Armistice Celebration Ending the Great War, Tokyo, November 1918.

“Nov. 21 [1918] – The citizens of Tokyo formally celebrated the European Armistice, when 2,500 distinguished guests were invited to meet the city and government officials at Hibiya park and more than a million people turned out to witness the proceedings and the parade.

“The Mayor of Tokyo [Tajiri Inajiro] and the Premier [Hara Takashi] read addresses and response was made by the British Ambassador [Sir Conyngham Greene] in the name of the foreign representatives.

“Decorated cars, floats and other forms of demonstration were seen moving about the capital all day. At night a monster lantern procession of more than 100,000 persons marched through the main thoroughfares and visited the Imperial Palace grounds , where the procession was viewed by Their Majesties.”

– The Japan Magazine, January 1919

Armistice Celebration Ending the Great War, Tokyo, November 1918. The mayor of Tokyo, Tajiri Inajiro, driving a Ford Model T touring car, leads a parade through the streets of Tokyo to celebrate the Armistice ending World War I. Under the terms of the Anglo-Japan Alliance Japan did not send troops to the European battlefields but did aid the Allies in Asia by seizing Germany’s colonies at Tsingtao and in the South Pacific, depriving them of bases for German commerce raiders.

“Early in August [1914] the British government asked the Imperial Japanese government for assistance under the terms of the Anglo-Japanese agreement of alliance. German men-of-war and armed vessels were then prowling the seas of eastern Asia to the serious menace of [British] commerce and that of our ally [Japan], while in Kiao-chao Germany was busy with warlike preparations, apparently for the purpose of making a base for warlike operations in eastern Asia. Grave anxiety was thus felt for the maintenance of the peace of the Far East.

“Germany’s possession of a base for powerful activities in one corner of the Far East was not only a serious obstacle to the maintenance of permanent peace [in the region], but also was in conflict with the more immediate interests of the Japanese Empire. The Japanese government, therefore, resolved to comply with the British request, and, if necessary, to open hostilities against Germany,

“On August 15, 1914, less than two weeks after the declaration of war between Great Britain and Germany, the Japanese ambassador in Berlin handed to the German Foreign Office an ultimatum, demanding that Germany should immediately withdraw all warships from Chinese and Japanese waters and deliver up the entire leased territory of Kiao-chao before September 15.

“At Tsing-tao, on the leased ground, the German government at great expense had erected strong fortifications, commanding the bay; under the shelter of frowning forts the Germans had constructed a magnificent floating dock which made Tsing-tao a splendid naval base … Germany had invested heavily in her Kiao-chao venture, and her imperial position in the Far East depended largely upon its security.

“Four days after the declaration of war, the Japanese navy established a blockade of Kiao-chao; and on September 2, 10,000 Japanese troops were landed on the Shantung peninsula outside the German leased territory.

“Japan’s position in relation to Korea, Kiao-chao and China”, 1914. [Source: A Brief History of the Great War, 1920.]

“By November 6 the forts had been silenced, and the word for an infantry assault was given by General Kamio. Early the next morning the attacking party discovered that white flags had been hoisted in the city. The articles of capitulation were soon signed, and on November 10, 1914, the German governor formally handed over Kiao-chao to Japan. In addition to the valuable naval base, Japan had captured 3000 German prisoners. The Japanese landing party had lost 236 killed and 1282 wounded; the small British East Indian force of 1360 men, which had arrived in September to coöperate with the Japanese landing party, lost 12 killed and 61 wounded.

“In the meantime Japanese naval forces were coöperating with the British in the conquest of Germany’s island possessions in the Pacific.

“Japan sent no troops to Europe, but her participation in the Great War served the cause of the Allies in several ways. It deprived the swift German commerce-raiders of a most important base in the Far East; it hastened the conquest of the German colonies; it enabled Great Britain to rest easier about her Indian Empire and her Chinese interests while she was centering her military efforts in western Europe; and it secured protection for Russia from attacks in the rear and a steady, uninterrupted flow of munitions of war from Japan and from America.”

– A Brief History of the Great War, by Carlton J. H. Hayes, 1920