ABSTRACT
Most students of United States diplomacy consider the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905 to have been the critical turning point in official American attitudes and policies toward Japan. 1 Prior to this war, these scholars contend, the United States government adhered to a strict policy of Japanese-American friendship. Japan seemed to share a common concern to keep the Far East open to all foreign contact, and the government in Washington and its representatives in East Asia sympathized with Japan’s efforts to revise its unequal treaties with the Western powers. American officials also looked with favor upon Japan’s victories over China in 1895 and Russia in 1905, since now Korea and China would be 172more accessible to U.S. businessmen, travelers, and missionaries. But after Japan had driven Russia out of Korea in 1905, only the United States challenged Japanese supremacy in that area. Growing tensions between the competitors threatened to destroy a half century of amity. For the first time since Commodore Matthew Perry had opened Japan to the West, scholars argue, government officials looked upon Japan as a threat to American interests in East Asia and the Pacific Ocean, and they recommended opposition to Japanese expansion. 2
