North Japan

**North Japan**, officially the **Democratic Socialist Republic of Japan**(**DSRJ**), is an island nation in East Asia. The capital city is Fukushima.  North Japan shares a border with neighboring South Japan.  The Japanese Military Zone marks the border between the two nations and has been there since the failed South Japanese Communist takeover in 1949.  Neither nation recognizes the border as both claim to be the lone sovereign government of the Japanese Islands.

North Japan was founded in 1948 by merging the Soviet and Cascadian military occupation zones of the Japanese islands following World War Two.  South Japan was followed in 1947 following the  Confederate States, United Kingdom, and Republic of China merging their zones.  Both nations have highly strained relations which has caused conflict between them and Border Skirmishes were a common area of fighting between the two nations off and on between 1953 and 1980.  Full war never broke out between the two but the use of military force has always been an area of tension on the islands.

## History

### End of the Japanese Empire

In 1945 Allied forces invaded the Japanese home islands, with the Soviet and Cascadian Red Armies invading the northernmost island and Britain, the CSA, and France invading the southern islands.  On January 14, 1946, the Japanese Emperor abdicated and the Japanese government surrendered to the Allied forces on the CSS Mississippi.

Immediately following the surrender the nation was divided into military occcupation zones between the Soviet Union, Cascadian People's Republic, Confederate States of America, United Kingdom, and Republic of China, although ROC forces left the island on March 6, 1946 to help fight in the Chinese Civil War.

### Formation of the DSRJ

In 1948, General Secretary Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union and Premier John Reed of Cascadia met in Fukushima.  The communist leaders were in Fukushima for the establishment of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Japan.  The two were on stage when Premier Kyuichi Tokuda took the stage and gave his speech.

*"Today marks the end of an era in Japanese history.  An era that was marked by bigotry, imperialism, and exploitation.  Thanks to our liberators from the Soviet Union and Cascadia, Japan has been freed.  Freed from bourgeois exploitation.  Free to fight for the worldwide socialist revolution.  Our brothers and sisters to the south still live in exploitation thanks to the western leaders and their Chinese puppet.  We must never give up our fight to free them.  Long live Japan.  Long live the Japanese people!"*
This "new era" in Japanese history was a major point of Tokuda's rule.  Shrines to the former emperor were torn down and relics of the old Japan were burned and destroyed.  the Japanese Communist Party was committed to their "New Japan."  Fukushima was entirely rebuilt during Tokuda's rule and the city was larger than South Japanese Kyoto until the later 1980s.

Tokuda was responsibe for the remilitarization of North Japan following the Second World War and launched the first Japanese military offensive since the war in April of 1953.  The offensive, in which 750 North Japanese T-34s and 15,000 Northern Soldiers attacked and occupied several South Japanese villages, nearly led to full scale war.  War was imminent if not for a United Nations peace keeping initiative.  One third of the villages were transfered over to North Japanese rule and the rest of their forces were withdrawn to the North.

### Nosaka Era

On October 14, 1953, at the age of 59, Premier Kyuichi Tokuda passed away of unknown causes.  North Japanese citizens and workers packed the streets throughout the nation in grief.  The JCP declared a national week of mourning for the deceased leader.  On October 21 he was given a full military funeral before being interred at a mausoleum in Fukushima.

The JCP Central Committee elected Sanzo Nosaka as the new Premier.  Nosaka quickly set forth on a plan of rebuilding North Japan's war machine to make it a competent match for the southern *"puppet kingdom"*.  He quickly set forth work on developing new military equipment to try and keep up with Western militaries without having to rely upon the Soviet Union or Cascadia.