Yamagata Aritomo

Prince (14 June 1838–1 February 1922) was a field marshal in the Imperial Japanese Army and twice Prime Minister of Japan. He is considered on of the architects of the military and political foundations of Meiji era Japan.

Early career

Yamagata was born in a lower-ranked samurai family from Hagi, the capital of the feudal domain of Choshu (present-day Yamaguchi prefecture. He went to Shokasonjuku, a private school run by Yoshida Shoin, where he devoted his energies to the growing underground movement to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate. He was a commander of Kihei-tai, a paramilitary organization created on semi-western lines by the Choshu domain and during the Boshin War he was appointed a staff officer.

After the Meiji Restoration, he was selected together with Saigo Tsugumichi to visit Europe in 1869 under government orders to research European military systems. Yamagata was strongly influenced by Prussian military and political ideas, which favored military expansion abroad and authoritarian government at home. He became War Minister in 1873. Yamagata energetically modernized the fledgling Imperial Japanese Army, which he modeled after the Prussian army, and began a system of conscription in 1873.

Military Career

As War Minister, Yamagata pushed through the foundation of the General Staff Office, which was the main source of Yamagata's political power and that of other military officers through the end of World War II. He was Commander of the General Staff Office in 1874-76, 1878-82, and 1884-85.

Yamagata led the newly modernized Imperial Army against the Satsuma Rebellion led by Saigo Takamori in 1877.

He also had Emperor Meiji write the Imperial Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors, in 1882. This document was considered the moral core of the Japanese military until its end in 1945.

Yamagata was awarded the rank of field marshal in 1898. He showed his leadership on military issues as acting War Minister and Commanding General during the First Sino-Japanese War as the Supreme Commander of the First Army Russo-Japanese War as the Chief Officer of the General Staff Office in Tokyo.

He is considered political and military ideological ancestor of the Strike North Group as he traced the first lines of a national defensive strategy against Russia after Russo-Japanese War.

Political Career

During his long and versatile career, Yamagata held numerous important governmental posts. In 1882, he became president of the Board of Legislation (Sanjiin) and as Home Minister (1883–87) he worked vigorously to suppress political parties and repress agitation in the labor and agrarian movements. He also organized a system of local administration, based on a prefecture-county-city structure which is still in use in Japan today. In 1883 he was appointed to the post of Lord Chancellor, the highest bureaucratic position in the government system before the Meiji Constitution of 1889.

He was the first Prime Minister of Japan after the opening of the Imperial Diet under the Meiji Constitution from 24 December 1889 to 6 May 1891. During his first term, the Imperial Rescript on Education was issued.

He became Prime Minister for a second term from 8 November 1898 to 19 October 1900. In 1900, while in his second term as Prime Minister, he ruled that only an active military officer could serve as War Minister or Navy Minister, a rule that gave the military control over any future cabinet. He also enacted laws preventing political party members from holding key posts in the bureaucracy.

In 1891 he received the honorific title of Genro, or official elder statesman. He was President of the Privy Council from 1893-94 and 1905-22.

In 1896, he led a diplomatic mission to Moscow, which produced the Yamagata-Lobanov Agreement confirming Japanese and Russian rights in Korea.

He was elevated to the nobility, and received the title of koshaku (prince) in 1907.

From 1900 to 1909, he opposed Ito Hirobumi, leader of the civilian party, and exercised influence through his protégé, Katsura Taro. After the death of Ito Hirobumi in 1909 Yamagata became the most influential politician in Japan and remained so until his death in 1922, although he retired from active participation in politics after the Russo-Japanese War. However, as president of the Privy Council from 1909 to 1922, Yamagata remained the power behind the government and dictated the selection of future Prime Ministers until his death.

Trivia

Yamagata was a talented garden designer, and today the gardens he designed are considered masterpieces of Japanese-style gardens. An example is the garden of the villa Murin-an in Kyoto.
In the anime Rurouni Kenshin, Aritomo Yamagata briefly enters the story to invite Himura Kenshin to join the army, as Kenshin's combat skills are legendary. Kenshin declines the offer.
In 1906, Yamagata received the Order of Merit by King Edward VII. His Japanese decorations included the Order of the Golden Kite (1st class), Order of the Rising Sun (1st class with Paulownia Blossoms, Grand Cordon) and the Order of the Chrysanthemum.

References