Originally posted by A_Bashkuev
Fantastic! I've always thought that War on Far East between Japan & Russia began in 1904

. It begin as Japan's raids onto:
1) Port-Arthur fleet base of First Russian Far East Fleet & resulted as 2 Russian battleships ("Czesarevitch" & "Retvizan") & 1 cruiser ("Pallas") was seriously damaged - no one was sinked.
2) Korean port Chemulpo blockade with cruiser "Varjag" & cannon-boat "Koreets" was sinked by japs.
No need to be sarcastic, this's what comes after you've been out of school for years and out of the reading loop for longer.

Also when you've just woken up for the day. Anyway, the Russo-Japanese War had never been my strong suit....
Vladivostok was never raided by japanese due to simple fact that it was really pointless - Gulf of Peter the Great is very shallow & no one Russian battleship can enter it & deep-water channel southerner then Nachodka could give berth for only cruiser (yeah, only one cruiser during all Russian-Japanese war - "Bogatyr" to be exact!).
Sorry, I meant the raid on the Russian Far East Fleet at Port Arthur (or wherever), not Vladivostok. Resulting in the Tsar ordering the Baltic Fleet to the Far East as well, which was also defeated.
The Japanese success in this pre-emptive strike was the inspiration for the later-day pre-emptive strike on Pearl Harbour in conception.

Was what I meant.
Then... you remarks is slightly out of "bull-eye" in this issue - Russians was aggressor side in this war as far as Japanese & it's unfair to blame only Japan for this war. (By the way Russia had her share of China in that war in form of "Outer Mongolia" that "was liberated from China influence" as result.)
I wasn't blaming anybody, merely stating (or trying to) the pre-emptive strike on the Russian Far East Fleet was the inspiration for the Pearl Harbour attk. Russia and Japan were manoevuring over Manchuria and trying to out-landgrab each other at this point. Pointless to argue who're more aggressive since both were aggressors trying to stomach down Chinese lands.
I think - every "great power" tried to get their foothold in China with Russia & England as major rivals. Russia took nothern part of China, England - South. USA & Germany tried to help Russia in this war (for lessening English influence in Far East). France favored her English relationships due to looming war against Germany & Japan... Japan became English battle spearpoint of some sort. It's very unfair to say that in 1900s Japan was "really aggressive country". Well...
Japan was as aggressive as any of the European powers, in her attempt to get her 'place in the sun'. FYI, the Russians tried for Manchuria, the Ili Valley in Xinjiang (which they still kept now), Xinjiang itself, Mongolia. The British controlled the Yangzi valley. The French influenced Guangxi. The Germans took Qingdao. The Japanese took Korea, which was a Chinese tributary state and later Manchuria. Chinese history is my strong suit.

Only the Americans did nothing much.
The Anglo-Japanese Alliance of 1902 also gave the Japanese the diplomatic confidence to take on Russia.
It's easy to forgot that in 1920s Poland was really aggressive in "foreign affairs field" against Germany - not vice versa. Try to take in account that Poland ruler intentionally broke couple of statements in Versaille treaty about "Danzig's corridore" & right's of German population in Silezia und Pommern & it was wide-spread idea "to teach Polish swines some lesson" strong before Hitler appearance (this motto was main song for right-wing parties in late 20s elections). It seems that war with Poland was decided by "german public opinion" to begin of 30s & would be true with Hitler or without him. But - outcome of this "Polish war" without so charismatic leader as Hitler would be... let's say - unknown.
Indeed, the Poles were very active internationally and took a very active part in the Russian Civil War. There were Polish units helping the White Russian forces thru out most of it AFAIK. Only natural the Soviets had a score to settle with them. I think sort of expected for a reborn nation.
The Poles also joined the Little Detente with France and Czechoslovakia and trying to isolate Germany. It didn't really work out though...