Hostname: page-component-77c89778f8-fv566 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-17T09:36:06.275Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Signing of the Sino-Iranian Treaty of 1920

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Li-Chiao Chen
Li-Chiao Chen*
Affiliation:
Fu Jen Catholic University, New Taipei City, Taiwan
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article looks at the efforts China and Iran made towards strengthening themselves and their search for independence and integrity after the First World War. Since the nineteenth century, the two countries had been in a similar situation, under pressure from treaties and rivalries with European powers. The change of the world order brought about by the 1914–18 war created an opportunity for China and Iran to claim back their rights, such as ending extra-territoriality. After the war, the Fourteen Points drawn up by the American president, Woodrow Wilson, gave hope for China and Iran to maintain their independence and integrity. During the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, China and Iran made both gains and losses. China was unable to solve the Shandong Problem but became one of the founding members of the League of Nations, while Iran did not get access to the Peace Conference but obtained Britain’s assurance of independence and integrity by signing the Anglo-Iranian Treaty of 1919, and then joined the League of Nations. China and Iran attempted to bring about cooperation between Asian countries, and therefore signed a treaty in 1920. The significance of the treaty was that the two countries agreed not to grant extra-territoriality to each other, which was what both countries were seeking to achieve at that time.

Keywords

Beijing GovernmentSelf-StrengtheningExtra-TerritorialityAnglo-Iranian Treaty of 1919Sino-Iranian Treaty of 1920League of Nations
Type
Regular Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 52 , Issue 5-6: Special Section: Saʿdi at Large , November 2019 , pp. 991 - 1008
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

This article is a revised and extended version of the author’s paper (in Chinese) “In Search of Independence and Integrity in China and Iran 1918–1921,” in “History” and “Histories” in China Diplomacy (Taipei: Cheng-Chi University Press, 2015), 1–28.

References

Alexander, Yonah, and Nanes, Allan, eds. The United States and Iran: A Documentary History. Frederick: University Publications of America, 1980.Google Scholar
Bast, Oliver. “Iran va Konferans-e Solh-e 1919: Amidha-ye Barbadrafte va Sarmashq-e Chini.” In Iran va Jang-e Jahani-ye Avval (Majmu‘e-ye Maqalat-e Seminar), ed. Akhavan, Safa, 443–58. Tehran: Markaz-e Asnad va Tarikh-e Diplomasi, 1380/2001.Google Scholar
Bast, Oliver. “Putting the Record Straight: Vosuq al-Dowleh’s Foreign Policy in 1918/19.” In Men of Order: Authoritarian Modernization under Atatürk and Reza Shah, ed. Atabaki, Touraj and Zürcher, Erik J., 260–81. London: I.B. Tauris, 2004.Google Scholar
Bast, Oliver. “Duping the British and Outwitting the Russians? Iran’s Foreign Policy, the ‘Bolshevik threat’, and the Genesis of the Soviet-Iranian Treaty of 1921.” In Iranian-Russian Encounters: Empires and Revolutions since 1800, ed. Cronin, Stephanie, 261–97. London: Routledge, 2013.Google Scholar
Bayāt, Kāveh, and Shahrezāʾi, Reza Ᾱzari, eds. Ᾱmāl-e Irāniān: Az Konferāns-e Solh-e Paris ta Qarārdād-e 1919 Iran va Engelis. Tehran: Shirāzeh Ketāb, 1392/2013).Google Scholar
Chang, Chun-Fu. Diplomatic History of the Republic of China (Volume 1). Taipei: Chen Chung Books, 1953.Google Scholar
Chang, Chun-Lan. “V.K. Wellington Koo’s Diplomacy at the Paris Peace Conference: A Study of his Role in the Shantung Question.” Bulletin of the Institute of Modern History Academia Sinica, no. 23 (1994): 29–52.Google Scholar
Chen, San-Jing. “Lu Cheng-Hsiang and the Paris Peace Conference.” Bulletin of Historical Research (National Taiwan Normal University), no. 2 (1974): 189–203.Google Scholar
Chen, San-Jing. China’s Journey to the World: From Participation in the First World War to Admission to the Paris Peace Conference. Taipei: Hsiu Wei, 2009.Google Scholar
Deng, Ye. The Paris Peace Conference and Beijing’s Internal-External Struggles: China’s Diplomatic Disputes and the Interests of Political Factions in 1919. Beijing: Social Science Academic Press, 2014.Google Scholar
Eto, Shinkichi. “China’s International Relations 1911–1931.” In The Cambridge History of China: 1914–1949. Volume 13: Republican China 1912–1949 (Part 2), ed. Fairbank, John K. and Feuerwerker, Albert, 74–115. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.Google Scholar
Fatemi, Nasrollah Saifpour. Diplomatic History of Persia 1917–1923. New York: Russell F. Moore Company, 1952.Google Scholar
Fortna, Benjamin C. “The Reign of Abdülhamid II.” In Cambridge History of Turkey. Volume 4: Turkey in the Modern World, ed. Kasaba, Reşat, 38–61. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ghani, Cyrus. Iran and the Rise of Reza Shah: From Qajar Collapse to Pahlavi Rule. New York: I.B. Tauris, 1998.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ghods, M. Reza. Iran in the Twentieth Century: A Political History. London: Adamantine Press, 1989.Google Scholar
Gohli-Majd, Mohammad. From Qajar to Pahlavi: Iran, 1919–1930. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2008.Google Scholar
Heravi, Mehdi. Iranian–American Diplomacy. New York: Theo. Gaus Sons, 1969.Google Scholar
Howard-Ellis, C. The Origin Structure and Working of the League of Nations. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1928.Google Scholar
Hsu, Immanuel C.Y. China’s Entrance into the Family of Nations: The Diplomatic Phase, 1858–1880. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988.Google Scholar
Huweritz, J.C. Diplomacy in the Near and Middle East, a Documentary Record: 1535–1914 (Volume 1). Toronto: D. Van Nostrand Company, 1956.Google Scholar
Ishtiaq, Ahmad. Anglo-Iranian Relations 1905–1919. New York: Asia Publishing House, 1974.Google Scholar
Katouzian, Homa. The Political Economy of Modern Iran 1926–1979: Despotism and Pseudo-Modernisnm 1926–1979. London: Macmillan Press, 1981.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katouzian, Homa. “The Campaign against the Anglo-Iranian Agreement of 1919.” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 25, no. 1 (May 1998): 5–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katouzian, Homa. State and Society in Iran: The Eclipse of the Qajars and the Emergence of the Pahlavis. London: I.B. Tauris, 2006.Google Scholar
Kawashima, Shin. The Formation of Modern China. Trans. Tien, Jianguo. Beijing: Beijing University Press, 2012.Google Scholar
Kazemzadeh, Firuz. “Russia and the Middle East.” In Russian Foreign Policy: Essays in Historical Perspectives, ed. Lederer, Ivo J., 489–530. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1962.Google Scholar
Keddie, Nikki. “Iran under the Later Qajars, 1848–1922.” In The Cambridge History of Iran: From Nadir Shah to the Islamic Republic (Volume 7), ed. Avery, Peter, Hambly, Gavin, and Melville, Charles, 174–212. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klein, Ira. “British Policy and the Iranian Constitution, 1919–1921.” Historian 36, no. 3 (1974): 434–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ling, Ming-De. History of Modern Sino-Japanese Relations. Taipei: Sanmin, 1984.Google Scholar
Ling, Ming-De. “Japan’s Policy toward China 1911–1915.” In Early Modern History of China: Early Years of the Republic of China (Volume 23 Part 1), ed. Chinese Culture Renaissance Movement Committee, 59–126. Taipei: Commercial Press, 1986.Google Scholar
Manela, Erez. The Wilsonian Moment: Self-Determination and the International Origins of Anticolonial Nationalism. New York: Oxford University Press, 2007.Google Scholar
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, ed. Collection of Treaties between China and Foreign Countries. Taipei: Wen-Hai Publisher, 1964.Google Scholar
Qian, Zhixiu. “What Happens in Persia in Recent Times.” Dongfang Zazhi 9, no. 9 (1912): 13–21.Google Scholar
Olson, William J. “The Genesis of the Anglo-Persian Agreement of 1919.” In Towards a Modern Iran: Studies in Thought, Politics and Society, ed. Kedourie, Elie and Haim, Sylvia G., 185–216. London: Frank Cass, 1980.Google Scholar
Olson, W.J. Anglo-Iranian Relations during World War I. London: Frank Cass, 1984.Google Scholar
Ramazani, Rouhollah K. The Foreign Policy of Iran: A Developing Nation in World Affairs 1500–1941. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1966.Google Scholar
Rezun, Miron. The Soviet Union and Iran: Soviet Policy in Iran from the Beginnings of the Pahlavi Dynasty until the Soviet Invasion in 1941. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1988.Google Scholar
Sabahi, Houshang. British Policy in Persia 1918–1925. London: Frank Cass, 1990.Google Scholar
Tang, Chi-Hua. “The Beginning of Treaty Revision Diplomacy of the Beijing Government in the Early Years of the Republic of China.” HsingDa Humanities Journal, no. 28 (June 1998): 117–43.Google Scholar
Tang, Chi-Hua. The Peking Government and the League of Nations. Taipei: Tonda Books, 1998.Google Scholar
Tang, Chi-Hua. Paris Peace Conference and China Diplomacy. Beijing: China Society Science Publisher, 2014.Google Scholar
Tang, Chi-Hua. Treaty Revision Campaign of the Beijing Government, 1912–1928: Out of the Shadow of the “Abrogation of Unequal Treaties.” Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press, 2010.Google Scholar
Temperly, H.W.V. A History of the Peace Conference of Paris (Volume VI). London: Henry Frowde and Hodder & Stoughton, 1924.Google Scholar
Volodarsky, Mikhail. The Soviet Union and its Southern Neighbours: Iran and Afghanistan, 1917–1933. London: Frank Cass, 1994.Google Scholar
Wang, Dong. “The Discourse of Unequal Treaties in Modern China.” Pacific Affairs 76, no. 3 (2003): 399–425.Google Scholar
Wang, Jianlang. Unequal Treaties and China (Volume 1). Honolulu: Silkroad Press 2000.Google Scholar
Wang, Yidan. “The Iranian Constitutional Revolution as Reported in the Chinese Press.” In Iran’s Constitutional Revolution: Popular Politics, Cultural Transformations and Transnational Connections, ed. Chehabi, H.E. and Martin, Vanessa, 369–79. London: I.B. Tauris, 2010.Google Scholar
Wu, Lin-Chun. America and Chinese Politics 1917–1928. Taipei: Tongda Books, 1996.Google Scholar
Xu, Guoqi. China and the Great War: China’s Pursuit of a New National Identity and Internationalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005.Google Scholar
Yeselson, Abraham. United States–Persian Diplomatic Relations 1883–1921. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1956.Google Scholar