The respected British Japanologist Richard Storry described the Japanese people as "docile instruments of the elite."
However, Storry's assessment of the Japanese national character was wrong.
Since the Meiji Restoration, there had only been two types of Seikanron (Conquest of Korea Theory) in that archipelago:
1.The hardliners who wanted to consume Korea now.
2.The moderates who wanted to modernize a bit first, then consume it.
The option of not consuming Korea never existed, as could be confirmed in numerous speeches by Foreign Minister Count Inoue Kaoru.
It wasn't just Foreign Minister Kaoru. Such speeches and tones could be easily found in any newspaper, and they all argued just one thing:
