The Second World War is still raging.
The Kuril Islands form the top part of the pacific RING OF FIRE! The southern most mere kilometres from Hokkaido the northern most a gnats cock off of Kamchatka. The islands are currently inhabited by almost 20,000 people, mostly Russians but with some Ainu other Baltic populations. The islands are home to many Russian ‘soldiers’ known as the Border Guard Service. The islands are known for their severe weather of long stormy winters followed by short and notoriously foggy summers. It is these foggy summers and the remoteness of the islands that made them the perfect launch site for the Pearl Habour attack.
In 1855 the islands were recognised as Japanese territory. After Japan’s second world war defeat, all of its territories were occupied by the Allied forces. The Allied Powers agreed that Japan’s main islands would be under American occupation; Taiwan would fall under Chinese occupation; and that Sakhalin Island and the Kurile Islands would be occupied by the Soviet forces.
In 1951 when the San Francisco Treaty was signed the allied powers handed Japanese land back, but Russia refused to sign over the Kurils. To this day Japan and Russia have never formalized any peace agreement, technically meaning the Second World War isn’t over.
As of 2015 Japan has been offered the southern most islands by Putin but it has refused as the offered land only counts for 7% of the disputed area.
Again, as with the Senkoku islands, this isn’t a “we miss our ancestral land!” dispute. The Kurils are surrounded by some of the most fertile fishing grounds in the North Pacific. There is also a possibility that there are oil and gas reserves. The island also has large deposits of various polymetallic ores including the rare mineral, rhenium.
In 2006, the Russian government pledged $630m to including improving energy and transport infrastructure on the Kuril island chain. The Japanese government also maintains public awareness of the dispute by allowing visits by former residents, displaced after the war to pray at their family shrines.