The Historical Significance of the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895

1. The Historical Significance of the Sino-Japanese War. The failure of the Sino-Japanese War marked the failure of the Westernization Movement in the Qing Dynasty, which lasted for more than 30 years. The achievements of modernization have gone up in smoke, and China people's pursuit of national rejuvenation has gone up in smoke since modern times. The cession of land and reparations and the loss of sovereignty facilitated foreign powers to give up their capital, which set off a wave of carve-up, marked a new stage of foreign powers' aggression against China, greatly deepened China's semi-colonization, and China's international status declined sharply. The Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895 directly led to the upsurge of China people's spontaneous anti-aggression struggle, such as the China people's national salvation movement, the bourgeois political reform and democratic revolution movement and the Boxer Movement.

2. As a result of the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895, the Japanese invaded China and Korea at the end of 19. According to China's calendar, 1894, the time when the war broke out was the Sino-Japanese War, so it was called the Sino-Japanese War.

During the Meiji Restoration, Japan embarked on the capitalist road, actively invaded and expanded abroad, and determined a "mainland policy" centered on China. At this time, the Qing Dynasty was an empire exposed to the world through the Westernization Movement, with political corruption, poor people's lives, intrigue among various factions in the officialdom, strong national defense and military, and lax discipline. The world's major capitalist countries are gradually transitioning to imperialism, and Japan's aggression has been supported by western powers to some extent.

1894, the East Learning Party uprising broke out in North Korea, and the North Korean government forces were successively defeated and forced to ask for help from the sovereign state of the Qing Dynasty. Japan also took the opportunity to send troops to North Korea and deliberately provoked war.

1894 (20th year of Guangxu) On July 25th, the naval battle of Toyoda broke out, and the Sino-Japanese War began. Because the Japanese had planned for a long time, the Qing Dynasty rushed to fight, and the war ended with the defeat of China and the annihilation of the Beiyang Navy. Under the military pressure of Japanese militarism, the Qing government in China signed the treaty of shimonoseki in April 1895.

The result of the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-1895 brought unprecedented national crisis to the Chinese nation and greatly deepened the degree of semi-colonization of China society. On the other hand, it has made Japan's national strength stronger and laid an important foundation for it to become a big country.

3. Reasons for the failure of the Sino-Japanese War: 1. Lack of foresight: At the critical moment when Japan was fully expanding its army and the danger of war approached, the Qing Dynasty relaxed its national defense construction, cut its military budget on the grounds of financial shortage, stopped buying warships from 1888, and stopped allocating funds for naval equipment and ammunition from 189 1.

2. Strategic reasons: Before provoking this war, Japan's wartime base camp formulated a "general operational policy" that the navy and the army considered as a whole. Its strategic goal is to wage a decisive battle with the Qing army in Zhili Plain of China, defeat the Qing army and oppress the Qing Dynasty to yield. In China, there was no clear strategic policy and operational plan before the war. In strategic planning, Japan has taken the lead.

3. Equipment inferiority: In the Yellow Sea naval battle between the two sides for sea control, the Qing army met the Japanese army with inferior strength. Limited by the technical conditions of warship manufacturing, the effective shooting distance of Beiyang warship is less than 3000 meters, while the effective range of Japanese warship Yoshino equipped with a new range finder can reach 5000 meters. The Japanese army is also equipped with a new type of rapid-fire gun.

4. Subjectively, the corruption of the Qing government led to the defeat of China's army in the Sino-Japanese War. Before the war, the Qing government did not make serious preparations. After the war broke out, it vigorously pursued the policy of "avoiding war and protecting itself", which delayed fighter planes, such as the battle of Pyongyang and the fiasco in ahava. Empress dowager cixi held a birthday banquet in the autumn of national disaster, and did not hesitate to misappropriate military expenses and ignore national interests.

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