japanese aircraft

[scorpiondown]

maybe someone can answer this...i was reading an appendix of "shattered Sword" when something didn,t make sense to me.Carrier division 1 aircraft had an "A" on the tail followed by a set of numbers..carrier division 2 had a "B" on the tail...why wouldn,t the japanese lettered the tails of their planes with japanese letters?? Instead of A,B...???????????

This seems to me like if today,the US Navy lettered it,s aircraft tails with letters from the cryllic alphabet....

those japanese planes would have been much more identifiable to the US Navy then having their tails marked this way..why would they use english alphabet letters?????????:hmmm:

[Sailor Steve]

Japanese aircraft were also designated using English letters and numbers: A6M, F1M1, Ki-44 etc. I'm not sure what the reason was either. I couldn't find anything definite online and my books are all in storage. They must have had a good reason. I'm sure somebody has it in a reference.

[MKalafatas]

Fascinating question. I don't know the answer, but the Japanese navy traditionally modeled its operational methods and procedures after the British navy, at the end of the 19th Century.

Perhaps the British started doing it that way, and the Japanese adopted it?

[WernherVonTrapp]

I'm just guessing here, but I think it may have something to do with international aviation standards and procedures set forth by the "International Civil Aviation Organization" established in 1903 when the first convention was held. The third convention, held in London in 1912 allocated the first radio call signs for use by aircraft. ICAN remained in operation until 1945, when the Provisional International Civil Aviation Organization (PICAO) replaced it. In 1947 PICAO became ICAO.

Again, I'm not certain,:hmm2: but this may be the reason for the alphanumeric codes used by the IJN in WWII.

[neural]

Another guess:
The latin alphabet has natural ordering (A, B, C, ...) while kana doesn't.

[scorpiondown]

just seems strange to letter your aircraft in a foreign language..especially during wartime!!
The japanese thumbed their noses at those naval treatys back then so i find it hard to believe that they would comply with some international aircraft standards especially on their warbirds..They would only be under japanese military control...It wasn,t like they called up honolulu air traffic control to ask for clearance!!!

I was thinking also,,,were their merchants all lettered with "MARU" also???
Just finding this pretty odd..never thought of it before

everyone has some pretty good guesses here though..like to know if one of you are correct!
we need Fuchida on here!!

[WernherVonTrapp]

just seems strange to letter your aircraft in a foreign language..especially during wartime!!
The japanese thumbed their noses at those naval treatys back then so i find it hard to believe that they would comply with some international aircraft standards especially on their warbirds..You're forgetting that the Japanese were American & British allies during WWI. Also, the international stanadards and aviation call signs were established (and well entrenched) before WWI. To change them at the outbreak of war after years of training and adoption as a standard would have caused considerable confusion. Besides, their use of international alphanumerics on their aircraft was of no consequence to the allies. We already knew next to nothing about their aircraft capabilities or the units to which the aircraft were assigned. Using international alphanumerics would not have given the allies any fruitful intelligence advantage. So why change the tail markings, causing all that confusion and retraining if it wasn't necessary.
Why not change their entire naval structure and hierarchy, instead of continuing to model it after the Bristish Royal Navy, if their aim was simply to thumb their noses at western society? They also continued to follow the teachings of the American naval historian, Alfred Thayer Mahan.

[scorpiondown]

sounds pretty logical.....you,d think that the japanese sailors and crews would have found anything "western" hated and looked down upon since they were at war and taught that they were the chosen race.

i,m just thinking myself that when i look at a letter from the japanese alphabet,,i don,t have a clue how to pronounce it. wonder if japanese crew members were in the same spot and had to be taught how to recognize the letters..i doubt they would have pronounced them how we do..

forgot this pov... if i was an american flyer or sailor,,i,d be sure to recognize an "A" or "B" or whatever letter used..so if i,m flying different engagements i,d recognize those "A"or "B" tailed planes are here again..I,d think naval intelligence would start to log these sightings and try to link what letters to what carriers that they suspect or know are in the area...Now if they had Japanese letters on the tail,,i,d think flyers would have a much tougher time recognizing that those are the same planes as before since we don,t know the japanese alphabet and those symbols look intricate and vary slightly from one another...one looks like another (at least to me)...

still think it would have been easier and more secure for them to use their own language for everything.

[Sailor Steve]

sounds pretty logical.....you,d think that the japanese sailors and crews would have found anything "western" hated and looked down upon since they were at war and taught that they were the chosen race.
The next time you watch Tora! Tora! Tora! pay special attention to the music played on the flagship when the admiral comes aboard. Popular music may have been traditionally Japanese at the time, but the military marches were undeniably Western. It's how they felt it should be done.

[WernherVonTrapp]

sounds pretty logical.....you,d think that the japanese sailors and crews would have found anything "western" hated and looked down upon since they were at war and taught that they were the chosen race.

i,m just thinking myself that when i look at a letter from the cryllic alphabet,,i don,t have a clue how to pronounce it. wonder if crew members were in the same spot and had to be taught how to recognize the letters..i doubt they would have pronounced them how we do..Well, I'm not even sure if I'm correct on the matter. I'm just surmising by extrapolating from different sources, or books I've read over the years. I know that the International Civil Aviation Organization established "call signs" for civil aviation to accomodate air transport to and from various international airports. I know that pilots would have to be trained on these procedures and call-signs. I think, but am not certain, that the Japanese were one of the member nations who adopted this system along with 27 or 28 other member nations. I speculate that these call-signs would probably have to correspond with specific identification markings on the aircraft. This was most likely, a successful system of organization that was also adopted by the military branches of various nations. These English alphanumerics can also be found on some German warplanes.
http://i1.trekearth.com/photos/28222/jsalis_3_06_2006_37_te.jpg

[scorpiondown]

never noticed that in Tora,Tora,Tora..going to watch again more closely..

I can see the germans with roman letters as their alphabet is the same as ours..but japanese is totally different..

I guess the strictness of their doctrine set the rules for markings and as they were based on the Royal navy and those international rules for aircraft..
the more i read about the japanese in WW2 ,,,they stuck to the plan no matter what,,,even if it was a slaughter,stick to the plan and no deviation from it...Must have been ingrained in the japanese of that time..

[WernherVonTrapp]

I can see the germans with roman letters as their alphabet is the same as ours..but japanese is totally different..

OK, how about Chinese aircraft?:D
http://www.ww2incolor.com/d/636263-2/BA28-CINA

[scorpiondown]

Has to be what you said about that treaty. I,d think Chinese would even be worse than the japanese doing it..Who was an influence with the chinese military..the British also??

[scorpiondown]

started thinking about numbers now!!!!!
does everywhere in the world use roman numerals??
found this...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_numerals
guess english was adopted as universal language,,if Chinese keep getting stronger and stronger (financially and militarily) we all might have to learn these!!!!:huh:

[doulos05]

started thinking about numbers now!!!!!
does everywhere in the world use roman numerals??
found this...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_numerals
guess english was adopted as universal language,,if Chinese keep getting stronger and stronger (financially and militarily) we all might have to learn these!!!!:huh:

Short answer: Basically everyone does, even the Chinese use it for everyday numbers. The marks under "Character" is actually more akin to their spelling of the word. Kind of like saying 1 = 'one'.

Here in Korea, we use both the Chinese (well, Sino-Chinese) numbering system and a native number system, but they're both written with Arabic numerals. The only difference is how you pronounce them. On a related note, that makes learning that part of the language kinda tricky because there's no indication which numbering system you should use, you have to understand the logical (to Koreans, anyway) system behind which one should be used.

[scorpiondown]

i posted the same question on another forum i came across yesterday.
received a couple of answers from some Japanese members there...

http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/aviation/japanese-aircraft-33043.html

[WernherVonTrapp]

i posted the same question on another forum i came across yesterday.
received a couple of answers from some Japanese members there...

:haha: Did you ask them why the Chinese used them?

[Hylander_1314]

British colonial influence maybe?

[scorpiondown]

nah,, would like to know if the chinese adopted them the same as the japanese did..don,t really understand why they would have adopted them though..Especially with Japans (and China,s) long history...To just adopt another alphabet after thousands of years using the one that was developed in their own country??? Guess it was for ease of communication.

[merc4ulfate]

It came from the International Air Navigation Convention in 1919.

http://www.faa.gov/licenses_certificates/aircraft_certification/aircraft_registry/aircraft_nnumber_history/



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_registration (has a list of current and pre-1928 national code letters)

The first use of aircraft registrations was based on the radio callsigns allocated at the London International Radiotelegraphic Conference in 1913. This was modified by agreement by the International Bureau at Berne and published on April 23, 1913. Although initial allocations were not specifically for aircraft but for any radio user, the International Air Navigation Convention held in Paris in 1919 made allocations specifically for aircraft registrations, based on the 1913 callsign list. The agreement stipulated that the nationality marks were to be followed by a hyphen then a group of four letters that must include a vowel (and for the convention Y was considered to be a vowel).
At the International Radiotelegraph Convention at Washington in 1927, the list of markings was revised and adopted from 1928; these allocations are the basis of the currently used registrations. The markings have been amended and added to over the years, and the allocations and standard are managed by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
Article 20 of the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation (signed in 1944) requires that all signatory countries register aircraft over a certain weight with a national aviation authority. Upon registration, the aircraft receives its unique "registration", which must be displayed prominently on the aircraft.
Annex 7 to the Convention on International Civil Aviation describes the definitions, location, and measurement of nationality and registration marks. The aircraft registration is made up of a prefix selected from the country's callsign prefix allocated by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) (making the registration a quick way of determining the country of origin) and the registration suffix. Depending on the country of registration, this suffix is a numeric or alphanumeric code, and consists of one to five digits or characters respectively.
The ICAO provides a supplement to Annex 7 which provides an updated list of approved Nationality and Common Marks used by various countries.

[Sailor Steve]

That is all nice, but doesn't apply to military aircraft. The numbers displayed on fuselages and tails in World War 2 were squadron markings, not civilian registrations.

[WernherVonTrapp]

I think I may have stumbled upon the answers. Though this is a Wikipedia reference, there are numerous references and external links at the bottom of the page. I haven't read it in it's entirety, but instead just glanced over the page. I guess I should've done this in the first place. All I did was Google the "History of Call Signs".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_sign

:salute:

[merc4ulfate]

While military letter designation meanings were different from country to country as in Britain using the H for hydroaeroplanes and M for maintenance the Letter naming convention was still in accordance to the IANC of 1919 in that is used standard English designations.


There is no single, clearly defined naming system for the Japanese. Four different systems were actually in use simultaneously during World War II, in addition to the codenames used by the Allies. The Japanese Army and Navy each used two systems to identify the same aircraft, so a type used by both services could have up to five different designations--a Japanese Army Kitai number, Army type number, Navy designation code, Navy type number, and Allied codename.

To confuse matters even further, a few types were known best by nicknames that had no official status. The Mitsubishi A6M fighter, also known as the Carrier-Borne Fighter Type 0, had the official Allied codename of "Zeke", but it went down in history under the unofficial nickname used by both sides: "Zero".

The Japanese Army Air Force identified aircraft by "Kitai" (airframe) numbers. This system consisted of "Ki", a dash, and a number. Originally the numbers were a simple numeric sequence. Later, some randomization was added as a security measure. Gliders received "Ku" ("Guraida") numbers instead. Subtypes or variants were indicated by Roman numeral suffixes, or by various Japanese abbreviations. A common example was "Kai" (for "Kaizo"), indicating a major modification.

In addition to Kitai numbers, most Army aircraft also received a second designation in a parallel system based on role and the year of entry into service. Originally, this value was the last two digits of the year, where 100 was used for the Japanese year 2600 (1940). Afterwards, the numbers were restarted from 1.

Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft received a designation code very similar to those used by the US Navy. This method consisted of a letter to indicate the aircraft's function, a sequential number to indicate a specific aircraft type (but unlike the USN system, the number 1 was retained), and a letter to indicate the manufacturing company. This series was then followed by a dash and a number to indicate a subtype, plus an optional letter or letters for further variations.

The Japanese Navy aircraft function codes are described below:


A = Carrier-borne fighter
B = Carrier-borne attack (or torpedo) bomber
C = Carrier-borne reconnaissance
D = Carrier-borne dive bomber
E = Reconnaissance seaplane
F = Observation seaplane
G = Land-based bomber
H = Flying-boat
J = Land-based fighter
K = Trainer
L = Transport
M = Special-purpose seaplane
N = Fighter seaplane
P = Bomber
Q = Patrol
R = Land-based reconnaissance
S = Night fighter
The major Japanese manufacturer codes included:

A = Aichi
D = Showa
K = Kawanishi
M = Mitsubishi
N = Nakajima
P = Nihon
V = Seversky
W = Kyushu, Watanabe
Y = Yokosuka
The IJN also used a parallel system based on role description and year number, similar to (but independent of) the Army system. In this case, however, the year 2600 (1940) became 0 instead of 100. This system was abandoned in 1943, when it was decided that revealing the year of an aircraft's entry into service might give useful information to the enemy. Aircraft were then given proper names instead.
Because the correct designations of Japanese aircraft were often not known to the Allies, simple codenames were assigned to them instead. Although they were not often followed, some basic rules for choosing the codename were developed:


Female Names
------------
bombers
dive bombers
reconnaissance aircraft
seaplanes
torpedo bombers

Male Names
----------
fighters
reconnaissance seaplanes

Names of Birds
--------------
gliders

Names of Trees
--------------
trainers

Female Names Beginning with "T"
-------------------------------
transport aircraft
The following list provides some of the various designations given to several Japanese aircraft of World War II.

Manufacturer & Designation Army/Navy Type Number or Proper Name Allied Codename
================================================== ==================================================
Aichi B7A Ryusei Navy Carrier-Borne Attack Bomber Ryusei "Grace"
Aichi D1A Navy Type 94 Carrier-Borne Dive Bomber "Susie"
Aichi D3A Navy Type 99 Carrier-Borne Dive Bomber "Val"
Aichi E11A Navy Type 98 Night Reconnaissance Seaplane "Laura"
Aichi E13A Navy Type 0 Reconnaissance Seaplane "Jake"

Kawanishi E7K Navy Type 94 Reconnaissance Seaplane "Alf"
Kawanishi H6K Navy Type 97 Flying-Boat "Mavis"
Kawanishi H8K Navy Type 2 Flying-Boat "Emily"
Kawanishi N1K1 Kyofu Navy Fighter Seaplane Kyofu "Rex"
Kawanishi N1K1/2-J Shiden Navy Interceptor Fighter Shiden "George"

Kawasaki Ki-32 Army Type 98 Light Bomber "Mary"
Kawasaki Ki-45 Toryu Army Type 2 Heavy Fighter "Nick"
Kawasaki Ki-48 Army Type 99 Light Bomber "Lily"
Kawasaki Ki-61 Hien Army Type 3 Fighter "Tony"
Kawasaki Ki-100 Army Type 5 Fighter
Kawasaki Ki-102 Army Type 4 Assault Plane "Randy"

Kyushu K11W Shiragiku Navy Operations Trainer Shiragiku
Kyushu Q1W Tokai Navy Patrol Plane Tokai "Lorna"

Mitsubishi A5M Navy Type 96 Carrier-Borne Fighter "Claude"
Mitsubishi A6M Zero-Sen Navy Type 0 Carrier-Borne Fighter "Zeke"
Mitsubishi A7M Reppu Navy Carrier-Borne Fighter Reppu "Sam"
Mitsubishi B5M Navy Type 97 Carrier-Borne Attack Bomber "Mabel" or "Kate 61"
Mitsubishi F1M Navy Type 0 Observation Seaplane "Pete"
Mitsubishi G3M Navy Type 96 Attack Bomber "Nell"
Mitsubishi G4M Navy Type 1 Attack Bomber "Betty"
Mitsubishi J2M Raiden Navy Interceptor Fighter Raiden "Jack"
Mitsubishi J8M Shusui Navy Rocket-Powered Interceptor Fighter Shusui
Mitsubishi K3M Navy Type 90 Crew Trainer
Mitsubishi Ki-15 Karigane Army Type 97 (Navy Type 98) Reconnaissance Plane "Babs"
Mitsubishi Ki-21 Army Type 97 Heavy Bomber "Sally"
Mitsubishi Ki-30 Army Type 97 Light Bomber "Ann"
Mitsubishi Ki-46 ****ei Army Type 100 Command Reconnaissance Plane "Dinah"
Mitsubishi Ki-51 Army Type 99 Assault Plane "Sonia"
Mitsubishi Ki-57 Army Type 100 Transport "Topsy"
Mitsubishi Ki-67 Hiryu Army Type 4 Heavy Bomber "Peggy"
Mitsubishi L3Y Navy Type 96 Transport "Tina"

Nakajima B5N Navy Type 97 Carrier-Borne Bomber "Kate"
Nakajima B6N Tenzan Navy Carrier-Borne Attack Bomber Tenzan "Jill"
Nakajima C6N Saiun Navy Carrier-Borne Reconnaissance Plane Saiun "Myrt"
Nakajima E8N Navy Type 95 Reconnaissance Seaplane "Dave"
Nakajima G8N Renzan Navy Heavy Bomber Renzan "Rita"
Nakajima J1N Gekko Navy Type 2 Reconnaissance Plane "Irving"
Nakajima Ki-27 Army Type 97 Fighter "Nate"
Nakajima Ki-34 Army Type 97 (Navy Type AT-2) Transport "Thora"
Nakajima Ki-43 Hayabusa Army Type 1 Fighter "Oscar"
Nakajima Ki-44 Shoki Army Type 2 Fighter "Tojo"
Nakajima Ki-49 Donryu Army Type 100 Heavy Bomber "Helen"
Nakajima Ki-84 Hayate Army Type 4 Fighter "Frank"

Yokosuka B4Y Navy Type 96 Carrier-Borne Attack Bomber "Jean"
Yokosuka D4Y Suisei Navy Type 11 Carrier-Borne Dive Bomber "Judy"
Yokosuka K5Y Navy Type 93 Intermediate Trainer "Willow"
Yokosuka MXY7 Ohka Navy Suicide Attack Plane Ohka
Yokosuka P1Y Ginga Navy Type 11 Bomber "Francis"
================================================== ==================================================
After the war, the Japanese, switched to a much simpler system similar to that used by the US today.

[merc4ulfate]

@WernherVonTrapp

Good find. The 1912 standardization spoken of in the article you found was the what was later used in the 1919 IANC naming convention.

[scorpiondown]

lot of good info there!!!:up: