Lüshunkou Totally Explained

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Lüshun city or Lüshunkou or (literally) Lüshun Port, formerly in historic references both Port Arthur and Ryojun, is a town located at the extreme southern tip of the Liaodong Peninsula, in the district of Dalian of the People's Republic of China. It has an excellent natural harbour, the possession and control of which became a casus belli in the Russo-Japanese war (1904–1905). Japanese and then Soviet administration would continue until 1953. During the first decade of that period, it was world famous and was more significant than the other port on the peninsula, today's Dalian. In Western diplomatic, news, and historical writings, it was known as Port Arthur, and during the period when the Japanese controlled and administered the Liaodong peninsula it was called Ryojun (旅順).

Geography

Dalian City, a sub-provincial city and prefectural capital, is some forty miles farther up the coast, sprawling around the narrowest neck of the Liaodong Peninsula, whereas Lushun occupies its southern tip. (See Landsat Map below 'Zoomed' — Lushun city' surrounds the lake-like structure clearly visible near the peninsular tip - the lakelike feature is the inner 'natural' harbor of the port, a very well-sheltered and fortifiable harbor to nineteenth-century eyes.)
The Liaodong (formerly Liaotung) peninsula and its relation to Korea, The Yellow Sea to its southeast, the Korea Bay to its due east, and the Bohai Sea (or Gulf) to its west are clearly seen on the map at above-right. Beijing (Peking) is almost directly (due west-northwest) across the Bo Hai Gulf from the port city.

Names in China

Names in China during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are complicated by the fact that many places took on names based on how they were reported in Western literature or history. This is further complicated in that four or five different languages might apply different names to a given place, and further complicated again when different transliterative schemes are used by translators attempting to render local names into Roman script. As an example of the size of the problem, one Russian Admiral's name has six different spellings in English.
Click for District Map

Earlier history

Surrounded by ocean on three sides, this strategic seaport was known as Port Artur (Порт Артур) under Russian administration and later Ryojun (旅順) under Japanese administration. Port Arthur took its name from a British Royal Navy Lieutenant named William C. Arthur, but was known to the Chinese as Lüshun. In August 1860, during the Second Opium War, Arthur had towed his crippled frigate into the harbor at Lüshun (at that time an unfortified fishing village) for repairs. The Russians and other Western powers then adopted the British name. Subsequent to World War II, the region found itself under Russian and finally Chinese rule. These and additional geo-historical name changes and recent history are delineated in the related article on Dalian.

As a focal point in history

Port Arthur first came into international prominence during the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895). Following Japan's defeat of Chinese troops at Pyongyang in Korea in September 1894, the Japanese First and Second Armies converged on the Liaodong Peninsula by land and sea. Japanese war planners, ambitious for control of the Liaodong Peninsula and Port Arthur and also cognizant of that port's strategic position controlling the northern Yellow Sea routes and the passage to Tianjin, were determined to seize it.
   Following only token resistance during the day and night of November 20-21, 1894, Japanese troops entered the fallen city on the morning of November 21. Several Western newspaper correspondents present at the time related the widespread massacre of Chinese inhabitants of the city by the victorious Japanese troops, apparently in response to the murderous treatment the Chinese had shown Japanese prisoners of war at Pyongyang and elsewhere. Foremost among the correspondents was James Creelman of the New York World. Though at least one American correspondent present completely contradicted Creelman's account, there's "little doubt" that the Japanese troops "indiscriminately killed" in the thousands Chinese soldiers and civilians (see Chushichi Tzusuki, The Pursuit of Power in Modern Japan 1825–1995,OUP, 2003 (reprint of 2000 ed), p. 128), and the story of a Japanese massacre soon spread among the Western public, damaging Japan's public image and nearly torpedoing the movement then ongoing in the United States to renegotiate the unequal treaties between that country and Japan. The event came to be known as the Port Arthur massacre.
   Japan went on to occupy Port Arthur and to seize control of the whole Liaodong Peninsula as spoils of war. As part of the terms of the Treaty of Shimonoseki concluding the war, Japan was granted the Liaodong Peninsula but had to cede back the territory when threatened jointly with war by France, Germany and Russia in what is called the Triple Intervention of 1895. This was seen as a great humiliation in Japan for reasons discussed at length in the article Treaty of Shimonoseki.
   Two years later, Russia coerced a lease of the Liaodong from China and gained railroad right-of-way to join the Liaodong Peninsula to the Chinese Eastern Railway with a line running from Port Arthur and nearby Dalny (Dalian} to the Chinese city of Harbin (see Kwantung Leased Territory), and systematically began to fortify the town and harbor at Port Arthur. This railway from Port Arthur to Harbin became a southern branch of the Chinese Eastern Railway (not to be confused with the South Manchurian Railway, the name of a company that undertook its management during the later Japanese period after 1905). All this was an additional goad to an already seething Japan. It was a hard lesson in international geopolitics Japan wouldn't soon forget.
   Ten years later Port Arthur again played a central role in war in the Far East. It is fair to say that at its heart, the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905) was an extended battle for the possession of Port Arthur and the railway to it, the Southern Manchurian Railway. After the Boxer Rebellion (1900–1901) had been extinguished by an international coalition of troops, Russia refused to withdraw its reinforcements from Manchuria and instead began to fortify and garrison the entire route along the Southern Manchurian Railway. With this development, Japan proposed the two powers meet and discuss their respective roles in eastern Manchuria, as the area was considered portion of their respective Spheres of Influence.
   Such talks were conducted between 1902 and 1904. While numerous proposals and agreement papers were generated between the two powers, Russia continued the de facto annexation of territory through fortification and garrison, if not de jure while employing stalling tactics in its negotiations. In the end, with over two years of intensive bi-lateral negotiations having gotten nowhere in clarifying each country's rights, prerogatives, and interests in inner Manchuria, Japan opted for war with Russia.

At the Heart of Conflict

The Battle of Port Arthur, the opening battle of the Russo-Japanese War, was fought in the heavily fortified harbor of the town of Port Arthur/Lüshun on February 9, 1904 when the Japanese attacked at night with torpedoes, followed by a brief day light skirmish by major surface combatants. The port eventually fell January 2, 1905 after a long train of preparatory battles on land and sea (See Russo-Japanese War Article) during which the Japanese occupied the whole Korean Peninsula, split the Russian Army, devastated the Russian Fleet, cut off the source of supplies on the railway from Harbin, and culminated in the end of the vicious and bloody battle known as the Siege of Port Arthur (June — January, Some sources place the siege start in late July instead, a technical difference due to definitions). By the end of July, the Japanese army had pushed down the Liaodong and was at the outer defenses of Port Arthur.
The fact that Japanese forces had closed to within artillery range of the harbor in early August led directly to the naval Battle of the Yellow Sea which maintained Japan in command of the seas, where her fleets continued to blockade the harbor. Virtually all the battles of the war until July of 1904 were strategic battles for territorial gain or position leading to the investment and siege of the port city. The Russian town of Dalney (Dalny / Dalien / Dalian) was undeveloped in this era prior to 1898 when the Russian Tsar Nicholas II of Russia funded founding of the town of Dalny (sometimes Dalney); and establishment of it as a port with many improvements and cultural attractions. In 1902, the Russian Viceroy de-emphasized Dalny (building a palace and cultural edifices instead at Port Arthur), except as a commercial port while continuing the development of manufacturing .

Postwar

The Japanese-controlled Ryojun City had 40 districts. The communist Lüshun City was established on November 25, 1945 to replace Ryojun. The city was a subdivision of a larger Lüda City and contained 40 villages in 3 districts: Dazhong (大众区), Wenhua (文化区), and Guangming (光明). In January 1946, Wenhua was merged into Dazhong, and the 40 villages were reduced to 23 communes (坊). In January 1948, the remaining two districts were merged into one: Shinei (市内区), with 12 communes.
On January 7, 1960, Lüshun City was renamed Lüshunkou District, still under Lüda. In 1985, 7 of its 9 townships were upgraded to towns.

Subdivisions

A district at the county level (市辖区, pinyin: shìxiáqū, lit. a district of a city) is a subdivision of a municipality or a prefecture-level city. These have status equal to a county, and are hence called "county level". Thus the 'Lüshunkou district contains 6 sub-districts and 7 towns (see Political divisions of China: Levels), and is itself under the prefecture level sub-provincial capitol city, Dalian.

Pinyin	Hanzi
Sub-districts
Desheng	得胜
Guangrong	光荣
Dengfeng	登峰
Shichang	市场
Longwangtang	龙王唐
Shuishiying	水师营
Towns
Jiangxi	江西
Shuangdaowan	双岛湾
Sanjianbao	三涧堡
Changcheng	长城
Longtou	龙头
Beihai	北海
Tieshan	铁山

Jiangsi Sub-district contains the 20.38-km² provincial Lushun Economic Development Zone established in 1992.

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