(iPoster) Varieties of Counterinsurgency Strategies in Late Nineteenth Century East Asia

• In Event: Poster Session: Strategic Decision-Making in Global Security & International Relations Theory
  In Poster Session: Poster Session: Strategic Decision-Making in Global Security

Abstract

The second half of the nineteenth century saw a rapid proliferation of violent conflict involving both state and nonstate actors in the East Asian region, prompting a series of political and military reforms. Existing accounts, however, tend to measure reform success and failure in terms of performance in interstate wars. Japan’s victory in the Sino-Japanese War (1894-95) and Russo-Japanese War (1904-05), moreover, is used as evidence for a regional shift in the military balance of power. In this paper, I shift the attention to the varied matrix of external and internal security threats in nineteenth century East Asia, including domestic insurgencies, rebellions, and civil war such as the Boshin War (1868-69) in Japan, the Taiping, Nian, and Muslim rebellions (1850s-1870s) in China, and the Jinju, Imo, and Tonghak rebellions in Korea. I argue that the timing and type of these prior experiences with domestic military crises shaped the state’s ability to respond to future security threats from both outside and within. Specifically, I show how Meiji Japan, Qing China, and Chosŏn Korea each responded with distinct strategies of counterinsurgency, ranging from state-led centralization of coercive institutions to the creation of decentralized but force-multiplying regional militias to reliance on foreign aid.

Author

• Seo-Hyun Park, Lafayette College