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Japanese Navy

Japanese Navy

The Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) (Japanese: 大日本帝国海軍 or 日本海軍 Nippon Kaigun) was the navy of Japan from 1869 until 1947, when it was dissolved following Japan's constitutional renouncement of the use of force as a means of settling international disputes. The origins of the Imperial Japanese Navy trace back to early interactions with states on the Asian continent at the beginning of the medieval period, and reached a peak of activity during the 16th and 17th century at a time of cultural exchange with European powers during the Age of Discovery. After two centuries of stagnation during the country's ensuing seclusion policy under the shoguns of the Edo period, Japan's Navy was comparatively backward when the country was forced open to trade by American intervention in 1854. This eventually led to the so-called Meiji Restoration, a period of frantic modernization and industrialization accompanied by the re-ascendance of the emperor, making the IJN the third largest navy in the world by 1920, and perhaps the most modern at the brink of World War II. The navy's history of successes, sometimes against much more powerful foes as in the 1895 Sino-Japanese war and the 1905 Russo-Japanese War, ended with almost complete annihilation in 1945 against the United States Navy, and official dissolution at the end of the conflict. United States Navy

Origins

Main article Naval history of Japan Naval history of Japan.]] Japan has a long history of naval interaction with the Asian continent, involving transportation of troops between Korea and Japan, starting at least with the beginning of the Kofun period in the 3rd century. Following the attempts at Mongol invasions of Japan by Kubilai Khan in 1281, Japanese "Wakō" pirates became very active plundering the coast of the Chinese Empire. Japan undertook major naval building efforts in the 16th century, during the Warring States period, when feudal rulers vying for supremacy built vast coastal navies of several hundred ships. Around that time, Japan seems to have developed the first ironclad warships in history, when Oda Nobunaga, a Japanese daimyo, had six iron-covered Oatakebune made in 1576 . 1576 Japan built her first large ocean-going warships in the beginning of the 17th century, following contacts with the Western nations during the Nanban trade period. In 1613, the Daimyo of Sendai, in agreement with the Tokugawa Bakufu, built Date Maru, a 500 ton galleon-type ship that transported a Japanese embassy to the Americas, and then continued to Europe. From 1604, about 350 Red seal ships, usually armed and incorporating some Western technologies, were also commissioned by the Bakufu, mainly for Southeast Asian trade. From 1640, Japan chose the policy of Sakoku (seclusion), which forbade contacts with the West, eradicated Christianity, and prohibited the construction of ocean-going ships on pain of death. The study of Western shipbuilding techniques resumed in the 1840s during the Late Tokugawa shogunate ("Bakumatsu"). In 1853 and 1854, U.S. Navy Commodore Matthew Perry, made a demonstration of force with the newest steam warships of the US Navy. Perry finally obtained the opening of the country to international trade through the 1854 Convention of Kanagawa. This was soon followed by the 1858 "unequal" U.S.-Japan Treaty of Amity and Commerce, which allowed the establishment of foreign concessions, extra-territoriality for foreigners, and minimal import taxes for foreign goods. U.S.-Japan Treaty of Amity and Commerce.]] As soon as Japan agreed to open up to foreign influence, the Tokugawa shogun government initiated an active policy of assimilation of Western naval technologies. In 1855, with Dutch assistance, the Shogunate acquired its first steam warship, the Kankō Maru, which was used for training, and established the Nagasaki Naval Training Center. In 1857, it acquired its first screw-driven steam warship, the Kanrin Maru. Naval students were sent to study in Western naval schools for several years, such as the future Admiral Takeaki Enomoto (who studied in the Netherlands from 1862–1867), starting a tradition of foreign-educated future leaders such Admirals Heihachiro Togo and, later, Isoroku Yamamoto. In 1865, the French naval engineer Léonce Verny was hired to build Japan's first modern naval arsenals, at Yokosuka and Nagasaki. By the end of the Tokugawa shogunate in 1867, the Tokugawa navy already possessed eight Western-style steam warships around the flagship Kaiyō Maru which were used against pro-imperial forces during the Boshin war, under the command of Admiral Enomoto. The conflict culminated with the Naval Battle of Hakodate in 1869, Japan's first large-scale modern naval battle, and ended with the defeat of the last Tokugawa forces and the restoration of Imperial rule.

Creation of the Imperial Japanese Navy (1869)

1869, 1869.]] From 1868, the restored Meiji Emperor continued with reforms to industrialize and militarize Japan to prevent United States and European powers from overwhelming her. The Imperial Japanese Navy was formally established in 1869. The new government drafted an ambitious plan to create a Navy with 200 ships organized into 10 fleets. It was abandoned within a year due to lack of resources. Domestic rebellions, especially the Satsuma Rebellion (1877) forced the government to focus on land warfare. Naval policy, expressed by the slogan Shusei Kokubō (Jp:守勢国防, lit. "Static Defense"), focused on coastal defenses, a standing army, and a coastal Navy, leading to a military organization under the Rikushu Kaijū (Jp:陸主海従, Army first, Navy second) principle.

British support

During the 1870s and 1880s, the Japanese Navy remained an essentially coastal defense force, although the Meiji government continued to modernize it. In 1870, an Imperial decree determined that the British Navy should be the model for development. Ships such as the Fuso, Kongo and the Hiei were built in British shipyards specifically for the Japanese Navy. A British naval mission visited Japan in 1873, headed by Comdr. Archibald Douglas. Later, Comdr. L.P. Willan was hired in 1879 to train naval cadets. Private construction companies such as Ishikawajima and Kawasaki also emerged around this time. Two large warships were ordered from British shipyards. Naniwa and the Takachiho were 3,650 ton ships. They were capable of speeds up to 18 knots (33 km/h) and were armed with 2 to 3-inch deck armor and two 10.2-in (260 mm) Krupp guns. The naval architect Sasō Sachū designed these on the line of the Elswick class of protected cruisers but with superior specifications. An arms race was taking place with China however, who equipped herself with two huge German battleships of 7,335 tons (the Ting Yüan and the Chen-Yüan). Japan resorted to French assistance to build a modern fleet which could prevail in the upcoming conflict.

Influence of the French "Jeune Ecole" (1880s)

Chen-Yüan (1894).]] During the 1880s, France took the lead in influence, due to its "Jeune Ecole" doctrine favoring small, fast warships, especially cruisers and torpedo boats, against bigger units. The Meiji government issued its First Naval Expansion bill in 1882, requiring the construction of 48 warships, of which 22 were to be torpedo boats. The naval successes of the French Navy against China in the Sino-French War of 1883–85 seemed to validate the potential of torpedo boats, an approach which was also attractive to the limited resources of Japan. In 1885, the new Navy slogan became Kaikoku Nippon (Jp:海国日本, lit. "Maritime Japan"). In 1886, the leading French Navy engineer Emile Bertin was hired for four years to reinforce the Japanese Navy and to direct the construction of the arsenals of Kure and Sasebo. He developed the Sanseikan class of cruisers; 3 units featuring a single powerful main gun, the 12.6 in (320 mm) Canet gun. Altogether, Bertin supervised the building of more than twenty units. They helped establish the first true modern naval force of Japan. It allowed Japan to achieve mastery in the building of large units, since some of the ships were imported, and some others were built domestically at the arsenal of Yokosuka:
- 3 cruisers: the 4,700 tons Matsushima and Itsukushima, made in France, and the Hashidate, built by Japan in Yokosuka.
- 3 costal warships of 4,278 tons.
- 2 small cruisers: the Chiyoda, a small cruiser of 2,439 built in Britain, and the Yaeyama, 1800 tons, built in Yokosuka, Japan.
- 1 frigate, the 1600 tons Takao, built in Yokosuka.
- 1 destroyer: the 726 tons Chishima, built in France.
- 16 torpedo boats of 54 tons each, built in France by the Companie du Creusot in 1888, and assembled in Japan. This period also allowed Japan "to embrace the revolutionary new technologies embodied in torpedoes, torpedo-boats and mines, of which the French at the time were probably the world's best exponents" (Howe, p281). Japan acquired its first torpedoes in 1884, and established a "Torpedo Training Center" at Yokosuka in 1886. 1886).]] These ships were the last major orders placed with France. Japan turned again to Britain, with the order of a revolutionary torpedo boat, the 1887 Kotaka, considered as the first ever effective design of a destroyer (Evans Kaigun, p17), and with the purchase of the Yoshino, built in Elswick, the fastest cruiser in the world at the time of her launch in 1892.

Sino-Japanese War

Japan continued the modernization of its navy, especially as China was also building a powerful modern fleet with foreign, especially German, assistance, and the pressure was building between the two countries to take control of Korea. The Sino-Japanese war was officially declared on August 1, 1894, though some naval fighting had already taken place. 1894 The Japanese navy devastated Qing's northern fleet off the mouth of the Yalu River at the Battle of Yalu River on September 17, 1894, in which the Chinese fleet lost 8 out of 12 warships. Although Japan turned out victorious, the two large German-made battleships of the Chinese Navy remained almost impervious to Japanese guns, highlighting the need for bigger capital ships in the Japanese Navy (the Ting Yuan was finally sunk by torpedoes, and the Chen-Yuan was captured with little damage). The next step of the Imperial Japanese Navy's expansion would thus involve a combination of heavily armed large warships, with smaller and innovative offensive units permitting aggressive tactics. As a result of the conflict, under the Treaty of Shimonoseki (April 17th, 1895), Taiwan and the Pescadores Islands were transferred to Japan. The Imperial Japanese Navy took possession of the island and quelled opposition movements between March to October 1895, and the islands continued to be a Japanese colony until 1945. Japan also obtained the Liaodong Peninsula, although she was forced by Russia to return it to China, only to see Russia take possession of it soon after. The Imperial Japanese Navy further intervened in China in 1900, by participating together with Western Powers to the suppression of the Chinese Boxer Rebellion. The Navy supplied the largest number of warships (18, out of a total of 50 warships), and delivered the largest contingent of Army and Navy troops among the intervening nations (20,840 soldiers, out of total of 54,000).

Russo-Japanese War

Boxer Rebellion.]] Following the Sino-Japanese War, and the humiliation of the forced return of the Liaotung peninsula to China under Russian pressure (the "Triple Intervention"), Japan began to build up its military strength in preparation for further confrontations. Japan promulgated a ten-year naval build-up program, under the slogan "Perseverance and determination" (Jp:臥薪嘗胆, Gashinshōtan), in which it commissioned 109 warships, for a total of 200,000 tons, and increased its Navy personnel from 15,100 to 40,800. The new fleet consisted of:
- 6 battleships (all British-made)
- 8 armored cruisers (4 British, 2 Italian, 1 German, and 1 French-made)
- 9 cruisers (5 Japanese, 2 British and 2 US-made)
- 24 destroyers (16 British and 8 Japanese-made)
- 63 torpedo boats (26 German, 10 British, 17 French, and 10 Japanese-made) torpedo boat.]] One of these battleships, Mikasa, the most advanced ship of her time, was ordered from the Vickers shipyard in the United Kingdom at the end of 1898, for delivery to Japan in 1902. These dispositions culminated with the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905). At the Battle of Tsushima, Admiral Togo onboard the Mikasa led the combined Japanese fleet into what has been called "the most decisive naval battle in history". The Russian fleet was almost completely annihilated: out of 38 Russian ships, 21 were sunk, 7 captured, 6 disarmed, 4,545 Russian servicemen died and 6,106 were taken prisoner. On the other hand, the Japanese only lost 116 men and 3 torpedo boats. These victories broke Russian strength in East Asia, and triggered waves of mutinies in the Russian Navy at Sevastopol, Vladivostok and Kronstadt, peaking in June with the Battleship Potemkin uprising, thereby contributing to the Russian Revolution of 1905. Russian Revolution of 1905.]] During the Russo-Japanese war, Japan also made frantic efforts to have a fleet of submarines. Submarines had only recently become operational military engines, and were considered as special weapons of considerable potential. The Imperial Japanese Navy acquired its first submarines in 1905 from the United States Electric Boat Company, barely four years after the U.S. Navy had commissioned its own first submarine, USS Holland. The ships were Holland designs. They were shipped in kit to Japan and then assembled at the Yokosuka Naval Yard, to become hulls No1 through 5, and became operational at the end of 1905.

Towards an autonomous national Navy

Japan continued in its efforts to build up a strong national naval industry. Following a strategy of "Copy, improve, innovate", foreign ships of various designs were usually analysed in depth, their specifications often improved on, and then were purchased in pairs so as to organize comparative testing and improvements. Over the years, the importation of whole classes of ships was progressively substituted by local assembly, and then complete local production, starting with the smallest ships, such as torpedo boats and cruisers in the 1880s, to finish with whole battleships in the early 1900s. The last major purchase was in 1913 when the battlecruiser Kongo was purchased from the Vickers shipyard. By 1918, there was no aspect of shipbuilding technology where Japanese capabilities fell significantly below world standards. By 1920, the Imperial Japanese Navy was the world's third largest navy, and was a leader in many aspects of naval development: 1920" battleship]]
- The Japanese Navy was the first navy in the world to use in naval combat a wireless communication system (following its 1897 invention by Marconi), at the 1905 Battle of Tsushima.
- In 1906, it launched the battleship Satsuma, at the time the largest warship in the world by displacement, and the first ship in the world to be designed and laid down as an "all-big-gun" battleship, one year before the British HMS Dreadnought.
- Between 1905 and 1910, Japan started to build battleships domestically. The 1906 battleship Satsuma was built in Japan with about 80% parts from Britain, but the next battleship class, the 1910 Kawachi was built with only 20% imported parts.

World War I

Japan entered World War I on the side of the Allies, against Germany and Austria, as a natural prolongation of the 1902 Anglo-Japanese Alliance. After an Anglo-Japanese siege, the Japanese Navy seized the German naval base of Tsingtao on the Shantung peninsula in China, in November 1914. Concurrently a battle group was sent to the central Pacific in August and September to pursue the German East Asiatic squadron, which then moved into the Southern Atlantic, where it encountered British naval forces. Japan seized the former possessions of Germany in Micronesia on this occasion (the Mariana Islands, Caroline Islands and Marshall Islands), which remained Japanese colonies until the end of World War II, under the League of Nations' South Pacific Mandate. South Pacific Mandate (Malta, 1919).]] Hard pressed in Europe, where it had only a narrow margin of superiority against Germany, Britain had requested, but was denied, the loan of Japan's four newest Kongo-class battleships (Kongo, Hiei, Haruna, Kirishima), the first ships in the world to be equipped with 14-inch (356 mm) guns, and the most advanced capital ships in the world at the time of their launch. Following further request to contribute to the conflict, and the advent of unrestricted German submarine warfare from 1917, the Imperial Japanese Navy sent a special force of destroyers to the Mediterranean in March 1917. The fleet, consisting of one armoured cruiser, Nisshin, and eight of the Navy's newest destroyers under Admiral Satō Kōzō, was based in Malta and efficiently protected allied shipping between Marseilles, Taranto and ports in Egypt until the end of the War. One destroyer, Sakaki, was torpedoed with the loss of 59 officers and men. After the conflict, the Japanese Navy received seven German submarines as spoils of war, which were brought to Japan and analysed, contributing greatly to the development of the Japanese submarine industry.

Interwar years

In the years before WW II the IJN began to structure itself specifically to fight the United States. A long stretch of militaristic expansion and the start of the Second Sino-Japanese war in 1937 had alienated the United States, and the country was seen as a rival of Japan. Second Sino-Japanese war in the world (1922)]] The Imperial Japanese Navy was faced, before and during World War II, with considerable challenges, probably more so than any other navy in the world. Japan, like Britain, was almost entirely dependent on foreign resources to supply its economy, so that the Imperial Japanese Navy had to secure and protect sources for raw material (especially Southeast Asian oil and raw materials) that were far away, and controlled by foreign countries (Britain, the United States and Holland). To achieve this goal, she had to build large warships capable of a long range. To achieve Japan’s expansionist policies, the Imperial Japanese Navy also had to fight off the largest navies in the world (The 1922 Washington Naval Treaty allotted a 5/5/3 ratio for the navies of Britain, the United States and Japan). She was therefore numerically inferior and her industrial base for expansion was limited (in particular compared to the United States). Her battle tactics therefore tended to rely on technical superiority (fewer, but faster, more powerful ships), and aggressive tactics (daring and speedy attacks overwhelming the enemy, a recipe for success in her previous conflicts). Washington Naval Treaty (1928), introducing enclosed turrets capable of anti-aircraft fire and the 24-inch (610 mm) oxygen fuelled Type 93 torpedo, was a design later emulated by other navies.]] During the interwar, Japan therefore took the lead in many areas of warship development:
- In 1921 it launched the Hosho, the first purpose-designed aircraft carrier in the world to be completed, and subsequently developed a fleet of aircraft carriers second to none.
- In keeping with its belief in big-gun action, the Imperial Japanese Navy was the first navy to mount 14-in (356 mm) guns (with the Kongo), 16-in (406 mm) guns (with the Nagato), and the only Navy ever to mount 18.1-in (460 mm) guns (with the Yamato).
- In 1928, it launched the innovative Fubuki-class destroyer, introducing enclosed turrets capable of anti-aircraft fire and the 24-inch (610 mm) oxygen fuelled Type 93 torpedo, a design soon emulated by other navies.
- Japan developed the oxygen fuelled Type 93 "Long Lance" torpedo, generally recognized as the best torpedo in the world, down to the end of World War II (Westwood, Fighting Ships). Japan sometimes continued to solicit foreign expertise in areas where it needed to catch up with the West: in 1921 it welcomed for a year and a half the Sempill Mission, a group of British aeronaval instructors who trained the Imperial Japanese Navy on several new aircraft, such as the Gloster Sparrowhawk, and various techniques such as torpedo bombing and flight control. During the pre-war years, two schools of thought battled over whether the Navy should be organized around powerful battleships that could ultimately win over American ones in Japanese waters, or around an aggressive fleet of aircraft carriers. Neither really prevailed, and both lines of ships were developed, with the results that neither solution displayed overwhelming strength over the American adversary. A consistent weakness of Japanese warship development was the tendency to incorporate too much armament, and too much engine power, in comparison to ship size (a side-effect of the Washington treaty), leading to shortcomings in stability, protection and structural strength.

World War II

The Imperial Japanese Navy was administered by the Ministry of the Navy of Japan and controlled by the Chief of the Imperial Japanese Navy General Staff at Imperial General Headquarters. In order to combat the numerically superior American navy, the IJN devoted large amounts of resources to creating a force superior in quality to any navy at the time. Consequently, at the beginning of World War II, Japan probably had the most sophisticated Navy in the world. Betting on the speedy success of aggressive tactics, Japan did not invest significantly on defensive organization: she should also have been able to protect her long shipping lines against enemy submarines, which she never managed to do, particularly under-investing in anti-submarine escort ships and escort aircraft carriers. The Japanese Navy enjoyed spectacular success during the first part of the hostilities, but American forces ultimately managed to gain the upper hand through technological upgrades to its air and naval forces, and a vastly stronger industrial output. Japan's reluctance to use their submarine fleet for commerce raiding and failure to secure their communications also added to their defeat. During the last phase of the war the Imperial Japanese Navy resorted to a series of desperate measures, including Kamikaze (suicide) actions.

Battleships

Kamikaze in history, in 1941.]] Japan continued to attribute considerable prestige to battleships and endeavoured to build the largest and most powerful ships of the period. Yamato, the largest and most heavily-armed battleship in history, was launched in 1941. The second half of World War II saw the last battleship duels. In the Battle of Guadalcanal on November 15 1942, the United States battleships South Dakota and Washington fought and destroyed the Japanese battleship Kirishima. In the Battle of Leyte Gulf on 25 October 1944 six battleships, led by Admiral Jesse Oldendorf of the U.S. 7th Fleet fired upon & claimed credit for sinking Admiral Shoji Nishimura's battleships Yamashiro and Fuso during the Battle of Surigao Strait; in fact, both battleships were fatally crippled by DD attacks before brough under fire by Oldendorf's old battleships. Nevertheless, the Battle of Samar on 25 October 1944 during the Battle of Leyte Gulf showed that battleships still be useful, albeit inefficient weapon. Only the indecision of Admiral Takeo Kurita and the fight by American destroyers and destroyer escorts saved the American aircraft carriers of "Taffy 3" from being pounded to the bottom by the gunfire of Yamato, Kongo and Nagato and their cruiser host. Miraculously for the Americans, only USS Gambier Bay along with four destroyers were lost due to surface action. The Yamato, for all the expense that went info building her, failed to score even a single hit. Ultimately, the advent of air power however spelled doom for the battleship. Battleships in the Pacific ended up primarily performing shore bombardment and anti-aircraft defense for the carriers. The Yamato and Musashi, were sunk by aircraft attacks long before they could come within striking range of the American fleet. As a result of the changing technology, plans for even larger battleships, such as the Japanese Super Yamato class, were cancelled.

Aircraft carriers

Super Yamato class.]] Japan put particular emphasis on aircraft carriers. The Imperial Japanese Navy started the Pacific War with 10 aircraft carriers, the largest and most modern carrier fleet in the world at that time. Its two Shokakus were superior to any carrier in the world until the wartime appearance of the American Essex-class aircraft carrier . However, a large number of the Japanese carriers were of small size in accordance to limitations placed upon the Navy by the London and Washington Naval Conferences. There were 6 American aircraft carriers at the beginning of the hostilities, only 3 of them operating in the Pacific, and 3 British aircraft carriers, of which a single one operated in the Indian Ocean. However, following the Battle of Midway, in which four Japanese carriers were sunk, the Japanese Navy suddenly found itself short of full fleet carriers, resulting in an ambitious set of projects to convert commercial and military vessels into escort carriers such as the Hiyo and Shinano, which became the largest aircraft carrier of World War II. The Navy also attempted to build a number of full fleet carriers, though most of these projects were not completed by the end of the war.

Naval Aviation

Shinano in this case, about to hit the USS Missouri.]] Japan began the war with a competent naval air force designed around some of the best airplanes in the world: the "Zero" was considered as the best carrier aircraft of the beginning of the war, the Mitsubishi G3M bomber was remarkable for its range and speed, and the Kawanishi H8K was considered as the world's best flying boat. The Japanese pilot corps at the beginning of the war were of high caliber as compared to their contemporaries around the world due to intense training practices and frontline experience in the Sino-Japanese War. The Navy also had a competent tactical bombing force based around the Mitsubishi G3M and G4M bombers, which astonished the world by being the first planes to sink enemy battleships under way, in the sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse. As the war dragged on, the Allies were quick to find weaknesses in Japanese Naval Aviation. Though most of the Japanese aircraft were characterized by having great operating ranges, they had very little in the way of defensive armament and armor. As a result, the more numerous, heavily armed and armored American aircraft were able to develop techniques that quickly nullified the advantages of the Japanese aircraft. Furthermore, due to delays in engine development, the Japanese Navy had great difficulty in developing new and more competitive designs during the war, resulting in the mass scale production of aircraft with known weaknesses. Following the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the Japanese Navy increasingly opted towards deploying aircraft in the kamikaze role.

Submarines

kamikaze Japan had by far the most varied fleet of submarines of World War II, including manned torpedoes (Kaiten), midget submarines (Ko-hyoteki, Kairyu), medium-range submarines, purpose-built supply submarines (many for use by the Army), long-range fleet submarines (many of which carried an aircraft), submarines with the highest submerged speeds of the conflict (Sentaka I-200), and submarines that could carry multiple bombers (WWII's largest submarine, the Sentoku I-400). These submarines were also equipped with the most advanced torpedo of the conflict, the oxygen-propelled Long Lance. A plane from one such long-range fleet submarine, I-25, conducted what is still the only bombing attack on the continental United States when Warrant Flying Officer Nobuo Fujita attempted to start massive forest fires in the Pacific Northwest outside the town of Brookings, Oregon on September 9th, 1942. Other submarines undertook trans-oceanic missions to German-occupied Europe, such as I-30, I-8, I-34, I-29 and I-52, in one case flying a Japanese seaplane over France in a propaganda coup. In May 1942, Type A midget submarines were used in the Attack on Sydney Harbour, and the Battle of Madagascar. Overall, despite their technical prowesses, Japanese submarines were relatively unsuccesful. They were often used in offensive roles against warships, which were fast, maneuverable and well-defended compared to merchant ships. In 1942, Japanese submarines managed to sink two fleet carriers, one cruiser, and a few destroyers and other warships, and damage several others. They were not able to sustain these results afterwards, as Allied fleets were reinforced and became better organized. By the end of the war, submarines were instead often used to transport supplies to island garrisons. During the war, Japan managed to sink about 1 million tons of merchant shipping (184 ships), compared to 1.5 million tons for Britain (493 ships), 4.65 million tons for the US (1,079 ships) and 14.3 million tons for Germany (2,840 ships). Early models were not very maneuverable under water, could not dive very deep, and lacked radar. (Later in the war units that were fitted with radar were in some instances sunk due to the ability of US radar sets to detect their emissions. For example, Batfish (SS-310) sunk three such equipped submarines in the span of four days). After the end of the conflict, several of Japan's most original submarines were sent to Hawaii for inspection in "Operation Road's End" (I-400, I-401, I-201 and I-203) before being scuttled by the U.S. Navy in 1946 when the Soviets demanded to have access to the submarines as well.

Self-Defense Forces

I-201.]] Following Japan's surrender to the United States at the conclusion of World War II, and Japan's subsequent occupation, Japan's entire imperial military was dissolved in the new 1947 constitution which states, "The Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as a means of settling international disputes." Japan's current navy falls under the umbrella of the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) as the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF).

References

- Boxer, C.R. (1993) "The Christian Century in Japan 1549–1650", ISBN 1-85754-035-2
- Delorme, Pierre, Les Grandes Batailles de l'Histoire, Port-Arhur 1904, Socomer Editions (French)
- Dull, Paul S. (1978) A Battle History of The Imperial Japanese Navy ISBN 0-85059-295-X
- Evans, David C & Peattie, Mark R. (1997) Kaigun: strategy, tactics, and technology in the Imperial Japanese Navy, 1887–1941 Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, Maryland ISBN 0870211927
- Gardiner, Robert (editor) (2001) Steam, Steel and Shellfire, The Steam Warship 1815–1905, ISBN 0785814132
- Howe, Christopher (1996) The origins of Japanese Trade Supremacy, Development and technology in Asia from 1540 to the Pacific War, The University of Chicago Press ISBN 0-226-35485-7
- Ireland, Bernard (1996) Jane's Battleships of the 20th Century ISBN 0-00-470997-7
- Lyon, D.J. (1976) World War II warships, Excalibur Books ISBN 0-85613-220-9
- Nagazumi, Yōko (永積洋子) Red Seal Ships (朱印船), ISBN 4642066594 (Japanese)
- Tōgō Shrine and Tōgō Association (東郷神社・東郷会), Togo Heihachiro in images, illustrated Meiji Navy (図説東郷平八郎、目で見る明治の海軍), (Japanese)
- Japanese submarines 潜水艦大作戦, Jinbutsu publishing (新人物従来社) (Japanese)

Notes

# Video footage of the Sino-Japanese war: [http://www2.open.ed.jp/real/15655/01.mp2 Video (external link)]. # THE FIRST IRONCLADS In Japanese: [http://s-mizoe.hp.infoseek.co.jp/m160.html], [http://www12.plala.or.jp/k-hakuyo/index_ship/ship_9/3000.htm]. Also in English: [http://www.samurai-archives.com/mth.html]: "Iron clad ships, however, were not new to Japan and Hideyoshi; Oda Nobunaga, in fact, had many iron clad ships in his fleet." (referring to the anteriority of Japanese ironclads (1578) to the Korean Turtle ships (1592)). In Western sources, Japanese ironclads are described in CR Boxer "The Christian Century in Japan 1549–1650", p122, quoting the account of the Italian Jesuit Organtino visiting Japan in 1578. Nobunaga's ironclad fleet is also described in "A History of Japan, 1334–1615", Georges Samson, p309 ISBN 0804705259. Korea's "ironclad Turtle ships" were invented by Admiral Yi Sun-sin (1545–1598), and are first documented in 1592. Incidentally, Korea's iron plates only covered the roof (to prevent intrusion), and not the sides of their ships. The first Western ironclads date to 1859 with the French Gloire ("Steam, Steel and Shellfire"). #"Her armament of twelve quick-firing guns was formidable for her size, and her 23-knot speed made her the fastest cruiser in the world" Evans Kaigun, p17 #Evans Kaigun, p60-61 #Corbett Maritime Operations in the Russo-Japanese War, 2:333 #Howe, p284 #Howe, p268 #Evans, Kaigun, p84 # "Laid down before Dreadnought and intended to carry 12-inch guns, she should have been completed as the world's first all-big-gun battleship. However there were not enough Armstrong 1904 pattern 12-inch guns available, and 10-inch guns|had to be substituted for all but four of the weapons. Thus it was that future all-big gun battleships were to be called "dreadnoughts", and not "satsumas"." Jane's "Battleships of the 20th century", p68 #"when completed, the most formidable and most superbly designed capital ships in the world" Evans, Kaigun, p161 #Evans, Kaigun, p212 #Lyon World War II warships p34 #Lyon World War II warships p35 #Howe, p286 #"In many ways the Japanese were in the forefront of carrier design, and in 1941, the two Shokakus—the culmination of prewar Japanese design—were superior to any carrier in the world then in commission" Evans, Kaigun p323 #"For speed and maneuverability, for example the Zero was matchless; for range and speed few bombers surpassed the Mitsubishi G3M, and in the Kawanishi H8K, the Japanese navy had the world's best flying boat" Evans, Kaigun, p312 #"by 1941, by training and experience, Japan's naval aviators were undoubtedly the best among the world's three carrier forces" Evans, Kaigun, p325 #Japanese submarines, p70

External links

- [http://www2.memenet.or.jp/kinugawa/ship/2300.htm Nobunaga's ironclad navy]
- [http://homepage2.nifty.com/nishidah/e/index.htm Hiroshi Nishida's IJN site]
- [http://www.combinedfleet.com/ Imperial Japanese Navy Page]
- [http://www.jda.go.jp/JMSDF/info/event/cm_p/16cm.html JSDF video commercial] Imperial Japanese Navy Category:Military history of Japan Category:Fleets Imperial Japanese Navy ja:大日本帝国海軍

Japanese language

Japanese (Japanese: 日本語（にほんご Nihongo, ) is a language spoken by over 127 million people, mainly in Japan, but also by Japanese emigrant communities around the world. It is considered an agglutinative language and is distinguished by a system of honorifics reflecting the hierarchical nature of Japanese society, with verb forms and particular vocabulary which indicate the relative status of speaker and listener. The sound inventory of Japanese is relatively small, and it has a lexically-distinctive pitch accent system. Though the two languages are completely unrelated, Japanese has been heavily influenced by Chinese over a period of at least 1,500 years. Japanese is written with a mix of Chinese characters (kanji) and a modified syllabary, kana, also originally based on Chinese characters. Much vocabulary has been imported from Chinese, or created on Chinese models.

Classification

Historical linguists who specialize in Japanese agree that it is one of the two members of the Japonic language family, but remain divided as to the origins of the Japonic languages. An older view, still widely held by some linguists and many non-linguists, is that Japanese is a language isolate. As for its relation to other languages, there are several theories (presented roughly in descending order of certainty):
- Japanese is a relative of extinct languages spoken by historic cultures in what are now the Korean peninsula and Manchuria. The best attested of these is the language of Goguryeo (a.k.a. Koguryo), with the more poorly-attested languages of Baekje (a.k.a. Paekche) and Buyeo (a.k.a Puyo) hypothesized to also be related. The limited data on these languages, as well as these cultures' historic ties, are the primary evidence.
- Japanese is a relative of Korean. This theory is based on the high degree of similarity between Japanese and Korean grammar. Proponents of this theory have also put proposed Japanese-Korean cognates. The idea of a Japanese-Korean relationship has been largely subsumed into the Altaic theory.
- Japanese is a member of the Altaic language family. Other languages in this group include Mongolian, Tungusic, Turkish, and (according to most proponents) Korean. Evidence for this theory lies in the fact that like Turkish and Korean, Japanese is an agglutinative language. Additionally, there are a suggestive number of apparently regular correspondences in basic vocabulary, such as ishi "stone" to Turkic daş, yon "four" to Turkic dört, kura "saddle" to Turkic kürtün, kiru "to cut" to Turkic kir-, inu "dog" to Turkic it, kumo "cloud" to Turkic köl "shadow", etc. These examples originate from [http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/query.cgi?root=config&basename=\data\alt\altet this database], which contains a comprehensive list of comparisons and theoretical Altaic etymologies.
- Japanese is a creole language. Phonological similarities and geographical proximity to Austronesian languages have led to the theory that Japanese may be a kind of creole, with an Altaic substratum and an Austronesian superstratum, or vice versa.
- Japanese is a purely Austronesian language. This theory enjoys little currency, since the grammar and lexis of Japanese are vastly different from those of any known Austronesian language.
- Ono Susumu has suggested a possible relationship between Japanese and Tamil, a member of the Dravidian language family spoken in southern India. Specialists in Japanese historical linguistics all agree that Japanese is related to the Ryukyuan languages (including Okinawan); together, Japanese and Ryukyuan are grouped in the Japonic languages. Among these specialists, the possibility of a genetic relation to Goguryeo has the most evidence; relationship to Korean is considered plausible but is still up to debate; the Altaic hypothesis has somewhat less currency, though it has grown significantly more respectable in recent years, primarily due to the work of Sergei Starostin, et al. Almost all specialists reject the idea that Japanese could be genetically related to Austronesian/Malayo-Polynesian languages or Sino-Tibetan languages, and the idea that Japanese could be related to Tamil is almost entirely excluded. It should be noted that linguistic studies, like all fields, can be strongly affected by national politics and other non-academic factors. For example, most linguists would say that Romanian and Moldovan are essentially the same language, and that they are known as two different languages for political reasons. Japan's long-standing rivalries and enmities with virtually all of its neighbours make the study of linguistic connection particularly fraught with such political tensions. However, these tensions are less prevalent among non-Japanese researchers.

Geographic distribution

Although Japanese is spoken almost exclusively in Japan, it has been and is still sometimes spoken in countries besides Japan. When Japan occupied Korea, Taiwan, parts of China, and various Pacific islands, locals in those countries were forced to learn Japanese in empire-building programmes. As a result, there are still many people in these countries who speak Japanese instead of or as well as the local languages. In addition, emigrants from Japan, the majority of whom are found in Brazil, where the biggest Japanese community outside Japan is found, Australia (especially Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne), and the United States (notably California and Hawaii), also frequently speak Japanese. There is also a small community in Davao, Philippines. Their descendants (known as nikkei 日系, literally Japanese descendants), however, rarely speak Japanese fluently. There are estimated to be several million non-Japanese studying the language as well.

Official status

Japanese is the de facto official language of Japan, and Japan is the only country to have Japanese as an official working language. There are two forms of the language considered standard: or standard Japanese, and or the common language. As government policy has modernized Japanese, many of the distinctions between the two have blurred. Hyōjungo is taught in schools and used on television and in official communications, and is the version of Japanese discussed in this article.

Dialects

Dozens of dialects are spoken in Japan. The profusion is due to the mountainous island terrain and Japan's long history of both external and internal isolation. Dialects typically differ in terms of pitch accent, inflectional morphology, vocabulary, particle usage, and pronunciation. Some even differ in vowel and consonant inventories, although this is uncommon. Dialects from less central regions, such as the Tōhoku or Tsushima dialect may be unintelligible to speakers from other parts of the country. The dialect used in Kagoshima in southern Kyūshū is famous for being unintelligible not only to speakers of standard Japanese but to speakers of nearby dialects elsewhere in Kyūshū as well. Kagoshima dialect is 84% cognate with standard Tokyo dialect. The Ryukyuan languages are spoken in the islands of Okinawa Prefecture. Not only is each language unintelligible to Japanese speakers, but most are unintelligible to those who speak other Ryukyuan languages. Due to the close relationship of Ryukyuan and Japanese, they are still sometimes said to be only dialects of one language, but modern scholars consider them to be separate languages. Recently, Standard Japanese has become prevalent nationwide, due not only to television and radio, but also to increased mobility within Japan due to its system of roads, railways, and airports. Young people usually speak their local dialect and the standard language, though in most cases, the local dialect is influenced by the standard, and regional versions of "standard" Japanese have local-dialect influence.

Sounds

Japanese vowels are "pure" sounds, similar to their Italian or Spanish counterparts. The only unusual vowel is the high back vowel , which is like , but unrounded. Japanese has five vowels, and vowel length is phonemic, so each one has both a short and a long version. Some Japanese consonants have several allophones, which may give the impression of a larger inventory of sounds. However, some of these allophones have since become phonemic. For example, in the Japanese of the first half of the twentieth century, was palatalized to , approximately chi; however, now and are distinct, as evidenced by words like paatii "party" and tii "tea." The syllabic structure and the phonotactics are very simple: the only consonant clusters allowed within a syllable consist of one of a subset of the consonants plus /y/. However, consonant clusters across syllables within the word are common, though limited in type.

Grammar

The basic Japanese word order is Subject Object Verb. Subject and object are usually marked by particles which come after the word. The basic sentence structure is topic-comment. For example, Kochira wa Tanaka san desu. Kochira ("this") is the topic of the sentence, indicated by the particle wa. The verb is desu ("be"). As a phrase, Tanaka san desu is the comment. This sentence loosely translates to "As for this person, (it) is Mr./Mrs./Ms. Tanaka". Thus Japanese, like Chinese and Korean, is often called a topic-prominent language, which means it indicates the topic separately from the subject, and the two do not always coincide. The sentence Zō wa hana ga nagai. literally means, "As for elephants, the nose is long." The topic is zō "elephant," and the subject is hana "nose." Japanese nouns have neither number nor gender. Thus hon may mean "book" or "books". It is possible to explicitly indicate more than one, either by using numbers, often with a counter. Words for people are usually singular. Thus Tanaka san usually means Mr/Ms Tanaka. Words that refer to people and animals can be made to indicate groups with noun suffixes that indicate groups, such as -tachi. Though some words, like hitobito "people," always refer to more than one, Japanese has no true plurals. Verbs are conjugated to show tenses, of which there are two: past and present, or non-past, which is used for the present and the future. For some verbs, that represent an ongoing process, the -te iru form indicates a continuous (or progressive) tense. For others, that represent a change of state, the -te iru form indicates a perfect tense. For example, kite iru means "He has come (and is still here)", but tabete iru means "He is eating". Questions are formed by adding a question element to the end of the verb, usually ka. For example, :Kore de ii desu. "This is OK." becomes :Kore de ii desu ka. "Is this OK?" Negatives are formed with verb endings. For example, :Pan o taberu. "I will eat bread." becomes :Pan o tabenai. "I will not eat bread." with taberu "to eat" changing to the negative form tabenai "to not eat". The word desu/da is the copula verb. It corresponds approximately to the English be, but often takes on other roles. A separate function of "to be" is to indicate existence, as in "there is", for which the verbs aru and iru are used for inanimate and animate things, respectively. For example, :Neko ga iru. "There's a cat.", and :Ii kangae ga nai. "I haven't got a good idea." The verb "to do" (suru, polite form shimasu) is often used to make verbs from nouns (ai suru "to love", benkyō suru "to study", etc.). Japanese also has a huge number of compound verbs (e.g. tobidasu "to fly out, to flee," from tobu "to fly, to jump" + dasu "to go out"). There are three types of adjective: #keiyōshi, or i adjectives, which have a conjugating ending i which can become, for example, past, or negative. For example atsui ("to be hot") #:atsui hi "a hot day". #keiyōdōshi, or na adjectives, which are followed by a form of the copula, usually na. For example hen (strange) #:hen na hito "a strange person". #rentaishi, also called true adjectives, such as onaji "the same" #:onaji hi "the same day". Both keiyōshi and keiyōdōshi may predicate sentences. For example, :Gohan ga atsui. "The rice is hot." :Kare wa hen da. "He's strange." Both inflect, though they do not show the full range of conjugation found in true verbs. The rentaishi are few in number, and unlike the other words, are limited to modifying nouns. They never predicate sentences. Examples include ookina "big" and onaji "the same" (although there is a noun onaji that can be followed by da, as in onaji da). Both keiyōdōshi and keiyōshi form adverbs, by following with ni in the case of keiyōdōshi: :hen ni naru "become strange", and by changing i to ku in the case of keiyōshi: :atsuku naru "become hot". The grammatical function of nouns is indicated by postpositions, also called particles. These include
- no for possession, :watashi no kamera "my camera"
- ga for subject, :Kare ga yatta. "He did it."
- o for direct object :Nani o tabemasu ka? "What will (you) eat?"
- ni for indirect object, :Tanaka san ni kiite kudasai "Please ask Mr./Ms. Tanaka",
- wa for the topic and many others. Japanese has many words that are translated as pronouns in English, such as watashi or boku, both meaning "I". Which is used depends upon many factors, including the sex and status of the speaker, who is being spoken to, and the social setting. Their use is often optional, since Japanese is described as a so-called pro-drop language, i.e., one in which the subject of a sentence does not always need to be stated. For example, instead of saying :Watashi wa byōki desu. "I am sick.", if the speaker is understood to be the subject, one could simply say Byōki desu. A single verb can be a complete sentence: :yatta! "(I / we / they / etc) did (it)!".

Politeness

Unlike most western languages, Japanese has an extensive grammatical system to express politeness and formality. Broadly speaking, there are three main politeness levels in spoken Japanese: the plain form (kudaketa 砕けた), the simple polite form (teineigo 丁寧語) and the advanced polite form (keigo 敬語). Since most relationships are not equal in Japanese society, one person typically has a higher position. This position is determined by a variety of factors including job, age, experience, or even psychological state (e.g., a person asking a favour tends to do so politely). The person in the lower position is expected to use a polite form of speech, whereas the other might use a more plain form. Strangers will also speak to each other politely. Japanese children rarely use polite speech until they are teens, at which point they are expected to begin speaking in a more adult manner. See uchi-soto The plain form in Japanese is recognized by the shorter, dictionary form of verbs, and the da form of the copula. At the teinei level, verbs end with the helping verb -masu, and the copula desu is used. The advanced polite form, keigo, actually consists of two kinds of politeness: honorific language (sonkeigo) and humble (kenjōgo) language. Whereas teineigo is an inflectional system, keigo often employs many special (often irregular) honorific and humble verb forms. The difference between honorific and humble speech is particularly pronounced in the Japanese language. Humble language is used to talk about oneself or one's own group (company, family) whilst honorific language is mostly used when describing the interlocutor and his group. For example, the -san suffix ("Mr", "Mrs" or "Ms") is an example of honorific language. It is not used to talk about oneself or when talking about someone from one's company to an external person, since the company is the speaker's "group". Most nouns in the Japanese language may be made polite by the addition of o- or go-; as a prefix. o- is generally used for words of native Japanese origin, whereas go- is affixed to words of Chinese derivation. In some cases, the prefix has become a fixed part of the word, and is included even in regular speech, such as gohan 'cooked rice; meal.' Such a construction often indicates deference to either the item's owner or to the object itself. For example, the word tomodachi 'friend,' would become o-tomodachi when referring to the friend of someone of higher status (though mothers often use this form to refer to their children's friends). On the other hand, a female speaker may sometimes refer to mizu 'water' as o-mizu merely to show politeness; this contrasts with the more abrupt speech of men (though men may also use very polite forms when speaking to superiors). See Gender differences in spoken Japanese. Many researchers report that since the 1990s, the use of polite forms has become rarer. Needless to say, many older people disapprove of this trend. Most Japanese people employ politeness to indicate a lack of familiarity. That is, they use polite forms for new acquaintances, but if a relationship becomes more intimate, they no longer use them. This occurs regardless of age, social class, or gender. Young people usually receive extensive training in the "proper" use of polite language when they start to work for a company.

Vocabulary

The original language of Japan was the so-called yamato kotoba. In addition to this original language, Japanese also has a great number of words that were either borrowed from Chinese or constructed on Chinese patterns. These words entered the language from the fifth century onwards via contact with Chinese culture. Chinese based words comprise as much as seventy percent of the total vocabulary of the Japanese language and form as much as thirty to forty percent of words used in speech. A much smaller number of words has been borrowed from Korean and Ainu. Japan has also borrowed a number of words from other languages, gairaigo. This began with borrowings from Portuguese in the 16th century, followed by borrowing from Dutch during Japan's long isolation of the Edo period. With the Meiji restoration and the reopening of Japan in the 19th century, borrowing occurred from German, French and English. Currently, words of English origin are the most commonly borrowed. In the Meiji era, the Japanese also coined many neologisms using Chinese patterns to translate Western concepts. The Chinese and Koreans imported many of these pseudo-Chinese words into Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese via their kanji characters in the late 19th and early 20th century. For example, 政治 seiji ("politics"), and 化学 kagaku ("chemistry"). As a result, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese share a large common corpus of vocabulary in the same way a large number of Greco-Roman words is shared among European languages. In the past few decades, wasei-eigo (made-in-Japan English) has become a prominent phenomenon. Words such as wanpataan (< one + pattern, "to be in a rut", "to have a one-track mind") and sukinshippu (< skin + -ship, "physical contact"), although coined from English, are nonsensical in a non-Japanese context. A small number of such words, such as anime and cosplay, have been borrowed back into English. Additionally, many native Japanese words have become commonplace in English, due to the popularity of many Japanese cultural exports. Words such as sushi, judo, karate, sumo, karaoke, origami, samurai, haiku, ninja, sayonara, rickshaw (from 人力車 jinrikisha), futon, and many others have become part of the English language. See list of English words of Japanese origin for more.

Writing system

Modern Japanese is written in a mixture of three main scripts: kanji, characters of Chinese origin used to represent both Chinese loanwords into Japanese and a number of native Japanese morphemes; and two syllabaries: hiragana and katakana. The Roman alphabet (romaji) is also sometimes used.

Learning Japanese

Learning Japanese involves understanding grammar, pronunciation, the writing system, and acquiring adequate vocabulary. While the sound system is simple to master compared with those of other languages, the writing system poses a challenge for those not used to Chinese characters. On the other hand one learns a lot about Japanese culture by studying kanji characters. Japanese students begin to learn kanji characters from their first grade of an elementary school. A guideline created by the Japanese Ministry of Education, the kyōiku kanji, specifies the 1,006 simple characters a child is to learn by the end of sixth grade. Children continue to study another 939 characters in a junior high school, which totally covers 1,945 jōyō kanji (common kanji) characters, which are usually considered sufficient for everyday life. Japanese can be learned without studying Chinese characters. However, Japanese borrowed thousands upon thousands of words from Chinese, and for various reasons, many of these Chinese-based words are now homophones (words pronounced identically) in Japanese. This may make it necessary to learn the characters if one wants to learn an extended vocabulary, although blind Japanese people who cannot read any characters are able to function in the spoken language without problems, since most words, even if not written down, can be understood by the context. "Nihon" (にほん) can mean "two long, thin objects" (二本) as well as "Japan" (日本). However, these two words have different accents, and are distinct even in isolation. Major universities throughout the world provide Japanese language courses. Moreover, South Korea, Australia, France, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Denmark and some states of the United States provide the language course at high schools or lower level schools. About 2.3 million people studied the language worldwide in 2003. 900,000 South Koreans, 389,000 Chinese people, 381,000 Australians, and 140,000 Americans study Japanese in lower and higher educational institutions. The Japanese government provides standard tests to measure spoken and written comprehension of Japanese for second language learners; the most prominent is the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT). The Japanese External Trade Organization JETRO organizes the Business Japanese Proficiency Test, to test ability to understand Japanese in a business setting. In Japan, more than 90,000 foreign students study at Japanese universities and Japanese language schools, including 77,000 Chinese and 15,000 South Koreans in 2003. Furthermore, local governments and some NPO groups provide free Japanese language classes for foreign residents, including Japanese Brazilians and foreign wives married to Japanese nationals. See also List of resources for learning Japanese.

External links

- [http://users.tmok.com/~tumble/jpp/japor.html Origin of the Japanese People and Language]
- [http://web.archive.org/web/20030618070124/http%3A//www-lib.icu.ac.jp/LibShuppan/lecture/6-2-1.html North Kyushu Creole] – A hypothesis concerning the multilingual formation of Japanese
- [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=1263 Ethnologue report for Japanese]
- [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=jpn Ethnologue report for language code JPN]

Bibliography

- Bloch, Bernard. (1946). Studies in colloquial Japanese I: Inflection. Journal of the American Oriental Society, 66, 97-109.
- Bloch, Bernard. (1946). Studies in colloquial Japanese II: Syntax. Language, 22, 200-248.
- Chafe, William L. (1976). Giveness, contrastiveness, definiteness, subjects, topics, and point of view. In C. Li (Ed.), Subject and topic (pp. 25-56). New York: Academic Press. ISBN 0-1244-7350-4.
- Kuno, Susumu. (1973). The structure of the Japanese language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. ISBN 0-2621-1049-0.
- Kuno, Susumu. (1976). Subject, theme, and the speaker's empathy: A re-examination of relativization phenomena. In Charles N. Li (Ed.), Subject and topic (pp. 417-444). New York: Academic Press. ISBN 0-1244-7350-4.
- Martin, Samuel E. (1975). A reference grammar of Japanese. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-3000-1813-4.
- McClain, Yoko Matsuoka. (1981). Handbook of modern Japanese grammar: 口語日本文法便覧 [Kōgo Nihon bumpō]. Tokyo: Hokuseido Press. ISBN 4-5900-0570-0; ISBN 0-8934-6149-0.
- Miller, Roy. (1967). The Japanese language. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
- Miller, Roy. (1980). Origins of the Japanese language: Lectures in Japan during the academic year, 1977-78. Seattle: University of Washington Press. ISBN 0-2959-5766-2.
- Mizutani, Osmau; & Mizutani, Nobuko. (1987). How to be polite in Japanese: 日本語の敬語 [Nihongo no keigo]. Tokyo: Japan Times. ISBN 4-7890-0338-8; ISBN 4-7890-0338-9.
- Shibatani, Masayoshi. (1990). Japanese. In B. Comrie (Ed.), The major languages of east and south-east Asia. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-4150-4739-0.
- Shibatani, Masayoshi. (1990). The languages of Japan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-5213-6070-6 (hbk); ISBN 0-5213-6918-5 (pbk).
- Shibamoto, Janet S. (1985). Japanese women's language. New York: Academic Press. ISBN 0-1264-0030-X. Graduate Level
- Tsujimura, Natsuko. (1996). An introduction to Japanese linguistics. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers. ISBN 0-6311-9855-5 (hbk); ISBN 0-6311-9856-3 (pbk). Upper Level Textbooks
- Tsujimura, Natsuko. (Ed.) (1999). The handbook of Japanese linguistics. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers. ISBN 0-6312-0504-7. Readings/Anthologies zh-min-nan:Ji̍t-pún-oē ko:일본어 ms:Bahasa Jepun ja:日本語 simple:Japanese language th:ภาษาญี่ปุ่น

1947

1947 (MCMXLVII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will take you to calendar).

Events

January

- January 1 - British mines nationalized
- January 1 - Nigeria gains limited autonomy
- January 1 - The Canadian Citizenship Act went into effect
- January 3 - Proceedings of the U.S. Congress are televised for the first time
- January 10 - United Nations takes control of the free city of Trieste
- January 15 - Elizabeth Short (the "Black Dahlia") is found murdered
- January 16 - Inauguration of Vincent Auriol as a president of France
- January 24 - Demetrios Maximos founds monarchist government in Athens
- January 25 - Philippinean plane crashes in Hong Kong with $5 million worth of gold and money
- January 30 - February 8 - heavy blizzard in Canada buries towns from Winnipeg to Calgary

February

- February 3 - In Snag, Yukon Territory, -63 degrees Celsius
- February 3 - Percival Prattis becomes the first African American news correspondent allowed in the United States House of Representatives and Senate press gallery.
- February 5 - Boleslaw Bierut becomes president of Poland
- February 10 - Paris peace treaties signed between the World War II Allies and Italy, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria: Italy cedes most of Istria to Yugoslavia
- February 12 - A meteor creates a crater into Sikhote-Alin, Soviet Union
- February 17 - Propaganda: The Voice of America begins to transmit radio broadcasts into the Soviet Union.
- February 20 - State of Prussia ceases to exist
- February 20 - Explosion at the O'Connor Electro-Plating Co in Los Angeles, California - 17 dead, 100 buildings damaged, 22-foot crater
- February 21 - In New York City, Edwin Land demonstrates the first "instant camera", the Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America.
- February 23 - International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is founded.
- February 28 - USA gives France a military base in Casablanca
- February 28 - In Taiwan, civil disorder is put down with large loss of civilian lives.

March-May

- March 1 - The International Monetary Fund begins to operate.
- March 1 - Wernher von Braun marries his first cousin, 18-year-old Maria von Quirstorp.
- March 1 - Japanese city Tsushima, Aichi is founded
- March 6 - USS Newport News, the first air-conditioned naval ship, is launched from Newport News, Virginia.
- March 12 - The Truman Doctrine is proclaimed to help stem the spread of Communism.
- March 15 - Hindus and Muslims clash in Punjab
- March 21 - Homer Collyer of the Collyer brothers is found dead in their house in Harlem, New York City. His brother is found April 8
- March 25 - A coalmine explosion in Centralia, Illinois kills 111.
- March 28 - WW2 Japanese booby trap explodes in Corregidor - 28 dead
- March 29 - Rebellion against French rule erupts in Madagascar
- April 16 - The Texas City Disaster - Ammonium nitrate cargo of SS Grandcap explodes in Texas City, Texas - 552 dead, 3000 injured, 200 lost, 20 city blocks destroyed
- May 1 - Gang of Salvatore Giuliano opens fire on a labor parade near Portella Della Ginestra, Sicily; Eleven killed, thirty wounded
- May 3 - New post-war Japanese constitution goes into effect.
- May 22 - Cold War: In an effort to fight the spread of Communism, President Harry S. Truman signs an act implementing the Truman Doctrine. The act granted $400 million in military and economic aid to Turkey and Greece.

June

- June 5 - Secretary of State Gen George Marshall outlines the Marshall Plan for U.S. aid to Europe.
- June 10 - Saab produces its first automobile.
- June 15 - Portuguese government orders 11 military officers and 19 university professors to resign accused of revolutionary activity
- June 20 - Bugsy Siegel found shot in the Beverly Hills mansion of Virginia Hill
- June 21 - A Seaman named Harold Dahl claims to have seen six UFOs near Maury Island. The next morning Dahl reports the first modern MIB encounter.
- June 23 - The United States Senate follows the United States House of Representatives in overriding U.S. President Harry S. Truman's veto of the Taft-Hartley Act.

July

Taft-Hartley Act
- July 1 - The Australian real estate franchise L. J. Hooker lists on the Australian Stock Exchange
- July 7 - Downed UFO believed to be found in the Roswell UFO incident
- July 10 - Princess Elizabeth announces engagement to Philip Mountbatten
- July 11 - Exodus (ship) departs France to Palestine with 4500 Jewish Holocaust survivor refugees
- July 18 - Following wide media and UNSCOP coverage, Exodus (ship) is captured by British troops and refused entry to Palestine in the port of Haifa
- July 18 - President Harry S. Truman signs the Presidential Succession Act into law which places the Speaker of the House and the Senate President Pro Tempore next in the line of succession after the United States Vice President.
- July 19 - Murder of Burmese nationalist Aung San
- July 24 - 100 year anniversary of Brigham Young leading 148 Mormon pioneers into the Salt Lake Valley, resulting in the establishment of Salt Lake City.
- July 26 - Cold War: U.S. President Harry S. Truman signs the National Security Act into United States law creating the Central Intelligence Agency, Department of Defense, Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the National Security Council.
- July 29 - After being shut off on November 9, 1946 for a refurbishment, ENIAC, one of the world's first digital computers, is turned on after a memory upgrade. It will remain in continuous operation until October 2, 1955.
- July 30 - Thor Heyerdahl sails with Kon-Tiki

August

Kon-Tiki Kon-Tiki
- August 5 - Netherlands stops political actions in Indonesia
- August 7 - Thor Heyerdahl's balsa wood raft the Kon-Tiki, smashes into the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotu Islands after a 101 day, 4,300 mile journey across the Pacific Ocean proving that pre-historic peoples could have traveled from South America.
- August 7 - The Bombay Municipal Corporation formally takes over the Bombay Electric Supply and Transport (BEST).
- August 9 - Beginning the 6 Scout World Jamboree - see [http://www.jamboree1947.com Jamboree Scout 1947] (in French)
- August 14 - Pakistan gains independence from the British Empire under the leadership of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah. While the transition is officially at midnight on this day, Pakistan celebrates its independence on August 14 compared to India on the 15th. Muhammad Ali Jinnah became the first Governor General of Pakistan.
- August 15 - Following decades of nonviolent resistance and periodic civil unrest from 1919, India gains independence from the British Empire. Pakistan splits from India. Jawaharlal Nehru takes office as first Prime Minister of India.
- August 15 - The Khan of Baluchistan declares independence (acceeds to Pakistan in 1948)
- August 16 - In Greece, General Markos Vafiadis takes over
- August 23 - Prime Minister of Greece Dimitrios Maximos resigns.
- August 27 - When the French government lowers the bread ration to 200 grams, it causes riots in Verdun and Le Mans

September-October

- September 4-September 21 - Hurricane in southeast Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama - 51 killed
- September 9 - "First actual case of (a computer) bug being found" - a moth lodged in a relay of a Mark II computer at Harvard.
- September 13 - Nehru suggests transfer of 4 million Hindus and Muslims between India and Pakistan.
- September 18 - The United States Army Air Forces, along with some components of the United States Navy's air arm, becomes the United States Air Force.
- October 14 - American test pilot, Captain Chuck Yeager flies a Bell X-1 faster than the speed of sound, the first man to do so in level flight.
- October 20 - The Indo-Pakistani War of 1947 begins
- October 30 - The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which is the foundation of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) is founded.

November

- November 2 - In California, Designer Howard Hughes performs the maiden flight of the Spruce Goose; the largest fixed-wing aircraft ever built (flight lasted only eight minutes).
- November 2 - Earthquake in Chilean Andes - 233 dead
- November 10 - Arrest of four steel workers in Marseille begins a communist rioting that spreads to Paris
- November 16 - 15.000 demonstrate in Brussels against the relatively short sentences of Nazis.
- November 16 - British begin to withdraw their troops from Palestine.
- November 20- Her Royal Highness Princess Elizabeth marries the Duke of Edinburgh at Westminster Abbey, London.
- November 20 - Paul Ramadier resigns as Prime Minister of France - he is succeeded by Robert Schuman. Schuman calls 80.000 reservists to quell the rioting miners
- November 24 - Red Scare:The United States House of Representatives votes 346 to 17 to approve citations of contempt of U.S. Congress against the so-called Hollywood 10 after the 10 had refused to co-operate with the House Un-American Activities Committee concerning allegations of Communist influence in the movie industry, (the 10 were blacklisted by Hollywood movie studios the next day).
- November 25 - New Zealand ratifies the Statute of Westminster and thus becomes independent of legislative control by the United Kingdom.
- November 27 - In Paris, police occupy editorial offices of communist newspapers.
- November 29 - The United Nations General Assembly votes to partition Palestine between Arabs and Jews.

December

- December 3 - French communist strikers derail Paris-Tourcoing Express train because of false rumors that it was transporting soldiers - 21 dead
- December 3 - Tennessee Williams' play A Streetcar Named Desire opens on Broadway.
- December 4 - French interior minister Jules Moch secures emergency measures against riots after six days of violent arguments in the national assembly
- December 9 - French labour unions calls off the general strike and begin negotiations with the French government
- December 23 - the Transistor is invented.
- December 30 - King Michael of Romania abdicates

Unknown dates

- Prussia is legally abolished in March by the Allied Control Council following World War II and the establishment of the Oder-Neisse line as Germany's eastern border.
- The House Un-American Activities Committee begin their investigations of communism in Hollywood.
- Cambridge University begins to admits women as full students.
- Mikhail Kalashnikov designs the AK-47 assault rifle.
- Walter Morrison invents the Frisbee.
- Raytheon produces first commercial microwave oven.
- Women's suffrage is granted in Argentina.

Births

January

- January 1 - Afeni Shakur
- January 2 - Ai
- January 2 - Jack Hanna, American zoologist
- January 3 - Patricia Anthony
- January 6 - Sandy Denny, British vocalist (d. 1978)
- January 8 - David Bowie, English musician
- January 8 - Jenny Boyd
- January 8 - Samuel Schmid, Swiss Federal Councilor
- January 16 - Laura Schlessinger, American psychologist and radio talk show host
- January 18 - Takeshi Kitano, Japanese film director and actor
- January 23 - Thomas R. Carper, U.S. Senator from Delaware.
- January 24 - Warren Zevon, American musician (d. 2003)
- January 29 - Linda B. Buck, American biologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
- January 30 - Les Barker, English poet
- January