Yellow Russia

Diagram of Plan

Yellow Russia (Russian: Желтороссия, romanized: Zheltorossiya; Chinese: 黃俄羅斯計劃, abbr. 黃俄）was an Imperial Russian plan and colonial project dating back to the late 19th to the early 20th centuries. Its intention was taking Chinese land, especially in Northeast China (Manchuria) and Xinjiang.

The term was first coined by Russian journalist Ilya Levitov.. It involved seizing northeastern lands from the weakened Qing China, resettling Cossacks and peasants to Manchuria, and converting the Chinese inhabitants to Orthodox Christianity.

Origins

The concept of Yellow Russia was first used by journalist Ilya Levitov, who wrote: “By Yellow Russia I mean the space in which the Russian element mixes with the Yellow race, especially the one that stretches from Lake Baikal to the Pacific Ocean. This space is, as it were, isolated from Russia and has something in common with it”.

Russian desire for colonial power in the East was largely driven by the desire for a warm-water port. Russia, and subsequently Russia's naval and trade power in the East was hugely constrained by the fact that it lacked a warm water port on the Pacific, greatly reducing its influence, trade and military power in the region. The Black and Baltic Seas provided limited access to the open ocean and could be blocked by Russia's neighbors.

Russia gained a huge amount of influence and power projection capabilities in the Pacific with the Convention of Peking in 1860, gaining all of Outer Manchuria, and would found the port of Vladivostok, which would become Russia's main power base in the Pacific, however the city's port was icebound for three months a year, and even when the port was thawed had it's access to the wider ocean restricted and controlled by Japan, who would be able to isolate the port and cut off its sea access. Thus, access to the Pacific Ocean would depend on relations with Japan. The Japanese could control the La Pérouse Strait (near Hokkaido) north of Vladivostok, the Tsugaru Strait (between Hokkaido and Honshu) in the east, and the Tsushima Strait (between Korea and Japan) in the south.

In 1861 Russia, seeking a way to break this geographical constraint, attempted to occupy the island of Tsushima. However, the Tokugawa Shogunate in Japan asked the British Empire to intervene, and in late 1861 the Russians were forced to end their attempt to take the island and leave Tsushima.

However, slowly but surely Russia was strengthening its position in the Far East. The population of Siberia and the Far East grew to 4.3 million in 1885. By 1897, the population of the eastern part of Russia grew to 6 million people. The Russians established control over Sakhalin and the forts Nikolaevsk and Mariinsk were built near the mouth of the Amur River.

Attempts to secure influence

Following the Convention for the Lease of the Liaotung Peninsula, Russia received the Kwantung Region for its use, built the Chinese Eastern Railway (CER) and the South Manchurian Railway, and also received control of the right-of-way of these railways. The largely Russified cities of Harbin and Dalian were founded in 1898 and 1899 respectively, and in 1901 the ambitious construction of a naval base at Port Arthur began on the Liaodong Peninsula. In 1900, after the suppression of the Boxer Rebellion, Manchuria was occupied by Russian troops.

Russian attempts to increase influence and gain economic power in Manchuria were also encouraged greatly by the businessman Aleksandr Bezobrazov, who in 1896 in a petition to Tsar Nicholas II, predicted that war with Japan was inevitable for Russia to pursue an aggressive policy against Japan in Korea and Manchuria. His proposal involved the establishment of a commercial enterprise similar to the British East India Company, which would provide the government with financial benefits while increasing influence and soft power in the area. While met with sympathy and support with much of the Russian Cabinet, Bezobrazov was at first thwarted by Finance Minister Sergei Witte, who convinced the Tsar to shut the project down, suspecting Bezobrazov's political intentions.

However, in 1896, King Kojong of Korea was persuaded by Jules Briner, a Russian merchant, to grant a timber concession along the Yalu River border between Korea and Manchuria, with Briner then offering to sell the concession to the Russian government in 1897. Bezobrazov then convinced Tsar Nicholas II of his plan, and the imperial cabinet approved the purchase despite Witte’s objections in May 1898. The concession was chartered as a private company in July 1901. Meanwhile, the Boxer Rebellion had resulted in a huge increase in Russian military presence in the area, and Russia was able to obtain similar concessions from China on the Manchurian side of the Yalu River.

Tsar Nicholas later sent Bezobrazov to the region in person, where he alarmed Admiral Yevgeni Ivanovich Alekseyev with talk of war with Japan, and the need to stop the withdrawal of Russian troops from Manchuria. In 1902, with Witte powerless at the court, Bezobrazov was given near unlimited access to state funds and was able to set up a private company called the Yalu River Timber Concessions.

From May 1903 onwards, Bezobrazov’s influence continued to increase, as the Tsar, after appointing Alekseyev as viceroy of the Far East, instructed him to discuss economic policy with Bezobrazov rather than Witte. Bezobrazov also returned to Manchuria to organize the Russian Timber Producing Association of the Far East. This Association was merged with the Manchurian Mining Association in August 1903. However, the actual outbreak of conflict between Japan and Russia in February 1904 partially due to the conflicting interests of the two Empires in the region caused the collapse of Bezobrazov’s enterprises, which were already financially overextended.

End of the project

Russia's expansionist goals in East Asia inevitably came into conflict with the interests of Japan, which had declared imperial claims to the same territories. As a result of the Russo-Japanese War, the Russian expansionist project in the Far East and China collapsed; Russia lost Port Arthur, ceding to Japan also the right to lease the Liaodong Peninsula and the South Manchurian Railway.

In 1932, the Japanese authorities founded the puppet state of Manchukuo in Manchuria, which included Harbin. In 1935, the USSR sold the Chinese Eastern Railway to Japan.

See also

• Russians in China
• Russian Harbin
• Albazinians
• Zheltuga Republic
• Sino-Russian border conflicts
• Green Ukraine