Global Units Modulo Circular Units: Descent Without Iwasawa’s Main Conjecture

Abstract: Iwasawa's classical asymptotical formula relates the orders of the

p

-parts

X_{n}

of the ideal class groups along a

-extension

F_{i} n f t y / F

of a number field

F

, to Iwasawa structural invariants

l a

and

m u

attached to the inverse limit

X_{i} n f t y = l i m p r o X_{n}

. It relies on "good" descent properties satisfied by

X_{n}

. If

F

is abelian and

F_{i} n f t y

is cyclotomic it is known that the

p

-parts of the orders of the global units modulo circular units

U_{n} / C_{n}

are asymptotically equivalent to the

p

-parts of the ideal class numbers. This suggests that these quotients

U_{n} / C_{n}

, so to speak unit class groups, satisfy also good descent properties. We show this directly, i.e. without using Iwasawa's Main Conjecture.

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