# Phan Boi Chau launches the Dong Du movement (1905–1908)

URL: https://allhistories.com/vietnam/timeline/1905-phan-boi-chau-launches-the-dong-du-movement
Location: Tokyo, Japan (Vietnamese exile movement)
Themes: Nationalism, Japan

Phan Boi Chau founded the Duy Tan Hoi (Modernization Association) in 1904, with Prince Cuong De as president, and went to Japan in 1905, where he met the Chinese reformer Liang Qichao. Liang advised him to concentrate on writing and propaganda, and he published the pamphlet Viet Nam vong quoc su that year. The Dong Du ('Go East') movement sent Vietnamese students to Japan from 1905 to 1908. The movement drew on Japan's modernisation and its victory over Russia in 1905, which inspired Asian nationalists. Phan Boi Chau hoped Japan would provide arms and support for the overthrow of French rule. He argued for an armed struggle and a constitutional monarchy, and recruited students from all three regions of Vietnam. Under pressure from France, Japan expelled Phan in 1909 and closed the student programme. He then moved to China, where in 1912 he dissolved the Duy Tan Hoi and helped found the Viet Nam Quang Phuc Hoi, which favoured a republic. The French seized him in Shanghai in 1925, and he lived under house arrest in Hue until his death in 1940. At this point in the timeline (1905), the Nguyen emperor Thanh Thai (2 February 1889 – 3 September 1907) reigned at Hue as nominal sovereign of the French protectorates of Annam and Tonkin. French authority was exercised by Paul Beau, governor-general of French Indochina (15 October 1902 – 28 February 1908). The main location of this event lies outside present-day Vietnam.

## Why it matters
The movement connected Vietnamese nationalism with Asian modernisation and trained a generation of exile activists.

Ruler at the Time: [Thanh Thai](https://allhistories.com/vietnam/rulers/thanh-thai)

## Sources
- [Wikipedia — Phan Bội Châu](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phan_B%E1%BB%99i_Ch%C3%A2u)
- [Wikipedia — Phan Châu Trinh](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phan_Ch%C3%A2u_Trinh)