Historical Dictionary of United States-Japan ... - Bakumatsu Films

BOXER UPRISING • 55
quiring the president, in the event of a foreign war, to forbid arms
shipments to both belligerents without distinction for attacker and attacked.
He belittled arguments for an accelerated naval buildup so as
to counter the growing Japanese threat, arguing in 1938 that “however
much we may disapprove of what is going on in the Orient, there is,
to my mind, no probability of Japan attacking the United States.” Borah
remained isolationist to the bitter end. He died in February 1940.
BOSHIN WAR. Lasting from early 1868 to mid-1869, the Boshin War
was a civil war fought between the primarily northern domains that
supported the Tokugawa shogunate and the Satsuma and Choshuled
domains fighting to unify Japan under a new imperial government
led by Emperor Meiji. The last Tokugawa shogun ceded power to
the emperor in late 1867, but many supporters of the Tokugawa government,
led by Aizu domain, regarded the establishment of the new
Meiji imperial government as a coup d’etat by the Satsuma and
Choshu domains. Though initially outnumbered by their opponents,
the “imperial forces” of Satsuma and Choshu and their allies defeated
the steadfast Tokugawa supporters with improved military tactics and
Western firearms, especially Armstrong cannons, mostly obtained
from European and American merchants. See also MEIJI RESTORA-
TION; TOKUGAWA, YOSHINOBU.
BOXER UPRISING. The Boxer Uprising erupted in 1900. A massive
uprising against the foreign and Christian presence in China, the
Boxers first targeted foreign missionaries and their Chinese converts
in Shantung province, but their aims soon broadened to include the
elimination from China of all foreign influence. Attacking foreign
rails and property along the way, the Boxers advanced against the imperial
capital of Peking and laid siege to the legation quarter. The outside
world’s contacts with the legation quarter were cut, and it was
feared for some weeks that all foreign diplomats and foreign residents
may have perished.
The Boxers convinced themselves that they had magic powers that
made them invulnerable. They were soon disabused of this notion. The
foreign powers dispatched troops—including 13,000 Japanese troops,
8,100 Russian troops, 5,800 British troops, 4,000 American troops, and
2,100 French troops—who possessed overwhelming military force.