SOLDIER OF MISFORTUNE
As the 19th century neared an end, the political situation in China was deteriorating by the day. The Qing Dynasty, which had ruled China since the mid-17th century, was in rapid decline, burdened by systemic corruption and a growing inability to effectively govern its people. China’s humiliating defeat at the hands of Japan in the Sino-Japanese War (1894–95) only added to the country’s suffering. For decades the two nations had argued over de facto control of Korea. Pro- and anti-Japanese factions in Korea had various violent clashes, and China intervened frequently, ultimately sending 2,500 troops into the country. Japan responded by landing 8,000 troops at Inchon and seizing the capital city of Seoul.
Full-scale war between China and Japan erupted on August 1, 1894, and the newly modernized Japanese forces won a virtually unbroken series of land and sea battles in Korea and Manchuria, massacring thousands of unarmed Chinese civilians at Port Arthur on November 21. The ensuing Treaty of Shimonoseki in April 1895 ended all Chinese influence in Korea and gave Japan near-complete domination of the war-torn country.
Alarmed by Japan’s massive gains, Germany, Russia, and France forced the island kingdom to relinquish control of Port Arthur and the Liaotung Peninsula in southeastern Manchuria. Russia took over control of the strategic peninsula and Chinese ports on the Yellow Sea, which in turn brought Great Britain into China to watch the Russians. Britain’s presence led to renewed unrest throughout China. It became increasingly clear that Guangxu, the 26-year-old Manchu emperor, would have to embrace reform and modernization (like Japan) or face ruin.
Kang aimed to modernize China and build up its army. All he needed was a leader.
The man best suited to advise the emperor about such reforms was the brilliant scholar Kang Youwei. Dubbed the “Martin Luther of Confucianism,” Kang had a bold vision for a modern China and a natural ability to lead. “I believed that I alone could remake the world,” he would later write. “A man of great virtue can inspire other men.” Aiming to recast China as a constitutional monarchy, Kang convinced the emperor to initiate the “Hundred Days’ Reform”—a series of ambitious programs designed to modernize China’s military, upgrade its educational system, introduce railroads, encourage mining, and generally embrace a more open relationship with the West.
The aging and conservative Empress Dowager Cixi, however, vehemently opposed reforms of any kind. Having originally stepped aside to let her nephew rule, she had staged a coup in 1898, placed the emperor under house arrest, executed six of his top advisers, and put a hefty bounty on Kang’s
