Today used to be Japan's Navy Memorial Day commemorating the victory by Admiral Togo's fleet over the Russia's Baltic fleet in the sea of Japan. More on that later.
It seems therefore a little bit appropriate that we find out today that perhaps up to 3 men of the former Imperial Army have survived the post-war years in Mindanao Island of the Philippines and are requesting to be taken home to Japan. It's been over 30 years since Lietenant Onoda came out of the jungle in Lubang.
Oh boy. Stay tuned for more.Japanese officials in the Philippines are to meet two men who claim to be Japanese soldiers who have lived in the jungle since the end of World War II. The pair, now in their 80s, were found on the southern island of Mindanao. They reportedly said they wanted to return to Japan, but were afraid of facing a court martial.
Their claim drew comparisons with the 1974 case of Lieutenant Hiroo Onoda, who was found in the Philippines jungle unaware the war had ended.
'Incredible if true'
The two men on Mindanao had contacted a Japanese national who was collecting the remains of war dead on Mindanao, according to government sources. They had equipment which suggested they were former soldiers. "It is an incredible story if it is true," Japan's consul general in Manila, Akio Egawa, told the AFP news agency. "They were found, I believe, in the mountains near General Santos on Mindanao Island. "At this stage we are not saying either way whether or not these two men are in fact former soldiers. We may be in a better position later today," he said.
According to Japanese media reports, the pair had been living with Muslim rebel groups and at least one of them has married a local woman and had a family. The BBC's Tokyo correspondent says the likelihood is that they are well aware the war is over but have chosen to stay in the Philippines for their own reasons.
Remote jungle Mindanao has seen more than two decades of Muslim rebellion and many areas are out of central government control. Japan invaded the Philippines in 1941, shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbour, and set up a brutal puppet government. In the closing months of the war, there was heavy fighting with US troops in the mountainous, heavily forested islands.
The Sankei Shimbun daily said the men would most likely be members of the Panther division, 80% of whom were killed or went missing during the final months of the war. It speculated there could be as many as 40 Japanese soldiers living in similar conditions in the Philippines.
When Lt Onoda was found on the Philippines island of Lubang in 1974, he initially refused to surrender. Only when his former commanding officer was flown over from Japan did he agree to leave the jungle. He later emigrated to Brazil.
The Muslim group operating in Mindanao is the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, or MILF, which is reall unfortunate for them because there are such things as MILF Hunters now (Warning, Sexual Content!!!). :)
Update:
Mainichi Shimbun newspaper has this report:
＜旧日本兵＞「数十人生存」情報も 半数が帰国希望 フィリピンに出征した旧日本兵らでつくる「曙光会」の近藤敏郎さん（８３）によると、昨年１２月２０日にフィリピンから帰国した厚生労働省の遺骨収集団から、ミンダナオ島のキバウエ東方で中内続喜（つづき）さん（８５）＝高知県明治村（現・越知町）出身＝ら３人が生存しているとの連絡が入ったという。近藤さんは「３人は現地のモロ族という部族に保護されているらしい。同島には旧日本兵の生存者が５７人おり、半数が帰国を希望していると聞いた」などと話した。 ◇未帰還者は２１人 厚生労働省によると、戦死情報がなく家族などの話から判断した旧日本兵の未帰還者は今年４月現在、２１人。中国１６人、旧ソ連２人、樺太とビルマ（現ミャンマー）、ベトナムの各１人で、フィリピンはゼロとなっていた。ただ、ミンダナオ島については、旧日本兵２６人が集団で住んでいるという情報があり、７２年８月と７３年１１月に現地を捜索したが、確証が得られなかった経緯がある。
（毎日新聞） - 5月27日15時57分更新
It says that up to 57 missing in action Japanese soldiers from WWII could be living on Mindanao Island, protected by the muslim Moro people. Heck, maybe Eiji Sawamura is alive too! That would be the laugh of the century.
Sea of Japan
Here's the link about the commemorations. That's the Russian take on it from Itar-Tass.
Here's another from Russian sources.
Asahi.com has this article. It's in Japanese.
日本海海戦から１００周年を迎えた２７日、神奈川県横須賀市稲岡町の記念艦「三笠」前で式典があり、海上自衛隊員ら約千人が集まった。Basically, Admiral Togo's great grandson works as a communications staff officer in the Maritime Self Defense Service Command and he attended. That's no big surprise.
当時の連合艦隊司令長官東郷平八郎のひ孫で、式典に参列した自衛艦隊司令部指揮通信計画幕僚の東郷宏重さん（４５）は「歴史を大切にするこのような行事が、平和の中で今後も続いていって欲しい」と話した。中曽根元首相も出席した。財団法人「三笠保存会」などが企画した。
日露戦争で連合艦隊はロシアのバルチック艦隊に勝利を収め、東郷の乗った旗艦「三笠」は、現在陸上に固定され、記念艦として保存されている。
Yomiuri has this to say:
日露戦争の日本海海戦１００周年記念式典が２７日、神奈川県横須賀市の記念艦「三笠」前で開かれ、国内外の関係者約１０００人が参加した。
１９０５年（明治３８年）５月２７日から２８日にかけて展開された海戦で、戦艦「三笠」を旗鑑とする日本の連合艦隊が、ロシアのバルチック艦隊を破り、日本に勝利をもたらした。
式典には、連合艦隊を率いた東郷平八郎元帥のひ孫らも出席。両国の国歌吹奏、黙とうなどに続き、記念大会名誉会長の中曽根康弘・元首相があいさつ。戦没者の冥福（めいふく）を祈り、両国の友好を誓った。
No big surprises,
The BBC take on it is here.
Time Magazine's take on it is here. It's a crappy take.
For something more balanced from Nashua:
By LANCE GAY, Scripps Howard News Service
A century ago, the navies of Russia and Japan squared off in the Battle of Tsushima in what one naval strategist concluded at the time was “the most decisive and complete naval victory in history.”It was supposed to be a turkey-shoot. Russia sent its Baltic fleet – the pride of the czar’s navy – on a nine-month, 18,000-mile voyage halfway around the world to confront Japan, which then was regarded as an exotic and backward land with no naval experience.
Japan, which had broken out of its self-imposed isolation only a half-century before, copied Western traditions in a rapid modernization program building a navy and army in the last half of the 19th century. It had never before faced a modern Western navy.The fleets met on the afternoon of May 14, 1905. After the smoke
cleared from the seas around the Japanese island of Tsushima, Japan had won a lopsided victory that changed the balance of power in Asia. Russia lost 22 vessels – a stunning defeat made more humiliating to the Kremlin because only three Japanese destroyers were sunk.Tsushima hasn’t caught fire in the public imagination like Horatio Nelson’s victory in the Battle of Trafalgar of 1805, even though Japan’s victory had a major impact on the United States.U.S. naval strategists used the fight as justification for building a mighty American navy that 36 years later would confront Japan for dominance of the Pacific Ocean. It also drove home a lesson being relearned in Iraq today about what happens when war planners forecast a cakewalk and fail to assess correctly all their enemy’s capabilities.
British naval strategists like Sir Julian Corbett, who called the fight the most decisive in history, altered their navy’s tactics and warship construction programs using lessons learned from Tsushima.
President Theodore Roosevelt clearly foresaw the significance.“In a dozen years the English, Americans and Germans, who now dread each other as rivals in the trade of the Pacific, will each have to dread the Japanese more than they do any other nation,” Roosevelt wrote.
Russia’s defeat rearranged the structure of power in Asia and exposed the weakness of Russia’s czarist regime. It also provoked violent street riots and demands for government reforms that culminated eventually in the Russian Revolution of 1917. Russia’s European allies were shocked at Russia’s military weakness and rethought their tangle of alliances that had guaranteed peace in Europe for almost a century.
Roosevelt won the Nobel Peace Prize by negotiating the treaty ending the Russo-Japanese war in talks held that fall in Portsmouth, N.H.But when the terms of the Treaty of Portsmouth became public in Japan, there were riots in the streets because the treaty did not require Russia to pay the Japanese war debts – something the Japanese thought their victory justified.
The war is still a sensitive issue in Japan today, partly because Russia entered World War II in 1945 to redress its 1905 losses by seizing Japan’s northern islands. Russia and Japan have never signed a peace treaty ending World War II because of the dispute over those islands.
Dartmouth College historian Steven Ericson said the centenary of the battle is rekindling interest in the Russo-Japanese war in Japan, where he has been invited to give a paper at a “World War Zero” conference being held at Tokyo’s Keio University later this year. Dartmouth is sponsoring a historical conference of its own on the war in September, while Portsmouth has invited Russian and Japanese scholars for a centennial celebration of the peace treaty session.“In a sense, it was a dress rehearsal for World War I,” Ericson said. “It had all sorts of ramifications for Northeast Asia, many of which are lingering today.”Edward Segal, a professor of history at Reed College in Portland, Ore., said the battle signaled a remarkable shift in the global balance of power and reflected the growing significance of Asia.
“This war had long-range effects that have not eaten into the public mind as others have done,” he said. “It was the first major victory by an Asian power over a
European power. It signals the rise of Asian strength and Asian nationalism, not only in Japan but also ultimately in China and elsewhere.”Clayton Black, chairman of the history department at Washington College in Chestertown, Md., said Tsushima was only one of a series of crushing defeats Russia endured in the war that began in 1904.With a troubled economy and growing unrest, Russia’s interior minister mused in 1903, “in order to prevent revolution, we need a little victorious war.”But Russia wasn’t victorious on either land or sea. The war began with a Japanese blockade of the Russian fleet at Port Arthur, and the army’s efforts to relieve it bogged down.
The czar decided to send his Baltic Fleet, based in St. Petersburg, to the rescue.“Tsushima was a dramatic climax to a disastrous effort for the Russians,” Black said.He said the Russians didn’t take the Japanese seriously. The lesson to be learned: “Unfounded assumptions about our opponents, failure to take their abilities seriously, can have enormous consequences for ourselves and for international relations.”
Timothy Francis, a historian with the Naval Historical Center in Washington, said the war had an impact on the modern development of the U.S. Navy. He noted that “lessons learned” articles on the war appeared within months in U.S. Navy publications.
So there you have it. One Hundred Years. Still no peace deal with the Russians.
-Art Neuro
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