The concept of lebensraum was infamously enunciated in the 1920s by the Nazi Party, but the practice of forceful expansionism in the interwar period was by no means exclusive of Germany. Manifest Destiny has been called “American lebensraum.” Fascist Italy used the notion of living space to justify expansion beyond its recognized borders. Preoccupied with the rapid pace of Western colonialism, isolated from the community of nations, bewildered by economic calamity, desperate for resources and land, and caught in the rising tide of corporatism, militarism, and nationalism, the Empire of Japan engaged in its own type of empire building in the early 20th century. In 1853, American Commodore Matthew C. Perry arrived on the shores of Japan with ships and armaments never seen in that corner of the world. After ordering the bombing of buildings in the port city of Uraga as a show of power, Perry presented the Japanese with a white flag and a list of demands. The ruling oligarchs in Japan feared the West's colonialist impulses and embarked on an ambitious modernization plan. Within a decade, the Meiji Restoration brought radical changes to the way Japan was structured governmentally, economically, socially, and militarily as a direct response to this encounter. The elite samurai warrior class was systematically dismantled in favor of a Western-style army. Within a generation, Japan had become an economic force and the dominant power in the Pacific. Megacorporations called zaibatsu have evolved and diversified to achieve economic dominance, developing ties with the government and military through their procurement activities. Meanwhile, d...... center of card......Bridge, southwest of Beiping. On the evening of July 7, 1937, a small Japanese force maneuvering near the Marco Polo Bridge requested entry into the small walled town of Wanping under the pretext of searching for one of their soldiers. The Chinese defense forces in the city refused the Japanese entry; a shot rang out and the two sides began shooting at each other. The Chinese government, under strong anti-Japanese pressure, refused to make any concessions in negotiating the dispute. The Japanese also maintained their position and the conflict intensified. As the fighting spread into central China, the Japanese recorded a series of consecutive victories. Japanese government officials, under mounting public pressure not to withdraw, sought rapid annexation of China. However, this eluded them and the two sides embarked on what would become the Second Sino-Japanese War..