戦間期における軍馬資源確保と農家の対応 : 「国防上及経済上ノ基礎ニ立脚」の実現をめぐって

抄録

The horse industry in modern Japan was consistently lead by military demand for military horses; however the interwar period should be considered. In this period, armaments reduction decreased the political and economic influence of the Army on the horse industry. The purpose of this paper is to clarify how the maintenance of military horses was practiced in the period, and especially how it was related to simultaneous advances in the streamlining of agricultural management. Through analysis of data regarding the Tohoku region, the main source of horse stock in Japan, this study makes clear the following two points. 1) The policy of the horse industry in the inter-war period was to create a demand for militarily-required "improved-horses", in farmers' horse breeding. Due to armaments reduction, the Army was no longer able to maintain military horses by itself. Therefore, it intended to entrust their maintenance to the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry by replacing military demand for horses with that of farmers. 2) To carry out this policy, technicians of the Ministry encouraged farmers to increase the use of horses. This was intended to increase their income brought from work performed by horses, and to make them keep improved-horses while streamlining agricultural management. But it was only large farmers that implemented this plan. In contrast, small farmers refused to accept this policy, because their scale of management was too small to exercise the abilities of the improved-horses. Instead, they requested to streamline their management systems by using ponies, which cost less than improved-horses but were not required for military purposes. Nevertheless, their request could not be realized as the use of stallions to produce ponies was prohibited by law. As a result, small farmers were forced to keep improved-horses uneconomically. The supply of many military horses in the following war period would not have been possible without their sacrifice.