24 Ë The Russo-Japanese War
Fig. 2.7.Giorgi Dekanozishvili (Paris, beginning of the twentieth century).
the meeting. Yet the Bolsheviks and other social-democratic parties questioned the
hegemony of the Socialist Revolutionaries and raised other issues, eventually leav-
ing the conference. The remaining seven parties managed to adopt a declaration in
which they advocated the overthrow of the Russian autocracy by armed uprising and
the foundation of a democratic republic.
Plans for such an armed uprising had already been detailed by Zillicaus and
Akashi well before the Geneva meeting,²⁸and they expended a great deal of money
on preparations, though initially Japan’s commitment was limited. Famously, Polish
Socialist Party leader Józef Piłsudski traveled to Tokyo to solicit Japanese aid in arms
with which to subvert Russia from within. But Piłsudski’s eorts were thwarted by
his rival Roman Dmowski (of the National Democratic Party), who also traveled to
Tokyo.²⁹Japan did, however, supply some money to provide weapons to the Russian
Socialist Revolutionaries through Zillicaus, who held the nancial sources hidden
from Russian parties. By contrast, he openly courted non-Russian opposition parties
with Japanese money. In July 1904 it was Zillicaus who introduced Loris Melikian and
28 On these conferences, see Antti Kujala, “March Separately – Strike Together: The Paris and Geneva
Conferences Held by the Russian and Minority Nationalities’ Revolutionary and Opposition Parties,
1904–1905,” in Akashi,Rakka ryusui ̄ , 85–167.
29 Kuromiya and Pepłoński,Między Warszawą a Tokio:, 32–36.