Anglo-Japanese Alliance

The Anglo-Japanese Alliance was a bilateral treaty of alliance between Japan and Great Britain, signed in London on 30 January 1902 and published on 12 February 1902. Its preamble says both governments wished to maintain the status quo and general peace in the Extreme East, to uphold the independence and territorial integrity of China and Korea, and to secure equal commercial and industrial opportunities there for all nations. Britain's interests were described as lying chiefly in China, Japan's in China and, to a special degree, in Korea. If either party went to war with a third power over those interests, the other promised strict neutrality and efforts to keep further powers out; if a second power joined the enemy, the ally would come to its assistance and make peace only by mutual agreement. Article VI set an initial term of five years, renewable unless notice was given twelve months before expiry, and extended the alliance automatically while either ally was at war. This record describes the 1902 agreement as a legal instrument.