sep 5, 1905 - The Treaty of Portsmouth

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Formally ended the 1904–05 Russo-Japanese War. It was signed on September 5, 1905 after negotiations lasting from August 6 to August 30, at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, United States. U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt was instrumental in the negotiations and won the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts.

The intermediary approached by the Japanese side was the United States President Theodore Roosevelt, who had publicly expressed a pro-Japanese stance at the beginning of the war. However, as the war progressed, Roosevelt had begun to show concerns on the strengthening military power of Japan and its impact on long-term United States interests in Asia. In February 1905, Roosevelt sent messages to the Russian government via the US ambassador to St Petersburg. Initially, the Russians were unresponsive, with Tsar Nicholas II still adamant that Russia would prove victorious in time. At this point, the Japanese government was also lukewarm to a peace treaty, as Japanese armies were enjoying an unbroken string of victories. However, after the Battle of Mukden, which was extremely costly to both sides in terms of manpower and resources, Japanese Foreign Minister Komura Jutarō judged that the time was now critical for Japan to push for a settlement.

The signing of the treaty settled immediate difficulties in the Far East and created three decades of peace between the two nations. The treaty confirmed Japan's emergence as the pre-eminent power in East Asia, and forced Russia to abandon its expansionist policies there, but it was not well received by the Japanese people.[7] The Japanese public was aware of their country's unbroken string of military victories over the Russians but was less aware of the precarious overextension of military and economic power these victories had required. News of the terms of the treaty appeared to show Japanese weakness in front of the European powers, and this frustration caused the Hibiya riots, and the collapse of Katsura Tarō's cabinet on January 7, 1906.

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