Editing May Fourth Movement (section)

=== Shandong Problem ===
{{Main|Shandong Problem}}
China had entered World War I on the side of the [[Triple Entente]] in 1917. Although that year, 140,000 Chinese laborers were sent to the Western Front as a part of the [[Chinese Labor Corps]],<ref>{{Cite book |last=Xu |first=Guoqi |title=Strangers on the Western Front: Chinese workers in the Great War |publisher=Harvard University Press |year=2011 |isbn=978-0-674-04999-4 |location=Cambridge, MA |pages=1–9}}</ref> the [[Treaty of Versailles]] ratified in April 1919 awarded rights to the German territories in [[Shandong]] to Japan. The representatives of the Chinese government put forth the following requests:
# Abolition of all privileges of foreign powers in China, such as [[extraterritoriality]]
# Cancelling of the Twenty-One Demands
# Return to China of the territory and rights of Shandong, which Japan had taken from Germany during World War I.
The Western allies dominated the meeting at Versailles, and paid little heed to Chinese demands. The European delegations, led by French Prime Minister [[Georges Clemenceau]], were primarily interested in punishing Germany. Although the American delegation promoted [[Woodrow Wilson]]'s [[Fourteen Points]] and the ideals of [[self-determination]], they were unable to advance these ideals in the face of stubborn resistance by [[David Lloyd George]] and Clemenceau. American advocacy of self-determination at the [[League of Nations]] was attractive to Chinese intellectuals, but their failure to follow through was seen as a betrayal. This failure of diplomacy at the [[Paris Peace Conference, 1919|Paris Peace Conference]] created what became known as the "Shandong Problem".<ref>{{Cite encyclopedia |year=1998 |title=Shandong question |encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/event/Shandong-question}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Guoqi |first=Xu |title=Asia and the Great War |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2016 |isbn=978-0-199-65819-0 |pages=153–184 |chapter=China and Japan at Paris |doi=10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199658190.003.0007}}</ref>