Korea Strait
Categories: Cleanup from July 2005 | Straits | Geography of South Korea | Geography of Japan
The Korea Strait is a sea passage between the East China Sea and the Sea of Japan (East Sea). To the north, it is bounded by the south coast of the Korean peninsula, to the south by the Japanese islands of Kyushu and Honshu. The strait has a depth of about 90 metres and is split by the Tsushima Islands. While the eastern channel of the Korea Strait is also referred to as Tsushima Strait, the western Channel has no special name.
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Geography
The Korea Strait lies between Korea and the western sides of the four main islands of Japan, in particular, Honshu, the largest. The Tsushima Islands lie to the west center of the Korea Strait, and the broader eastern channel (Tsushima Strait) is bounded to the west by Tsushima and to the east through south-east by Honshu and to the south-south-east by Kyushu. It and the west channel together connect the Sea of Japan and the East China Sea. The Tsushima Strait is narrowest at its southern end, constricted there by nearby Iki Island, which lies wholly in the strait near the tip of Honshu.
The Tsushima Strait (対馬海峡) is that part of the Korea Strait located east of the Tsushima Islands — a small archipelago of fourteen closely located islets grouped around one large island divided by a canal. The island group is commonly called both Tsushima Island and Tsushima Islands, and is known colloquially simply as Tsushima; the islets are of economically negligible importance.
The Tsushima Strait measures approximately 60 miles (97 kilometres) long and 40 miles (64 kilometres) wide. The strait has a depth of about 90 metres and is bounded by the Tsushima Islands to the west. Nearby Iki Island lies in the strait about 50 kilometres towards Kyusu from the southern tip of Kamino-shima (South Island).
Currents
A branch of the Kuroshio Current (Japan Current) passes through the strait. Its warm branch is sometimes called Tsushima Current. Originating along the Japanese islands this current passed through the Sea of Japan then divides along either shore of Sakhalin Island; eventually flowing into the Northern Pacific Ocean via the Strait north of Hokkaido and into the Sea of Okhotsk north of Sakhalin Island near Vladivostok.
Economic significance
Numerous international shipping lanes pass through the strait, including those carrying much of the traffic bound for the ports of southern South Korea. Both South Korea and Japan have restricted their territorial claims in the strait to 3 nautical miles from shore, so as not to permit free passage through it. [1]
Passenger ferries ply numerous routes across the strait. Commercial ferries run from Busan, South Korea to Japanese ports including Fukuoka, Tsushima, Shimonoseki, and Hiroshima. Ferries also connect Tsushima Island with Fukuoka, and South Korea's Jeju Island with the Korean mainland. Ferries connecting Busan and Japanese cities with ports in China also traverse the strait.
Historic impact
Historically these narrows served as a highway for high risk voyages (Korea to the Tsushima Islands to Iki Island to the western tip of Honshu) for cultural exchange between Japan and Korea. Japan periodically sent year long embassies to the court of the Chinese, deliberately trying to learn from the great empire to the west (after the Americans and Europeans breached Japan's isolationism, they repeated this unusual and deliberate process to learn from western nations from about 1860). The straits also occasionally served as an invasion path. For example, some archeologists believe the first migrations of the Mongoloid race traveled across to Honshu around the 8th century BCE, and Buddhism was transmitted from Baekje to Japan over this strait long before sea going ships were available. Iki to Kamino-shima, the southern end of the large island of Tsushima is about 50 kilometres. Busan (Korea), to the Northern tip of Tsushima, about the same across the western side of the Korea Strait. These were tremendous distances to attempt in small boats over open seas.
Mongolian invasion
The Mongolian invasion of Japan crossed this sea and ravaged the Tsushima Islands before the kamikaze (神風) – usually translated as "divine wind" – a typhoon that is said to have saved Japan from a Mongol invasion fleet led by Kublai Khan in 1281. The Korean Armed Forces have attacked Japan through it, and vice versa.
Battle of Tsushima
- See main article: Battle of Tsushima
The reason the Tsushima strait is famous, is that one of the most decisive naval battles of modern times, the Battle of Tsushima, fought on May 27 and May 28, 1905 (May 14 and May 15 in the Julian calendar then in use in Russia) took place there due east of the north part of Tsushima and due north of Iki Island between the Japanese and Russian navies in 1905; the Russian fleet was virtually destroyed by the Japanese. In Japan, it is called the Sea of Japan naval battle.
References
- ^ "The Republic of Korea’s Maritime Boundaries, page 18". . URL accessed on June 23, 2005.