1943 Omura Geological Map of Malaysia, Singapore, Sumatra, Borneo, Java

An exceptional discovery, this is Ōmura Ichizō's World War II era geological survey of Malay and the East Indies. The survey was completed and published one year after the Japanese conquest of the region in order to assess drilling and mining viability. With a multi-front war in progress, the Japanese needed to acquire as many raw material resources as possible and the geological exploitation of this region was essential to their ambitions. The map depicts from the Malaya Peninsula to southern Java and from Aceh (northwester Sumatra) to North Borneo. Singapore, at the southern tip of Malaya, takes center stage.

Japanese Ambitions in the East Indies

Following their successful seizures of the Malay Peninsula (1941), Singapore (1942), parts of Borneo (1941 - 42), Java (1942), and Sumatra (1942), the Japanese were firmly in control of the East Indies. This area, along with China and Oceania, was intended to be the trading and resource linchpin of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, a Japanese dominated alliance of East Asian, Southeast Asian, East Indian, and Oceanic countries. The Japanese wasted little time. Within a year of their conquest, they dispatched their premier oil engineer, Ōmura Ichizō, to perform a detailed geological survey of the islands in order to determine potential drilling and mining sites.

The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere

The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere (大東亜共栄圏) was an imperial concept created and promulgated for occupied Asian populations from 1940 through 1945 by the Empire of Japan. Announced by Hachirō Arita on June 29, 1940, the Co-Prosperity Sphere was intended as a self-sufficient 'bloc of Asian nations led by the Japanese and free of Western powers.' It covered Southeast Asia, Eastern China, Manchuria, Japan, the East India Islands, and parts of Oceania. The idea promoted the cultural and economic unity East Asians, Southeast Asians, and Oceanians with the underpinning assumption that Japan, which had never been conquered and was the only Asian national to fully modernize, was the 'Light of Asia.'

Publication History and Census

This map was compiled by the Japanese mining engineer Ōmura Ichizō (大村, 一蔵) and published in 1943 in Tokyo by Nihon Tōsei Chizu (日本統制地圖). We are aware of only one other example, which is housed in the National Diet Library, Japan.