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Scarcely a half-century had passed since the barbarians aboard Perry's black ships had humiliated the shoguns, and now Japan was a politely pugnacious power. The Meiji Restoration (the Emperor died in 1912) was a miracle of national self-regeneration, but the lessons imperfectly learned from the imperialist powers of the 19th century contained, or perhaps simply intensified, some dangerous poisons: a hunger for autocracy, a reliance on force, a fear of isolation from the world, and a rankling sense of grievance. The world would hear more of them. —By Otto Friedrich