lutionaries seized the disintegrating reins of government in 1911. The contrast between the political unity and efficient administration the Japanese revolutionaries inherited from the Tokugawa, and the political disunity and disrupted central government the Chinese revolutionaries inherited from the Manchu dynasty, does much to explain the more rapid progress the Japanese made in modernizing their country, and the entirely unprecedented economic and military supremacy Japan was soon to win in the Far East.
The leaders of the new imperial regime had all been deeply impressed by the helplessness of Edo, Satsuma, and Choshu in the face of occidental military power, and the humiliation they had been forced to suffer because of their military backwardness. Quite naturally, they were obsessed with the idea of creating a Japan capable of holding its own in the modern world. Since they were military men by tradition and early training, they thought primarily in terms of military power; but they were surprisingly broad-minded in their approach to the problem, realizing that to achieve military strength Japan needed economic, social, and intellectual renovation. They set out to make Japan strong, and they showed a willingness to do anything necessary to achieve this goal.
Early in January of 1868, the new government had the young emperor officially assume direct rule over the nation. The new era was given the name of Meiji, and the transfer of power from the Tokugawa to the group around the emperor came to be known as the Meiji Restoration. Meiji remained the official title for