Barbed wire, trenches, and machine guns are all elements of modern warfare that are mainly associated with the bloody carnage of World War One, yet they were all first used in combination 10 years earlier in a largely forgotten war that was fought in Manchuria and Korea: the Russo-Japanese War.

At this time, the Russian Empire was expanding south into Asia, while the growing Japanese Empire was expanding north into the same territory. Conflict between the two seemed inevitable. Few doubted the outcome: the Russian Empire had one of the largest armies and most powerful navies in the world. Japan’s armed forces, meanwhile, were much smaller and lacked a tradition of modern warfare. A short war and a rapid and emphatic Russian victory were generally expected. That wasn’t how things turned out. This is the surprising story of the Russo-Japanese War, the first major war of the twentieth century.