After defeating China in the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-1896), Korea was occupied and ruled by the Japanese. Shortly after Japan's defeat of Russia in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905), Japan made Korea a protectorate. In 1910, Japan annexed the peninsula. Korean nationalists and intellectuals fled the country, and in 1919 some of them founded the Provisional Korean Government in Shanghai, China, headed by Syngman Rhee.
The Japanese conferred colonial status on Korea and the Korean people. They suppressed Korean culture and engaged in forced assimilation. Exiled Korean nationalists, led mainly by Communists,
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