Great awar Japan

[Steve1871]

I check other forum,Asia pacific, seems very little interest in Japan. It is true that Japan played very little effort in the Great War, Minor Naval warfare. Anyway, if anyone interested , here if few pix's of Great War period Japanese Type 30 carbine

[genegwf]

Very nice carbine! I have not seen one before, thanks for posting your pictures.

 

Gene

[Steve1871]

Thanks Genegwf

I rarely home, on this forum, which is great, not very much interest on the Japan side, so did not take too many pic's.

Never shot it. As tiny as it is, I wonder what kind of a kick it has

[Chasemuseum]

A very interesting carbine. This is the Type 30 "hook safety" 1897 "Arisaka" weapon rather than the much more common Type 38 (1905) which was their primary weapon through both WW1 and WW2. The T30 design was found to have various unsatisfactory features during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905, hence the replacement model.  They remained as a reserve grade weapon until the end of WW2. 

 

A large quantity (150,000) of Japanese rifles (T30 & T38, both full length rifles and carbines) were sold to the British Government early in 1914 and 1915 (List of Changes 17213  24th Feb 1915) and used by both the Army and Navy as second grade weapons. Latter in the war a large quantity of these were supplied to Russia and used on the Eastern Front. The Russian m1916 Federov semi-automatic rifle was built in 6.5mm Arisaka as it was a convenient cartridge due to being part of the Russian ordnance system to support their Arisakas.

 

Japanese involvement in the war was important for the German Empire and navy. Early in the war, Japan captured the German concession on the China coast (Tientsin), This deprived the German Pacific squadron an effective base. The squadron moved across the Pacific Ocean to south America, having a major success against the Royal Navy at the Battle of Coronel. After steaming to the south Atlantic, it was trapped at the Royal Navy's major coaling station - the Falkland Islands and destroyed in a battle there. Without the loss of access to Tientsin  the Pacific Squadron would have been extremely difficult to isolate and destroy. As it was, the German raiders in the Indian Ocean (Emden, Konigsberg and Wolf) were elusive and difficult to manage.

 

The Japanese Navy assisted New Zealand and Australia in providing the battleship Ibuke, which provided an escort for the 1st contingent of the NZEF from New Zealand to Australia, and then the combined NZEF & AIF  contingents through the Southern and Indian Oceans. The Ibuki stayed with the convey when MHAS Sydney was detached to investigate the report of the Emden being at the Cocos Islands telegraph & underseal cable repeater station at the Cocos Islands. The Emden was destroyed (beached & burning) in the subsequent battle.

 

Japan also occupied several pacific island groups which were German colonies, eliminating these as wireless and maritime coaling stations.

 

As such the Japanese role was significant from a strategic perspective. They helped bottle-up the Central Alliance in Europe, reducing their impact on global trade and permitting military resources to be concentrated rather than requiring huge quantities to be dissipated on global garrisons - this is excepting German East Africa, where relatively minor German colonial forces operated successfully throughout the war and where over 20 times their numbers were required to contain them in operations that were never successful.  

 

Regards shooting a T30 carbine, I have never done this but have shot both the T38 rifle and carbine, using modern Norma ammunition. 6.5mm Arisaka is a lovely shooting cartridge. The recoil is very light. A number of cavalry carbines have very unpleasant muzzle blast (Spanish m98 police carbines in 7.62 NATO are deafening). For the Arisaka carbine muzzle blast was not an issue (note that I used Norma not surplus military ammunition).  I found the T38 carbine a delight to shoot.

 

I am not entirely sure I would shoot a T30. Spare parts are hard to find if anything breaks, while T38 parts a readily available.

 

Cheers

Ross

 

 

 

 

[Steve1871]

Thank you Very Cery much Ross.

I had no idea Japan was so involved in the Great War. I knew Britain bought some Japanese rifles, but I thought wrong, I thought they were type 38.great responce, thanks again

Steve

[David Filsell]

Ross is spot on in his evaluation.

[T8HANTS]

In a private diary I had access to, the author noted that the troop ship Aquitania had been escorted part way across the Med by a squadron that included a Japanese warship apparently.

 

[Knotty]

The Imperial Japanese navy sent 14 destroyers and a cruiser to the Mediterranean to help in protection of troopships. One of the Japanese destroyers, Sakaki, was sunk by an Austrian U-boat in June 1917 off Crete. A total of 59 were killed, including Cmdr. Taichi Uehara, the ship’s captain. 

In one of the Maltese CWGC* cemeteries there is a memorial to over 70 Japanese sailors who gave their lives in the Mediterranean.

*The Capuccini Military Cemetery

Edited 12 June , 2019 by Knotty
Cemetery name

[4thGordons]

Here are my (T38) Carbine and Rifle

 

And a member of the DLI with a Arisaka rifle

Chris

 

[Steve1871]

Hey Knotty!

 As I say in my profile, History is like a treasure hunt, never know what you will find, and the Great War was so vast, after many years, I still scratching the surface,

We skim over the big battles. The Somme, the trenches, Jutland and all, but it is all the small battles that make up the whole. Your

brief telling of 14  Japanese destroyers and a cruiser being stationed in the Med is a real "GEM", thanks, I hope to learn more some day

[Keith_history_buff]

A prior thread, which makes for a great read about the Arisaka

 

[Steve1871]

Hey 4G, wish I had Type 38 rifle and carbine. Have read in several places that the Type 38 has the strongest receivers of any rifle in both world war's, both of yours look great. 

Thank's for sharing

[trajan]

What still astounds me is how the senior strategists of the major powers in WW1 never seemed to have read or absorbed the various military commission reports on the Russo-Japanese War which would have helped avoid so much of a mess in 1915-18. 

Edited 9 July , 2019 by trajan