I have read in the book Under Three Flags: Anarchism and Anti-Colonial Imagination that several Filipino intellectuals who immigrated to Japan became naturalized subjects of the Meiji government, and were vying the Japanese government to sell surplus rifles left from the war in Korea to the growing Filipino rebels in the Philippines. But the Meji Government simply do not want to commit anything, as it feared retaliation from Europeans.
However, Mariano Ponce, which went to Japan days after Spanish started arresting propaganda leaders, succeeded in buying two shiploads of arms and ammunition from the Japanese government. The first shipment was placed on the Nunobiki-maru, along with 10000 arms and 5 million ammunition, and accompanied with Japanese officers and volunteer soldiers who want to serve in the Filipino Army. Unfortunately, a typhoon sunk the ship off the coast of Formosa, and the second shipment was not delivered until the capture of Aguinaldo by the Americans, which prompted Ponce to donate it to Sun Yat-sen, a close friend and a revolutionary against the Manchu rulers of China.
OTOH, Tagawa Moritaro, a carpenter from Nagasaki, has become a successful businessman in the Philippines. It appears in June 1895 that Bonifacio [leader of the Katipunan, the Filipino revolutionaries] asked him to create a trading company that exports hemp, tobacco, sugar and other products [which was produced by rebels] on which the income would be used to buy Murata rifles in Japan. Bonifacio remarked that the Katipunan will pay all the expenses if Moritaro will go to Japan to arrange the purchase. However, nothing came out of the deal.
Now with the various PODs:
1. Nunobiki-maru is not sunk.
2. Moritaro agreed to Bonifacio's deal, established the Moritaro Trading Company, went to Japan, and persuaded the Meiji government to sell arms to the revolutionaries.
Given the circumstances:
1. Will the Philippine Revolution be more successful?
2. I'm sure the Spanish will suspect the Moritaro Trading Company, but if they unveiled that the company is helping the revolutionaries, AND given that Japanese volunteers were serving the revolutionaries, will the Meiji government eventually commit to the rebel's cause? I've recalled that the radical republican newspaper La Justicia in Spain, commented that, "A beautiful future of a simultaneous war in Cuba, the Philippines..... it is sufficient that the government of the Restoration may write on the ruins of the Spanish nation the historic epitaph Finis Hispanae.", i.e. the war with US and Japan.
Thoughts, anyone??
However, Mariano Ponce, which went to Japan days after Spanish started arresting propaganda leaders, succeeded in buying two shiploads of arms and ammunition from the Japanese government. The first shipment was placed on the Nunobiki-maru, along with 10000 arms and 5 million ammunition, and accompanied with Japanese officers and volunteer soldiers who want to serve in the Filipino Army. Unfortunately, a typhoon sunk the ship off the coast of Formosa, and the second shipment was not delivered until the capture of Aguinaldo by the Americans, which prompted Ponce to donate it to Sun Yat-sen, a close friend and a revolutionary against the Manchu rulers of China.
OTOH, Tagawa Moritaro, a carpenter from Nagasaki, has become a successful businessman in the Philippines. It appears in June 1895 that Bonifacio [leader of the Katipunan, the Filipino revolutionaries] asked him to create a trading company that exports hemp, tobacco, sugar and other products [which was produced by rebels] on which the income would be used to buy Murata rifles in Japan. Bonifacio remarked that the Katipunan will pay all the expenses if Moritaro will go to Japan to arrange the purchase. However, nothing came out of the deal.
Now with the various PODs:
1. Nunobiki-maru is not sunk.
2. Moritaro agreed to Bonifacio's deal, established the Moritaro Trading Company, went to Japan, and persuaded the Meiji government to sell arms to the revolutionaries.
Given the circumstances:
1. Will the Philippine Revolution be more successful?
2. I'm sure the Spanish will suspect the Moritaro Trading Company, but if they unveiled that the company is helping the revolutionaries, AND given that Japanese volunteers were serving the revolutionaries, will the Meiji government eventually commit to the rebel's cause? I've recalled that the radical republican newspaper La Justicia in Spain, commented that, "A beautiful future of a simultaneous war in Cuba, the Philippines..... it is sufficient that the government of the Restoration may write on the ruins of the Spanish nation the historic epitaph Finis Hispanae.", i.e. the war with US and Japan.
Thoughts, anyone??
