Daqing Yang . Technology of Empire: Telecommunications and Japanese Expansion in Asia, 1883–1945 . (Harvard East Asian Monographs, number 219.) Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Asia Center. 2010. Pp. xvii, 446. $49.95.

Scholars have long awaited the arrival of Daqing Yang's book, which does not disappoint in terms of breadth. Yang engages a variety of topics ranging from Me...