Russo-Japanese War

Russo-Japanese War
Clockwise from top: Russian cruiser Pallada under fire at Port Arthur, Russian cavalry at Mukden, Russian cruiser Varyag and gunboat Korietz at Chemulpo Bay, Japanese dead at Port Arthur, Japanese infantry crossing the Yalu River
Date 8 February 1904  – 5 September 1905 (1 year, 6 months and 4 weeks) Location Manchuria, Yellow Sea, Korea, Sea of Japan Result Japanese victory Territorial changes Russia cedes Port Arthur and Dalniy in the Liaodong peninsula, Southern Sakhalin, and the control of the South Manchuria Railway to Japan Kvantunskaya Oblast and Southern Sakhalin become Kwantung Leased Territory and Karafuto Prefecture respectively
Belligerents
Russia	Japan
Commanders and leaders
Nicholas II Aleksey Kuropatkin Roman Kondratenko † Anatoly Stessel  Oskar Gripenberg Mikhail Zasulich Yevgeni Alekseyev Stepan Makarov † Wilgelm Vitgeft † Robert Viren Zinovy Rozhestvensky	Emperor Meiji Katsura Tarō Ōyama Iwao Kodama Gentarō Nogi Maresuke Kuroki Tamemoto Oku Yasukata Terauchi Masatake Tōgō Heihachirō Itō Sukeyuki Kamimura Hikonojō
Strength
1,365,000 (total)[1] 900,000 (peak)[2]	1,200,000 (total)[1] 650,000 (peak)
Casualties and losses
Total: 43,300–71,453 dead[3][4] 34,000–52,623 killed or died of wounds 9,300–18,830 died of disease 146,032 wounded 74,369 captured Material losses: 8 battleships sunk 2 battleships captured	Total: 80,378–86,100 dead[3][4] 47,152–47,400 killed 11,424–11,500 died of wounds 21,802–27,200 died of disease 153,673–173,400 wounded Material losses: 2 battleships sunk

Events leading to World War I
Unification of Germany 1866–1871 Franco-Prussian War 1870–1871 Second Concert of Europe 1871 Great Eastern Crisis 1875–1878 Campaign in Bosnia 1878 Dual Alliance 1879 Boer Wars 1880–1902 Austro–Serbian Alliance 1881–1903 Triple Alliance 1882 Berlin Conference 1884 Bulgarian Crisis 1885–1888 Reinsurance Treaty 1887–1890 Franco-Russian Alliance 1894 First Sino-Japanese War 1894–1895 Anglo-German naval arms race 1898–1912 Fashoda Incident 1898 Anglo-Japanese Alliance 1902 May Coup 1903 Russo-Japanese War 1904–1905 Entente Cordiale 1904 First Moroccan Crisis 1905–1906 Pig War 1906–1908 Anglo-Russian Convention 1907 Young Turk Revolution 1908 Bosnian Crisis 1908–1909 Racconigi Bargain 1909 Second Moroccan Crisis 1911 Italo-Turkish War 1911–1912 Balkan Wars 1912–1913 Assassination of Franz Ferdinand 1914 July Crisis 1914
v t e

The Russo-Japanese War (8 February 1904 – 5 September 1905) was fought between the Russian Empire and the Empire of Japan over rival imperial ambitions in Manchuria and the Korean Empire. The major land battles of the war were fought on the Liaodong Peninsula and near Mukden in Southern Manchuria, with naval battles taking place in the Yellow Sea and the Sea of Japan.

Russia had pursued an expansionist policy in Siberia and the Far East since the reign of Ivan the Terrible in the 16th century.^[5] At the end of the First Sino-Japanese War, the Treaty of Shimonoseki of 1895 had ceded the Liaodong Peninsula and Port Arthur to Japan before the Triple Intervention, in which Russia, Germany, and France convinced Japan to relinquish its claim. Japan feared that Russia would interfere with its plans to establish a sphere of influence in mainland Asia, especially as Russia built the Trans-Siberian Railroad, began making inroads in Korea, and acquired a lease of the Liaodong Peninsula and Port Arthur from China in 1898. Japan signed the Anglo-Japanese Alliance in 1902, and began offering to recognize Russia's dominance in Manchuria in exchange for recognition of Korea as part of Japan's sphere of influence. However, this was rejected by Russia.

After negotiations broke down, Japan opened hostilities in a surprise attack on the Russian Pacific Fleet at Port Arthur on 9 February [O.S. 27 January] 1904. Both sides declared war, and Japanese troops landed in Korea, crossed the Yalu River into Manchuria in May, and landed more forces on the Liaodong Peninsula. In August, the Japanese laid siege to Port Arthur, which eventually fell in January 1905. In March 1905, Japanese troops took Mukden, the Manchurian capital, after heavy fighting. The Russian Baltic Fleet, which had sailed over seven months and 18,000 nautical miles (33,000 km) from the Baltic Sea, arrived in the region in May and was intercepted and destroyed by the Japanese Combined Fleet at the Battle of Tsushima. The war was concluded with the Treaty of Portsmouth (5 September [O.S. 23 August] 1905), mediated by US President Theodore Roosevelt.

The treaty recognized Japanese interests in Korea, and awarded to Japan Russia's lease on the Liaodong Peninsula, control of the Russian-built South Manchuria Railway, and the southern half of the island of Sakhalin (Karafuto). The complete military victory of an Asian and non-Western nation over a European and Western power surprised international observers, and transformed the global balance of power, with the Empire of Japan emerging as a great power and the Russian Empire declining in prestige among the European powers. Russia's incurrence of substantial casualties and losses for a cause which resulted in a humiliating defeat contributed to internal unrest culminating in the 1905 Russian Revolution, during which the tsarist autocracy was forced to make concessions.