The Anglo-Japanese Alliance and the First World War

Abstract

On entering the war, the Tsingtao operation was carried out. On 23–4 September 870 soldiers from the South Wales Borderers Second Battalion stationed in northern China under the command of Brigadier N.W. Barnardiston, landed. The Japanese side assumed that the British troops’ first battle would be around Mount Shihmen three days after they landed. But this plan was cancelled by the British who proposed to stay at Puli from the 25th and to prepare for battle there. After the battles at Kushan and Fushan, the British acquired half of the 36th Indian (Sikh) Regiment of 450 men and reached the front line. Thereafter, for a month the British and the Japanese prepared for a full-scale offensive which they launched on 31 October. But the British force did not move.¹ The Japanese units concluded ‘it was hard to trust you as war comrades if you permit only our troops to engage in the fighting at this time’, that ‘the British army was baggage’ and that it was ‘no more than decoration on the battlefield’.² Consequently, Japanese newspapers and magazines reported that: British soldiers were different in nature from Japanese soldiers and were excessively ‘elegant’ (cautious) when it came to launching joint operations. Only when nothing happened were British soldiers wonderful and it was like taking a lady on a trip. However, such a lady can be a burden and lead to total disaster for a force when the enemy appears. Such reports, when reported back to Britain, generated considerable revertment among the British public.³