Terauchi’s purportedly independent conservative government was in fact dependent on the gentry party of provincial Japan, the Seiyukai. Their redoubtable leader, Hara Takashi, was no progressive. He resisted the rising tide of democracy in Japan and was only too happy to profit from a rigged election in 1917 to establish a huge majority in the Diet. He scoffed at the aspirations of Chinese nationalism. But of one central feature of the new world Hara was unshakably convinced – the dominant power of the future was the United States.
