Two days after the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, and one day before the second one exploded over Nagasaki, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan. Contributing little to Japan’s defeat, it nevertheless, reaped many rewards from its belated decision, including several million dollars worth of “war booty" stripped from industrialized Manchuria, and thousands of Japanese prisoners-of-war to bolster Siberian labor camps. But its greatest prize was territory; under an agreement worked out with Churchill and Roosevelt at Yalta several months earlier, Stalin was rewarded with the return of southern half of Sakhalin and control of the entire chain of Kuril Islands. This acquisition enabled him to encircle the Sea of Okhotsk almost completely with Soviet territory.
Although less well known than other seas, the Sea of Okhotsk is both strategically and economically vital to the Soviet Union. Yet, traditionally and legally, it is an open sea. But, in the years since the end of the war, Soviet polemicists have been carefully building a case for its recognition as a territorial or closed sea. To date, however, they have not gained Japanese acquiescence or U. S. recognition.
As part of the scheme, Moscow has loudly and angrily protested foreign incursions into the Sea of Okhotsk, not only claiming that foreign vessels have no right to be there, but also that they infringe on Soviet security and sovereignty. Writing in Morskoy Sbornik, the official journal of the Soviet Navy, Major of Justice G. S. Gorshkov summarizes his country’s position:
The United States is also giving particular “attention” to the Sea of Okhotsk, an area of great economic and defensive importance to the Soviet Union. This sea penetrates deep into the territory of the U.S.S.R., and its configuration is greatly different from other far eastern seas. No international waters or air lanes pass through or over it; no American territory adjoins it. Nevertheless, U. S. military ships and aircraft have turned up here time after time for intelligence purposes, violating the security of the Soviet state . . . .
Despite its international status, Gorshkov’s sensitivity is not difficult to understand. Covering an area of 614,000 square miles, or almost two-thirds the size of the Mediterranean Sea, this huge body of water has an average depth of 2,800 feet, with a recorded maximum of 11,069 feet. As one of the richest fishing grounds in the world, it provides better than one-tenth of the Soviet Union’s total annual catch. According to local fishermen, the salmon are so large and abundant that sea gulls actually perch on their backs during low tide. Unfortunately for the fishermen, there is a real impediment to navigation in the ice which covers the sea for five or six months of the year.
The Kurils, over which control had been contested until 1875, came completely under Japanese rule in 1875 following a treaty between Japan and Russia. Stretching almost 750 miles from the tip of the Kamchatka Peninsula to Hokkaido, the chain consists of 56 volcanic islands—reportedly, over 30 volcanoes are still active—and numerous uninhabited rocks. Deep straits separate each island. Earthquakes occur frequently and are often accompanied by tidal waves or tsunami. Mostly bleak, wet, and cold, the islands afford meager resources. The natives exist mostly on fishing, although some light farming is done on the southern islands. Overall, the Kurils’ value is best described as strategic.
Sakhalin’s value, however, is largely economic. Situated in the southwestern Sea of Okhotsk and separated by only four miles at its nearest point from the Asian continent by the shallow Tatar Strait, Sakhalin was long assumed to be a peninsula rather than an island. Its income is derived from a large fishing industry, timber, coal, and oil. Coal deposits on the island are an important source of energy for the Soviet Union’s far eastern industry. Petroleum, piped under the Tatar Strait to refineries on the mainland, is virtually the only source of oil in this area.
For many years, much of the Soviet population on Sakhalin consisted of convicts exiled for political or criminal reasons to serve terms of hard labor felling trees or digging coal. After World War II, the Soviet government deported the Japanese natives and attempt to lure free Russian workers to the island with such capitalist incentives as salary bonuses and hardship pay. The plan has not been entirely successful and since 1959, emigration has actually exceeded natural population increases in the Sakhalin Oblast,* one of the few places in that fast-growing country to experience this phenomenon.
Although the Soviet Union now claims that its territorial waters extend 12 miles from the ebb tide line, vessels can legally enter the Sea of Okhotsk through the La P[é]rouse and Nemuro Straits on either side of the Japanese island of Hokkaido, or through any of the sufficiently wide straits separating several of the Kuril Islands. But the Soviet Union strongly disputes the legality of free passage into the Sea of Okhotsk and, oddly enough, supports its position with international law. Major of Justice Gorshkov claims that: “. . . legal arguments confirm the correctness of fixing the status of the Sea of Okhotsk as both a closed and internal sea coming under the international law concept of historical waters.”
*In 1947, the Kurils and Sakhalin were incorporated into the Russian Republic (RSFSR) as a single administrative territory designated as the Sakhalin Oblast.
Under close examination, however, these “arguments” are not entirely consistent with the facts. If a country has claimed a particular body of water and other governments have accepted or acquiesced, then its claim is normally considered historically legal. Such is the case for the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays, for example, and for that matter, the White Sea and the Sea of Azov. But, because Japan controlled access to the Sea of Okhotsk for many years, including over half the years during which the Communist Party has been in the Kremlin, it can hardly be considered an historical water of the Soviet Union. Actually, the 1945 settlement over the Kurils and Sakhalin was only the latest in the long struggle between Russia/U.S.S.R. and Japan for control of this area.
It was not until the Moscow empire became firmly established in the 17th century that Russians began to venture into the little known eastern lands. Their impetus was not so much for the glory of Mother Russia, but rather for personal gain and contact with the fabled riches of China. The push to the east began in earnest under Ivan the Terrible, who liked to call himself the “Siberian Tsar.” By the late 17th century, these new lands were common knowledge among learned men of Russia, and by the time of the fascinating Bering and Spanberg expeditions (1725-42), the eastern area, including the Kurils, was fairly well mapped.
Russians first learned of Sakhalin while exploring the Amur basin. Chinese merchants spoke of a large island or peninsula at the Amur’s entrance, referring to it as “rocks at the mouth of the black river.” Although the Japanese knew it was an island as early as 1808, Russia believed Sakhalin was a peninsula until 1849 when Captain Nevelskoy discovered a suitable channel. Previously, European explorers attempting to circumnavigate the island were stopped by sandbanks in the shallow Tatar Strait which they assumed were part of a land connection with continental Asia. Nevelskoy’s discovery proved significant several years later during the Crimean War when an English squadron sailed to the northern Pacific to destroy a number of Russian frigates. The English, believing Sakhalin was a peninsula, thought they had the Russians bottled up, only to find that their prey had escaped through the little-known channel.
Meanwhile, Japan was well aware of the increasing Russian settlements on Sakhalin and the Kurils, but had to avoid a showdown because of internal problems. To preserve at least part of the Kurils for its jurisdiction, Japan negotiated with Russia in 1811 the first of several settlements over these islands. Urup, the middle island of the chain, was recognized as neutral; the northern islands to be administered by Russia; Japan to control the southern islands. Sakhalin’s status remained unsettled.
Both continued to vie for Sakhalin and occasionally angers nearly boiled over. Finally, the two sides reached an arrangement in 1875 when Japan agreed to give up all claims to Sakhalin in exchange for full control of the entire Kuril chain. Although this kept the peace temporarily, each continued to covet the other’s “exclusive” territory.
Friendly relations once more ebbed, culminating in the sudden Japanese attack on the Russian fleet in Port Arthur on 6 February 1904. His forces suffering crushing defeats on land and sea, and his European sector torn by political unrest, the Tsar hastily sued for peace. On 5 September 1905, his representatives accepted the negotiated terms of the Treaty of Portsmouth arbitrated by President Theodore Roosevelt. Among some other minor provisions, Russia had to give up the half of Sakhalin below the 50th parallel. The defeat was not only a great blow to Russian pride, but it also meant Japan’s entrenchment in the Sea of Okhotsk.
Despite designs on mainland territory, Japan remained content to allow the Tsar to struggle with internal difficulties for the next decade or so. But when the Bolsheviks took power and Russia became embroiled with civil war, the temptation was too great. Japanese occupation troops were sent into northern Sakhalin and over to the Siberian mainland. Although other countries participated in the intervention to “protect their citizens and economic interests,” Japan’s troops were the most numerous. The U. S. decision to intervene there was largely to exert a restraining influence on Japan.
Increasing British and U. S. pressure finally forced Japan to evacuate the Siberian mainland in November 1922, but Japanese troops did not leave Soviet territory completely until Moscow granted coal and oil extraction concessions in northern Sakhalin. A treaty covering these privileges was signed on 20 January 1925. It also re-established formal diplomatic and consular relations between the two antagonists. A new period of peaceful and profitable co-operation appeared to have dawned, but for all practical aspects it was a peace of convenience: Japan was concentrating on its eventual takeover of the Pacific, while the new Bolshevist leaders, especially Stalin, were busy tightening their grasp on the former Russian Empire.
When the German-Japanese anti-Comintern pact was made public in 1936, fragile Moscow-Tokyo relations once more came close to breaking. Increasing pressure was placed on Japan to end its economic interests in northern Sakhalin, but Japan could not be budged. Just when a clash seemed unavoidable, the signing of the Soviet-Japanese neutrality pact was announced in April 1941. Realizing the looming danger in the west, Stalin was forced to buy time in the east.
Although not released at the time, Japan had agreed in this treaty to give up its concessions in the Soviet portion of Sakhalin. Japan’s acquiescence was surprising, for extraction rights were not to expire until 1970, and the plentiful oil and coal were important to the Japanese war machine. But hearing news of the German success on the eastern front, Japan continued digging and drilling until the Red Army began to reverse the German offensive. Japan officially ended its economic occupation in northern Sakhalin on 30 March 1944.
On 5 April 1945, when Japan’s demise was near, Stalin denounced the neutrality pact and declared it longer valid. Four months later, on 8 August 1945, he declared war on the moribund Japanese empire. In proclamation on Japan’s surrender, Stalin told his countrymen that the Soviet Union’s recovery of the Kurils and southern Sakhalin was a proper revenge for “. . . the defeat of Russian troops in 1904-5 . . . which lay like a black spot on our country.”
It seems, therefore, that Japan’s historical and geographic involvement in the Sea of Okhotsk negates the Soviet contention that it be considered an internal sea. Consequently, as Major of Justice Gorshkov admits: “Officially, the Soviet Union has not raised the question of declaring the sea historic internal waters.” But Moscow is quite willing to accept recognition of the Sea of Okhotsk as a closed sea, shared with no one except Japan.
The official Soviet Manual of International Maritime Law provides this definition of a closed sea, which agrees with that of U. S. sources: “Seas which essentially constitute routes leading to the ports and shores of coastal states and are connected to the high seas through a series of straits . . . .”
The first step toward establishing the Sea of Okhotsk as a closed sea was taken during the 1951 San Francisco Peace Conference when Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko proposed that the straits around the Japanese islands be closed to foreign military navigation and that the Seas of Japan and Okhotsk be declared closed. The U. S. Secretary of State, Dean Acheson, and the other Allied representatives refused to consider Gromyko’s proposals. Accordingly, the Soviet Union was not a signatory of the peace treaty with Japan.
Although Soviet jurists have asserted repeatedly that the Sea of Okhotsk should be regarded as a closed or territorial sea, Moscow has expediently avoided an official declaration. The United States, therefore, has never specifically recognized or denied any Soviet claim over this water. Should an official declaration be made, the United States would be obliged to protest its validity or accept the consequences of inaction.
For Japan, however, the Sea of Okhotsk has been a serious problem. Prior to 1945, Japanese fishermen trawled at will in this water, gathering huge catches from its depths. After the war, the Soviet Union instructed its patrol boats to seize any Japanese trawlers which unwittingly strayed into Soviet-claimed territorial waters. Despite this harassment, the Japanese have continued to maintain a large fishing fleet in the Sea of Okhotsk. In 1957, Moscow threatened to close the sea to all foreign fishing vessels, but has never followed through. The fact that Japan recognizes only a 3-mile limit does not concern the Soviets in the least. As further evidence of its displeasure over Japanese fishing in this disputed sea, the Soviet Union to date has seized more than 1,200 Japanese fishing boats and jailed over 10,000 Japanese fishermen on charges of violating territorial waters. Frequently, the trawlers have trouble in determining their exact position because of chronic bad weather and navigational difficulties. In addition, Hokkaido fishermen are in Soviet-claimed waters virtually as soon as they leave their own shore. Despite the ubiquitous Soviet trawlers along our coastline, U. S. fishermen do not enter the Sea of Okhotsk.
Intimidation of Japanese fishing vessels may also serve as a means of exerting pressure on Japan to sign a formal peace treaty on Moscow’s terms. In 1956, Japan and the Soviet Union signed a “peace agreement” which purportedly set the framework for a formal peace treaty. Besides once more establishing formal diplomatic relations, the agreement stipulated that the Habomai Islands, a group of small islands off the northeast coast of Hokkaido, and Shikotan Island would be returned upon conclusion of a formal treaty. Japan has since asked for the return of Kunashiri and Iturup, two large islands of the Kuril group just north of Hokkaido. Hence it is also possible the Soviet Union was enticing the Japanese into an anti-American position by dangling some highly desired territory before them.
Recently, Tokyo has been making high-level diplomatic overtures to Washington for the return of its southern territories, i.e., Okinawa and the other Ryukyu Islands, and to Moscow for the return of its northern territories, i.e., the Shikotan, Kunashiri, and Iturup Islands, and the Habomai group. While talks have been favorable with the United States, the Soviet Union thus far has turned a deaf ear. A measure of Moscow’s resolve in this matter can be gleaned from a recent Izvestiya announcement: “. . . the question of to whom the Kurils belong has been settled once and for all, and any attempt to reshape the postwar frontiers will hardly be of any benefit to Japan.”
In the meantime, the Soviet Union continues to lay the groundwork for an official claim to the Sea of Okhotsk. It is quite within the realm of possibility that it may someday declare the Sea of Okhotsk closed to all foreign vessels, except Japan (with whom it would negotiate a fishing treaty).
The implications of such an action would force the United States once more to re-examine its already antiquated maritime policy which is essentially embodied in the words of Arthur Dean, spoken at the 1958 Geneva Conference on the Law of the Sea: “We have made it clear that in our view there is no obligation on the part of states adhering to the three-mile rule to recognize claims on the part of others to a greater breadth of territorial sea. On that we stand.”
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A graduate of the University of Maryland in 1968, Mr. Given served in the U. S. Navy as an enlisted man from 1955 to 1959. From 1959 to 1967, he was a research analyst at the National Security Agency. He received his M.A. degree in Soviet Studies from Georgetown University in 1968. Since 1967, he has been a research analyst, assistant chief, Undersea Warfare Division, in the office of the Chief of Naval Operations.