The Russo-Japanese war saw the first defeat of a major European imperialist power by an Asian country. When Japanese and Russian expansionist interests collided over Manchuria and Korea, the Tsar assumed Japan would never dare to fight. However, after years of planning, Japan launched a surprise attack on the Russian Port Arthur, on the Liaoyang Peninsula in 1904 and the war that followed saw Japan win major battles against Russia. This book explains the background and outbreak of the war, then follows the course of the fighting at Yalu River, Sha-ho, and finally Mukden, the largest battle anywhere in the world before the First World War.

This book examines the major warships of the Imperial Russian Navy which participated in the Russo-Japanese War. The focus is on the battleships, coastal defence warships, and cruisers of the Pacific Squadron and Baltic Squadron that fought during the war. It discusses in detail their design and development between the years of 1885 and 1905, concentrating particularly on battleships and cruisers. The book explores, in depth, the mutually influential relationship between Russian and foreign warship design, as Russia progressed from a reliance on foreign designs and shipyards towards an ability to produce its own influential ships, such as the Novik. The title also outlines the gripping operational history of the Russian warships which participated in the Russo-Japanese war, tracing their activity before and during the combat, as well as the post-war fate of those ships which were bombarded, scuttled, captured, or salvaged. Packed with contemporary photography and full-colour illustrations, this title offers a detailed and definitive guide to the design, development, and destiny of the Russian warships which battled the Japanese in the Eastern seas.

Text by Sebastian Dobson, Anne Nishimura Morse, Frederic Sharf.

The Russo–Japanese War (1904–05) was an armed conflict between the Russian Empire and the Empire of Japan over rival imperial ambitions in Manchuria (China)and Korea. The major theatres of operations were the Liaodong Peninsula and Mukden in Southern Manchuria and the seas around Korea, Japan and the Yellow Sea. Contents: Causes of the War The First Blow The Korean Campaign Naval Operations Sinking of the "Petropavlovsk" Battle of the Yalu Cutting off Port Arthur The Assault that Failed Battle of Liaoyang Naval Battle off Port Arthur Battle of the Sha-ho The North Sea Outrage Surrender of Port Arthur The First Year of the War After Port Arthur In Winter Quarters The Battle of Mukden Retreat towards Harbin The Battle of the Japan Sea The Treaty of Peace

Narrative history based on eyewitness accounts.

The Russo-Japanese War in Manchuria was the first 20th century conflict fought between the regular armies of major powers, employing the most modern means – machine guns, trench warfare, minefields and telephone communications; and the battle of Mukden in March 1905 was the largest clash of armies in world history up to that date. Events were followed by many foreign observers; but the events of 1914 in Western Europe suggest that not all of them drew the correct conclusions. For the first time in the West the armies of this distant but important war are described and illustrated in detail, with rare photos and the superbly atmospheric paintings of Russia's leading military illustrator.

Despite the growing number of publications on the Russo-Japanese War, an abundance of questions and issues related to this topic remain unsolved, or call for a reexamination. This 30-chapter volume, the first in the two-volume project Rethinking the Russo-Japanese War, provides a comprehensive reexamination of the origins of the conflict, the various dimensions of the nineteen-month conflagration, the legacy of the war, and its place in the history of the twentieth century. Such an enterprise is not only timely but unique. It has benefited from a multinational team of thirty-two scholars from twelve nations representing a broad disciplinary background. The majority of them focus on topics never researched before and without exception provide a novel and critical view of the war. This reexamination is, of course, facilitated by a century-long perspective as well as an impressive assortment of primary and secondary sources, many of them unexplored and, in a number of cases, unavailable earlier.