운요호사건과 이토 히로부미

Abstract

This paper investigates the evidence that Itō Hirobumi became deeply involved in planning the Unyō incident (Sep 1875) and manipulating the official report, based on the recently photo-printed Itō Hirobumi document. Itō Hirobumi drew up the master plan of the Unyō incident in consultation with Gustave Emil Boissonade and even after the incident, he spearheaded the fabrication of the official report in order to take control of the incident in the way that had been initially intended. The incident was fundamentally a different approach, compared with the way that negotiations had been made between Korea and Japan. While the first demonstration by the Unyō warship was created within a diplomatic context, simply in pursuit of bargaining demands, the Unyō incident was designed as a political tactic to deal with domestic matters within Japan. As the Ōkubo regime had been in trouble due to issues about separation of the ministries from the Council of State, Itō Hirobumi and his supporters provoked the incident in order to get rid of both the conservatives, including Shimazu Hisamitsu, and the radicals, including Itagaki Taiske. Thus, the Unyō incident clearly indicates that it was provoked only as a political tactic. As a result, the incident made it possible for the regime to succeed in freezing the separation matter and expel its advocates, Shimazu and Itagaki. Through the Unyō incident, the ultimate end of eliminating political opponents was successfully accomplished, but it also stirred up an extensive “subdue Korea controversy (Sei-Kan-ron)” within Japan due to the counter-propaganda that Korea provoked the incident. In the history of Korea-Japan relations, the incident needs to be further considered so as to play a crucial part in expanding distorted images against Korea through the “controversy” and establishing “View of Contempt for Korea” grounded on “A Theory of Western Civilization,” rather than just be the incident occurring before the treaty of Kanghwa. Leaving the intensified “subdue Korea controversy” unsettled, could possibly cause agitation of the Armed Forces, which might lead to the combination of “subdue Korea party” with “dissatisfied Samurai” within the military. Therefore, a Kuroda mission could possibly mobilize warships and troops to pose as envies for accusation. Meanwhile, the dispatch of envoys with warships made anti-Japanese agitation widespread within Korea, to such an extent that Korea identified Japan with the West. It was the Unyō incident that was the direct cause of the beginning of Korea’s uneasy relationship with Japan in the modern times.