Video of US F35 Fighter Landing and Taking Off From Japanese Navy Ship

[Gildor]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6WqRCALGd0&t=141s

This video shows a US F35 fighter landing and taking off from the JS Izumo, Japan's largest warship. The flights were testing the Izumo's modifications to handle short take off, vertical landing aircraft. The Japanese Maritime SDF is planning to take delivery of some F35's in 2023.

This flight was notable in that this is the first time a fixed wing fighter aircraft has operated off a Japanese naval vessel since World War II.

I thought this post counts as Japanese culture, so that is why I posted it here. Apologies if I misjudged.

[kijakusai]

Re:Video of US F35 Fighter Landing and Taking Off From Japanese Navy Ship

This video shows a US F35 fighter landing and taking off from the JS Izumo, Japan's largest warship...

Thank you for posting the link to the video, Gildor-san.

Since the tail assembly of the F35B in the video has a 'Bat' mark, the F35Bs seem to belong to Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 242 of Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni.
The tail assembly of the F35B also has the 'Izumo いずも' insignia.
The uniforms of US Marine servicemen who participate in the operation, too, have the 'Izumo いずも' shoulder patches.
When the F35B has landed on JS Izumo, the pilot, too, shows us an 'Izumo いずも' badge.

The insignia of JS Izumo (DDH-183):
https://www.mod.go.jp/msdf/formal/koubo/

The ship's name 'Izumo' is derived from Izumo Province, and Izumo Province is an important place in Japanese mythology.
A famous mythological story related to Izumo Province is that in Izumo Province strong deity Susanoo-no-Mikoto destroyed eight-headed and eight-tailed monstrous serpent Yamata no Orochi and Susanoo-no-Mikoto found divine sword (Equivalence in the Anglosphere? Well...think of Excalibur) Ame-no-Murakumo-no-Tsurugi/Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi in one of the tails of the serpent/dragon Yamata no Orochi.
Design-wise, the insignia of JS Izumo consists of the divine sword Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi and the eights heads of the monstrous serpent Yamata no Orochi.
I think British writer on anime Helen McCarthy has said that the name of the protagonist of Ghost in the Shell 'Kusanagi Motoko' is like 'Jane Excalibur', if I remember correctly.
Mifune Toshirō played the role of deity Susanoo-no-Mikoto in a 50s Japanese film of which special-effect director was Tsuburaya Eiji.

The 'Sankei Shinbun' newspaper, too, has posted a video about the operation on YouTube.
It had been cinematographed by the Japan Maritime Self-Defence Force.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Thb-US3vjYc

On a side note, your 'Asakusa-san' avatar is nice, ^_^ and the camouflage pattern of Asakusa-san's Boonie hat suits well with the topic, since American and Japanese servicemen in the video wear camo uniforms.

I have heard that Kaga-san, too, will have a modified flight deck which can deal with F35Bs.

The length of JS Izumo is 248m (813ft 8in), and the length of aircraft carrierSōryū was 227.5m (746ft 5in). So Izumo seems to be a so-so large ship.

Speaking of naval vessels, when USS George Washington (CVN-73) came to Japan in 2008, Commander U.S. Naval Forces Japan printed CVN73, a manga about USS George Washington, and gave the CVN73 manga to Japanese people.

https://www.stripes.com/news/comic-b...rrival-1.78594
https://www.stripes.com/branches/nav...c-book-1.79870

In the manga, the air boss of USS George Washington says that he will go shopping in Akihabara. He may be an otaku.

[Gildor]

Thank you kijakusai-san for your usual in-depth, informative, and interesting response!

One thing I notice is that you refer to the other ship to get the modifications as "Kaga-san". I always thought honorifics only applied to people, but here it is being used for an object (a Navy Ship). Are there rules for how honorifics are applied to non-humans?

[kijakusai]

Re:Video of US F35 Fighter Landing and Taking Off From Japanese Navy Ship

Thank you kijakusai-san for your usual in-depth, informative, and interesting response!

It's a pleasure.

One thing I notice is that you refer to the other ship to get the modifications as "Kaga-san". I always thought honorifics only applied to people, but here it is being used for an object (a Navy Ship). Are there rules for how honorifics are applied to non-humans?

Oh, you are keen regarding linguistic things. ^_^
I think you have said it is funny that Texan Felix Leiter teaches American English to Britisher James Bond, who tries to disguise himself as a New Englander in a novel by Ian Lancaster Fleming. I think Kingsley Amis half-jokingly criticised Ian Fleming about Fleming's knowledge of American English in The James Bond Dossier. In the You Only Live Twice novel, Tiger Tanaka calls James Bond 'Bondo-san' (also in the film version, Tiger Tanaka calls James Bond 'Mr Bond' or 'Bon(d)-san').
When Ian Fleming visited Japan, he made friends with Saitō Torao (maybe already in the 1950s when writing a part of the travelogue Thrilling Cities), an architect who also worked as the editor-in-chief of an annual about Japan-related things written in English that was published by the Asahi Shimbun newspaper. Since the 'Tora-' part of the architect's name 'Saitō Torao' can mean 'tiger', it is said that the head of the Japanese secret service Tiger Tanaka in You Only Live Twice is modelled upon the architect Saitō Torao.

JS Kaga (DDH-184) has the same name as aircraft carrier Kaga, and the warship girl in Kantai Collection who is modelled on the aircraft carrier Kaga is often called 'Kaga-san' in KanColle-related works, probably because Kaga in Kantai Collection is a senpai/elder sister-like girl. Since I am accustomed to the ship-related name 'Kaga' having the honorific '-san' in KanColle-related works, I have half-jokingly added the honorific '-san' also to the name of the ship that 'inherited' the name 'Kaga'.
When JS Kaga (DDH-184) was launched, the KanColle Staff posted a congratulation message on Twitter, and its illustration depicted warship girl Kaga and JS Kaga.
https://twitter.com/kancolle_staff/s...05083847540737
Artist Shibafu, who had done character design of some warship girls including Kaga for Kantai Collection, illustrated the Twitter message.
The KanColle Staff, too, referred to the warship girl as 'Kaga-san' in the text of the Twitter message. The KanColle Staff referred to JS Kaga (DDH-184）just as 'Kaga' in the text, though.
The ships' names 'Kaga' are derived from Kaga Province. JS Kaga has and the aircraft carrier Kaga had a shrine within them, and it is/was a branch shrine of the Shirayama-himé Shrine, which was the most prestigious shrine in Kaga Province. In ancient times, when noblemen were appointed as governor of Kaga Province and came to Kaga Province, they had to go and worship at the Shirayama-himé Shrine first.

Going back to the original topic, indeed, 'Are Japanese honorifics applied also to non-humans?' is an interesting question.
Getting straight to the point, roughly speaking, Japanese honorifics can be applied also to non-humans.
Again roughly speaking, when you add an honorific to a word which means a non-human, the stylistic feel of the word in question can become polite/soft-spoken (if it works well).
I have seen Japanese people add an honorific to ships' names when they mention ships' names in a soft-spoken way.
In a questionnaire aimed at Japanese businessmen, 80% of the answerers have said, 'I add an honorific to the name of another company when I mention that company.' So it is likely that when a Japanese businessman talks with an American businessman who is fluent in Japanese and works for, say, Big Blue, the Japanese businessman refers to the American businessman's company as 'IBM-san', and the American businessman can easily undestand that the Japanese businessman has mentioned the company to which the American businessman belongs in a polite style.
Also it is likely that an inhabitant in a town adds an honorific to the name of a popular mom-and-pop store that has a long history in the town when he mentions the store in question.
If you check the colophons of dōjinshi, you will find that dōjinshi artists often add honorifics to the names of printing offices which have printed those dōjinshi. It reflects the artists' 'Thank you for printing my dōjinshi' feeling.
The '-san' honorific can be attached also to workplace nouns. You may remember the Denkigai no Hon'ya-san manga/anime. The 'Hon'ya-san' part in the title means 'Bookshop-san'. (The bookshop in the manga/anime is modelled on the Tora-no-Ana bookshop in Akibahara.)
It is likely that a veterinarian adds an honorific to the name of a dog when he talks to the owner of the dog in a soft-spoken way at the veterinary clinic.
It is likely that when a mother and her child visit a ranch and see a horse, the mother refers to the horse as 'O-uma-san' (an honorific prefix + horse + san).
The title of a picture book by famous writer of children's literature Matsutani Miyoko is Ninjin-san ga Akai Waké, which means 'The reason why carrot-san is red.'
When film-makers say, 'Bijutsu-san' (lit. 'art-san'), it means a person who belongs to the art department.
Fuji TV broadcast a TV programme about sound effects in the 1990s, and its title was Onkō-san. 'Onkō' is a shortened form of 'onkyō kōka', and it means 'sound effects'. So 'Onkō-san' is 'Sound Effects-san', and it means 'sound effects artists'.
Perhaps fans of anime in non-Japanese countries tend to regard manga-ka Ozawa Satoru mainly as the creator of the Blue Submarine No. 6 anime, but actually, the most important work by Ozawa Satoru is probably the Submarine 707 manga. In a scene in the Submarine 707 manga, when Captain Hayami of the Japan Maritime Self-Defence Force sees a U.S. Navy vessel, he refers to the U.S. Navy vessel as 'America-san'.
In the Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water anime, the submarine Nautilus has a defensive device whose name is 'Home Guard'. It is hommage to the 'Home Guard' defensive device which Submarine 717 used in the Submarine 707 manga.
You may have watched the Giant Robo OVA (dir. by Imagawa Yasuhiro). That is based on the Giant Robo manga by Yokoyama 'Gigantor' Mitsuteru. Some early chapters of the Giant Robo manga were drawn by Ozawa Satoru.
The sponsor for the Tetsujin 28-gō (Gigantor) anime in the 1960s was Glico, which is the company that makes and sells the Pocky biscuit sticks. So, like modern-day otaku who eat the Pocky biscuit sticks, their parents, too, ate confectionery made by Glico when they were kids. (You can hear the singers say, 'Glico' in the OP credit sequence.)

Since adding an honorific to a non-human can, when it doesn't work well, result in sounding odd, unnatural, childish, ridiculous, or the like, adding an honorific to a non-human is not an always-OK thing, and I have not yet studied the matter well to the level where I can write a concise manual on rules for how honorifics are applied to non-humans, but probably it is safe to say that Japanese honorifics' scope of application is fairly wide. Again, sorry about my being unable to present a concise manual about the rules here.

Speaking of navies and special effects (and honorifics), in a TV programme about Star Wars broadcast in Japan in the 80s, I saw special effects cinematographer Richard Edlund, A.S.C. speak Japanese. He was a navy serviceman who worked for the Fleet Air Photo Lab in Atsugi in Japan, and he learnt Japanese in Japan. He also saw Kurosawa Akira films and Godzilla movies at a Tōhō's cinema.
Mr Edlund adds an honorific to Japanese names even when he speaks in English. Probably he knows the 'mentioning a person's name without any honorific title is impolite, so add an honorific to the name' custom.

A person who played a part in spreading the '-san' honorific more in the States recently may be broadcaster and now baseball executive Victor Rojas. The staff of the Sankei Sports newspaper gave Mr Rojas a copy of Sankei Sports of which headline was 'Big Fly Ohtanisan' in the Latin Alphabet.
https://www.sanspo.com/article/20210...LUAMJSUSR66D4/

https://lohas.nicoseiga.jp/thumb/7605321i?1510134494
In this colour dōjin KanColle 4-koma manga, Japanese warship girl Akigumo calls American warship girl Iowa 'Iowa-san'.
In the 4-koma manga, Iowa-san is writing one-page synopses for live-action KanColle films in hopes that one of them will be produced by an American motion-picture company in Hollywood. Synopsis 1 is an Independence Day-like sci-fi movie, Synopsis 2 is a zombie movie, and Synopsis 3 is an Asylum Studio-ish shark movie.

In this photo, we can clearly see the pilot have the 'Izumo' badge in his hand.
https://twitter.com/USMC/status/1445407315990138889

[Gildor]

Thank you kijakusai-san! There is lot more to Japanese honorifics than I imagined. However, I think I'll just stick to people. I'd be afraid of making a faux-pas if I tried to add one to a non-human. I have enough trouble keeping the usage of -san, -kun, -chan, etc straight when referring to people!

[kijakusai]

Thank you kijakusai-san! There is lot more to Japanese honorifics than I imagined. However, I think I'll just stick to people. I'd be afraid of making a faux-pas if I tried to add one to a non-human. I have enough trouble keeping the usage of -san, -kun, -chan, etc straight when referring to people!

It's a pleasure.

In a scene in the Submarine 707 manga, Lieutenant Commander Blood, who is the captain of a Canadian naval submarine and is fluent in Japanese, has said, 'America-san,' when his mentioning the United States Navy.
I wonder whether the manga creator Ozawa Satoru watched this Swashbuckler film.

If you add an honorific to a non-human in a proper way, your Japanese will sound in a soft-spoken and advanced-level way.
After having studied Japanology at Columbia, Harvard, Cambridge and Kyoto University, when young Donald Keene contributed articles in Japanese to a Japanese magazine aimed at the intelligentsia, some Japanese eggheads said, 'Keene-san is very good at Japanese, but his Japanese is still somewhat unnatural.'
Even the Donald Keene wrote unnatural Japanese. So you need not be afraid of making a mistake when you speak or write a piece of Japanese discourse. ^_^

'Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.'

Anyway, I hope that you continue to study Japanese. ^_^

[kijakusai]

When the 2022 Japanese-American Friendship Festival was held at Yokota Air Base in Western Tokyo on 22nd May, Air Force One, which carried President Joe Biden, arrived at Yokota Air Base.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjU9Bx8Sqkc
https://twitter.com/asahicom/status/1528354307615035396