– I updated the post at the end –

In trying to track down some material on a famous Korean patriot of the late-19th – early-20th century, I ran across this paragraph at Wikipedia for the colonization of Korea by Japan:

A separate agreement was signed in secret between the United States and Japan at this time, subsequently aroused anti-American sentiment among Koreans decades later.^[12] The Taft-Katsura Agreement exchanged what amounted to a lack of interest and military capability in Korea on the part of the United States (Japan was given a free hand in Korea) for a lack of interest or capability in the Philippines on the part of Japan (Japanese imperialism was diverted from the Philippines).^[12] Given the diplomatic conventions of the times, however, the agreement was a much weaker endorsement of the Japanese presence in Korea than either the Russo-Japanese peace treaty or a separate Anglo-Japanese accord.^[12] 

I like how Wikipedia allows anyone to post or edit entries but also strives to be as close to an objective encyclopedia as you can get when allowing such freedom in authorship/editorship.   — And this paragraph is about as close to “objective” as you can find with the Taft-Katsura Thingy — which I say because it is the closest attempt at being objective I’ve probably ever run across…

I particularly like the phrasing “for a lack of interest or capability”.   That does pretty much sum up the defense against the very common Korean perception that the US “gave” Korea to Japan in “exchange” for the Philippines.

GI Korea has written a good post on this here.

I still quibble with the above paragraph, though.  How do you exchange a “lack of interest”??? 

And Japan wasn’t “given” a free hand in Korea.  It took it in bold fashion by fighting two significant wars within 10-20 years of each other to gain the free hand.  — And that’s the core of the whole problem trying to blame the US for Korea’s colonization:  

You can’t say the US  “gave” Japan a “free hand” unless you can show America had either an obligation or significant concern in stopping Japan but decided to back off once discussing the matter with her.  Once you admit the US had a lack of interest in Korea, the only thing you can fall back on is the obligation angle - which many do – which Korea did at the time by pointing to the “good offices” clause in the first US-Korea treaty — but most scholars today chalk that up to nonsense (and a misreading and lack of experience on the part of the Korean monarchy at the time). 

And lastly, I quibble with calling the memorandum an “agreement” though that is much better than the somewhat usual label of “treaty.” 

It was simply the record of a conversation – a conversation taking place, if I remember correctly, basically in connection with the US position as peace arbiter in the effort to end the Russo-Japanese War.  And it was kept secret at the time, because the peace treaty to end that war was being worked on and could have been scuttled, as it had been in the past, by leaking information on what discussions were going on among the major powers. 

I recommend you read the memorandum yourself.

At that link, you’ll also see that Koreans are not the only ones determined to grossly misread history.

But, again, I do believe this Wikipedia entry shows a better effort at being objective in telling the history than I’ve seen before.

(On a side note, in reading over the two images of the actual memorandum, I got the feeling whoever collected them did some redacting of his/her own:  I can’t say for sure, and I couldn’t track down another facimile copy right away — but I remember reading the document 5 or 6 years ago, and I seem to remember that on page two, when Taft is saying what he believes Pres. Roosevelt’s views are but admonished that he should not be taken as speaking directly for the president — Taft goes on to remind Katsura that his personal opinions, though those of a high officer in the government, were not a binding treaty or agreement by saying that, under the US Constitution, the Senate must approve all treaties.   And from my memory and the look of page two of the memorandum on the site linked above, it seems one of the redactions occurs right at that point where Taft is telling Katsura that what he is saying is not a verbal, contractual agreement.)

[Update]

I still can’t find the facsimile copy of the memorandum in the government archives.  I seem to remember that is where I found them originally when I was looking in a univeristy liberary with their gov. doc. databases.

I did find a text of the memorandum that is easier to read than the images linked above.  Below is the key paragraph showing what I wrote above that I remembered:

His judgment was that President Roosevelt would concur in his [Taft's] views in this regard, although he [Taft] had no authority to give assurance of this. Indeed Secretary Taft [two words deleted] added, that he felt much delicacy in advancing the views he did for he had no mandate for the purpose from the President, [rest of sentence deleted:] and since he [Taft] left Washington Mr. Root had been appointed Secretary of State and he [Taft] might seem thus to be trespassing on another’s department. He [Tat] could not, however, in view of Count Katsura’s courteous desire to discuss the questions, decline to express his [Taft's] opinions [here commences excision:] which he had formed while he was temporarily discharging the duties of Secretary of State under the direction of the President [here excision ends] and he [Taft] would forward to Mr. Root [two words deleted] and the President a memorandum of the conversation.  (Taft-Katsura Memorandum; 2009, Vol. 1 Issue 1, p1, 2p – published by Great Neck Publishing)

Taft clearly went out of his way to tell Katsura that he was not in effect making government policy by making an “agreement” with Japan through Katsura.   I don’t see how so many people over the years have read it so differently…

[Update 2]

Looking more closely at the photostat copies of the memorandum that the author Tyler Dennett, writing in 1924, reprinted which I linked above, and that the website on Dokdo-Takeshima reposted, and comparing it to the last quote above, you can see that Dennett did cut out a key portion of the text.

Specifically, he redacted:  “and since he [Taft] left Washington Mr. Root had been appointed Secretary of State and he [Taft] might seem thus to be trespassing on another’s department.”

He also cut out:  “[here commences excision:] which he had formed while he was temporarily discharging the duties of Secretary of State under the direction of the President [here excision ends]”

Dennett states in article where he presents the photostats that he cut the parts out that would identify Taft as the author of the memorandum, and these two quotes being removed can fit that criteria.

But, taking out these sentences (rather than just Taft’s name) does vital damage to an interpretation of the whole document regards to whether or not it was a secret “treaty” or “agreement” on Korea’s fate:  

In the two sentences, Taft clearly defines the extent of what his opinion stands for by telling Katsura that he is not the Sec. of State, that he can’t speak definatively for Pres. Roosevelt, and that he is not making an agreement between the two countries.

I don’t know how much more clearly he could put it.

Even without the redacted parts, there is still enough you can see in the photostat Dennett presents to clue you in that Taft let it be known he was speaking of his own opinion and observation, but these two missing sentences make it even more clear. 

Lastly, I don’t know what the last long redacted section is.  The text version of the memorandum I just found doesn’t include it, and I’m not going to keep looking for the official document version that has the full photostat that I vaguely remember locating in a university research library a few years ago.  

Earlier in this post, I said I thought the missing section referred to the fact the Senate must OK treaties but I was misremembering somewhat – It wasn’t the perogtive of the Senate but the State Department he talks about…

– For an overall understanding, though, it doesn’t matter.  The point is that Taft was explicit in defining what power his opinion had and that it wasn’t much…