Russo-Japanese War and Military Swords—A Turning Point in Modern Japanese Sword Culture

On February 8, Meiji 37 (1904), the Imperial Japanese Navy launched a surprise attack on Russia's Port Arthur, opening the Russo-Japanese War. This conflict was not only Japan's total-war commitment to national destiny, but also a decisive turning point in the history of the Japanese sword as a weapon. The katana—once dismissed as "obsolete" following the Satsuma Rebellion (1877)—was rehabilitated through the Russo-Japanese War as a "spiritual symbol of bushido," becoming an essential officer's accoutrement through the militarist era of the Showa period—the essence of this transformation is etched into this war.

The Meiji Military Sword System—Redefining the Blade After the Edict of Sword Removal

The Edict of Sword Removal (Meiji 9, 1876) stripped commoners of the right to bear swords, and the Satsuma Rebellion (Meiji 10, 1877)—where Satsuma samurai wielding katanas were defeated by rifle-equipped government forces—marked the moment when the Japanese sword lost practical battlefield value. Firearms defeated the sword—it seemed a death sentence to the blade that had symbolized the warrior's soul.

Yet within the military officer corps, the sword survived in altered form. The Meiji government mandated that army and navy officers carry the "military sword," creating a distinctive style that merged Western military dress with traditional Japanese blades. The officer's military sword established in Meiji 19 (1886) combined European-style fittings with a Japanese sword blade; subsequent modifications culminated in the Type 32 Military Sword (Meiji 32 / 1899), formally adopted by the Army.

A defining feature of Meiji-period officer military swords was the allowance for officers to carry personally obtained Japanese blades—including treasured heirlooms—remounted in Western-style fittings. This coexistence of modern scabbard and traditional blade embodied Meiji modernization itself: the harmony of rationality and tradition. Officers entering the Russo-Japanese War often carried family swords or newly commissioned blades from celebrated smiths to the battlefields of Manchuria.

Sword smiths faced profound change. Demand for blades had collapsed following the Edict of Sword Removal, but the military sword system secured steady orders. From the mid-Meiji period onward, smiths in Tokyo, Osaka, and Gifu specialized in military sword production. Masters like Gassan Sadakazu (初代) became renowned for presentation blades for the imperial court and military officials. The Russo-Japanese War decisively expanded the demand for military swords—the "survival strategy" for modern smithcraft.

Nogi Maresuke and the Siege of Port Arthur—"Samurai Resolve" and the Mythologization of the Sword

The figure who most embodied the Japanese sword's connection to the Russo-Japanese War was General Nogi Maresuke, commander of the Third Army. Tasked with capturing the fortress of Port Arthur, Nogi launched repeated frontal assaults against the seemingly impregnable Russian position—fortified with barbed wire, machine guns, and artillery—losing countless men, including his two sons (Katsunori and Yasunori). After five months of siege, Port Arthur fell on January 1, 1905, but Japanese casualties reached approximately 60,000 (killed and dead from disease combined).

Nogi bore deep responsibility for these losses and committed ritual suicide alongside his wife, Shizuko, the day after the Meiji Emperor's death (Meiji 45 / September 13, 1912). Nogi's death was widely celebrated as the final act of a man who upheld bushido after the Edict of Sword Removal, profoundly affecting intellectuals and writers of the era. Natsume Soseki reflected Nogi's death in the death of his protagonist in *Kokoro*, while Mori Ogai depicted the spirit of ritual suicide in "Okitsu Yagorō's Testament." Nogi's military sword became mythologized as "the symbol of bushido" and is displayed today at Yasukuni Shrine's Yushukan Museum, testifying to generations of visitors to the historical bond between the Russo-Japanese War and the Japanese sword.

The siege of Port Arthur is evaluated as a costly war of attrition from a military standpoint. Yet the image of "samurai resolve" became inseparable from the spiritual revival of Japanese sword culture in modern Japan. Nogi became the symbol of "the last samurai," catalyzing renewed cultural interest in the Japanese blade.

The Battle of the Japan Sea and Togo Heihachiro—The "Z Flag" and the Authority of the Military Sword

The Battle of the Japan Sea (Battle of Tsushima), May 27–28, 1905, saw Admiral Togo Heihachiro's Combined Fleet virtually annihilate the Baltic Fleet—an unprecedented victory. The Baltic Fleet had undertaken a seven-month expedition from Europe via Africa and India, expected to outnumber the Japanese fleet. Togo met them with the "T-crossing tactic," sinking 21 of the Baltic Fleet's 38 main vessels in two days of combat and capturing six more—a historic triumph.

When Togo hoisted the "Z flag" on the deck of his flagship *Mikasa* and issued the order "The fate of the Empire hangs on this one battle," the scene became a symbol of Japanese military spirit and bushido passed down through history. Togo became a world-renowned hero, compared to Nelson, and an icon of Japanese victory.

Togo held the Japanese sword in high regard; his military sword carried special authority as a blade personally reviewed by the Meiji Emperor—a "heaven-viewed sword." Among naval officers, possessing an excellent military sword became a point of spiritual pride, a culture inherited by Taisho and early Showa naval officer traditions.

Long-Term Impact of the Russo-Japanese War on Japanese Sword Culture

Japanese victory transformed the cultural status of the Japanese sword. Since the Edict of Sword Removal, the katana had been dismissed as an "outdated antique"—now it was redefined as a "national symbol embodying the victory of bushido."

Inazō Nitobe's *Bushido* (English edition, 1900)—published before the war—was reassessed and reread worldwide in light of Japan's triumph. The sword gained international recognition as an embodiment of bushido. Western observers seeking to understand how an Asian nation defeated a European power attributed it to the spiritual force of bushido and seized upon the Japanese sword as its symbol. For the first time, the Japanese sword acquired standing as an "international cultural icon."

On the demand side, the Russo-Japanese War made military sword bearing a de facto requirement among officers, spurring orders to smiths. The Gifu and Seki blade-smithing communities flourished through mass production of military sword blades, while Tokyo and Osaka master smiths gained renown crafting high-grade commissioned blades for senior officers and military cliques.

More decisively, the wartime convention of "officers must bear the sword" continued through the Taisho period into the militarist Showa era, leading to the adoption of the Type 94 Military Sword (1934) and Type 98 Military Sword (1938). The Russo-Japanese War laid the spiritual and institutional foundation of prewar Japan's military sword culture and remains an indispensable historical watershed for understanding sword culture during the Pacific War era.

The Russo-Japanese War and Sword Collecting—Historic Blades as Witnesses to War

Among the swords officers carried in the Russo-Japanese War were family heirlooms and treasured blades. Following the rise of sword appreciation and collecting after the Meiji Restoration, officers took pride in mounting superior blades as military swords. Records from across Japan document cases of former daimyo families' sons carrying family tachi and uchi-katana remounted in military sword fittings to the battlefields. The fact that famous old and new swords experienced modern warfare is historically singular in blade history.

Forts bearing shell scars still stand on the battlefields of Port Arthur and Mukden; some swords left by Japanese soldiers are held in museums in Port Arthur, China. The military sword used by Nogi Maresuke is displayed at Yasukuni Shrine's Yushukan, where it testifies to the historical relationship between the Russo-Japanese War and the Japanese sword.

The Russo-Japanese War was the final great historical stage on which the Japanese sword transitioned from "instrument of war" to "spiritual symbol of bushido." Through this conflict, the Japanese sword secured its place as an inseparable element of Japanese national identity and cultural heritage. That legacy passed through the militarist Showa period, the postwar establishment of the Japanese Sword Preservation Society, the modern Living National Treasure system, and now forms the foundation of the Reiwa sword renaissance.