Dokdo / Takeshima

The rocks

The islets lie in the sea that Koreans call the East Sea and Japanese the Sea of Japan. There are two main islets, Dongdo (East Islet) and Seodo (West Islet), and 89 smaller rocks, with 187,554 m² of land in all. Seodo rises to 168.5 m.^[1] American documents of the time call them the Liancourt Rocks.^[4]

They have no economic value of their own, though the waters around them are good fishing grounds.^[3][5] South Korea’s management office recorded two civilian residents, 40 coast guards and six lighthouse keepers in 2017.^[3] Ordinary visitors have been allowed to land since 24 March 2005, weather permitting.^[1]

1900 or 1905

Japan says it acquired the islets in 1905 as terra nullius, land that belonged to no one, because Korea had no effective control over them. South Korea says they had already been made part of Ulleungdo County in 1900, and that Japan’s move was a usurpation.^[3] Japan went on to annex all of Korea in 1910, so in South Korea the 1905 incorporation is seen as the first step of colonial rule.^[3]

After the war

In January 1946 the Allied occupation authorities suspended Japan’s administration of several island areas, the rocks among them.^[4] In July 1951 South Korea asked the United States to name Dokdo among the islands Japan would give up in the peace treaty. Assistant Secretary of State Dean Rusk refused in a letter of August 1951: the rocks, he wrote, were “according to our information never treated as part of Korea” and had been under Japan’s Shimane prefecture “since about 1905”.^[4]

The San Francisco Treaty that year had Japan renounce Korea “including the islands of Quelpart, Port Hamilton and Dagelet”. It did not mention the rocks at all.^[3] Japan reads that as confirming they stayed Japanese.^[4] Even the US was not of one mind. In 1952 its embassy in Korea wrote that “it appears that its status is unsettled”, while its forces were using them as a bombing range, and Korean fishermen there reported being bombed.^[4]

Korean control

In 1953 a Japanese patrol vessel was fired on from the islets.^[4] South Korea has kept a small coast guard unit there since 1954.^[6] On 25 September 1954 Japan proposed taking the dispute to the International Court of Justice, and on 28 October South Korea refused.^[4] It still refuses: Seoul says there is no dispute to submit.^[3]

Shimane prefecture has held a Takeshima Day since 2005, and Japan’s defence white papers call the islets inherent Japanese territory.^[3] On 10 August 2012 Lee Myung-bak became the first South Korean president to visit. Japan’s foreign minister, Koichiro Gemba, called it “utterly unacceptable” and Japan temporarily recalled its ambassador.^[2] Japan said it was considering taking the case to the Court.^[7]