萬寶山事件의 經緯

The Transition of Wanpaoshan Incident

The Wanpaoshan incident that broke out in the area of Mt. Wanpao of Manchuria in April, 1931 was merely one other of the frequent disputes between the Chinese and Koreans in Manchuria in those days. What makes the incident particulrly imPortant in the eye of the student of history, however, is that the Kantogun (Japanese Forces in Manchuria關東軍) attempted to take advantage of the incident to further its encroachment on Manchuria. The Chinese government had been opposing, and interfering with, the settling down of Koreans in Manchuria. For it regarded the Korean farmers and other settlers as vanguards of the Japanese encroachment and expansion onto the Asian land mass rich in natural resources. The actual cause of the incident was a collision of the opposing interests of the Chinese government and the Kantogun. The Chinese government had wanted to expel the Korean settlers from the area, while the Kantogun had plotted to make the Koreans there brew up some sort of trouble with the Chinese, and thereby to occupy Manchuria by force. However, the Japanese proceeded to negotiate with the Chinese government, pretending to believe the incident to have been an outcome of differences of opinion between the Chinese and Koreans on the rights of Koreans to lease land from the Chinese. While negotiation with the Chinese government for the settlement of the incident was going on, Kim Yi-sam, chief of Chang-ch’un bureau of the Chosun-Ilbo Ca Korean daily paper in Seoul) reported the news of the incident back home in great exag geration and falsehood, thus arousing the antagonism and enmity of the entire Korean people and, thereupon, entailing some reprisals by Koreans on Chinese residents in Korea. But thanks to the serious activities undertaken hurriedly by some shrewd officials of the Chinese Nationalist Government and others in Machurian outposts, and to similar efforts of the Committee for Survey of Wanpaoshan Incident organized by Koreans in Manchuria and other Korean endeavours, and finally to the expose of the intrigue of the Kantogun by the apologetic announcement of Kim Yi-sam-thanks to all these, extremely serious reprisals were prevented from taking place either in Manchuria or in Korea. Thus the Japanese attempts to exploit the incident came to a total failure, and the incident, far from aggravating to such an extent to give the Kantogun pretexts for outright occupation of Manchuria, rather became a turning point in the relationships between the Chinese and Koreans in Manchuria, giving rise to a cooperating spirit of the two peoples. The Japanese then had to devise another excuse for occupation of the much coveted territory of Manchuria, and the subsequent invention by the Kantogun was no other than the Liut’iaok’ou incident (柳條溝) in September, 1931. Hence it is not right to consider the Wanpaoshan incident to have been the very immediate cause for the Manchurian war in 1931-1937.