The First Sino-Japanese War Indemnity Revisited

Abstract

The question of the amount of the First Sino-Japanese War indemnity involves three main elements: Japan’s military expenditure on the war, China’s actual payment, and the actual amount Japan received. On all of these issues, there have always been considerable differences between Chinese and Japanese scholars. In this study, we analyze relevant archives and documents and the main scholarly work in both China and Japan and provide a detailed discussion of several scholarly points of views and their basis, and examine the pre- and postwar exchange rates between the yen, the Chinese treasury standard (Kuping) silver tael, and the pound sterling, taking account of the fluctuating value of the yen before and after the war. On this basis, we calculate that Japan’s actual military spending on the war was no more than 125 million yen, while the actual payments by the Qing government, converted to pounds sterling and then to yen, totaled 358.36 million yen. Japan extorted 233.36 million yen from China, or three times Japan’s total annual revenue at the time.