Dimitri’s Reviews > Japan's Imperial Army: Its Rise and Fall > Status Update

The late historian Fujiwara Akira asserted that a majority of Japanese military deaths during the Pacific war resulted from starvation, not hostile action. Put differently, army incompetence killed more Japanese soldiers than did the Allies.

In China, where Fujimara served, logistics was left to his infantry battailon rather than specialized transportation units.

A more recent % analysis concurs in general.

With France defeated & Britain on the verge, Japan had a once-in-a-lifetime chance to isolate Chiang from western aid by severing his supply routes that ran through Indochina & [British] Burma. Improved ties with the Axis could prevent the US from interfering if the army moved south into those colonies.

The Wuhan* battles marked the limit of the Japanese Army's offensive capability to conduct large scale operations. By fall '38 it depended on Chinese puppets to control occupied zones, exploit the resources of the North & protect Japan's economic interests elsewhere in China.

*The city in Yangzi was the logistic cornerstone cum administrative base for Nationalist armies.

#3 To modernize and reequip the army to drive Caucasian influence from East Asia. Japan would maintain friendly relations with China until it defeated the USSR and then move south against the US.

#2 ...while at the same time the prime minister and the navy were seeking to expand into the southern regions. Neither the narrower military strategy nor the broader national policy resolved the competing and contradictory objectives of the services.

The "fundamental principles of national defense and national policy" prepared by Ishiwara Kanji, head of operations of the general staff, had been simple enough.

#1 In theory the August decisions melded imperial defence policy, the five ministers of the inner cabinet's own approved national policy, and the imperial foreign policy into a comprehensive and unified approach to resolve Japan's international issues. But the result was a series of flawed compromises that left the army and foreign ministry promoting efforts against the Soviet Union...

The technical board deemed bombers less effective than artillery for ground support & only approved 1 light bomber regiment. The others were aerial reconnaissance & fighter units. The army turned to civilian industry to produce its aircraft, promoting competition for their design & manufacture. The Nakajima, Kawasaki and Mistubishi corporations soon monopolised.

Tanaka (head of the 1915-22 military research committee) believed that radically altered international situation with its interlocking system of alliances demanded a wholesale redefinition of national defence policy. His goal (excepting the naval treaty with Britain) was autarky, but to achieve this Japan had to have unlimited access to China's natural resources. His proposals anticipated a north AND south expansion.

(2)... rejoin the field armies near Mukden. The Russian commander, jowever, fought a series of skillful delaying actions in june/july to buy time for reinforcements to arrive fron European Russia. Port Arthur was left isolated & besieged.

Russian raiders continued to cruise the sea of Japan, picking off victims, spreading panic among coastal towns & provoking criticism of the military's competence.

(1) the "Manchurian Army" consisting of the First & Second armies, would advance along the South Manchurian railroad to LIAOYANG, where the First Army would envelop the enemy's right flank, destroy the Russian field army, open the way to Mukden for the decisive battle before Russia could mobilise its full military strength. Simultaneously the Third Army would attack Port Arthur and, after taking the fortress...