Why Turkish Airlines Flew Into a War Zone for 215 Japanese

Turkish Airlines, Japan, 1985: with Saddam Hussein's deadline hours away, two Turkish Airlines planes flew into Tehran to rescue 215 Japanese citizens no one else would carry. This is the true story behind Japan–Turkey friendship, and it begins 95 years earlier with the Ottoman frigate Ertuğrul, wrecked by a typhoon off Kushimoto, Japan in 1890.

How did a poor fishing village save 69 Turkish sailors, and why did Turkey never forget? From the Ertuğrul disaster to the 1985 Tehran evacuation during the Iran–Iraq War, this is a story of a debt repaid across a century.

The Ottoman frigate Ertuğrul · Kii Ōshima & Kushimoto, Wakayama · Kashinozaki Lighthouse · Emperor Meiji · Sultan Abdulhamid II · the 1985 Tehran evacuation · Turkish Airlines · Ambassador Nomura & Ambassador Birsel · Turgut Özal · Captain Orhan Suyolcu

???? Sources
- nippon.com — Murakami Naohisa, "The Ertuğrul Incident" (2015)
- Embassy of Türkiye in Tokyo — Ertuğrul disaster note (2017)
- Wakayama Prefecture — international relations pages
- Sasakawa Peace Foundation, Ocean Newsletter No. 364 (2015)
- House of Councillors of Japan, Foreign Affairs Committee record, April 3, 1985
- Amb. Nomura's 2007 speech & Junichi Numata's account (ertugrul.or.jp)
- Japanese & English Wikipedia articles on the Ertuğrul incident

SOURCES & CREDITS

Music by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com), licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 — http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• "Redletter"
• "Immersed"
• "Ishikari Lore"
• "Lost Time"
• "Oppressive Gloom"
• "Reawakening"
• "Promises to Keep"
• "The Parting"
• "Long Note Two"
• "Satiate - only strings"

Images via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY / CC BY-SA):
• "Iran Iraq War Start Attack on Tehran Airport-19…" by Mhsheikholeslami, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=93849891
• "Iran Iraq War Start Attack on Tehran Airport 19…" by Mhsheikholeslami, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=93849892
• "THY Turkish Airlines DC-9-32 (8544129676)" by clipperarctic, CC BY-SA 2.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=28485547
• "THY Türk Hava Yolları - Turkish Airlines McDonn…" by M D West, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=173231023
• "Mehrabad Airport, Shahid Fakuri Complex and Aza…" by Ali Safdarian, CC BY 3.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=60324005
• "Airport Nurnberg DC-10 Turkish Airlines" by Airportnuernberg, CC BY-SA 3.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=9565708
• "TC-JAV, Turkish DC-10 (6060110163)" by clipperarctic, CC BY-SA 2.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=28485853
• "KITLV A496 - Suezkanaal te Suez, KITLV 100611" by Zangaki., CC BY 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=99601550
• "KITLV A496 - Suezkanaal te Suez, KITLV 88017" by Zangaki., CC BY 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=99686104
• "Kasinosaki-Lighthouse Feb2010" by 玄史生, CC BY-SA 3.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=9489868
• "Kashinozaki Lighthouse" by Douglas Perkins, CC BY 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=46520240
• "Kashinozaki Lighthouse 2" by Motokoka, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=80401046
• "Kashinozaki Lighthouse 1" by Motokoka, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=80401049
• "Kushimoto-toruko-ireihi" by Si-take., CC BY-SA 3.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=93337681
• "Cenotaph of Turkey ship, Ottoman frigate Ertuğr…" by Motokoka, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=80401051
• "Kii oshima turkey ship crash001" by Opqr, CC BY-SA 3.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=30426923
• "Bimarestan-e Susan (Susan Hospital) in Iraq-Ira…" by Mahdi Kalhor, CC BY 3.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=52744842
• "Pertev Aşcıoğlu ve Turgut Özal" by Furkan Işıldak, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=38485019
• "THY A310 at AMS (16132450851)" by G B_NZ, CC BY-SA 2.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=57988146
• "FRANKFURT OCT 1985 THY TURKISH AIRLINES AIRBUS…" by simon butler from halesowen, uk, CC BY 2.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=176857340
• "Interior of Turkish Memorial and Museum" by Motokoka, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=80399302

Sound effects:
• Sound "Model 500 Telephone British ring.ogg" by CianMcCann, CC BY-SA 3.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=4223230
• Sound "Sea waves.wav" by Ganesh Mohan T, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=144323753
• Sound "428086 inspectorj airplane-boeing-flyby-right-t…" by InspectorJ, CC BY 4.0: https://commons.wikimedia.org/?curid=116752652

Public domain works via Wikimedia Commons by Katsushika Hokusai, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Utagawa Hiroshige, Itō Jakuchū and The Graphic (1891).
Atmospheric footage: Pixabay (AttilaPergel, JoshuaWoroniecki, Kanenori, McPix22, NickyPe, md579)

Rarely Told: true stories, rarely told.
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