See also: Hindu–German Conspiracy Taishō period Shōwa period The siege of Tsingtao (German: Belagerung von Tsingtau; Japanese: 青島の戦い; simplified Chinese: 青岛战役; traditional Chinese: 青島戰役) was the attack on the German port of Qingdao (Tsingtao) from Jiaozhou Bay during World War I by Japan and the United Kingdom.

Britain viewed the German presence in China with suspicion and leased Weihaiwei, also in Shandong, as a naval port and coaling station.

Britain also began to forge close ties with Japan, and diplomatic relations became closer, with the Anglo-Japanese Alliance being signed on 30 January 1902.

The next day, Major-General Mitsuomi Kamio, General Officer Commanding (GOC), 18th Infantry Division, was ordered to prepare to take Qingdao by force.

At the beginning of hostilities in Europe, the ships of the East Asia Squadron under Vice Admiral Maximilian von Spee were dispersed at various Pacific colonies on routine missions.

On 27 August the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) sent ships under Vice-Admiral Sadakichi Kato, flying his flag in the pre-dreadnought battleship Suwo, to blockade the coast of Jiaozhou.

These included the dreadnoughts Kawachi, Settsu, the battlecruiser Kongō, her sister Hiei, and the seaplane carrier Wakamiya, whose airplanes became the first of its kind in the world to attack sea and land targets.

[8] The 18th Infantry Division was the primary Japanese Army formation that took part in the initial landings, numbering some 23,000 soldiers with support from 142 artillery pieces.

Kaiser Wilhelm II made the defence of Qingdao a top priority, saying that: "…it would shame me more to surrender Tsingtao to the Japanese than Berlin to the Russians".

[18] Early in the siege, the Kaiserin Elisabeth and German gunboat Jaguar made an unsuccessful sortie against Japanese vessels blockading Qingdao.

S90 was unable to run the blockade back to Qingdao and was scuttled in Chinese waters when the ship ran low on fuel.

The Japanese started shelling the fort and the city on 31 October and began digging parallel lines of trenches, just as they had done at the siege of Port Arthur nine years earlier.

While the Germans were initially able to use the heavy guns of the port fortifications to bombard the landward positions of the Allies, they soon ran out of ammunition.

The German garrison was able to field only a single Etrich Taube airplane during the siege flown by Lieutenant Gunther Plüschow.

That airplane was used for frequent reconnaissance flights and Plüschow made several nuisance attacks on the blockading squadron dropping improvised munitions and other ordnance on them.

Plüschow flew from Qingdao on 6 November 1914 carrying the governor's last dispatches, which were forwarded to Berlin through neutral diplomatic channels.

Though the German garrison was able to hold out for nearly two months despite the naval blockade with sustained artillery bombardment and being outnumbered 6 to 1, the defeat nevertheless temporarily served as a morale booster.

The German defenders watched the Japanese with curiosity as they marched into Qingdao but turned their backs on the British when they entered into town.

[3] Admiral Alfred Meyer-Waldeck later accused the Japanese military of holding German and Austro-Hungarian POWs in inhumane conditions.

The Admiral later alleged that POWs held in Japanese custody "were subjected to the arbitrariness of subordinate authorities in various camps for five long years.