世紀転換期のアメリカ合衆国と朝鮮半島――日本による大韓帝国保護国化までを中心に――

抄録

This article focuses on the U.S. policy toward the Korean Peninsula during the Imperial Era, from the end of the nineteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth century. The twentieth century is sometimes called the “American Century.” The U.S. sustained its commitment to Northeast Asia, including the Korean peninsula, especially during World War II. Exploring its first meeting with the Korean Peninsula would facilitate an understanding of the international environment surrounding the related events.

When the U.S. showed an interest in the Pacific for the first time over the nineteenth century to the beginning of the twentieth century, China was the most important market in the Northeast Asia. The second country they focused on was Japan, and the third was Korea. The main interest of the U.S. with respect to Korea concerned missionary activities, and thus, U.S. missionaries brought educational institutes to Korea.

With the conclusion of the Spanish-American War (1898), the U.S. changed its policy toward East Asia after acquiring the Philippines. The U.S. implemented an open-door policy toward China and sought an adversarial relationship with Russia, which freed the port of Dalian in 1899. On the other hand, the U.S. enhanced its friendly relations with Japan, which tried to expand its territory in order to manifest itself as an imperialist state.

Korea asked the U.S. to do ‘good offices’ that is negotiating with Japan and China, since Korea became the turf of the Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895). The U.S. considered doing good offices for a short while; however, it decided not to make a commitment to the war. Since the U.S. feared Japanese involvement in the Philippines, it entered into the Katsura-Taft Agreement (1905), in which it approved of Korea being placed under the Japanese rule in return for a pledge that Japan would not invade the Philippines. The balance of power in the Northeast Asia seemed to be preserved for a while.

After the Japanese annexation of Korea (1910), Japan intervened in China ―the point of contention was specifically the puppet state of Manchukuo, an important market for the U.S, which was established by Japan in 1932. As a result, the confrontation between Japan and the U.S. became inevitable. Eventually, the Japanese attack on the Pearl Harbor in 1941 led to the Pacific War.

From the end of the nineteenth century to the twentieth century, Korea had been in the “periphery” because China and Japan as well as the Western powers used strong-arm tactics vis-a-vis Korea. In 1910, the Western powers acknowledged the Japanese annexation of Korea, which ended in 1945. Therefore, I demonstrate in this article that with the influence of the international environment, the Korean peninsula has been a fool of fate up to the present day.