with
parallels showing the division at the
50th parallel north with the Karafuto Prefecture highlighted in red
Japanese settlement on Sakhalin dates to at least the
Edo period. Ōtomari was established in 1679, and cartographers of the
Matsumae domain mapped the island, and named it "Kita-
Ezo". Japanese cartographer and explorer
Mamiya Rinzō established that Sakhalin was an island through his discovery of what is now named
Mamiya Strait (
Strait of Tartary) in 1809. Japan unilaterally proclaimed
sovereignty over the whole island in 1845. The 1855
Treaty of Shimoda acknowledged that both the
Russian Empire and Japan had joint rights of occupation to Sakhalin, without setting a definite territorial demarcation. As the island became settled in the 1860s and 1870s, this ambiguity led to increasing friction between settlers. Attempts by the
Tokugawa shogunate to purchase the entire island from the Russian Empire failed, and the new
Meiji government was unable to negotiate a partition of the island into separate territories. In the
Treaty of Saint Petersburg (1875), Japan agreed to give up its claims on Sakhalin in exchange for undisputed ownership of the
Kuril Islands. Japan
invaded Sakhalin in the final stages of the
Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905, but per the 1905
Treaty of Portsmouth was allowed to retain only the southern portion of the island below the
50° N parallel. Russia retained the northern portion, although the Japanese were awarded favorable commercial rights, including fishing and mineral extraction rights in the north. In 1907, Karafuto Prefecture was officially established, with the capital at
Ōtomari. In 1908, the capital was relocated to
Toyohara. In 1920, Karafuto was officially designated an external territory of Japan, and its administration and development came under the aegis of the
Ministry of Colonial Affairs. Following the
Nikolaevsk Incident in 1920, Japan briefly seized the northern half of Sakhalin, and occupied it until the establishment of formal
diplomatic relations with the
Soviet Union in 1925; however, Japan continued to maintain
petroleum and
coal concessions in northern Sakhalin until 1944. In 1943, the status of Karafuto was upgraded to that of an "
inner land", making it an integral part of the
Empire of Japan. As Japan was extending its influence over
East Asia and the
Pacific through the establishment of a
Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, the
Imperial Japanese Army as part of its offensive
contingency plans to invade the
Soviet Union if it either became involved in the
Pacific War or collapsed due to the
ongoing German invasion, proposed the annexation of the remaining northern half of Sakhalin to Japan.
Soviet invasion In August 1945, after repudiating the
Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April, and according to the signed agreements of Yalta, in which Stalin pledged that the Soviet Union would enter the Pacific War three months after the defeat of Germany, the
Soviet Union invaded Karafuto. The Soviet attack started on 11 August 1945, three days before the
surrender of Japan. The Soviet 56th Rifle Corps, part of the
16th Army, consisting of the 79th Rifle Division, the 2nd Rifle Brigade, the 5th Rifle Brigade and the 214 Armored Brigade, attacked the
Japanese 88th Infantry Division. Although the Soviet
Red Army outnumbered the Japanese by three to one, they advanced only slowly due to strong Japanese resistance. It was not until the 113th Rifle Brigade and the 365th Independent Naval Infantry Rifle Battalion from
Sovetskaya Gavan landed in
Tōro, a seashore village in western Karafuto, on 16 August that the Soviets broke the Japanese defense line. Japanese resistance grew weaker after this landing. Actual fighting continued until 21 August. Between 22 and 23 August, most remaining Japanese units agreed to a ceasefire. The Soviets completed the conquest of Karafuto on 25 August 1945, by occupying the capital of Toyohara.
Post-war There were over 400,000 people living in Karafuto when the Soviet offensive began in early August 1945. Most were of Japanese or Korean extraction, though there was also a small
White Russian community as well as some
Ainu indigenous tribes. By the time of the ceasefire, approximately 100,000 civilians had managed to escape to
Hokkaido. The military government established by the
Soviet Army banned the local press, confiscated cars and radio sets and imposed a curfew. Local managers and bureaucrats were made to aid Russian authorities in the process of reconstruction, before being deported to labor camps, either on North Sakhalin or in
Siberia. In schools, courses in
Marxism–Leninism were introduced, and Japanese children were obliged to sing songs in praise of
Stalin. Step by step Karafuto lost its Japanese identity.
Sakhalin Oblast was created in February 1946, and by March all towns, villages and streets were given
Russian names. More and more colonists began to arrive from mainland Russia, with whom the Japanese were obliged to share the limited stock of housing. In October 1946 the Soviets began to repatriate all remaining Japanese. By 1950 most had been sent, willing or not, to Hokkaido. They had to leave all of their possessions behind, including any currency, Russian or Japanese. Today some keep alive the memory of their former home in the meetings of the
Karafuto Renmei, an association for former Karafuto residents. In 1945, with the defeat of Japan in
World War II, the Japanese administration in Karafuto ceased to function. The Japanese government formally abolished Karafuto Prefecture as a legal entity on 1 June 1949. In 1951, at the
Treaty of San Francisco, Japan renounced its rights to Sakhalin, but did not formally acknowledge Soviet sovereignty over it. Since that time, no final peace treaty has been signed between Japan and Russia, and the status of the neighboring Kuril Islands
remains disputed. ==Geography==