ABSTRACT
War between China and Japan erupted in 1894 over which country retained sovereignty over the Korean peninsula. The most important naval encounter was the Battle of the Yellow Sea—also known as the Battle of the Yalu—of 17 September 1894. When the two fairly equally matched naval forces engaged each other, with the Chinese fleet under Admiral Ding Ruchang and the Japanese fleet under Vice-Admiral Ito Sukehiro, it was an open question which side would win; initially, Westerners put their odds on China. In the end, the Japanese proved victorious, not because of their modern equipment, which was no match for China’s, but because of their more extensive training and understanding of how to use their Western-built naval equipment.
