of minister for two months. On 13 October 1915 the new foreign minister became Kikujirō Ishii, ambassador in Paris since 1912. Later that same month Japan acceded to the Pact of London, undertaking not to conclude a separate peace with Germany. Ōkuma himself remained in power until October 1916, when after disputes with the genrō he resigned, and he was succeeded by Field Marshal Masatake Terauchi, Yamagata’s choice.
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