Japan and Turkey: A Century of Imperial Patronage and Mutual Aid

Roots of a Rare Friendship

In 2024, Japan and the Republic of Turkey celebrated 100 years of diplomatic relations. Their governments established formal ties on August 6, 1924, and the Japanese embassy in Turkey opened the following year, in March 1925. That November, Obata Yukichi arrived in Istanbul to serve as Japan’s first ambassador to Turkey.

But the roots of this friendship are typically traced back further, to the events surrounding the wreck of the Ottoman frigate Ertugrul on September 16, 1890.

The Ertugrul arrived in Yokohama in June 1890 on a goodwill visit ordered by Sultan Abul Hamid II of the Ottoman Empire. The ship was making its way home that September when it was crippled by a storm and crashed on the rocks off the coast of Kushimoto, a community on the island of Kii Oshima (Wakayama Prefecture). A handful of sailors managed to clamber ashore and seek help from Kushimoto’s townspeople. Although the shipwreck claimed the lives of 581 officers and sailors, 69 survived, thanks largely to the townspeople’s valiant rescue efforts and Japan’s subsequent care for the victims.

Japan’s Imperial Diplomacy

The Ertugrul episode set the tone for Japan-Turkey relations in two ways. The first aspect was the pivotal role of the Imperial Household. The Ertugrul’s courtesy call was part of a diplomatic exchange that began with an official visit by Prince Komatsu (Akihito) to Istanbul in 1887.

Following the establishment of diplomatic relations between Japan and the Republic of Turkey, the Japan-Türkiye Society was established in 1926 with Prince Takamatsu (Nobuhito; third son of Emperor Taishō) as its first president. The society’s current president (as of November 2024) is Princess Akiko. Prince Mikasa (Takahito), the younger brother of Emperor Shōwa, was a scholar of Middle Eastern history with a special interest in Turkey. The prince visited the country in April 1963 and met with the president and prime minister. He played a central role in the establishment of the Middle Eastern Culture Center (Mitaka, Tokyo), completed in 1979, and the affiliated Japanese Institute of Anatolian Archeology, which opened in Turkey’s Kirsehir Province in 1998. Led by archeologist Ōmura Sachihiro, the institute is carrying out excavations at the sites of Kaman-Kalehöyük, Yassihöyük, and Büklükale.

Crown Prince Akishino and his wife visited Turkey in mid-December 2024 to mark the 100th anniversary of diplomatic ties, underscoring the enduring role the imperial household plays in the Japan-Turkey relationship.

Friends in Need

The second attribute of Japan-Turkey relations prefigured by the Ertugrul incident is the spirit of mutual assistance. In March 1985, at the height of the Iran-Iraq War, Iraq threatened to shoot down any aircraft traveling in Iranian airspace and gave foreigners a tight deadline to leave Tehran. With no direct flights between Tokyo and Tehran, Japan was unable to evacuate its citizens before the deadline, and the Japanese turned to Turkey for help. Ankara responded, and Turkish Airlines transported several hundred Japanese citizens home to safety. This act of generosity was seen as an illustration of the enduring ties of mutual assistance between our peoples going back to the Ertugrul shipwreck a century earlier. Both historical episodes were dramatized in the 2015 Japanese-Turkish film production Kainan 1890 (Ertugrul; English title, 125 Years Memory).

The same spirit of mutual assistance has emerged time and again in response to the earthquakes to which both Japan and Turkey are prone. (In the past 25 years alone, Turkey has experienced eight earthquakes registering a magnitude of 6.0 or higher.)

The Turkish republican government in Ankara sent the Japanese government a cash solatium following the Great Kantō Earthquake of September 1923, and Tokyo repaid the gesture after the magnitude 7.8 earthquake that struck Erzincan Province in 1939 (according to a March 1, 2023, piece in the Yomiuri Shimbun).

On August 17, 1999, a magnitude 7.6 earthquake struck Izmit in Kocaeli Province, just east of Istanbul, killing roughly 17,500. Japanese Foreign Minister Kōmura Masahiko was the first foreign dignitary to enter Istanbul in the aftermath of the quake, arriving the next day. Japan immediately dispatched rescue and medical teams to the stricken area and pledged approximately $1 million in emergency and humanitarian grant aid. In the weeks that followed, Tokyo provided several additional emergency grants, an official development assistance loan package worth $200 million, and a team of Japanese experts to assist in earthquake-proofing. Hyōgo Prefecture, site of the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake, donated 500 temporary housing units.

In the aftermath of the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami of March 11, 2011, a Turkish team of 22 rescue workers and 5 medical professionals traveled to Miyagi Prefecture and spent three weeks searching for survivors in the hard-hit communities of Ishinomaki, Tagajō, and Shichigahama. Turkey also provided emergency supplies for the victims. In the autumn of the same year, Van Province in Eastern Anatolia was hit by two earthquakes, one on October 23 (M 7.1) and another on November 9 (M 5.6), with a combined death toll of 644. The Japanese government responded immediately after the first quake, providing emergency relief supplies through the Japan International Cooperation Agency, along with 500 tents and emergency grant aid for temporary housing. Japanese nongovernmental organizations also dispatched relief workers to the region. One volunteer, Miyazaki Atsushi of the Association for Aid and Relief, perished when his hotel collapsed in the second quake. The Turkish people still remember Miyazaki’s heroism and have named a park in the Sariyer district of Istanbul and other public facilities in his honor.

On February 6, 2023, two major earthquakes rocked southeastern Turkey near the Syrian border, causing more than 52,000 deaths in Turkey and Syria. In response, Tokyo sent the Japan Disaster Relief Team, consisting of specially trained search and rescue workers, medical personnel, and experts in disaster management and other related areas. It also sent emergency supplies, provided $8.5 million in emergency assistance, and sent a team of JICA experts to the disaster zone.

The Road Ahead

In the Turkish media, Japan has earned the sobriquet kara gün dostu, or rainy-day friend, bearing witness to the durable ties of mutual support binding our two countries. Disaster management is a field in which Japan and Turkey can be expected to extend their cooperation as we look ahead to the next century of bilateral relations. But this would also be a good time to consider stepping up efforts in other areas.

Japan and Turkey have yet to sign a free trade agreement or economic partnership agreement, although negotiations began a full decade ago. One sticking point is Japan’s trade surplus with Turkey, which Ankara is anxious to reduce before removing barriers to more extensive trade.

In recent years, Ankara’s industrial policies have focused on the domestic defense industry. Turkey currently exports military drones to more than 40 countries around the world, and it would doubtless like to add Japan to the list. But importing military equipment from a non-ally like Turkey is not a viable option for Tokyo, given the constraints imposed by the Constitution and public opinion. For now, we may need to leverage the tried and tested tools of imperial diplomacy and disaster support to expand economic cooperations in ways that benefit both sides and deepen our friendship.

(Originally published in Japanese. Banner photo: Princess Akiko at an event celebrating 100 years of diplomatic ties between Japan and Turkey, Chiyoda, Tokyo, November 6, 2024. © AFP/Jiji.)