Japan: The Rise of an Empire covers many decades of Japanese Empire history. It identifies the beliefs, the policies, and the practices of the Japanese from 1853 to the Pacific War. It describes Japan's opening to modernization with the 1853 arrival of commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry in the country, and details the wars launched by Emperor Meiji and Emperor Hirohito during the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries.The book exposes the expansionist policy practiced by Japan at the end of the 19th century and during the first period of the 20th century.