Divided loyalties: Russian emigrés in Japanese-occupied Manchuria

ABSTRACT

This article describes how the changing political situation in Manchuria from the 1920s to the 1940s affected the lives of the Russian émigré community. The establishment of Manzhouguo (1932–1945) and growing international conflict in Northeast Asia exacerbated internal differences within the Russian community, producing multiple loyalties and shifting commitments. Partly as a result of their diversity and different earlier loyalties (Tsarist and Civil War periods), the Russian emigres in Manzhouguo found it difficult to attach to any one ideal, leader, political group or state. Facing very few choices, Russian émigré organizations and their leaders collaborated with the Japanese authorities. The escalation of war in China made their lives even more unsettled and unpredictable, as they became vulnerable to manipulation by different political forces. Although the notion of singular loyalty had been a virtue for them, it was perforce betrayed as recourse to weak multiple loyalties became the means of survival.

KEYWORDS:

• Manzhouguo
• China
• Russian emigres
• BREM
• loyalty/vernost’

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. ‘Loyalty’ has no exact equivalent in the Russian language, except for a relatively new word loyal’nost, of English/French origin. The Soviet Encyclopedic Dictionary (1989) translates ‘loyalty’ as vernost’, defining it as formal commitment to law or existing authority (Prokhorov 1989, 737).

2. My choice of émigré leaders and organizations is selective; so is the historiography of Russian émigré life in Manchuria. A complete analysis and historiography of the Russian diaspora in Manchuria and Manchukuo is beyond the scope of this study. My discussion of the White General V. A. Kislitsyn is based on Sabine Breuillard (2000); my discussion of Ataman Semenov, Cossack Union and the Bureau of the Russian Emigrants (BREM) is based on Luch Azii (Semenov 1934a, 1934b) and Zatsepine (2013a); for the Russian fascists, see Oberländer (1966), Stephan (1978), and Löwe (2014). For more recent comprehensive historiography of ‘Russian Manchuria’ in Russian, see Nazemtseva (2016).

3. For the early days of the CER, see Wolff (1999, 14–48). On the urban development along the CER, see Zatsepine (2013b).

4. The tensions over the joint management of the railway remained, as in 1924 the Soviet Union negotiated two separate agreements with the government of China and with Zhang Zuolin’s de facto government of Manchuria’s Three Eastern Provinces, which were at odds with each other (Ellman 1997, 120–131).

5. Around 20,000 CER employees registered with the Soviet Consulate in order to preserve their jobs. Many of them were jokingly called ‘radishes’ – Red on the outside, White on the inside. A small number took Chinese citizenship, while others preferred to remain stateless or sought work elsewhere (Bakich 2000, 17–18; Moustafine 2013, 148).

6. Zhang Xueliang (1901–2001) was the son of Manchuria’s warlord ruler Zhang Zuolin. Both of them saw Manchuria as their own domain and were beyond control by China’s Central government. In 1928, Zhang Zuolin was murdered by the Japanese military and Zhang Xueliang assumed control of Manchuria until Japan invaded it in 1931.

7. According to Shi Fang, Liu Shuang and Gao Ling, after 1925, the population of stateless Russian émigrés in Harbin was in decline, but from 1931 to 1934 it fluctuated: 27,617 in 1931, 21,839 in 1932, 24,908 in 1933, and 20,801 in 1934. In the following years it was below 10,000. The Soviet population in Manchuria was 41,188 in 1931, 26,234 in 1932, 29,346 in 1933, and 34,178 in 1934. In the following years, it fluctuated between 25,000 and 31,000 (Shi, Liu, and Gao 2003, 97).

8. According to official Manzhouguo sources, in 1933, the Russians occupied 25% of Harbin’s population of 384,570 people (Manchukuo 1933, 118).

9. The Kwantung Army (関東軍, or Kantōgun in Japanese) had its origins in the Japanese garrison which guarded the South Manchurian Railway (SMR) and the Kwantung Leasehold, which Japan took over from Imperial Russia after the Russo-Japanese War in 1904–1905. After the First World War, the influence of the Kwantung Army in South Manchuria was on the rise. The Kwantung Army protected the interests of the SMR, and exercised autonomy from the Japanese military establishment. In 1928, its leaders carried out the assassination of the Chinese warlord Zhang Zuolin. After occupying Manchuria on 18 September 1931, the Kwantung Army played a key role in the politics and administration of Manzhouguo (Yamamuro 2006, 9, 264–266).

10. DVSV was built on the foundations of the Russian All-Military Union (Russkii Obshchevoinskii Soiuz), a Russian émigré organization in Europe, uniting former White Russian military personnel, which had its branch in Manchuria from the late 1920s.

11. Later this Union was renamed as the Cossack Union of East Asia (Soiuz Kazakov Vostochnoi Azii).

12. For discussion of Luch Azii as Semenov’s propaganda tool, see Zatsepine (2013a, 135–139).

13. For an idyllic portrayal of the Cossack life in Trekhrech’e in 1935, see Nestor (1935, 11–12).

14. Russian fascists in Manchuria saw their objectives in Russia to be unique (samobytnyi) and they did not develop extreme racial theories calling for extermination of the Jews and subjugation of other ‘lesser’ cultures, including Slavic, to which they belonged. The leaders of the Russian fascists differed with each other over their attitudes towards the Jews. On distinctive features of the Russian fascists, see Löwe (2014, 144–152).

15. From 1940 to 1943, the Russian Fascist Party continued to operate in Shanghai. For the final years of the VFP, see Stephan (1978, 199–207); Oberländer (1966, 172–173).

16. Balakshin argues that Matkovsky was a double-agent, providing intelligence to the Japanese and Soviet authorities. However, during his career in Manzhouguo, his enemies did not find any evidence to support these rumours and accusations (Balakshin 1958, 188–195).

17. In China this war is called 抗日战争, or the War of Resistance against Japan.

18. The Battle of Nomonhan/Khalkhin Gol, on the Manzhouguo-Mongol border, in 1939, was an exception. It did not affect the majority of Manzhouguo’s population.

19. Many left for the treaty ports of Shanghai and Tianjin, as well as other points in Asia and even Australia. Others had returned to the Soviet Union. By the end of the 1930s, the Russian population of Harbin had dropped to around 30,000 (Moustafine 2013, 149).