Fake IJA dog tag warning

[Nick Komiya]

I added a warning about fake tags to the pinned tag thread.

[Ryukyutunnelrat]

Hi Nick, first off wanted to say that your introduction to dog tags thread is fantastic and a great reference to all Japanese military collectors

Reference your post about field improvised dog tags. I have to admit that this may be the exception to the rule but I have dug up several improvised tags on Okinawa in the past and also have dug up numerous blank dog tags in caves (it was always a bummer to find a blank one). Attached is one I personally dug up in a cave on Yeaju Dake, Okinawa. You can see that it is clearly field made and not done using standard dies. Another one was found on the same hill in the cave next to the one I dug this one up and it was done the same way, same unit (42nd Field Artillery Regiment under the 24th Division)

several years ago, I bought a dog tag off of Fleabay that is from the same unit and clearly shows the same style of improvised kanji. The fact that two were dug up in a cave on okinawa and the one I found on Fleabay clearly shows that field improvised tags were used with some units at least on Okinawa.

[Ryukyutunnelrat]

My dug up tag next to the one I found on Fleabay showing same style of improvised use without dies. The back of the one has a name on it "Iwata Mitake"

[Nick Komiya]

There are always exceptions to the rule for whatever reason (loss, forced induction of locals etc), when only small quantities are needed, but those that you show are carved in the officer style with proper tapering stroke ends, which is a far cry from crude screwdriver punch work. There is really no comparison between the quality that these show and the type of fakes I wanted to warn against.

[Nick Komiya]

Relating to the above topic, companies would have been equipped with the proper tools to carve in the officer's tags. Officer tags initially only had rank and name on them plus preparing them was his personal problem, but you will read in my tag thread that later regulations required unit designations too and issued officer tags as well. Unlike EM tags, you couldn't just pull out ready-made tags off the shelf for issue to officers. These would need to be done at the field unit and custom done, so if they had need for an EM tag on a one-off basis they could cope with that without having to resort to screwdrivers.
By the way, on a different note, the shipment manifests to troops outside Japan often included ID tags and I assume most of the new tags needed at the time of switching over to the new Tsushogo codes were supplied from Japan ready-made in this manner. Otherwise it would have been a big burden to units already in the field.

[Ryukyutunnelrat]

Nick completely agree with exception to the rule. just wanted to point out that one must really look at the improvised ones that are not die struck and not automatically assume that they are fake.

David.