One day in November 1913, Victor Hermann, manager of the Tokyo branch of the German Siemens Company, accompanied by Alexander Hill, the German Embassy, ??came to the Navy Ministry to say hello, saying that someone from Siemens Company He stole the company's documents and fled to the UK, extorting 500,000 marks from Siemens. The Japanese were a little confused: If a German company is robbed by a thief, what does it have to do with Japan? If you want to ask Japanese detectives to help catch the thief, you should ask the Ministry of Internal Affairs, not the Navy. Seeing that the Japanese couldn't understand, the Germans said directly: "Maybe the incident cannot be concealed. Once this incident is made public, I am afraid that the names of several senior Japanese navy officers will be published in Europe, so I came to say hello. It's better for you early." It's better to be prepared." It turned out that among the stolen documents was a telegram in which Siemens agreed to give a kickback to Rear Admiral Tatsuto Iwasaki, the former head of the Naval Ministry's first department responsible for weapons procurement. The Navy knew something was wrong as soon as they heard this. It was the tense moment of the Eighth Eighth Fleet plan. They thought that with Admiral Gonbei Yamamoto as Prime Minister, it would be easier for the Navy to raise money. Who knew that such a thing would happen? An inquiry committee chaired by General Dewa Shigehiro was quickly established to investigate the matter. The result of the investigation was that someone did take money in Germany, and the Germans only did the interior work of the cruiser battleship King Kong ordered by the Japanese in the UK. The British who did the real work also gave the Japanese money, and Even more was given. Matsumoto and Lieutenant General, the original head of the Naval Administration Headquarters alone, took 400,000 yen from the British. Don’t forget that this was an era when you could build a house in Tokyo with a thousand yen. Nippon Steel’s predecessor, Yawata Steel, was built with only 570,000 yen in the beginning. This 450,000 yen is a huge number. One can imagine. Lieutenant General Matsumoto Kazu was the commander-in-chief of Wu Town Defense Office at the time of the incident, and was already the candidate for the next Prime Minister of the Sea. People familiar with Japanese politics should know that Japan has a tradition of money-making politics. It is said that Matsumoto got the money just to As Prime Minister, I am preparing funds for political activities, so the money is still in the bank. As soon as this document was published in Japan on January 23, 1914, it was an earthquake. The Congress was in chaos, and the media was desperately hyping it up. To use the words of the historian Tokutomi Sufeng, a later Class A war criminal suspect, to describe it: "When I think of the Navy, I think of Yamamoto Gonbei, and when I think of Yamamoto, I think of kickbacks." Angry The crowds flocked to the National Assembly and the Navy Ministry, and four thousand police officers were unable to maintain order. As a result, the Army dispatched a brigade from the Third Regiment to help maintain order and the situation was calmed down.
The result was that Gonbei Yamamoto, who had just taken the throne as prime minister, and his cabinet resigned en masse in April.