Hui Zheng1,a*
1Institute for Mutual Learning of East-West Civilizations,Zhejiang Gongshang University, Hangzhou 310018, Zhejiang, China
aEmail:22010130006@pop.zjgsu.edu.cn
*Corresponding author
Abstract: This article examines the life of Wang Hongnian (1874–1945), the first Chinese state-sponsored law graduate from Tokyo Imperial University, as a case study in how legal expertise can be used as diplomatic capital across national boundaries. By analyzing records from the Japanese Foreign Ministry, Qing Dynasty memorials, and unpublished writings by Wang, we argue that figures like Wang, operating in semi-colonial contexts, skillfully combined Meiji-era legal principles with Confucian governance to address uneven Sino-Japanese relations. Utilizing Bourdieu’s theory of capital conversion and Bhabha’s idea of “third-space intellectuals,” we show how Wang’s legal education served as a form of symbolic power, enabling him to resist Japanese imperial pressure while engaging with elite Meiji networks. Our study challenges the simplistic binary of collaboration versus resistance by highlighting the nuanced and negotiated nature of semi-colonial agency. This research contributes to discussions on the globalization of international law and the impact of peripheral figures in shaping the modern imperial world.
Keywords: Study-abroad Movement; International Law; Asianism; Meiji Japan; Qing Diplomacy
- Introduction
The history of Chinese students in Meiji Japan has often swung between two perspectives: viewing them as passive recipients of imperial teachings [1] or as direct proponents of anti-colonial nationalism [2]. This binary perspective overlooks the complex role of intellectual intermediaries who navigated transnational power structures using their specialized knowledge, a gap particularly evident in studies focusing on legal experts. Recent academic work has examined the changing role of international law amid globalization, emphasizing its importance in promoting global economic collaboration [3-4], resolving cross-border legal issues, and adjusting to the rise of emerging market economies. These studies and the examination of transnational intellectual networks [5-6] offer important frameworks to move beyond such simplistic views. Nonetheless, there is a lack of research on how legal expertise functioned as diplomatic capital in Sino-Japanese relations, especially during the crucial transition from the fall of the Qing Dynasty to the foundation of the Republic of China (1912-1922) [7]. A modern photograph of Wang Hongnian is depicted in Figure 1.
Figure 1. Modern photograph of Wang Hongnian
This article bridges these lacunae through the lens of a “knowledge-diplomacy nexus,” a conceptual framework that synthesizes Bourgeoisie’s theory of cultural capital conversion with Dudden’s critique of imperial legalism. We analyze the career of Wang Hongnian (1874-1945), the first state-sponsored law graduate from Wenzhou at Tokyo Imperial University, whose trajectory exemplifies three understudied dynamics: The co-production of expertise, highlighting how Japanese legal education, particularly at elite institutions like Tokyo Imperial University, facilitated the creation of jurisprudential frameworks that integrated Western legal principles with East Asian governance traditions, as seen in the development of ‘translingual practice’; Asianism as contested terrain, exploring how Meiji-era pan-Asian solidarity rhetoric (Konoe’s Tōa Dōbun Kai) served both as a networking mechanism for Chinese students and an ideological veil for Japanese expansionism; and diplomatic brokerage, examining how technical legal knowledge became convertible into diplomatic influence during asymmetric conflicts, challenging Westphalian narratives of interstate relations. Drawing on newly triangulated archives, including Japanese Foreign Ministry records (JACAR), Qing examination registers, and Wang’s publications, this study makes three contributions: Empirically, it corrects chronological errors in Wang’s biography, confirming his departure as 1899 instead of 1898, and decodes his mediation of five Sino-Japanese crises from 1916 to 1922. Theoretically, it demonstrates how “peripheral” actors manipulated imperial knowledge systems to resist diplomatic coercion, complicating colonial dichotomy theories. Methodologically, it models microhistorical analysis of “third-space intellectuals” (Bhabha, 1994) to reveal the granular mechanics of transnational legal acculturation. By examining Wang’s journey through the educational, bureaucratic, and diplomatic realms, we assert that his legal acumen, honed at Tokyo Imperial University and leveraged via elite networks such as Shibusawa Eiichi’s Ryūmonsha, served as a versatile asset that bolstered pragmatic defense of sovereignty. This reframes scholarly understanding of how semi-colonial actors navigated the complexities of Meiji modernity, balancing the transfer of emancipatory knowledge with the challenges of imperialism. The article’s theoretical framework, which is pivotal for guiding the research and interpreting its findings, is illustrated in Figure 2
Figure 2. Theoretical framework diagram of the article
- Literature Review
2.1 Chinese Students in Meiji Japan
Early scholarship on late-Qing students in Japan, epitomized by Saneto, portrayed them as passive conduits through which Meiji modernization was transmitted to China [8-9]. These works emphasized the technical transfer of legal and military knowledge, treating students as instruments of state-led modernization. Sang Bing reinforced this narrative by highlighting how Zhang Zhidong and other reformers instrumentalized Japan as a “bridge between East and West,” regarding students merely as interchangeable components in a nationalist engineering project [10-12]. From the 1980s onward, a counter-narrative of “nationalist resistance” emerged, led by Wang Ping (1966) and Huang Fuqing (2005) [13-15]. These scholars emphasized how exposure to republican ideals in Japan radicalized students into anti-Qing revolutionaries. Huang’s analysis of Tokyo-based journals like The People’s Journal argued that students “used Japan as a base to export nationalism back to China” [16,17]. Yet such studies equated studying in Japan with awakening anti-colonial consciousness, overlooking how specialists in law or engineering practiced non-confrontational strategies within imperial structures.
2.2 International Law in East Asia
Western scholarship on modern East Asian international law has long been dominated by the “imperial legalism” paradigm [18]. Dudden demonstrated how 19th-century Japan weaponized international law for expansion through “treaty revision,” forcing China to accept the “civilized nation” discourse [19]. Liu introduced “translingual practice” to analyze Yan Fu and Liang Qichao’s translations of international law, but still assumed a unidirectional “West-to-East” flow [20]. Recent works have begun exploring the “reverse utilization” of international law in colonial settings [20]. Benton , studying India, proposed “law as a weapon of the weak,” yet did not extend this to East Asia [21]. Chinese scholars, such as Qiu Zhihong, have examined jurists like Wang Chonghui, concentrating mainly on ‘national legal construction’ while overlooking how individual diplomats utilized international law for resistance at a micro level [22-23]. Recent scholarship has reframed extraterritoriality and legal modernity in East Asia. Pär Cassel’s Grounds of Judgment demonstrates how Qing and Tokugawa courts actively negotiated rather than passively received the mixed-court system, foregrounding local agency within unequal treaties. Teemu Ruskola’s Legal Orientalism further exposes how Western and Japanese imperial powers constructed “Oriental despotism” as a legal category to justify extraterritorial jurisdiction. Both studies, however, privilege macro-institutional analysis and the production of discursive categories. This article focuses on Wang Hongnian, a bilingual micro-actor who navigates between Tokyo lecture halls and Beijing legation files, thereby shifting the perspective from institutional structure to the dynamic process of capital conversion. how a jurist, under the influence of semi-colonialism, repurposed imperial legal texts, those artifacts critiqued by Ruskola for their Orientalist nature into strategic tools for the defense of sovereignty. In so doing, we extend Cassel’s “local agency” argument beyond the courtroom and into the diplomatic back-channel, while grounding Ruskola’s discursive critique in the granular mechanics of semi-colonial legal practice.
2.3 Transnational Intellectual Networks
Bourdieu’s theory of capital conversion provides novel analytical tools for examining overseas students [24]. Shin first applied “cultural capital” to Korean students in Japan, showing how their “Japanese degrees” granted access to colonial bureaucracies [25]. Nevertheless, these studies presuppose a “center-periphery” power structure, yet they fall short of explaining how peripheries might leverage central resources [26]. Postcolonial theory provides crucial supplements. Bhabha’s “third space” reveals how colonial intellectuals carved out spaces of resistance through “mimicry and difference” within imperial discourses [27]. Stoler further argued that colonial elites’ “ambivalent collaboration” functioned as a survival strategy [28]. However, these studies primarily concentrate on India and Southeast Asia, resulting in East Asian cases being less explored.
The section on research gaps highlights three critical areas: First, the concept of techno-nationalism among law students, particularly how they engaged with Japanese law—not merely adopting or rejecting it but utilizing it to assert sovereignty claims. Second, the semi-colonial dynamics in international law, exploring how diplomats employed legal discourse to broaden negotiation opportunities given the context of incomplete sovereignty. Third, the micro-mechanisms of agency and the potential synthesis of Bourdieu’s concept of “capital” with Bhabha’s “third space” to explain the strategies of historical actors. Wang Hongnian’s case provides an ideal lens through which to examine these areas. His legal training at Tokyo Imperial University, his connections within the East Asia Common Culture Society, and his role in five crisis mediations offer unique insights into semi-colonial ‘legal diplomacy’. Regarding the completeness and provenance of archival sources, specific details are provided to address reviewer inquiries. JACAR sampling involved examining 4.7 linear meters, approximately 9,300 folios, of the ‘Miscellaneous Records on Chinese Students in Japan (Army and Foreign Affairs Department),’ JACAR Ref. A04010124600–A04010124612, covering the period from 1899 to 1922. This represents the entire series for Qing/Republican state-funded law students. The classification history notes that the Shandong Railway briefs (JACAR B16080854600) became accessible in 1972, while the Zhengjiatun military attaché reports (B16080854700) were declassified in 1989, with de-classification stamps visible on the original files. Additionally, a targeted search of British FO371/1754–1759 (Zhengjiatun) and FO371/8023–8031 (Washington Conference) at The National Archives, Kew, resulted in only incidental mentions. These files lack the granular memoranda found in Japanese and Qing archives and are cited only for corroboration, thus excluded from the primary analysis.
- Theoretical Framework
This article presents a knowledge–diplomacy nexus as its primary analytical framework, integrating Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of capital conversion with Homi Bhabha’s concept of the “third space” to elucidate how Wang Hongnian transformed his legal expertise into diplomatic leverage under semi-colonial circumstances [29]. The framework operates across three interrelated dimensions: forms of capital, field structure, and agent strategy [30]. In terms of forms of capital, Bourdieu identifies four types: economic, cultural, social, and symbolic. Within the realm of legal diplomacy, Wang’s legal capital is operationalized as academic capital, demonstrated by his law degree from Tokyo Imperial University and training in the German–Japanese civil-law synthesis; institutional capital, reflected in his Qing title of “juren in law and politics” and his position as Counselor at the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo after 1912; and symbolic capital, represented by Japanese honors such as the Order of the Rising Sun (4th class, 1913) and the Order of the Sacred Treasure (2nd class, 1921), which established his status as a “trustworthy intermediary.” These forms of capital are dynamic, converted through crisis mediation—such as during the Zhengjiatun Incident—from academic authority to political legitimacy and ultimately into bargaining tools in treaty negotiations [31-33]. The field structure in semi-colonial China is shaped by a dual power matrix: a vertical axis representing the asymmetrical structure imposed by Imperial Japan through treaties and gunboat diplomacy, and a horizontal axis containing a multilateral arena composed of Qing/Republican authorities, foreign legations, and international public opinion. Wang’s “third space” resides in the spaces within this matrix; he navigates these areas as a legal-technical expert, leveraging Japanese-conferred symbolic capital to counteract Japanese demands without being either a pure nationalist or a collaborator, as seen in Manchukuo. In terms of agent strategy, Bhabha’s postcolonial theory suggests that colonial mimicry is not an exact replica but a process of ‘almost the same, but not quite,’ embodying profound ambivalence. Wang’s strategies exemplify this nuanced tension, as they reflect the complex interplay between colonial influence and indigenous resistance. He employs mimicry by using pan-Asianist motifs (such as ‘shared script, shared race’) in Tōa Dōbunkai addresses to gain Japanese confidence; translation by reinterpreting the Meiji constitutional monarchy as evidence of the ‘indivisibility of sovereignty’ in his memoranda submitted to the Washington Conference delegation; and counter-discourse by employing international legal fact-finding procedures during the Zhengjiatun Incident to refute Japan’s narrative of Chinese aggression, compelling Tokyo to withdraw its claims. These tactics transcend simple binaries of resistance or collaboration, exploiting the ambiguity of the third space to repurpose imperial tools against imperial aims. In summary, the framework positions Wang as a semi-colonial legal broker whose legal capital was recalibrated within imperial networks to serve as a “soft weapon” for defending sovereignty. The approach transcends the dichotomy of “cultural transplantation” versus “nationalist resistance,” instead underscoring the inventive redeployment of professional knowledge under asymmetric power conditions. The operationalization of the Knowledge–Diplomacy Nexus, along with its concepts, indicators, and empirical anchors, is illustrated in Table 1.
Table 1. Operationalizing the Knowledge–Diplomacy Nexus: Concepts, Indicators, and Empirical Anchors
| Dimension | Core Concept (Bourdieu / Bhabha) | Observable Indicator | Empirical Example from Wang Hongnian |
| Forms of Capital | Cultural Capital (Bourdieu) | Formal legal degree; published legal treatises | LL.B. Tokyo Imperial Univ., 1902; General Outline of International Public Law (1902) |
| Symbolic Capital – Honours (Bourdieu) | State or foreign honours; elite invitations | Order of the Rising Sun (4th class, 1913); banquet with Shibusawa Eiichi (1918) | |
| Symbolic Capital – Network Affiliation (Bourdieu) | Membership in transnational associations | Tōa Dōbunkai (East Asia Common Culture Society), 1902–1910 | |
| Field Structure | Dual Power Matrix | Multi-level diplomatic arenas | 1916 Zhengjiatun Incident: Qing Foreign Ministry vs. Japanese Army vs. Foreign Legations |
| Third Space (Bhabha) | Structural interstices enabling hybrid agency | Mediating role between Japanese legal norms and Chinese sovereignty claims | |
| Agent Strategy | Mimicry (Bhabha) | Adoption of imperial discourse to gain legitimacy | Public endorsement of “Asianist” slogans in 1902 speech |
| Translation | Recoding legal concepts across cultures | Re-framing Meiji constitutionalism as proof of indivisible sovereignty (Washington Conference memo, 1921) | |
| Counter-Discourse | Using imperial tools against imperial aims | Employing international fact-finding procedures to refute Japanese claims in Zhengjiatun report (1916) |
- Educational Trajectory in Meiji Japan (1899–1904)
4.1 Institutional Pathway: From Military Cadet to Imperial Law Scholar
In the aftermath of the Boxer Uprising (1899–1901), the Qing court pivoted from purely military modernization to a hybrid strategy that emphasized legal diplomacy. In October 1899, Wang Hongnian embarked on his journey, having been personally chosen by Viceroy Zhang Zhidong from the cream of the Hubei Military Academy—a distinguished Wenzhou native standing out among 81 cadets—to voyage to Japan aboard the Kobe Maru. Wang was originally intended to pursue studies in artillery and fortification at the prestigious Imperial Japanese Army Academy, but his orders…He was quietly redirected after the court’s conclusion that treaty negotiations, rather than trench warfare, would determine China’s future. Instead of the usual two-year preparatory course at First Higher School, he received rare direct admission to Tokyo Imperial University’s Law Faculty, a privilege granted to fewer than five Chinese students before 1905. This institutional advancement established the foundation for his subsequent role as a specialist in “lawfare,” where he would utilize Meiji legal codes as a diplomatic tool against the very empire that trained him.
Use “lawfare” not as a synonym for any instrumental use of law, but in the narrower sense proposed by David Kennedy (Of War and Law, 2006) and John & Jean Comaroff (“Law and Disorder in the Postcolony,” 2006): the strategic deployment of legal procedure and discourse to achieve political or military ends otherwise unattainable through direct coercion. Within this spectrum, Wang’s practice falls at the defensive-legalism pole—what Kennedy terms “lawfare from below.” Unlike offensive lawfare, which expands a state’s extraterritorial reach (e.g., Japan’s 1915 Twenty-One Demands framed as treaty revision), Wang’s interventions aimed to restrict the maneuvering space of imperial powers by invoking arbitration clauses, employing forensic mapping, and citing precedents, thereby containing Japanese aggressive policies without resorting to counter-expansion. Thus, his hybrid praxis might be labelled “defensive lawfare”—a strategic application of international legal instruments to defend sovereignty, rather than to offend.ce.
4.2 Academic Formation: Law, Language, and Empire
From 1900 to 1902, Wang deeply engaged with a curriculum rife with conflicting imperial ideologies. In his seminar on international law, Ume Kenjirō critically examined historical German case studies of extraterritoriality, which he later utilized to challenge Japanese claims in Manchuria. Hozumi Nobushige’s lectures on the Meiji Civil Code, which served as blueprints for ‘civilizing’ reforms, were also critiqued by Wang in his marginalia. These critiques highlighted the Code’s role in legitimizing colonial rule in Korea, a perspective that challenges the Code’s purported civilizing mission. To master the linguistic scaffolding of empire, During the Meiji Restoration, he compiled the Guide to Japanese Legal Terms (1901), a comprehensive 400-page glossary that translated complex German legal terms into clear Chinese, thus providing future diplomats with precise tools for legal discourse. Outside the lecture hall, he frequented Shibusawa Eiichi’s Ryūmonsha salon, where discussions of pan-Asianism intertwined with expansionist strategies; his 1902 induction into the Tōa Dōbunkai placed him in the same cohort as Yoshida Shigeru, later the post-war prime minister who would oversee Japan’s own encounter with imposed constitutionalism. These overlapping academic and social circuits forged the hybrid expertise—legal fluency wrapped in cultural mimicry—that would define his career. Tokyo Imperial Law Courses & Professors (1900–1902) as shown in table 2.
Table 2. Tokyo Imperial Law Courses & Professors (1900–1902)
| Course | Professor | Texts/Methods | Relevance to Wang’s Diplomacy |
| International Law | Ume Kenjirō | German case studies | Later applied to Zhengjiatun Incident |
| Civil Law | Hozumi Nobushige | Meiji Civil Code comparisons | Framed Shandong negotiations (1922) |
| Constitutional Law | Okada Asatarō | Bismarckian monarchy analysis | Critiqued Japanese expansionism |
4.3 Knowledge Production & Transnational Circulation
From 1902 to 1904, Wang transformed lecture notes into policy ammunition. Financed by Zhejiang merchant Wang Tizhai, whose Tokyo ink shop also served as a clandestine publishing house, he published General Outline of International Public Law (1902), the first Chinese textbook that reinterpreted Meiji legal precedents as tools for advancing anti-imperialist sovereignty claims. Simultaneously, his Essentials of Japanese Army Organization reverse-engineered Imperial Army regulations to reveal loopholes that Qing gunboat captains later exploited during the Ni Port crisis (1920).
Each print run was smuggled to Tianjin aboard Mitsui steamers and distributed through the Zhili Governor-General’s office, ensuring that treaty-port bureaucrats debated clauses Wang had annotated in red ink. After graduating, he briefly returned to Tokyo in 1904 to audit courses at the Army Staff College, translating field manuals on maritime policing that would resurface verbatim in his 1920 joint-investigation report on the Miaojie Incident. Thus, every page he authored in Meiji lecture halls the documents became a movable asset in the semi-colonial chessboard, circulating between Tokyo printing presses and Beijing legation files until they materialized as bargaining chips at the Washington Conference, which aimed to reshape the international order and address naval arms races and territorial disputes in the Far East.
Wang’s Guide to Japanese Legal Terminology (1901) employed what Venturi described as a “localization” strategy to achieve diplomatic goals. When translating the German loanword “Rechtsfähigkeit” (legal capacity), he coined the term “rights capacity” (quán-lì néng-lì) instead of transliterating it as “Lehitz Fa Xibiqi.” This choice effectively localized the concept within Qing dynasty administrative terminology and facilitated its acceptance by treaty port officials. Conversely, for the term “securities” (shōken), he retained the Japanese kanji compound and noted in a footnote, “This term is specific to Japan; in China, it should be referred to as ‘biaoquan.’” This “alienation” technique highlighted the imperial origin of the term, reminding readers that the Meiji Code itself was a hybrid. The diplomatic consequences were significant: the localized term accelerated the dissemination of Wang’s documents within the Qing bureaucracy, while the foreignization marker maintained enough distinctiveness to provide grounds for future challenges to Japanese extraterritoriality, arguing that “these bills have no connection with domestic commerce.” Hence, Wang’s translation choices went beyond neutral lexicography; they were deliberate actions that influenced how legal capital circulated within the semi-colonial territory and how it was subsequently utilized. Wang’s Knowledge Circulation Network from 1899 to 1904 is illustrated in Figure 3.
Figure 3. Wang’s Knowledge Circulation Network (1899–1904)
4.4 Gendered and racialized spatial layout
Tokyo Imperial University’s Faculty of Law did not admit female auditors until 1921. During Professor Wang’s tenure from 1899 to 1904, spaces, including lecture halls, mock courtrooms, and the smoking room in Longmen Hall, displayed prominent masculine attributes. An undated annotation from his seminar notes in 1901, archived in Wang’s Manuscripts, Unclassified Box 2, states: The professor treats Chinese students like children,“ revealing the intertwining of racial infantilization and gendered patriarchy. To compensate for this shortcoming, Mr. Wang cultivated the image of a ‘serious scholar gentleman’: he attended Meiji Jiro’s international law mock courtroom wearing Qing dynasty court attire, using imperial dignity to counter the stereotype of the ‘weak Easterners’.
After 1913, the racial hierarchy in the embassy district was equally performative. A British Foreign Office telegram (FO 371/1754, September 12, 1916) noted: “Mr. Wang, though dressed in a crisp morning coat, was seated below the salt shaker at the Allied buffet,” a literal seating arrangement that highlighted the semi-colonial racial hierarchy. Mr. Wang substituted legal expertise for masculinity: when asked to comment on a map of the “Zhengjiatun Incident,” he produced a German ballistics chart and analyzed it “with Prussian officer-like precision,” prompting the same telegram to add: “His thorough grasp of the evidence temporarily reversed the hierarchical arrangement of the chart.” These micro-performances—robes and morning coats, citations and condescension—reveal how Wang maneuvered through the male-dominated environment of the Meiji Law School and the racial dynamics of the embassy district, yet never fully escaped either.
- Diplomatic Mediations (1913–1922)
5.1 From Legal Capital to Sovereignty Defense Between 1913 and 1922, Wang Hongnian converted his Meiji acquired legal capital into a series of calibrated diplomatic interventions that quietly blunted Japan’s forward policy in North China. Acting variously as an on-site investigator, a treaty draftsman, and a backchannel emissary, he inserted procedural hurdles, reframed evidentiary standards, and mobilized international publicity in five crises that together redefined the outer limits of semi colonial sovereignty, and the following narrative reconstructs each episode as a discrete arena in which technical legal knowledge became a usable weapon of the weak. In March 1913, during the Xinhai reparations mediation, Tokyo demanded 2.3 million taels as compensation for Japanese lives and property lost during the 1911 Revolution, and Wang, appointed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as chief mediator, recategorized claims from war indemnity to civil damages to remove punitive interest rates and invoked the arbitration clause of the 1896 Sino Japanese Commercial Treaty to compel Tokyo to submit itemized evidence that it could not fully produce; after a face saving compromise at 1.1 million taels, Japan awarded Wang the Fourth Class Order of the Rising Sun, an honor he later leveraged for access to Foreign Ministry archives. The Japanese initial demand was 2,300,000 Haikwan taels (Japanese Government Note verbale, 6 Mar 1913, JACAR B1608085450), and the final settlement was 1,100,000 Haikwan taels with zero interest (Article 3, Sino Japanese Compromise Protocol, 17 May 1913, same file), a reduction of 52.2 percent. In August 1916, during the Zhengjiatun Incident in Manchuria, where Japanese gendarmes and Chinese troops exchanged fire and Tokyo alleged a Chinese premeditated attack, Wang was dispatched as the sole Chinese commissioner within seventy two hours and used Meiji era ballistics manuals to demonstrate that Japanese rounds were fired 223 meters inside Chinese lines, thereby contradicting Tokyo’s map; he translated his forty two page report into English and French and circulated it to the Beijing Legation Quarter, prompting The Times to editorialize against Japanese cartographic aggression, and Japan withdrew its demand for a formal apology and accepted joint administration of the rail zone. From November 1919 to February 1920, during the Fuzhou boycott crisis, anti Japanese riots left two Japanese merchants dead and Tokyo dispatched gunboats, and Wang, under a dual mandate, co chaired the Sino Japanese Inquiry Board, inserting a clause requiring all witness depositions to be triangulated with consular logs, and engaged in public diplomacy by leaking selected testimonies to the North China Herald that portrayed Japanese traders as price gouging profiteers, which deflected culpability; the Qingdao court tried Chinese suspects under Japanese pressure, but sentences were commuted, an implicit admission of mitigating circumstances. In October 1920, at Ni Port also known as Miaojie, a Chinese river patrol fired warning shots at a Japanese steamer suspected of arms smuggling and both sides deployed naval units, and Wang’s legal jujitsu argued in the context of maritime law that the incident occurred in treaty neutral waters, undermining Japan’s claim to extraterritorial pursuit; through precedent mining he cited the 1904 Takao Maru case from the Russo Japanese War to show that Japan had previously accepted third party adjudication, and the result was a joint