ABSTRACT
Defeat in 1945 stripped Japan of an empire, acquired in fifty years of conquest, which at its peak embraced most of East Asia. After centuries of self-imposed isolation, Japan had adopted a policy of territorial expansion in 1895. By 1910 it had annexed Korea and taken Taiwan from China and southern Sakhalin (Karafuto) from Russia. After the 1914-18 war it took over, under a League of Nations mandate, the Caroline, Mariana and Marshall islands in Micronesia, which had been German colonies. In 1931, taking advantage of China’s lack of any strong central government, the Japanese occupied its north-eastern region, Manchuria, where in 1932 they established a puppet state called Manchukuo. During the 1930s they conquered a large part of eastern China.
