Yellow Russia

It involved seizing northeastern lands from the weakened Qing China, resettling Cossacks and peasants to Manchuria, and converting the Chinese inhabitants to Orthodox Christianity.

However, the Tokugawa Shogunate in Japan asked the British Empire to intervene, and in late 1861 the Russians were forced to end their attempt to take the island and leave Tsushima.

His proposal involved the establishment of a commercial enterprise similar to the British East India Company, which would provide the government with financial benefits while increasing influence and soft power in the area.

Meanwhile, the Boxer Rebellion had resulted in a huge increase in Russian military presence in the area, and Russia was able to obtain similar concessions from China on the Manchurian side of the Yalu River.

Tsar Nicholas later sent Bezobrazov to the region in person, where he alarmed Admiral Yevgeni Ivanovich Alekseyev with talk of war with Japan, and the need to stop the withdrawal of Russian troops from Manchuria.

In 1902, with Witte powerless at the court, Bezobrazov was given near unlimited access to state funds and was able to set up a private company called the Yalu River Timber Concessions.

As a result of the Russo-Japanese War, the Russian expansionist project in the Far East and China collapsed; Russia lost Port Arthur, ceding to Japan also the right to lease the Liaodong Peninsula and the South Manchurian Railway.