Japanese Military Yen

Japanese Military Yen (Chinese and Japanese: 日本軍用手票, also 日本軍票 in short), commonly abbreviated as JMY, was the currency issued to the soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army and the Imperial Japanese Navy as a salary. The Imperial Japanese government first started issuing the military yen during the Russo-Japanese War in 1904. The military yen reached its peak during the Pacific War period, when the Japanese government excessively issued to all of its occupied territories. During the war, the military yen was also forced upon the local population as the official currency of the occupied territory. Since the military yen was not backed by gold, and did not have a specific place of issuance, the military yen could not be exchanged for Japanese yen. Forcing local populations to use the military yen officially was one of the ways the Japanese government could dominate the local economies.