Politics

Manchukuo

A puppet state set up by Japan in occupied Manchuria in 1932, headed by Puyi, the last emperor of China. Real power lay with the Japanese Kwantung Army. It collapsed in August 1945.

After the Mukden Incident of September 1931 the Kwantung Army occupied Manchuria, and on 1 March 1932 a nominally independent Manchukuo was proclaimed there, with its capital at Changchun, renamed Xinjing. It was headed by Puyi, first as chief executive and from 1934 as emperor. In practice Japanese officers and officials ran its administration, economy and policing. Following the Lytton Commission's report, the League of Nations refused to recognise the state, and in 1933 Japan left the League; Italy and Germany were among the countries that later recognised Manchukuo.

Manchukuo served Japan as an industrial and military base, a springboard for the attack on the rest of China and a zone of friction with the Soviet Union. In August 1945 the Red Army destroyed the Kwantung Army, the state ceased to exist and Puyi was taken prisoner by the Soviets.