Shandong Problem
산둥 문제
The dispute over the decision of the Paris Peace Conference, Article 156 of the Treaty of Versailles, to transfer Germany’s rights in Shandong, the Jiaozhou Bay leasehold, railways and more, to Japan rather than return them to China after the First World War. The decision set off the May Fourth Movement of 1919 and China’s delegation refused to sign the treaty. Mediated by the United States at the Washington Conference, the leasehold was returned to China in 1922, though Japan’s economic dominance continued.
In depth
Origins: after two German missionaries were murdered in Shandong in 1897, Germany used the incident to lease Jiaozhou Bay, including Qingdao, for ninety-nine years in 1898. Japan entered the First World War in 1914 and seized Qingdao, and in 1915 Yuan Shikai accepted thirteen of the Twenty-One Demands, in effect recognising Japan’s succession to the German rights. Britain and France also promised them to Japan, and in late 1918 Duan Qirui’s government, accepting the Nishihara loans, secretly reaffirmed the transfer.
Paris: China, which entered the war in 1917, had supported the Allies on condition that Shandong be returned, and its delegation under Lu Zhengxiang asked for the cancellation of the Twenty-One Demands and the return of Shandong; Wellington Koo argued that Shandong, Confucius’s birthplace, was to China what Jerusalem was to Christians. But on 30 April 1919 the conference sided with Japan, and the decision became Article 156. When the news arrived Beijing’s students demonstrated on 4 May, and on 28 June China’s delegation refused to sign. China made a separate peace with Germany in 1921.
Settlement: at the Washington Naval Conference of 1922 the United States mediated a settlement recognising Chinese sovereignty, and the leasehold was returned in June. Japan kept its economic dominance over the railway and the province, however, and when the Northern Expedition reached Shandong in 1928 it sent troops, leading to the Jinan incident. Shandong remained in effect a Japanese sphere until 1945.