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War and Diplomacy
The Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) formally ended on 5 December 1905 with the Treaty of Portsmouth (new Hampshire). The accord was reached through mediation by US President Theodore Roosevelt. The President's offer of good offices was motivated by two foreign policy goals:
* maintaining a balance of power beneficial to the United States in Northeast Asia, a region Roosevelt recognized as having strategic significance;
* enhancing American prestige by presenting the US as a nation other great powers turned to for guidance and assistance.
While Roosevelt made every effort to present himself as the objective neutral party, his sentiments - both as an individual and as a statesman - favored Japan. On the one hand he admired the more progressive Asian nation, and considered imperial Japan a freer nation than the despotic Russia of the czars. On the other hand he was concerned that St. Petersburg's occupation of Manchuria might lead to further expansion in East Asia, to the detriment of American access to the Chinese and Korean market.
His...