The Japanese Naval Paratrooper Specialty Patch Hoax
Article about: The Japanese Naval Paratrooper Specialty Patch Hoax This hoax was exposed more than 30 years ago in Japan, but news of the exposure of it being a fantasy piece never seems to have reached US
The Japanese Naval Paratrooper Specialty Patch Hoax
The Japanese Naval Paratrooper Specialty Patch Hoax
This hoax was exposed more than 30 years ago in Japan, but news of the exposure of it being a fantasy piece never seems to have reached US shores, so I’ll just give you the story as it came out in the 80s. I cannot take any credit for this discovery, which was announced in Japan’s monthly “PX magazine” by my colleague, Etsuko Yagyu, Japan’s foremost authority on navy uniforms.
She was writing a series on NLF uniforms, and the 5th installment of that series was the NLF paratrooper uniforms. Within this article, she discussed the patch in question under the heading “Fake specialty patch for paratroopers”.
In order to give her full credit, I will just translate below what she wrote.
“Many publications available to us today feature what is purported to be the design of a Japanese navy paratrooper arm patch. The design consists of ---- (omitted).
I too was almost gullible enough to buy into it at first, accepting it as real, but soon I started to entertain doubts based on irregularities in the design details.
Firstly, the IJN never would use a foul anchor (entangled chain design) design on insignia intended for EM and NCOs. In addition, the shaft of the anchor appeared too narrow and the cherry blossom too small compared to the navy design tradition of the times.
The IJN were desperate to conceal the existence of paratroops, and such a patch would have only blown their cover. Even when they made their jump in the Pacific War, they were kept totally silent by request of the army. Thus the public only learned of the navy paratrooper jump after the army jump had been publicized. The army took all the bows and the navy jump was initially totally disregarded.
As of March 1942, for security reasons, the navy abolished the previous descriptive designs of specialty patches and instead replaced them all with simple cherry blossom designs common to all specialties and only reflecting the difference between “regular” and “advanced” course graduates by the cherry blossom designs.
To be thorough, I interviewed navy paratrooper vets, but they were unanimous in answering back, “A patch with parachutes? Of course not, Never!”
Paratroopers were not regarded as a true specialty, as the specialty of both the First and Third Yokosuka Special Land Forces was their land fighting skills once they hit the ground, regardless of the method of delivery to the ground. Thus the navy never acknowledged its paratroopers with a specialty patch.
By the way, Bomber and Fighter arm patches also attributed in a similar way to IJN flight crews are total hoaxes as well.”
Below you can see that the origin of the hoax lies in the cover design of the July 1945 US Intelligence booklet on paratroopers. Where that cover design came from is anyone’s guess, but a hard verifiable fact is that such a design was never approved before the navy dropped specialty patches altogether in March 1942. And as Yagu says, the foul anchor suggests it was not designed by any Japanese familiar with navy design practices. (The “Golden Kite” army paratrooper breast patch, on the other hand, was established as late as 13th October 1943).
Also, the illustrations from Yagyu’s article emphasizing it all as a hoax.
There have been updated copies of the arm patches without the chain, which may have been introduced in response to her Expose, but those still don't change the fact that such regulations were never issued by the navy, a fact I can also personally vouch for.
Type 4, I will close this thread, if you continue to hijack it with sidetracking questions. I will disregard your post and ask you to post a separate thread, if you wish to discuss it with others.
Thanks Nick. How would we ignorant American scroungers have not known about this interesting research considering how open & sharing your fellow countrymen are Your excellent contributions make up for this isolation centric behavior! The question still remains unanswered, how'd did a fantasy design make it on the cover of a 1945 booklet? Completely from the imagination of US military intelligence ? Perhaps. To further clarify my position I agree that the existing patches aren't period or original but most certainly post war fantasy pieces. That said your colleague is incorrect regarding Japan's use of fouled anchor! Just look at common navy officer & petty officer cap insignias! Yes those weren't intended for enlisted lower ranks but.... I sure would be interested in owning or viewing the above mention article on navy uniforms!
She was consultant for the movie "Tora, Tora Tora" as well as these here Etsuko Yagyu - IMDb
I also wrote for the publisher of PX, so I happen to have all the editions the publisher used to send me. I recommended that book to you when it came out, but you didn't want it. It's only in Japanese anyway.
Thanks Guy! I will try to find a used example. Not a fan of high priced illustrated reference books printed only in Japanese so perhaps that's why I dismissed it
Another fabulous post Nick, thank you! It adds much weight to the "fake" side of the debate. The expert you cite is evidently quite knowledgable and even took time to interview veterans, so her opinion is to be respected. It is, however opinion. As our research has revealed in recent times, the opinions of experts are sometimes proven wrong in certain areas. I'll grant the difficulty in proving that something didn't or doesn't exist, and so acknowledge that the facts, as known, don't support the patch as a legitimate Japanese WWII item.
As you and Jareth discussed, though, the patches exist, in both summer and winter colors. The Intel publication was dated 1 month before the end of the war, so these patches were made during the war. We know from the sword and flag world that fakes were being produced during the war, so that could explain them. There were some pretty inovative entrepreneurs active at that time making fakes of all kinds of things. And while our Intellegance forces are supposed to be fool-proof, we know even they have been bamboozled many times.
I would like to submit one more option, that even if unlikely, is still a possibility (since we are all speculating here). During my Air Force days, I had a patch made for a team of pranksters of which I was a ringleader. We didn't wear the patch on our uniforms, but we'd pass them out to people we pranked. I have also seen many unofficial patches made for distribution by the fighter pilot community. It is possible (even if unlikely) that some troopers in that day had designed a patch such as this as a momento of their accomplishment, to be kept as a personal memory.
The weight of the evidence falls clearly on the side of fakery, though ... for now Thank you, Nick, for your ongoing protection of the integrity of our hobby!
The Japanese Naval Paratrooper Specialty Patch Hoax
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Your excellent contributions make up for this isolation centric behavior! The question still remains unanswered, how'd did a fantasy design make it on the cover of a 1945 booklet? Completely from the imagination of US military intelligence ? Perhaps. To further clarify my position I agree that the existing patches aren't period or original but most certainly post war fantasy pieces. That said your colleague is incorrect regarding Japan's use of fouled anchor! Just look at common navy officer & petty officer cap insignias! Yes those weren't intended for enlisted lower ranks but.... I sure would be interested in owning or viewing the above mention article on navy uniforms!
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