Northeast Asia, Japan And Russia Compete With The Modern The Fate Of The Korean Peninsula

After the Meiji Reformation,Japan got onto the capitalist road and eagered to expand its territory. While Russia,defeated in Crimea War,also headed its spear towards the Far East region.Because of the geo-political strategic relations,both Japan and Russia wanted to occupy Korea solely,so that they could dominate the whole Northeast Asia.Hence,they launched a fierce contest in this region.During this process,the Korea Kingdom became more and more centrifugalized towards Qing Dynasty.Finally,this subsidiary relation came to an end after the Sino-Japanese War in 1894.Got rid of Chinese political control,the Korea Kingdom became a norminally independent country.Then he became an arena for the Japan-Russia contest.As the contradiction between Japan and Russia deepened,the Kingdom's destiny became worse and worse.The turbulent,war-torn Korea Kingdom became a strategic fort in the Far East region which could be compared to that of Balkan in Europe.The fierce contest between Japan and Russia worsened the situation in this region.On one hand,the independent Korea Kingdom existed in name only;On the other hand,this contest touched the expansion benefits of the old-brand colonizer-Britain.Later,the establishment of Anglo-Japanese Alliance greatly changed the strength contrasts between Japan and Russia in Northeast Asia,therefore accelerated the arrival of the Japan-Russia War.This war made Korea a dependent country and a colony of Japan.Also the Korea's Li Dynasty was died out by history.During those turbulent years,both the royal family of the Li Dynasty and the common people suffered a lot as their country gradually lost its national sovereignth.We can see that the contests between Japan and Russia in Northeast Asia exerted a great influence on Korea's domestic and foreign affairs,which caused modern Korea a miserable historical destiny.By sorting out the progression of Japanese and Russian aggression towards Korea and by analyzing the relationship between the Japan-Russia contest and modern Korea'sdestiny,the auther tries to draw lessons from history and expects this finding having certain reference function to reality.Take international relations among the main countries and national interests as an object in mind and from both macro and micro perspective,this thesis elaborates,comprehensively and systematically, how the developments and changes of Japan-Russia contradictions influenced the domestic and foreign affairs of the Korea Kingdom in modern times so as to expound the geographical strategic value of the Korean peninsula towards Japan and Russia. Also,the author tries to make clear how the contradictions between Japan and Russia developed;the changes of international patterns in Northeast Asia brought forth by this contradiction and how the Japanese-Russian contest and the changes of international patterns in Northeast Asia affected the destiny of the Korea Kingdom.From this ,we are allowed to realized the influence of the international relations among the main countries exerted on the regional political patterns and the national interests.