Japan–Russia relations
Japan–Russia relations are the modern bilateral relations between Japan and Russia, following Empire of Japan–Russian Empire relations and Japan–Soviet Union relations.
Historically, the two countries had cordial relations until a clash of territorial ambitions in Manchuria led to the Russo–Japanese War of 1904, which ended in a Japanese victory that in turn weakened the House of Romanov's reign in Russia. Japan later intervened in the Russian Civil War, sending troops to the Russian Far East and Siberia, followed by border conflicts between the two countries throughout the 1930s. The two signed a non-aggression pact in 1941, but the Soviet government nevertheless declared war on Japan in 1945 by invading Manchukuo and seizing the Kuril Islands. The two countries ended their formal state of war with the Soviet–Japanese Joint Declaration of 1956, but have still not resolved the Kuril Islands dispute.
Following the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, relations between the two countries became tense after Japan imposed sanctions against Russia, which then placed Japan on its list of "unfriendly" countries. Japan and Russia each expelled a number of diplomats, and Russia halted peace negotiations with Japan that included talks on resolving the Kuril Islands dispute.
History
Russian navigator Adam Laxman was sent by Catherine the Great to return Japanese castaway Daikokuya Kōdayū to Japan. Russian diplomat Nikolai Rezanov was commissioned by Alexander I as Russian ambassador to Japan to conclude a commercial treaty, but his efforts were thwarted by the Japanese government.Tsarist era (1855–1917)
Diplomatic and commercial relations between the two empires were established from 1855 onwards. Japan and Russia participated in the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion in China. Relations were minimal before 1855, mostly friendly from 1855 to the early 1890s, then turned hostile over the status of Korea. The two nations contested control of Manchuria and Korea, leading to Japanese victory in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905. Russia began construction of the Trans-Siberian railroad, which for the first time gave it easy access to Siberia and adjacent areas. Meanwhile, Japan's defeat of China in 1894-95 Sino-Japanese war demonstrated Japan's military modernization, and its quest for control of Korea. Russia and Japan both were making inroads into Chinese territories, especially in Manchuria. both were blocked from moving south of Manchuria by the strength of British and American resistance. Relations were good 1905–1917, as the two countries divided up Manchuria and Outer Mongolia.Soviet era (1917–1991)
Relations between the Communist takeover in 1917 and the collapse of Communism in 1991 tended to be hostile. Japan had sent troops to counter the Bolshevik presence in Russia's Far East during the Russian Civil War, but left without any gains.Relations were tense in the 1930s, as Japan took full control of Manchuria in 1931 and made war on China in 1937. Moscow favored China. The Russians defeated Japan at the bloody Nomonhan Incident in 1939. Japanese leaders decided to avoid any war with the USSR and instead turned south against Britain, the Netherlands and the United States. As a result, Japan and Russia signed a non-aggression agreement on April 13, 1941.
According to reports, some of the victims of Unit 731, a covert biological research united which conducted human experimentation, were Russians. Japan has yet to acknowledge the existence of the unit, as well as the Soviet victims.
The USSR declared war on Japan in August 1945 and invaded Japanese-controlled areas of Korea and Manchuria, swiftly capturing the defenders. Moscow kept POWs after the war for years, using them for forced labor, a concern that heightened Japan's support of the anti-Soviet side of the Cold War.
The U.S. had full control of the Occupation of Japan, to Moscow's annoyance. In response Moscow refused to sign the 1951 peace treaty. Therefore, the state of war between the Soviet Union and Japan technically existed until 1956, when it was ended by the Soviet–Japanese Joint Declaration of 1956. A formal peace treaty still has not been signed. The key stumbling block to improving relations between the Soviet Union and Japan in the post-war period has been the territorial dispute over the Kurils, which are known as the Northern Territories in Japan.
After 1975, the Soviet Union began openly to warn that a Japanese peace treaty with China would jeopardize Soviet–Japan relations. The signing of the Sino-Japanese peace treaty in mid-1978 was a major setback to Japanese-Soviet relations. Moscow saw it as placing Tokyo with Washington and Beijing firmly in the anti-Soviet camp. Soviet actions served only to alarm and alienate the Japanese side. The 1980s Soviet military buildup in the Pacific was a case in point.
The 1980s saw a decided hardening in Japanese attitudes toward the Soviet Union. Japan was pressed by the United States to do more to check the expansion of Soviet power in the developing world following the December 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. It responded by cutting off contacts beneficial to the Soviet regime and providing assistance to "front line" states, such as Pakistan and Thailand. Under Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone, Japan worked hard to demonstrate a close identity of views with the Reagan administration on the "Soviet threat". Japan steadily built up its military forces, welcomed increases in United States forces in Japan and the western Pacific, and pledged close cooperation to deal with the danger posed by Soviet power.
This economic cooperation was interrupted by Japan's decision in 1980 to participate in sanctions against the Soviet Union for its invasion of Afghanistan and by its actions to hold in abeyance a number of projects being negotiated, to ban the export of some high-technology items, and to suspend Siberian development loans. Subsequently, Japanese interest in economic cooperation with the Soviet Union waned as Tokyo found alternative suppliers and remained uncertain about the economic viability and political stability of the Soviet Union under Gorbachev. Japan-Soviet trade in 1988 was valued at nearly US$6 billion.
Although public and media opinion remained skeptical of the danger to Japan posed by Soviet forces in Asia, there was strong opposition in Japan to Moscow's refusal to accede to Japan's claims to the Northern Territories, known to the Japanese as Etorofu and Kunashiri, at the southern end of the Kuril Island chain, and the smaller island of Shikotan and the Habomai Islands, northeast of Hokkaidō, which were seized by the Soviets in the last days of World War II. The stationing of Soviet military forces on the islands gave tangible proof of the Soviet threat, and provocative maneuvers by Soviet air and naval forces in Japanese-claimed territory served to reinforce Japanese official policy of close identification with a firm United States-backed posture against Soviet power. In 1979, the Japanese government specifically protested a buildup in Soviet forces in Etorofu, Kunashiri, and Shikotan.
The advent of the Mikhail Gorbachev regime in Moscow in 1985 saw a replacement of hard-line Soviet government diplomats who were expert in Asian affairs with more flexible spokespersons calling for greater contact with Japan. Gorbachev took the lead in promising new initiatives in Asia, but the substance of Soviet policy changed more slowly. Gorbachev was consistently uncompromising regarding the Northern Territories. Furthermore, Soviet forces in the western Pacific still seemed focused on and threatening to Japan, and Soviet economic troubles and lack of foreign exchange made prospects for Japan-Soviet Union economic relations appear poor. By 1990, Japan appeared to be the least enthusiastic of the major Western-aligned developed countries in encouraging greater contacts with and assistance to the Soviet Union.
Changes in Soviet policy carried out under Gorbachev beginning in the mid-1980s, including attempts at domestic reform and the pursuit of détente with the United States and Western Europe, elicited generally positive Japanese interest, but the Japanese government held that Moscow had not changed its policies on issues vital to Japan. The government stated that it would not conduct normal relations with the Soviet Union until Moscow returned the Northern Territories. The government and Japanese business leaders stated further that Japanese trade with and investment in the Soviet Union would not grow appreciably until the Northern Territories issue has been resolved.
Early post-Soviet era (1991–1999)
By the late 1990s, the Russian leadership began to pivot from West to East, considering improving relations with Japan as part of this effort, and viewed Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto's position as an opportunity. President Boris Yeltsin met with Prime Minister Hashimoto in Krasnoyarsk on 1 November 1997, where he proposed to solve the territorial problem with a peace treaty by 2000. Yeltsin also asked Hashimoto to consider financial assistance to Russia to the measure of $3 or $4 billion. Hashimoto also promoted the idea of increasing economic cooperation, which was called the Hashimoto–Yeltsin plan. In mid-April 1998, the Kanawa summit between the two leaders included Hashimoto making a proposal of having the four disputed Kuril islands coming under Japanese sovereignty. Yeltsin made a public statement about it and that he was considering accepting it, which prompted the Russian government and media to unite against this. By the autumn of 1998, the proposal had died after so much opposition in Russia, and Hashimoto was out of office after the July 1998 parliamentary election. Nonetheless, about $1.5 billion of the World Bank/IMF loan to Russia came from Japan. A meeting in November 1998 between Foreign Minister Keizo Obuchi and Yeltsin in Moscow took place, where Russia proposed to give Japan special status over the islands jointly with Russia as transitory legal regime. The Japanese side was cautious to the proposal and by 1999 there was a stalemate on the territorial question, while the economic initiatives stalled in their implementation.On July 30, 1998, the newly elected Japanese prime minister Keizō Obuchi had focused on major issues: signing a peace treaty with Russia, and renewing the Japanese economy. However, he died soon afterwards.