In the past, these guys were evidently kicked clear into their neighbors yard by a horse that didn't care to get shoes nailed into its hoofs....and there is NO WAY they will let THAT ever happen again ! 1903 photograph by Herbert Ponting.

This is Korea ca.1897-1900. Commenter idea0853 believes it is actually September 6th, 1897. See his comment far down below. As a stereoview, the first record I can find of its being published is in 1901.

The image is tragically symbolic. A crowd of Koreans stand under the shadow of the Japanese "Rising Sun" flag, while their own Korean National Flag is relegated to the size of a bath towel.

Although Korea has not yet been formally annexed to Japan, a series of subjugating treaties backed by military force had allowed the Japanese to "call the shots" and "run the show", basically doing whatever they wanted with Korea and the Koreans.

I have never seen such a graphic image demonstrating the lack of respect Japan had for any of its neighbors in the Century leading up to WW2 -- well, except for a pile of photographs I have that show the Japanese Military abusing the Chinese, which a National Magazine in Tokyo told me they could never publish in Japan. "It is not good for Japanese Morale and the Nation of Japan to know what happened in the past", I was told.

Of course, they did not have to tell me that, as I was already familiar with the so-called "History Books" approved by the Ministry of Education during my over three decades of living there. Of course, some of the History Books published in America for their schools are in the pits as well. No doubt every nation (to either a LARGE or small degree) lives in some amount of corporate, official denial about not only the present, but especially the past.