Жапониядағы 1923 жылғы қантөгіс жер сілкінісі және корей халқының қырғыны

Megathrust earthquake and tsunami centered in Honshu, Japan

The Great Kantō earthquake (関東大地震) also known in Japanese as (関東大震災) struck the Kantō Plain on the main Japanese island of Honshū at 11:58:32 JST (02:58:32 UTC) on Saturday, September 1, 1923. Varied accounts indicate the duration of the earthquake was between four and ten minutes. Extensive firestorms and even a fire whirl added to the death toll. The earthquake had a magnitude of 7.9 on the moment magnitude scale , with its focus deep beneath Izu Ōshima Island in Sagami Bay. The cause was a rupture of part of the convergent boundary where the Philippine Sea Plate is subducting beneath the Okhotsk Plate along the line of the Sagami Trough. In the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, the Kantō Massacre began. Rumors emerged that ethnic Koreans in Japan had poisoned wells or were planning to attack cities. In response, the Japanese police and bands of armed vigilantes killed ethnic Korean civilians and anyone they suspected of being Korean. Estimates of the death toll from the massacre vary, with most third party sources citing fatalities ranging from 6,000 to 10,000. Drills, as well as knowledge promotion events, are centered around that date as well as awards ceremonies for people of merit.

Ethnic Koreans were massacred after the earthquake. The Home Ministry declared martial law and ordered all sectional police chiefs to make maintenance of order and security a top priority. A false rumor was spread that Koreans were taking advantage of the disaster, committing arson and robbery, and were in possession of bombs. Anti Korean sentiment was heightened by fear of the Korean independence movement. In the confusion after the quake, mass murder of Koreans by mobs occurred in urban Tokyo and Yokohama, fueled by rumors of rebellion and sabotage. The government reported that 231 Koreans were killed by mobs in Tokyo and Yokohama in the first week of September. Independent reports said the number of dead was far higher, ranging from 6,000 to 10,000. Some newspapers reported the rumors as fact, including the allegation that Koreans were poisoning wells. The numerous fires and cloudy well water, a little known effect of a large quake, all seemed to confirm the rumors of the panic stricken survivors who were living amidst the rubble. Vigilante groups set up roadblocks in cities, and tested civilians with a shibboleth for supposedly Korean accented Japanese: deporting, beating, or killing those who failed. Army and police personnel colluded in the vigilante killings in some areas. Of the 3,000 Koreans taken into custody at the Army Cavalry Regiment base in Narashino, Chiba Prefecture, 10% were killed at the base, or after being released into nearby villages. A monument commemorating this was built in 1993 in Wenzhou. In response, the government called upon the Japanese Army and the police to protect Koreans; 23,715 Koreans were placed in protective custody across Japan, 12,000 in Tokyo alone. The chief of police of Tsurumi (or Kawasaki by some accounts) is reported to have publicly drunk the well water to disprove the rumor that Koreans had been poisoning wells. In some towns, even police stations into which Korean people had escaped were attacked by mobs, whereas in other neighborhoods, civilians took steps to protect them. The Army distributed flyers denying the rumor and warning residents against attacking Koreans, but in many cases, vigilante activity only ceased as a result of Army operations against it. In several documented cases, soldiers and policemen participated in the killings, and in other cases, authorities handed groups of Koreans over to local vigilantes, who proceeded to kill them. Amidst the mob violence against Koreans in the Kantō Region, regional police and the Imperial Army used the pretext of civil unrest to liquidate political dissidents. Director Chongkong Oh made two documentary films about the pogrom: Hidden Scars: The Massacre of Koreans from the Arakawa River Bank to Shitamachi in Tokyo (1983) and The Disposed of Koreans: The Great Kanto Earthquake and Camp Narashino (1986). They largely consist of interviews with survivors, witnesses, and perpetrators. The importance of obtaining and providing accurate information following natural disasters has been emphasized in Japan ever since. Earthquake preparation literature in modern Japan almost always directs citizens to carry a portable radio and use it to listen to reliable information, and not to be misled by rumors in the event of a large earthquake.

Following the devastation of the earthquake, some in the government considered the possibility of moving the capital elsewhere. Proposed sites for the new capital were even discussed. Japanese commentators interpreted the disaster as an act of divine punishment to admonish the Japanese people for their self centered, immoral, and extravagant lifestyles. In the long run, the response to the disaster was a strong sense that Japan had been given an unparalleled opportunity to rebuild the city and rebuild Japanese values. In reconstructing the city, the nation, and the Japanese people, the earthquake fostered a culture of catastrophe and reconstruction that amplified discourses of moral degeneracy and national renovation in interwar Japan, fostering a culture of militarism. After the earthquake, Gotō Shinpei organized a reconstruction plan of Tokyo with modern networks of roads, trains, and public services. Parks were placed all over Tokyo as refuge spots, and public buildings were constructed with stricter standards than private buildings to accommodate refugees. The outbreak of World War II and subsequent destruction severely limited resources. Frank Lloyd Wright received credit for designing the Imperial Hotel, Tokyo, to withstand the quake, although in fact the building was damaged, though standing, by the shock. The destruction of the US embassy caused Ambassador Cyrus Woods to relocate the embassy to the hotel. Wright's structure withstood the anticipated earthquake stresses, and the hotel remained in use until 1968. The innovative design used to construct the Imperial Hotel, and its structural fortitude, inspired the creation of the popular Lincoln Logs toy. The unfinished battlecruiser Amagi was in drydock being converted into an aircraft carrier in Yokosuka in compliance with the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922. The earthquake damaged the ship's hull beyond repair, leading it to be scrapped, and the unfinished fast battleship Kaga was converted into an aircraft carrier in its place. In contrast to London, where typhoid fever had been steadily declining since the 1870s, the rate in Tokyo remained high, more so in the upper class residential northern and western districts than in the densely populated working class eastern district. An explanation is the decline of waste disposal, which became particularly serious in the northern and western districts when traditional methods of waste disposal collapsed due to urbanization. The 1923 earthquake led to record high morbidity due to unsanitary conditions following the earthquake, and it prompted the establishment of antityphoid measures and the building of urban infrastructure. The Honda Point Disaster on the West Coast of the United States, in which seven US Navy destroyers ran aground and 23 people died, has been attributed to navigational errors caused by unusual currents set up by the earthquake in Japan.

Beginning in 1960, every September 1st is designated as Disaster Prevention Day to commemorate the earthquake and remind people of the importance of preparedness, as August and September are the peak of the typhoon season. Schools and public and private organizations host disaster drills. Tokyo is located near a fault zone beneath the Izu Peninsula which, on average, causes a major earthquake about once every 70 years, and is also located near the Sagami Trough, a large subduction zone that has potential for large earthquakes. Every year on this date, schools across Japan take a moment of silence at the precise time the earthquake hit in memory of the lives lost. Some discreet memorials are located in Yokoamicho Park in Sumida Ward, at the site of the open space in which an estimated 38,000 people were killed by a single fire whirl. the story mentions the Great Kantō earthquake, causing the boy unable to contact her. The short story was adapted to the song "Taishō Roman" by Yoasobi, which the music video shows the giant clock pointing to 11:58, the time that the earthquake occurred.

The earthquake is recreated in the 1983 asadora Oshin, from episode 114 to 117, showing the financial and human losses the disaster caused, as the new factory Oshin and her husband Ryuzo built is destroyed, and their faithful retainer Genji dies protecting their son Yu. The earthquake becomes a major a plot point as it drives the family to move to Saga, to live with Ryuzo's parents. An incident after the Great Kanto earthquake is recreated in the 1998 film, After Life, known in Japanese as Wandafuru Raifu (or Wonderful Life). Directed by Hirokazu Kore eda, the plot takes place in a way station for those who have just died. The newly deceased will take their happiest memory with them into the afterlife. One of the newly deceased has a memory of being in the woods after the earthquake. Michiyo Akaishi's josei manga Akatsuki no Aria features the earthquake in volume 8. Several places frequented by the protagonist Aria Kanbara, like her boarding school and the house of the rich Nishimikado clan that she is an illegitimate member of, become shelters for the wounded and the homeless. Aria's birth mother is severely injured by debris and later dies, and this triggers a subplot about Aria's own heritage. In Yuu Watase's 2017 josei manga Fushigi Yûgi Byakko Senki, the heroine Suzuno Osugi enters The Universe of the Four Gods for the first time right after the earthquake: her father Takao, who is dying from injuries he suffered when the family house fatally collapsed on him and Suzuno's mother Tamayo, orders her to do so, so she will survive the disaster and its aftermath. After a brief time there, she's sent back to the already destroyed Tokyo, and she, alongside her soon to be love interest Seiji Horie and two young boys named Hideo and Kenichi, is taken in by a friend of the late Takao, Dr. Oikawa. Waki Yamato's manga Haikara san ga Tōru actually reaches its climax after the Great Kantō earthquake—which happens right before the wedding of the female lead, Benio Hanamura, and her second love Tousei. Benio barely survives when the Christian church she's getting married in collapses, and then she finds her long lost love Shinobu whose other love interest Larissa is among the victims; they get back together, and Tousei allows them to. In Makiko Hirata's josei manga and anime Kasei Yakyoku the story finishes some time after the earthquake, as a corollary to the main love triangle between the noblewoman Akiko Hashou, her lover Taka Itou, and Akiko's personal maid Sara Uchida. The earthquake happens just as the marriage between Akiko and her fiancé Kiyosu Saionji is announced. Sara is in the streets, and Taka is taking Sara's brother Junichirou to a hospital after he was injured in a yakuza related incident. The Hashou's mansion is destroyed, leading to an emotional confrontation between Akiko and Saionji; meanwhile, Sara's humble house in the suburbia is also destroyed and her and Junichirou's mother dies of injuries she sustained in the earthquake. Maurice Tourneur's 1924 silent film Torment has an earthquake in Yokohama in its plot, and uses footage of the Kantō earthquake in the film. In the 2013 animated film by director Hayao Miyazaki, The Wind Rises, the protagonist Jiro Horikoshi is traveling to Tokyo by train to study engineering. On the way, the 1923 earthquake strikes, damaging the train and causing a huge fire in the city. Part of the story in the manga and anime Taisho Otome Fairy Tale (by Sana Kirioka) happens during the earthquake. At that time Yuzuki was in Tokyo visiting a friend, causing Tamahiko to worry, and follow her to Tokyo. In the 2022 animated film Suzume no Tojimari, directed by Makoto Shinkai, the earthquake is briefly alluded to in a segment recounting Tokyo's devastation 100 years prior.

Aldrich, Daniel P. "Social, not physical, infrastructure: the critical role of civil society after the 1923 Tokyo earthquake." Disasters 36.3 (2012): 398–419. Borland, Janet. "Voices of vulnerability and resilience: children and their recollections in post earthquake Tokyo." Japanese Studies 36.3 (2016): 299–317. Clancey, Gregory. "The Changing Character of Disaster Victimhood: Evidence from Japan's 'Great Earthquakes'." Critical Asian Studies 48.3 (2016): 356–379. Hunter, Janet. "'Extreme confusion and disorder'? the Japanese economy in the Great Kantō earthquake of 1923." Journal of Asian Studies (2014): 753–773 online. Hunter, Janet, and Kota Ogasawara. "Price shocks in regional markets: Japan's Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923." Economic History Review 72.4 (2019): 1335–1362. Pdf. Weisenfeld, Gennifer. Imaging Disaster: Tokyo and the visual culture of Japan's Great Earthquake of 1923 (Univ of California Press, 2012).