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The Treaty showed Japan that white races would stand together against the yellow, and the Japanese as a race were mortified at what they were convinced was a dishonourable peace.
The peace treaty provided for, amongst other things, the mutual withdrawal of Russian and Japanese armies from Manchuria within eighteen months; and the return of Manchuria to China except for the leased territories of Liaodong (Guandong) and the southern section of the Manchurian Railway which was transferred to Japan by Russia.
However, at a Conference held in Peking in December 1905 at which the Chinese government approved the Treaty, the now enfeebled and impotent Qing dynasty gave Japan even greater rights in Chinese territory than had been agreed in Portsmouth. The Japanese had now acquired rights and concessions on Chinese territory for the first time.
Chinese involvement
It has not been my intention to describe the detailed progress of the war as this has been covered in numerous books and articles, but to highlight how the Chinese were involved. It has proved disappointing to find that even when China and the Chinese position are referred to, writers usually skim over the subject in a single page or two.
The Russian promise to evacuate territories in Manchuria occupied after the Boxer insurrection was ignored and the progressive Russification of the Three Provinces could only mean one thing - that the Russians had no intention of withdrawing. During 1903 the Chinese Government showed a firmer attitude in their request for promises from the Russian Minister relating to the evacuation of Manchuria. Japanese strong moral support acted as an incentive to the more progressive Chinese to strengthen the influence of the few patriotic Chinese statesmen who had the welfare of the Empire at heart. Meetings of the literati in most of the larger cities in China during October 1903 denounced Russia in no uncertain terms. Little could be expected from the Empress Dowager and her clique. One day she ranted on hearing some real or fancied desecration by Cossacks in the former Manchu capital at Mukden where the ancestors of the Manchu ruling clan were buried, and threatened reprisals; the next day she was considering possibilities of closer links between Russia and China and even, perhaps,
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