| Abstract |
Since the late nineteenth century, the Western powers led by the Britain established a system of free navigation in the Chinese waters through treaty and gunboat diplomacy. As the maritime hegemon, Britain managed to secur its Far Eastern shipping interests in China by maintaining maritime order. However, after the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese hostilities in 1937, the Japanese navy unilaterally initiated “shipping cut-off” operation in Chinese waters, blockading coastal ports, prohibiting Chinese ships from sailing, and stopping and searching foreign ships to prevent Chinese ships from disguising themselves as foreign vessels. Given that Britain had the largest shipping interests in China, the Japanese blockade threatened to undertime the maritime order that it had worked to uphold for nearly a century. Nevertheless, in order to avoid direct confrontation with Japan, Britain ultimately adopted a policy of concession and compromise. The main concern was that if Britain refused to cooperate, Japan might declare a state of war, thereby invoking wartime international law to expand the blockade to all third-country shipping—including British vessels. Such a development would have delivered a devastating blow to British commercial and shipping interests in China. Thus, to prevent Japan from unilaterally escalating the conflict, Britain agreed to allow Japanese warships to stop and visit British merchant vessels in Chinese waters to verify their nationality. Choosing the lesser of two evils, Britain sacrificed part of its freedom of navigation rights in order to avoid further escalation of the conflict and a complete suspensionof British maritime trade in the region. |
