User:Emiya1980/sandbox3: Difference between revisions – Wikipedia

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==Inner Workings of the Japanese Naval High Command==

== of the Japanese ==

===Rise of the Fleet Faction===

•”The upshot of the London treaty was a divided navy. According to an estimate by the naval intellectual Rear Admiral [[Sōkichi Takagi|Takagi Sōkichi]], the navy’s political influence in national affairs, which normally amounted at most to one-third that of the army, was reduced to a fourth or a fifth. Yet from this weakened position, the navy contended with the army to increase its share of the budget and war materiel. After the mid-1930s, Japan’s national policy was increasingly influenced by army-navy rivalry.” {{sfn|Asada|2006|p=169}}

•”The navy’s division after the London Conference gave the Katō-Suetsugu group a chance to expand its influence, with the backing of disgruntled senior officers. Behind Katō were Fleet Admiral [[Tōgō Heihachirō|[Heihachirō] Tōgō]]—the naval demigod— and his minion, Vice Admiral Ogasawara (Ret.). Both had strenuously opposed the treaty. In January 1933 the fleet faction was strengthened when Admiral [[Mineo Ōsumi|[Mineo] Ōsumi]], a hardliner and opponent of naval limitation was appointed navy minister with the backing of Tōgō, Ogasawara, and [[Katō Kanji]]. The first step to strengthen the fleet faction was to install imperial Prince Fushimi, the only remaining fleet admiral after Tōgō died as chief of the Naval General Staff in February 1932. Already at the time of the London Naval Conference, [[Prince Fushimi Hiroyasu|Prince Fushimi [Hiroyasu]]] had sided with the fleet faction…During his long and undistinguished tenure as chief of the Naval General Staff, February 1932 to April 1941, his vice chiefs invoked the august name of the prince to press the navy minister into acquiescing in the demands of the Naval General Staff. Further, as a member of the imperial family, Fushimi was not to be held accountable for any error or misjudgment. Because nobody could restrain him, he tended to be dogmatic, which only ¶impeded the navy’s policy making. As relations with the United States deteriorated, he displeased the [-new page-] emperor with his hard-line recommendations. In October 1941, Fushimi presented ‘extremely belligerent arguments’ about policy toward the United States, profoundly disappointing the emperor. In April 1941, Navy Minister [[Koshirō Oikawa|Oikawa Koshirō]] told Vice Admiral [[Shigeyoshi Inoue|[Shigeyoshi] Inoue]], head of the Naval Aviation Department, that the ailing Fushimi wished to retire and asked his opinion. Inoue supported his retirement. As he explained, a prince of the blood was simply not brought up to assume such a position at such a critical time. But even after he retired in April 1941, Fushimi retained the right to have his say in the appointment of top leaders, especially navy ministers.”{{sfn|Asada|2006|pp=169-170}}

•”A second important move to strengthen the fleet faction was to restructure the Naval General Staff after the manner of the army. Traditionally, the power of the chief of the Naval General Staff had been subordinate to that of the Navy Minister. Even regarding high-command matters (operations), the chief had customarily sought the consent of the minister before making a presentation to the throne. This tradition of the Navy Ministry’s primacy over the Naval General Staff had prevailed until the London Naval Conference. ¶ As already noted, Rear Admiral [[Satō Tetsutarō]], Vice Chief of the Naval General Staff, attempted in 1915 to enhance the authority of the chief of the Naval General Staff and angered Navy Minister [[Katō Tomosaburō]], who demoted him. Katō Kanji, then vice chief and absolutely opposed to a system of civilian navy ministers, planned to revise the regulations of the Naval General Staff to expand its authority. He ordered his protégé, Captain [[Ibō Takahashi|[Ibō] Takahashi]], a leader of the fleet faction, to draft a plan, but he did not dare present it as long as Katō Tomosaburō was alive. The plan was revived when Takahashi became vice chief of the Naval General Staff in February 1932. Fushimi ordered Takahashi to revise the Naval General Staff regulations to enlarge its power. Disgruntled with the Washington and London treaties, Prince Fushimi believed these treaties were a result of the weak-kneed policy of Navy Minister Katō Tomosaburō and his successors. The only way to rectify the deplorable situation, Prince Fushimi, believed was to strengthen the Naval General Staff. ¶ This time, circumstances were far more favorable. The London treaty controversy had given rise to a demand, inside and outside the navy, to establish the right of the supreme command. The 15 May (1932) Incident in which a group of young naval officers played a leading role in the assassination of Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi, had an electrifying effect upon the navy, dramatizing the need to placate young malcontents. A revision of the Naval General Staff regulations would help appease hot-blooded young officers. Japan’s external situation also favored the revision. In a postwar reminiscence, Takahashi admitted that one of his aims was to be prepared for war with the United States; he feared that the Shanghai Incident of 1932 might cause a Japanese-American War.”{{sfn|Asada|2006|pp=170-171}}

•”The main aim of strengthening the Naval General Staff was to transfer jurisdiction over the size of armaments from the Navy Ministry to the Naval General Staff. Already on 23 January 1933, Navy Minister [[Mineo Ōsumi|Ōsumi Mineo]] and Prince Fushimi had met with Army Minister Araki Sadao and Chief of the Army General Staff [[Prince Kan’in Kotohito|Prince Kan’in [Kotohito]]] and signed a secret document titled ‘Decision on the Size of Armaments’. It stated that the size of armaments was ‘an absolute condition for national defense and strategy’ and therefore a decision on it must be made by the chiefs of the Navy and Army General Staffs. ¶ Acting on Prince Fushimi’s orders, Takahashi, a foremost leader of the fleet faction and generally regarded as Katō Kanji’s successor, presented to the Navy Ministry the demands, designed to ‘reduce the navy minister’s authority to a minimum (Inoue’s words). The Navy General Staff demanded sole jurisdiction not only over command matters but the size of armaments, education and the training of the fleets, even personnel policy. The Navy Ministry tried to oppose this. Captain Inoue, who as Chief of the First Section of the Naval Affairs Bureau negotiated with the Naval General Staff’s representative, stoutly resisted. He later wrote that the Naval General Staff’s demand was ‘a most outrageous act, tantamount to raising a standard of revolt against the navy minister.’ Inoue held that the problem of armaments, involving budget, must remain under the jurisdiction of the Navy Ministry. He felt that expansion of the Naval General Staff would only increase the danger of war. ¶ With Inoue refusing to budge, the negotiations were taken over by Terashima Ken, head of the Naval Affairs Bureau, and Shimada Shigejirō, head of the Operations Division. The matter had come to look like a feud between the fleet faction and the treaty faction. When a deadlock again ensued, Vice Chief Takahashi played his trump card with Navy Minister Ōsumi: he threatened that unless the demands of the Naval General Staff were met, Fushimi would resign. Katō Kanji also put pressure on Ōsumi. When Fushimi himself confronted Ōsumi, the navy minister hastily complied. He was already inclined to side with the hardliners in the Naval General Staff. This was not the last time Prince Fushimi abused his status as a member of the imperial family to impose his and the naval high command’s will that ran contrary to the emperor’s wish. The Naval General Staff had its way even though naval elders — former Navy Minister [[Keisuke Okada|[Keisuke] Okada]], [[Saitō Makoto]] (prime minister) , and [[Kantarō Suzuki|Suzuki Kantarō]] — all opposed it. Okada said he had ‘never seen such an outrageous plan’.”{{sfn|Asada|2006|p=171}}

•”The revised regulations of the Naval General Staff broke with the navy’s tradition by establishing primacy over the Navy Ministry. With command over naval forces in peacetime transferred to the chief of the Naval General Staff, the regulations sharply reduced the navy minister’s control over the naval establishment….¶ When the new regulations, after being sanctioned by the navy minister, came up for the emperor’s approval in September 1933, they encountered unexpected opposition. The emperor sharply questioned Ōsumi, expressing fear that ‘a slight misapplication of the new regulations could cause excessive intervention by the Naval General Staff in budgetary and personnel matters that are under the government’s jurisdiction.’ The emperor ordered Ōsumi to prepare a memorandum pledging that the Naval General Staff would not unduly intervene in government affairs. Only after Ōsumi submitted the reuired document four days later did Hirohito approved the proposed revision. The London treaty would expire in 1935, and two years’ notice of the nullification of the Washington treaty could be issued in 1934. The Navy General Staff now controlled the fate of the Washington and London system. ¶ On 1 October 1933, the day the revision went into effect, Prince Fushimi addressed his assembled subordinates: ‘This revision is a great reform for the regeneration of the Imperial Navy.’ It proved to be, in the words of official naval historian Nomura Minoru, ‘an important milestone on the navy’s road to the Pacific War.’ Withdrawal from the Washington-London system in [1933-36], conclusion of the [[Tripartite Pact]] in 1940, and the determination to go to war — these were strongly supported by the Naval General Staff. During the crises of 1940-41, the Naval General Staff would take a more risk-taking stance than Naval Ministry leaders.”{{sfn|Asada|2006|p=172}}

•”A third attempt to strengthen the fleet faction and to decimate the treaty faction was the so-called Ōsumi purge. During 1933-34 senior officers of the treaty faction who had supported the Washington and London treaties were systematically retired or placed on the reserve list. Navy Minister Ōsumi had the backing of Fleet Admiral Tōgō, Prince Fushimi, and Katō Kanji. Among the victims of the purge were some of the ablest officers known for their moderate [-new page-] views. Admiral Yamanashi Katsunoshin was fifty-six years old at the time of his forced retirement; of the vice admirals, Hori Teikichi was fifty-one, Sakonji Seizo fifty-five, and Terashima Ken fifty-two. (Normal retirement age for admirals was sixty-five, for vice admirals, sixty-two.) ¶ The forced retirement of Hori was a great loss to the navy. Celebrated as ‘the finest brain ever produced by the Naval Academy,’ a greater brain than even Akiyama Saneyuki, he was a brilliant administrator. A devoted disciple of Katō Tomosaburō, he carried the now-famous ‘Katō message’ to Tokyo at the time of the Washington conference. Hori had also attended the Geneva Conference and played a crucial role in concluding the London treaty as head of the Naval Affairs Bureau…”{{sfn|Asada|2006|pp=172-173}}

•”The consequences of the Ōsumi purge cannot be overemphasized. It decimated the navy’s finest leadership and weakened the moderate forces that might have exercised rational restraint over the Kato-Suetsugu group and, later, their fire-eating disciples in the middle echelons. Admiral [[Shigetarō Shimada|Shimada Shigetarō]], Navy Minister at the time of the Pearl Harbor attack, later reflected, ‘Had Hori been navy minister before the outbreak of the war, he would have coped with the situation more aptly.’ In a similar vein, Inoue said that if Hori and Yamanashi had stayed in the navy, the history of Japan would have been quite different. Such lamentations bespeak the dearth of leadership that crippled the navy in 1940-1941. Captain Takagi Sōkichi said he could now county only four first-rate admirals — [[Mitsumasa Yonai|Yonai Mitsumasa]], [[Isoroku Yamamoto|Yamamoto Isoruku]], Inoue Shigeyoshi, and [[Mineichi Koga|Koga Mine’ichi]] — who ‘miraculously’ escaped the purge; their ‘good fortune’ was not being involved in naval limitation. ¶ With revision of the Naval General Staff regulations, the ‘command group’, which for years had chafed under the control of the navy minister and the ‘administrative group’ now would have its day. One indication of the interest that the Naval General Staff had begun to take in ‘war guidance’ — national defense policy and war preparations — was the creation of a post designated as the war guidance officer. Under direct control of the head of the Operations Division and holding section chief rank, the war guidance officer was to push for a hard-line policy toward the United States in 1940-41″{{sfn|Asada|2006|p=173}}

===Reorganization & War Plans===

•”Within the Navy Ministry the locus of political functions was the Naval Affairs Bureau; its chief joined the vice minister in assisting the navy minister. The official directly in charge of state policy matters was the chief of its First Section, but he was handicapped by a vastly understaffed office. In 1936 the Japanese navy confronted a crisis following the nullification of the Washington treaty and withdrawal from the 1935 London Conference. Expansion into Southeast Asia was alluring. To bolster the navy’s policy-making functions, lead national policy in the critical years ahead, and better cope with the army and its much larger staff, the navy in the spring of 1936 created three ad hoc committees for naval policy (the First Committee), organizational restructuring (the Second Committee), and the naval budget (the Third Committee). Because these committees were mainly staffed with key section chiefs (and also some bureau and division heads) of the Navy Ministry and the Naval General Staff, they enhanced the influence of middle-echelon officers on the making of national policy. ¶ Of the committees set up in 1936, the most important was the First Committee, charged with formulating ‘the Empire’s national policy and concrete naval policy and its implementation in light of changes in the international situations, especially after the expiration of the naval treaties.’ The results of its investigation and recommendations filtered into deliberations in the upper echelons that culminated in the now-famous ‘Fundamentals of National Policy’ approved by the Five Ministers Conference on 7 August 1936, which for the first time incorporated the navy’s policy ‘to advance to the South Seas’.”{{sfn|Asada|2006|p=174}}

•”On the Second Committee’s recommendation, the Naval Affairs Bureau was restructured in November 1940. This organizational reshuffle was aimed at enhancing the navy’s ability to cope with the United States, especially in the aftermath of the Tripartite Pact in September 1940. The chief of the First Section of this bureau was in charge of state policy matters and naval armaments, but his office was understaffed. The navy needed to raise its voice to vie with the army in national and defense policy. It therefore decided to divide its Naval Affairs Bureau and create a Naval Ordnance Bureau, to which many of its tasks were transferred. This new bureau, headed by Rear Admiral [[Zenshiro Hoshina|Hoshina Zenshirō]], was in charge of fleet mobilization, munitions, and ships. ¶ At the same time, the navy created the Second Section of the Naval Affairs Bureau, to which its First Section relinquished jurisdiction over political, diplomatic, and defense policy. Underlying this reshuffling was the navy’s conviction [-new page-] that ‘to tide over the unprecedented national crisis attendant to the Tripartite Pact’, it must now abandon the navy’s traditional stance of nonintervention in politics and ‘resolutely venture into the hub of state activities.’ The Second Section was to be ‘a powerful organ of policy guidance’ and its main task was to ‘strengthen the Imperial Navy’s influence in national affairs from the broad viewpoint of war guidance.’ By the very nature of its assigned task — to negotiate with the army to counter its demands as well as to make war plans — the Second Section assumed an extremely bellicose posture toward the United States and Great Britain.”{{sfn|Asada|2006|pp=174-175}}

===Road to Pearl Harbor===

•”In August 1938 the navy took up the question of a military alliance with Germany proposed by Joachim von Ribbentrop, the Nazi Party’s foreign minister. Germany’s objective was to use the Japnese navy to deter American intervention in the European war against Germany. Any German alliance would be an ill-fated match between sea power and land power, and no faithful disciples of Mahan would condone such a marriage of convenience. Yonai, Yamamoto and Inoue opposed the alliance because of the risk of alienating, even fighting, the United States. [¶] But the Yonai-Yamamoto-Inoue trio was from the beginning a minority within the navy. They were outnumbered by the pro-German faction and also had to contend with army supporters of an alliance with Germany. Among the middle-echelon pro-German forces were Captain Oka Takazumi, chief of the First Section of the Naval Affairs Bureau; Commander Shiba Katsuo of the same section; Commander Shiba Katsuo of the same section; Commander Kami Shigenori of the Operations Section; Commander Fujii Shigeru of the Second Section; and Yokoi Tadao, war guidance officer. Kami, Shiba, and Yokoi were Nazi sympathizers, having returned from the attache’s office in Berlin. Their views were revealed in a remark made in the summer of 1938 by Rear Admiral Inagaki Ayao of the Naval Aviation Department to German naval attache Paul W. Wenneker: ‘For different reasons, Germany and Japan have the same interest in ‘smashing’ England. Both countries need a few more years before they are sufficiently armed for this.’ Such an anti-British sentiment would soon be imbued with an anti-American view. In July 1939 Vice Admiral Kondo Nobutake, who had been stationed in Germany in 1935—1937 and would soon be vice chief of the Naval General Staff, told Wenneker that he ‘did not believe that it will come to a war with England and America. Even if it should, it is manifest that the one opponent worthy of attention, America, can do practically nothing to get the better of Japan militarily.’ “{{sfn|Asada|2006|pp=213-214}}

•”On October 27, Prince Fushimi urged Shimada to decide on war. ‘Unless we speedily open hostilities, we shall lose the opportune moment to strike.’ Prince Shimada was more responsive to Prince Fushimi’s war advocacy than to the emperor’s desire for peace. Shimada succumbed, and on October 30 he reached his decision to go to war, although he admitted that it had been barely ten days since he was appointed and that he had not had time to study the matter carefully. He told Sawamoto and Oka, ‘As it is, there is no telling when the United States will make a preemptive strike.’ The U.S. fleet would steam out across the Pacific in full force as soon as Japan ran out of fuel and its fleet was stranded. ‘Japan’s operational plan will be completely nullified and our chance for victory will disappear.’ ” {{sfn|Asada|2006|p=272}}

==Makino Nobuaki==

==Makino Nobuaki==

Rise of the Fleet Faction

•”The upshot of the London treaty was a divided navy. According to an estimate by the naval intellectual Rear Admiral Takagi Sōkichi, the navy’s political influence in national affairs, which normally amounted at most to one-third that of the army, was reduced to a fourth or a fifth. Yet from this weakened position, the navy contended with the army to increase its share of the budget and war materiel. After the mid-1930s, Japan’s national policy was increasingly influenced by army-navy rivalry.”

•”The navy’s division after the London Conference gave the Katō-Suetsugu group a chance to expand its influence, with the backing of disgruntled senior officers. Behind Katō were Fleet Admiral [Heihachirō] Tōgō—the naval demigod— and his minion, Vice Admiral Ogasawara (Ret.). Both had strenuously opposed the treaty. In January 1933 the fleet faction was strengthened when Admiral [Mineo] Ōsumi, a hardliner and opponent of naval limitation was appointed navy minister with the backing of Tōgō, Ogasawara, and Katō Kanji. The first step to strengthen the fleet faction was to install imperial Prince Fushimi, the only remaining fleet admiral after Tōgō died as chief of the Naval General Staff in February 1932. Already at the time of the London Naval Conference, Prince Fushimi [Hiroyasu] had sided with the fleet faction…During his long and undistinguished tenure as chief of the Naval General Staff, February 1932 to April 1941, his vice chiefs invoked the august name of the prince to press the navy minister into acquiescing in the demands of the Naval General Staff. Further, as a member of the imperial family, Fushimi was not to be held accountable for any error or misjudgment. Because nobody could restrain him, he tended to be dogmatic, which only ¶impeded the navy’s policy making. As relations with the United States deteriorated, he displeased the [-new page-] emperor with his hard-line recommendations. In October 1941, Fushimi presented ‘extremely belligerent arguments’ about policy toward the United States, profoundly disappointing the emperor. In April 1941, Navy Minister Oikawa Koshirō told Vice Admiral [Shigeyoshi] Inoue, head of the Naval Aviation Department, that the ailing Fushimi wished to retire and asked his opinion. Inoue supported his retirement. As he explained, a prince of the blood was simply not brought up to assume such a position at such a critical time. But even after he retired in April 1941, Fushimi retained the right to have his say in the appointment of top leaders, especially navy ministers.”

•”A second important move to strengthen the fleet faction was to restructure the Naval General Staff after the manner of the army. Traditionally, the power of the chief of the Naval General Staff had been subordinate to that of the Navy Minister. Even regarding high-command matters (operations), the chief had customarily sought the consent of the minister before making a presentation to the throne. This tradition of the Navy Ministry’s primacy over the Naval General Staff had prevailed until the London Naval Conference. ¶ As already noted, Rear Admiral Satō Tetsutarō, Vice Chief of the Naval General Staff, attempted in 1915 to enhance the authority of the chief of the Naval General Staff and angered Navy Minister Katō Tomosaburō, who demoted him. Katō Kanji, then vice chief and absolutely opposed to a system of civilian navy ministers, planned to revise the regulations of the Naval General Staff to expand its authority. He ordered his protégé, Captain [Ibō] Takahashi, a leader of the fleet faction, to draft a plan, but he did not dare present it as long as Katō Tomosaburō was alive. The plan was revived when Takahashi became vice chief of the Naval General Staff in February 1932. Fushimi ordered Takahashi to revise the Naval General Staff regulations to enlarge its power. Disgruntled with the Washington and London treaties, Prince Fushimi believed these treaties were a result of the weak-kneed policy of Navy Minister Katō Tomosaburō and his successors. The only way to rectify the deplorable situation, Prince Fushimi, believed was to strengthen the Naval General Staff. ¶ This time, circumstances were far more favorable. The London treaty controversy had given rise to a demand, inside and outside the navy, to establish the right of the supreme command. The 15 May (1932) Incident in which a group of young naval officers played a leading role in the assassination of Prime Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi, had an electrifying effect upon the navy, dramatizing the need to placate young malcontents. A revision of the Naval General Staff regulations would help appease hot-blooded young officers. Japan’s external situation also favored the revision. In a postwar reminiscence, Takahashi admitted that one of his aims was to be prepared for war with the United States; he feared that the Shanghai Incident of 1932 might cause a Japanese-American War.”

•”The main aim of strengthening the Naval General Staff was to transfer jurisdiction over the size of armaments from the Navy Ministry to the Naval General Staff. Already on 23 January 1933, Navy Minister Ōsumi Mineo and Prince Fushimi had met with Army Minister Araki Sadao and Chief of the Army General Staff Prince Kan’in [Kotohito] and signed a secret document titled ‘Decision on the Size of Armaments’. It stated that the size of armaments was ‘an absolute condition for national defense and strategy’ and therefore a decision on it must be made by the chiefs of the Navy and Army General Staffs. ¶ Acting on Prince Fushimi’s orders, Takahashi, a foremost leader of the fleet faction and generally regarded as Katō Kanji’s successor, presented to the Navy Ministry the demands, designed to ‘reduce the navy minister’s authority to a minimum (Inoue’s words). The Navy General Staff demanded sole jurisdiction not only over command matters but the size of armaments, education and the training of the fleets, even personnel policy. The Navy Ministry tried to oppose this. Captain Inoue, who as Chief of the First Section of the Naval Affairs Bureau negotiated with the Naval General Staff’s representative, stoutly resisted. He later wrote that the Naval General Staff’s demand was ‘a most outrageous act, tantamount to raising a standard of revolt against the navy minister.’ Inoue held that the problem of armaments, involving budget, must remain under the jurisdiction of the Navy Ministry. He felt that expansion of the Naval General Staff would only increase the danger of war. ¶ With Inoue refusing to budge, the negotiations were taken over by Terashima Ken, head of the Naval Affairs Bureau, and Shimada Shigejirō, head of the Operations Division. The matter had come to look like a feud between the fleet faction and the treaty faction. When a deadlock again ensued, Vice Chief Takahashi played his trump card with Navy Minister Ōsumi: he threatened that unless the demands of the Naval General Staff were met, Fushimi would resign. Katō Kanji also put pressure on Ōsumi. When Fushimi himself confronted Ōsumi, the navy minister hastily complied. He was already inclined to side with the hardliners in the Naval General Staff. This was not the last time Prince Fushimi abused his status as a member of the imperial family to impose his and the naval high command’s will that ran contrary to the emperor’s wish. The Naval General Staff had its way even though naval elders — former Navy Minister [Keisuke] Okada, Saitō Makoto (prime minister) , and Suzuki Kantarō — all opposed it. Okada said he had ‘never seen such an outrageous plan’.”

•”The revised regulations of the Naval General Staff broke with the navy’s tradition by establishing primacy over the Navy Ministry. With command over naval forces in peacetime transferred to the chief of the Naval General Staff, the regulations sharply reduced the navy minister’s control over the naval establishment….¶ When the new regulations, after being sanctioned by the navy minister, came up for the emperor’s approval in September 1933, they encountered unexpected opposition. The emperor sharply questioned Ōsumi, expressing fear that ‘a slight misapplication of the new regulations could cause excessive intervention by the Naval General Staff in budgetary and personnel matters that are under the government’s jurisdiction.’ The emperor ordered Ōsumi to prepare a memorandum pledging that the Naval General Staff would not unduly intervene in government affairs. Only after Ōsumi submitted the reuired document four days later did Hirohito approved the proposed revision. The London treaty would expire in 1935, and two years’ notice of the nullification of the Washington treaty could be issued in 1934. The Navy General Staff now controlled the fate of the Washington and London system. ¶ On 1 October 1933, the day the revision went into effect, Prince Fushimi addressed his assembled subordinates: ‘This revision is a great reform for the regeneration of the Imperial Navy.’ It proved to be, in the words of official naval historian Nomura Minoru, ‘an important milestone on the navy’s road to the Pacific War.’ Withdrawal from the Washington-London system in [1933-36], conclusion of the Tripartite Pact in 1940, and the determination to go to war — these were strongly supported by the Naval General Staff. During the crises of 1940-41, the Naval General Staff would take a more risk-taking stance than Naval Ministry leaders.”

•”A third attempt to strengthen the fleet faction and to decimate the treaty faction was the so-called Ōsumi purge. During 1933-34 senior officers of the treaty faction who had supported the Washington and London treaties were systematically retired or placed on the reserve list. Navy Minister Ōsumi had the backing of Fleet Admiral Tōgō, Prince Fushimi, and Katō Kanji. Among the victims of the purge were some of the ablest officers known for their moderate [-new page-] views. Admiral Yamanashi Katsunoshin was fifty-six years old at the time of his forced retirement; of the vice admirals, Hori Teikichi was fifty-one, Sakonji Seizo fifty-five, and Terashima Ken fifty-two. (Normal retirement age for admirals was sixty-five, for vice admirals, sixty-two.) ¶ The forced retirement of Hori was a great loss to the navy. Celebrated as ‘the finest brain ever produced by the Naval Academy,’ a greater brain than even Akiyama Saneyuki, he was a brilliant administrator. A devoted disciple of Katō Tomosaburō, he carried the now-famous ‘Katō message’ to Tokyo at the time of the Washington conference. Hori had also attended the Geneva Conference and played a crucial role in concluding the London treaty as head of the Naval Affairs Bureau…”

•”The consequences of the Ōsumi purge cannot be overemphasized. It decimated the navy’s finest leadership and weakened the moderate forces that might have exercised rational restraint over the Kato-Suetsugu group and, later, their fire-eating disciples in the middle echelons. Admiral Shimada Shigetarō, Navy Minister at the time of the Pearl Harbor attack, later reflected, ‘Had Hori been navy minister before the outbreak of the war, he would have coped with the situation more aptly.’ In a similar vein, Inoue said that if Hori and Yamanashi had stayed in the navy, the history of Japan would have been quite different. Such lamentations bespeak the dearth of leadership that crippled the navy in 1940-1941. Captain Takagi Sōkichi said he could now county only four first-rate admirals — Yonai Mitsumasa, Yamamoto Isoruku, Inoue Shigeyoshi, and Koga Mine’ichi — who ‘miraculously’ escaped the purge; their ‘good fortune’ was not being involved in naval limitation. ¶ With revision of the Naval General Staff regulations, the ‘command group’, which for years had chafed under the control of the navy minister and the ‘administrative group’ now would have its day. One indication of the interest that the Naval General Staff had begun to take in ‘war guidance’ — national defense policy and war preparations — was the creation of a post designated as the war guidance officer. Under direct control of the head of the Operations Division and holding section chief rank, the war guidance officer was to push for a hard-line policy toward the United States in 1940-41″

Reorganization & War Plans

•”Within the Navy Ministry the locus of political functions was the Naval Affairs Bureau; its chief joined the vice minister in assisting the navy minister. The official directly in charge of state policy matters was the chief of its First Section, but he was handicapped by a vastly understaffed office. In 1936 the Japanese navy confronted a crisis following the nullification of the Washington treaty and withdrawal from the 1935 London Conference. Expansion into Southeast Asia was alluring. To bolster the navy’s policy-making functions, lead national policy in the critical years ahead, and better cope with the army and its much larger staff, the navy in the spring of 1936 created three ad hoc committees for naval policy (the First Committee), organizational restructuring (the Second Committee), and the naval budget (the Third Committee). Because these committees were mainly staffed with key section chiefs (and also some bureau and division heads) of the Navy Ministry and the Naval General Staff, they enhanced the influence of middle-echelon officers on the making of national policy. ¶ Of the committees set up in 1936, the most important was the First Committee, charged with formulating ‘the Empire’s national policy and concrete naval policy and its implementation in light of changes in the international situations, especially after the expiration of the naval treaties.’ The results of its investigation and recommendations filtered into deliberations in the upper echelons that culminated in the now-famous ‘Fundamentals of National Policy’ approved by the Five Ministers Conference on 7 August 1936, which for the first time incorporated the navy’s policy ‘to advance to the South Seas’.”

•”On the Second Committee’s recommendation, the Naval Affairs Bureau was restructured in November 1940. This organizational reshuffle was aimed at enhancing the navy’s ability to cope with the United States, especially in the aftermath of the Tripartite Pact in September 1940. The chief of the First Section of this bureau was in charge of state policy matters and naval armaments, but his office was understaffed. The navy needed to raise its voice to vie with the army in national and defense policy. It therefore decided to divide its Naval Affairs Bureau and create a Naval Ordnance Bureau, to which many of its tasks were transferred. This new bureau, headed by Rear Admiral Hoshina Zenshirō, was in charge of fleet mobilization, munitions, and ships. ¶ At the same time, the navy created the Second Section of the Naval Affairs Bureau, to which its First Section relinquished jurisdiction over political, diplomatic, and defense policy. Underlying this reshuffling was the navy’s conviction [-new page-] that ‘to tide over the unprecedented national crisis attendant to the Tripartite Pact’, it must now abandon the navy’s traditional stance of nonintervention in politics and ‘resolutely venture into the hub of state activities.’ The Second Section was to be ‘a powerful organ of policy guidance’ and its main task was to ‘strengthen the Imperial Navy’s influence in national affairs from the broad viewpoint of war guidance.’ By the very nature of its assigned task — to negotiate with the army to counter its demands as well as to make war plans — the Second Section assumed an extremely bellicose posture toward the United States and Great Britain.”

Road to Pearl Harbor

•”In August 1938 the navy took up the question of a military alliance with Germany proposed by Joachim von Ribbentrop, the Nazi Party’s foreign minister. Germany’s objective was to use the Japnese navy to deter American intervention in the European war against Germany. Any German alliance would be an ill-fated match between sea power and land power, and no faithful disciples of Mahan would condone such a marriage of convenience. Yonai, Yamamoto and Inoue opposed the alliance because of the risk of alienating, even fighting, the United States. [¶] But the Yonai-Yamamoto-Inoue trio was from the beginning a minority within the navy. They were outnumbered by the pro-German faction and also had to contend with army supporters of an alliance with Germany. Among the middle-echelon pro-German forces were Captain Oka Takazumi, chief of the First Section of the Naval Affairs Bureau; Commander Shiba Katsuo of the same section; Commander Shiba Katsuo of the same section; Commander Kami Shigenori of the Operations Section; Commander Fujii Shigeru of the Second Section; and Yokoi Tadao, war guidance officer. Kami, Shiba, and Yokoi were Nazi sympathizers, having returned from the attache’s office in Berlin. Their views were revealed in a remark made in the summer of 1938 by Rear Admiral Inagaki Ayao of the Naval Aviation Department to German naval attache Paul W. Wenneker: ‘For different reasons, Germany and Japan have the same interest in ‘smashing’ England. Both countries need a few more years before they are sufficiently armed for this.’ Such an anti-British sentiment would soon be imbued with an anti-American view. In July 1939 Vice Admiral Kondo Nobutake, who had been stationed in Germany in 1935—1937 and would soon be vice chief of the Naval General Staff, told Wenneker that he ‘did not believe that it will come to a war with England and America. Even if it should, it is manifest that the one opponent worthy of attention, America, can do practically nothing to get the better of Japan militarily.’ ”

•”On October 27, Prince Fushimi urged Shimada to decide on war. ‘Unless we speedily open hostilities, we shall lose the opportune moment to strike.’ Prince Shimada was more responsive to Prince Fushimi’s war advocacy than to the emperor’s desire for peace. Shimada succumbed, and on October 30 he reached his decision to go to war, although he admitted that it had been barely ten days since he was appointed and that he had not had time to study the matter carefully. He told Sawamoto and Oka, ‘As it is, there is no telling when the United States will make a preemptive strike.’ The U.S. fleet would steam out across the Pacific in full force as soon as Japan ran out of fuel and its fleet was stranded. ‘Japan’s operational plan will be completely nullified and our chance for victory will disappear.’ ”

Makino Nobuaki

Early life

•”Makino Nobuaki (Shinken) was the second son of Ōkubo Toshimichi (1832-1878). His original name was Ōkubo Shinyū. (Nobukama). His was leading bushi (samurai) house in the fief of Satsuma (present-day Kagoshima), and his father Toshimichi played a leading role in the Meiji Restoration of 1868. At an early age Nobuaki was designated hair to the ruling house (daimyō) Makino of Mikawa (present-day Aichi). The connection between the two houses was from the time of his great-grandfather, whose daughter married into the Makino family. Nobuaki was brought up in the Ōkubo house, however, not in Mikawa, and he accompanied his father to Tokyo in 1871 shortly after the restoration. Later he went overseas with him on the Iwakura Mission to Europe and America (1871-1873). He remained in America to attend school and returned to Japan in the fall of 1874. At about this time he assumed the name Makino Koretoshi, and three years later he changed his given name to Nobuaki.”

Education & Early Political Career

•”Makino attended the newly founded Tokyo Imperial University, but he left before completing his studies and entered the Foreign Ministry. In 1880 he was sent to serve in the Japanese Legation in London…In 1882 Makino returned to Japan. Thereafter he served in a number of official posts at home and abroad. In 1896 he was appointed envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary and sent to Italy. In 1899 he was sent to Austria and appointed to serve simultaneously in Switzerland. He returned to Japan in 1902. In 1906 he was appointed minister of education in the first Saionji cabinet; in 1911 he became minister of agriculture and commerce in the second Saionji cabinet; in 1913 he was appointed foreign minister in the Yamamoto Gombei cabinet. In 1918-1919 he attended the Paris Peace Conference with Saionji.”

•”In June 1906 Education Minister Makino issued a ‘morals directive’ (fūki kunrei) A prominent authority on Meiji ideology, Carol Gluck says this directive:

set the tone for the promotion of wholesome thought (kenzen naru shisō). It sought to combat spiritual ‘despondence’, moral ‘decadence’, and licentious ‘self-indulgence’ on the one hand, and socialism and the ‘poison’ of radical ideas on the other. Both were linked to ‘the recent publications that have increasingly tempted young men and women with dangerous opinions, world-weary attitudes, and depictions of the baser sides of life.’ To prevent the erosion of school and family authority and the disruption of the ‘foundations of the state’ and of the ‘social order’, Makino instructed educators to ‘scrutinze the contents of books read by students and pupils. Those that are deemed beneficial should be encouraged, while those likely to arouse unwholesome results (furyō no kekka) should be strictly prohibited both in an out of school.’

Strangely Makino does not mention this controversy or his directive in his memoirs. His reasons can only be speculated upon. It is extremely unlikely that he forgot about this issue, but he may have been embarrassed by it later. In 1906, it aroused more cebate than his proposal to lengthen compulsory education. Moreover, it illustrates Makino’s basic position: the affairs of state and arranging the new social order in Japan were not to be left to ‘free thinkers.’ Direction was needed from high government leaders who were by definition well informed and well intentioned. He, as a responsible member of this elite group, was not one to shirk his responsibilities.

Courtier of Emperor Hirohito

•”Count Makino, though twelve years younger than Saionji, came to his position of influence vis-à-vis Hirohito before the venerable prince. He was appointed imperial household minister in February 1921, and Crown Prince Hirohito was made regent for his mentally ill father, Emperor Taishō, in Movember of the same year. In 1925 Makino became lord keeper of the privy seal. Thus, including his time as imperial household minister, he was actively engaged in guiding the young crown prince and emperor (r. 1926-1989) in his duties as head of state for fourteen years….”

•”Western scholars agree that Makino was a guiding force early in Hirohito’s career as regent and emperor and that Makino was, ‘like Saionji, a liberal constitutional monarchist who believed that friendly ties must be maintained with Great Britain and the United States.’ Because of these convictions, Makino was on the hit list of many radical reformers and assassins in the 1930s. Even so, his reputation as a moderate needs to be qualified. ¶ Makino’s memoirs indicate that he was an elitist and a nationalist. He recalls, for example, his respect for Saionji, who worked to abolish the fiefs and establish prefectures (haihan-chiken) early on to promote a strong national govern,ent. In late nineteenth-century Japan this was considered progressive in comparison with Tokugawa ‘feudalism’, and Makino describes Saionji as a ‘progressive thinker’ ahead of his time. He himself was a product of his time, however, and a moderate only in comparison with the militarists of the 1930s. His admiration of Saionji was explicitly defined within the context of ‘imperial restoration’ (ōsei fukko). He saw Saionji as a champion of imperial rule and emphasize the roles played in the restoration by court nobles (kugyō), not common people. Others singled out for praise were also of aristocratic birth: Iwakura Tomomi (1825-1883) and Sanjō Sanetomi (1837-1891). Iwakura was a high-born aristocrat closely associated with Makino’s father, and Makino says no one else could have guided the restoration with such noble intentions and great acumen. ¶ The conservative tenor of Makino’s thought is demonstrated by numerous statements in his memoirs. A further example is a notations from 1877. In it Makino says the new government officials, having served in comparable capacities in the old feudal system, were not without experience. But without the skilled supervision of Iwakura and Sanjō, he says, an effective government could not have been established. In the future his own supervision of the crown prince and new emperor would be embossed with similar elitist preconceptions about the importance of guidance by the oligarchs.”

•”Makino’s activities prior to becoming an adviser to the future Shōwa emperor show that he was well educated and had wide experience overseas as well as in Japan. One could say he was a ‘moderate, in the context of his time and place, in that he did not oppose representative governent and the freedom of individuals to act or express themselves. But he did try to channel the thinking and action of the Japanese people in a distinctly nationalistic direction. Whether he realized it or not, this approach to governing subverted the foundations of free government and was little different in method, as opposed to content, from what the militarists promoted and practiced in the 1930s and 1940s. ¶ Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) formulated what have come to be regarded as two of the basic prerequisites of democratic government:’democracy requires an apprenticeship in freedom,’ and people have to learn to govern themselves. In Japan nearly a hundred years [-new page-] later Makino may have seen himself as a tutor of the emperor and his people, but freedom and democracy were not his highest educational priorities. Moreover, de Tocqueville, his like-minded English contemporary John Stuart Mill (1806-1873), and many others who later addressed the problems of democratic government were profoundly concerned about the danger to individual freedom from society itself. But, like the militarists, Makino and his colleagues did not see this as a problem. Indeed, manipulating public opinion for ‘higher purposes’ was valued over freedom and open responsible expression of opinions about government policy. The Japanese were taught, by civil as well as military leaders, not to govern themselves but to follow the dictates of a small minority of self-ordained spokesmen who defined the national polity and defined, as well, what a good Japanese should be. Unlike the ultranationalists of the 1930s Makino was urbane and cosmopolitan; but, very much like them, he was committed unquestioningly to the idea of Imperial Japan as a world power. This meant giving highest priority to furthering both aspects of this concept — ‘imperial’ solidarity at home and ‘world power’ abroad. If society restrained individual freedom in the process, that was not necessarily a bad thing. Civil rights, liberties, and responsibilities were clearly of little importance to Makino. Public discipline and obedience were.

•”Makino appears to have monitored the young regent’s public and private activities rather closely. It is difficult to ascertain, however, the exact nature of this ‘control’ because our sources are vague at best. Shortly after Hirohito became regent, for example, Makino had him informed regularly of military and political matters. The first military report (fukumei) recorded by Makino took place on 16 March 1922. It was conducted by the minister of the navy, Katō Tomosaburō (1861-1923), who gave a general report on the authority of the sovereign (zenken) that lasted about one hour. Unfortunately Makino’s diary does not go into detail concerning the content of these reports although he was often present. ¶ Makino, in other words, tells us a considerable amount about private problems, like the ongoing debate over Hirohito’s proposed marriage, but not political or military matters. A further example: on 13 September 1922 he notes that the regent summoned him to discuss the resignation of the lord keeper of the privy seal, which was to take place the following day. ‘Therefore I went for an audience,’ wrote Makino. ‘I related the details of the coming events in private to the regent and explained how he should react to what the privy seal will [-new page-] say.’ We can see that Makino was a source of information for Hirohito, as well as a tutuor who advised him about protocol with regard to the affairs of state. What exactly was said, however, is in many cases not recorded in Makino’s diary and thus the nature of his information and instructions is often impossible to ascertain. It is clear, however, that as regent Hirohito did little without Makino’s approval. And there is little reason to doubt that both he and Prince Saionji tightly supervised Hirohito’s appointments and early activities.”

•”To Hirohito it seemed an admirable moment to acquaint his advisers with his idea of how monarchy should present itself to the people now that a new reign was dawning. It was time, he told them, for the image of the Emperor to be refurbished, for many of the old myths and shiboleths to be repudiated, and for a closer and warmer contact between Emperor and people established. He had in mind, of course, a similar sort of relationship to that between King George the Fifth of England and the British people, where the distinction between ruler and subject, between royalty and the common people, was recognized and acknowledged, but the emotion felt by the masses toward their king was love rather than awe, loyal affection rather than superstitious fear. ¶ In the conditions prevailing in Japan at the time, nothing was more likely to alarm the military diehards and their cohorts in the secret societies, for both of them were sustained by their claim to be the apostles of the divine Emperor, the instruments of his infallible will. Were the monarchy suddenly to become a merely constitutional institution, fallible, human, willing to listen to the people and obey the decisions of the Diet, as the King of England did, their activities could be called in question and their domination of policy thus jeopardized, for they could no longer claim to be acting in accordance with divine commands. Constitutional [-new page-] monarchy meant democracy, and democracy was a condition they least wished to see, for they rightly suspected that it would be suspicious of the Army and Navy, reluctant to finance their adventures, pro-peace, pro-disarmament, pro-appeasement of the peoples of those part of the Asia mainland, particularly China, where the military had plans for Japanese aggrandizement. The least thing they wanted was a ‘human being’ on the throne; to produce the kind of awesome respect most conducive to an obedient populace, they needed a god for whom they carried the sword. It would spell death to their plans if the new Emperor came to be regarded as just another pleasant young man; and they grew alarmed when Hirohito accompanied the Prince of Wales during part of his tour, waved his hand in acknowledgment of the cheers of the crowd, and was even seen to be smiling. It was bad e3nough for a prince regent to be seen walking with a foreign prince and chatting and smiling; but it would be shameful if such conduct continued after he ascended the throne. Vague criticisms began to appear in the newspapers, planted by the assiduous disciples of Toyama, the chief of the Black Dragon Society, muttering that the Prince Regent’s advisers were remiss in allowing him to demean himself by hobnobbing with foreigners and other inferiors….And Toyama let it quietly be known that a young man who had blown himself up with a homemade bomb in front of the Imperial Palace in March, 1922 — three weeks before the Prince of Wales’ visit — was a member of the Black Dragon Society. He had killed himself as a gesture of protest against attempts to sully the purity of the Imperial family by forcing the Prince Regent to mix with foreign (and therefore inferior) royal persons on terms of equality.”

•”Had Prince Saionji and Count Makino, the two most senior advisers of the Prince Regent, bee less concerned for a quiet life and an absence of political conflict, they would have advised Hirohito to face up to the objections of the military clique. It may be taken as certain, from a reading of their background, that they too would have been appalled by the diminution of the Imperial influence and the encouragement of the idea that the Emperor was a constitutional monarch rather than a descendant of the gods. But neither of them wished to see Hirohito become a puppet [-new page-] manipulated by the extremists. Had they been wiser they might well have utilized his eagerness to popularize himself as a weapon against both the Army and members of the Black Dragon Society, judiciously using him and his successful European tour as a means of building up his persona and turning him not from a divine prince into a human being, but from a remote and mystic god-who-is-feared into a god-the-people-know-and-trust. In other words, this was the period when he could have been encouraged to assert his independence….The public was on his side. The Army was unpopular. The secret societies would never have dared to oppose him, dedicated as they insisted they were to the protection of the divine Emperor and the propagation of his Imperial will. It was a moment when there were strong enough forces in Japan to have rallied round him had he insisted on a showdown with the militants and fanatics. Alas, Saionji and Makino were too effete to grasp the opportunity. They counselled caution and advised the Prince Regent to pay attention to the Army and treat the Black Dragon Society with respect. Perhaps they were afraid of Toyama’s dedicated assassins, the ones who had threatened Prince Yamagata with death during the crisis over royal engagement, and feared for their own lives as well as that of the Prince Regent. Whatever the reason, their advice was such that. Hirohito, still chastened by his failure to free himself as a person, was now persuaded to circumscribe his activities as heir to the throne. One wonders if he would have revolted had he realized that it was the first step by the Army to immure him in the Imperial Palace and turn him into the puppet behind whom they could plan the policies that would lead to world war.”

•”On September 18, 1931, the Kwantung Army in Manchuria independently embarked on the annexation of that country, ignoring opposition to their plans in Tokyo. As usual, they manufactured an excuse for their aggression: once more, as in the case of the killing of Marshal Chang Tso-lin in 1928, a train on the line near Mukden was blown up by a mine. This time Japanese were among those killed. Once more the Japanese comman in Manchuria blamed ‘provacateurs’ in the Chinesde Army and took over key points in the country as ‘necessary measures of self-defense’ and ‘to protect the lives of Japanese civilians.’ The plot by local Army officers to seize the country had reached its climax and the establishment of Japanese-controlled Manchukuo, with Henry Pu Yi as its ppuppet Emperor, was on the way. ¶ The Prime Minister in power at the time of the coup…was an irresolute politician named Mr. Reijiro Wakatsuki. Why he had [-new page-] been chosen for the job at this moment in Japan’s history is a mystery. The three statesmen most responsible for recommending him to the Emperor, Prince Saionji, Count Makino and Baron Harada, appear to have done so because they believed he would stand up to the Army in the matter of keeping its budget under control and exercising needed economies. But he was soon shown to be vacillating and craven-hearted (not surprisingly, perhaps, in the circumstances) when Army matters came before him.”

•”The secretary to the Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal, Count Makino [Nobuaki], at this time was a certain Baron Koichi Kido, who will loom larger in this story as it proceeds from now on. The office of the Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal was a key one in that it was this official who maintained a constant contact between the Emperor and his Minister: it through him that all audiences with the Emperor were arranged (with the important exception of the Minister of War and Navy, who had free right of access); and it was through him that all information about what was happening in his Empire was conveyed to the monarch. If County Makino was his Imperial master’s voice, Baron Kido was Makino’s eyes and ears. It was his job to act as informant of any rumors, gossip, plots and trends which came to his ears. Fortunately for the researcher into the period, he also kept a diary of his professional comings and goings, and from it a day-to-day record can be pieced together of events in Japan as seen from the Imperial palace.”

•”In May 1932, the Prime Minister of Japan was Mr. Tsuyoshi Inukai, whose Seiyukai Party had won the last election and ousted the administration of the hesitant and nervous Mr. Wakatsuki….Goatee-bearded, mentally alert and physically energetic, he was not only extremely able but also courageous as well. His appointment to the premiership recommended once more by the old Genro, Saionji and Count Makino had been warmly welcomed by the Emperor, for in his first audience the old man had made it clear that he would brook no nonsense from the Army fanatics and would curb their ambitions in China by cutting their budget at home. In fact one of Inukai’s first acts on coming into office was to dispatch a secret enoy to Chiang Kai-shek in China with the object of finding a formula with which peace talks could begin and Sino-Japanese differences resolved. That he had no intention of withdrawing troops from Manchuria or of diminishing Japan’s position as ‘most favored nation’ in China — he merely thought the goals could be attained more subtly by diplomatic than military means — did nothing to dissuade the younger members of both Army and Navy that he was working against them. They were determined to eliminate him and also the advisers at the court whose ‘evil machinations’ had persuaded the Emperor to accept him. They chose May 15, 1932, for their day of judgment…”

•”Shortly after Tanaka’s resignation [as Prime Minister], on the day prior to selecting his successor, Makino enacted his plan for removing the emperor from direct participation in political policy discussions…For the sake of constitutional monarchy–and, more important, the preservation of the imperial house–the emperor must not appear to be responsible for political policy. He must be entirely dissociated from government actions and any personal liability for them. Makino brought up this pressing issue with the emperor…Imperial thoughts could be transmitted by telephone, Makino suggested, or perhaps the grand chamberlain could be dispatched to transmit imperial inquiries…The emperor thought this a very welcome solution, Makino noted. This procedure, as it turned out, was to have an ominous effect. Makino could prevent direct communication between the emperor and Japan’s civil leaders, but he could not do the same with the military.”

•”The emperor was to be protected from involvement in the daily affairs of government that might lower him, a ‘living god,’ in the eyes of the Japanese people. Likewise such involvement would undermine his claims to being a constitutional monarch and make him responsible for these affairs. Not to be overlooked is that fact that this policy also increased the power of the court officials surrounding the emperor, including Makino. These bureaucrats maintained that they enunciated the ‘imperial will’. But because Makino and his colleagues at court could not prevent the emperor from actively discussing military affairs, high military officers claimed in a like manner to represent the ‘imperial will.’…¶For many years after the war, the lines of influence and responsibility between Japan’s prewar leaders and the emperor remain obscure. Therefore one could say Makino was successful: he restrained the emperor from being, or appearing to be, responsible for specific political policies. But the cost was high. Decision making was increasingly privatized, and behind the scenes the military , relieved of civilian pressure through the emperor, was able to expand its power. As the military gained the upper hand it was deemed necessary to make career officers prime ministers in order to bridge the gap between civil and military officials. Shielding the emperor from political responsibility, as suggested by Saionji and implemented by Makino, was partly responsible, then, for the rise of the military in prewar Japan.”

World War II infobox

Oka Takazumi

Oka Takazumi (1890 – 1973) was a Japanese admiral and politician. He served as Chief of the Navy Ministry’s Military Affairs Bureau from 1940 to 1944.

Oka graduated from the Naval Academy in 1911 and subsequently completed his education at the Naval Staff College in 1923. In October 1940, he was appointed Chief of the Naval Affairs Bureau, an office whereby he presided over all policy-making within the Japanese Navy.

In the years leading up to the outbreak of the Pacific War, Admiral Oka…..

•“In August 1937 the [Japanese] navy took up the question of a military alliance with Germany proposed by Joachim von Ribbentrop, the Nazi Party’s foreign minister. Germany’s objective was to use the Japanese navy to deter American intervention in the European war against Germany. Any German alliance would be an ill-fated match between sea power and land power, and no faithful disciples of Mahan would condone such a marriage of convenience. Yonai, Yamamoto and Inoue opposed the alliance because of the risk of alienating, even fighting the United States. ¶ But the Yonai-Yamamoto-Inoue trio was from the beginning a minority within the navy. They were outnumbered by the pro-German faction and also had to contend with army supporters of an alliance with Germany. Among the middle-echelon pro-German forces were Captain Oka Takazumi, chief of the First Section of the Naval Affairs Bureau; Commander Shiba Katsuo of the same section; Commander Kami Shigenori of the Operations Section Commander Fujii Shigeru of the Second Section; and Yokoi Tadao, war guidance officer. Kami, Shiba, and Yokoi were Nazi sympathizers, having returned from the attaché’s office in Berlin. Their views were revealed in a remark made in the summer of 1938 by Rear Admiral Inagaki Ayao of the Naval Aviation Department to German naval attaché Paul W. Wenneker: ‘For different reasons, Germany and Japan have the same interest in ‘smashing’ England. Both countries need a few more years before they are sufficiently armed for this.’ Such an anti-British sentiment woudl soon be imbued with an anti-American view. In July 1939 Vice Admiral Kondō Nobutake, who had been stationed in Germany in 1935-1937 and would soon be vice chief of the Naval General Staff, told Wenneker that he ‘did not believe that it will come to a war with England and America. Even if it should, it is manifest that the one opponent worthy of attention, America, can do practically nothing to get better of Japan militarily.”

•“One way for the Yonai-Yamamoto-Inoue triumvirate to control subordinates was to keep them ignorant of policy deliberation at higher levels. After Yonai returned to the navy ministry from the Five Ministers Conferences, he talked only to Yamamoto and Inoue, sometimes joined by Vice Chief of the Naval General Staff Koga Mine’ich. This approach had the drawback of causing resentment among section chiefs, who were mortified because their counterparts in the army seemed apprised of matters discussed at the Five Ministers Conference. As an ‘absolutely confidential memo’ written by Captain Oka Takazumi stated, ‘Because middle-echelon officers are kept utterly in the dark about the intentions of their superiors, they are unable to decide how to act.’ If they continued to be ignored, Oka warned, ‘the dissatisfactions of the lower echelons would finally come to explode.’ Lack of communication between the upper and middle echelons hampered and misled the latter in their efforts toward policy coordination with army representatives. Admiral Nomura Kichisaburō, though opposed to a German alliance, felt it necessary to advise Yamamoto to ‘ventilate’ communication with the navy’s middle echelons.”

•“The navy’s middle-echelon officials had assumed that Navy Minister Yonai approved of a pact against not only the Soviet union but also Britain and France. Support for a German alliance drew strength from anti-British feelings permeating naval circles, especially among middle-rank officers. An idea of the hostility felt toward Britain can be gleaned from a memorandum drafted by the Naval General Staff in September 1938. This memorandum revived the image of Britain as a haughty, selfish ingrate that had exploited Japan during World War I but then had abandoned the Anglo-Japanese Alliance and joined the United States in imposed the 60 percent ration on Japan at the Washington Conference. In another memorandum, Captain Oka asserted that the China war had resolved itself into ‘diplomatic warfare’ with Britain in which Japan’s hand would be strengthened by alliance with Germany. The anti-British feelings of middle-echelon officials were based on a sense of international isolation that expressed itself in the charge that Britain had been mobilizing other nations to ‘form an encirclement of Japan.’ An alliance with Germany, they felt, would go far to end Japan’s isolation as well as to terminate the China War successfully.”

•Oka was certain that America would never align itself with Britain. Leaders in Washington, he asserted, had learned from World War I, which cost the United States $25 billion, only to result in bickering over payment of Allied war debts. “It is only maintaining its neutrality,” he declared, “that the United States can hold the ‘casting vote’ in the world and fish in troubled waters.” Oka revealed the navy’s inner motive for an anti-British alliance when he argued that if the pact was against the Soviet Union, it could not be “used for the pursuit of national policy (expanding into the South Seas, etc.) An anti-Russian alliance would concede the army’s priority in armaments, whereas a broader pact against Britain would accord with the navy’s policy of southern advance and help win priority for preparations against the Anglo-American powers…

•“During all this time Navy Minister Oikawa still hoped that war could somehow be avoided, but he remained passive and silent in meetings. Although the feeling in the Naval General Staff had turned to war, leaders of the ministry, though acquiescing in the southward drive, hoped it could be accomplished without triggering war. Chief of the Naval Affairs Bureau Oka, taking pains to mediate between Oikawa and Nagano, recalled, ‘We did not think America would impose a total embargo, although we did recognize the risk. But when the ABCD encirclement threatened Japan, there was no other alternative but to accede to the demands of the high command.’ Oka implied that ministry leaders could not resist the demands of the Naval General Staff.”

•“Despite the fight some naval leaders put up against the Tripartite Pact, it would be wrong to assume that the navy, as an institution, was more cautious and rational than the army about Japan’s drawing close to the fascist powers. Yonai and his strongest allies, Yamamoto and Inoue Shigeyoshi, the chief of military affairs, were increasingly in the minority…Yonai and his allies had to counter not only the army but also the navy’s own Nazi admirers, who were multiplying as a result of Hitler’s blitzkrieg successes and pushing for the Axis alliance. ¶ Rear Admiral Oka Takazumi, who would head the Navy Ministry’s Naval Affairs Bureau and appoint its fiercest prowar advocate. Ishikawa Shingo, its sectional chief in the fall of 1940, thought that the Axis alliance was a good idea, arguing that Japan could end the China War by intimidating Britain. By allying with Germany and Italy, he claimed, Japan would be able to corner Britain into brokering peace between Japan and China…’The historically isolationist United States would not try to counter the powerful German-Italian-Japanese alliance by siding with Britain, whose moon is already waning,’ insisted Oka.”

•“The [Japanese] navy, too, had its middle-ranking hawks. The primary example was Ishikawa Shingo, a section chief in the Navy Ministry’s Military Affairs Bureau, also in his midforties. . In 1931, around the time of the Manchurian Incident, he wrote a controversial book, Japan’s Crisis, under a pseudonym (and without permission from the navy, grounds enough for dismissal from the service). In it, he warned that the United Stateshad entertained ambitions to control the East since the middle of the previous century, and he urged Japan to embark on a ‘great national march to senure its right to survival’ in the face of impending American threats. He thought the conferences on naval reduction that had been held in Washington and London were part of a Western conspiracy to obstruct Japan’s right to prominence. Like the army’s Ishiwara Kanji, who had conceived of the Manchurian takeover, Ishikawa greatly influenced younger officers with his polemical book, turning many in what had traditionally been the pro-British navy into Nazi sympathizers. His fanatical personality had long alarmed the top brass. Nicknamed Wild Shot, he had been consistently passed over for influential positions for much of his career. Now, in the fall of 1940, Oka, chief of the Naval Affairs Bureau and a strong advocate of Japan’s Axis alliance, appointed Ishikawa leader of its Arms Division, overriding objections from the Personnel Bureau. ¶ Ishikawa, along with other like-minded associates, formed the First Naval Defense Policy Committee (the so-called First Committee), which would shape the navy’s prowar position on the eve of Peral Harbor. He believed, like Tanaka, that war with the United States was something not to be avoided but to be faced heroically. In his thinking, Japan’s military occupation of French Indochina was about preparing for an inevitable war rather than a possible one. Ishikawa, in fact, favored a forceful military advance beyond Indochinese borders and advocated the conquest of British Malaya within 1941.”

Excerpts about Union Pacific Railroad

•”The Central Pacific Railroad existed prior to the Pacific Railway Act of 1862, but the act itself established the Union Pacific. It was the first corporation chartered by the federal government since the Bank of the United States, and initially it was a mere shell. The Union Pacific would not take on a real existence until commissioners appointed by Congress opened its subscription books and sold two thousand shares. Only then could the purchasers organize the railroad.“^[66]

•”When the company opened its subscription books in September of 1862, it sold only twenty shares of stock, and the Union Pacific remained moribund until 1863 when Thomas Clark Durant took hold of it…¶With no one else investing, Durant and [George Francis] Train could take control with little investment of their own. They purchased shares, paid for in part from speculations in contraband cotton, and lent the 10 percent initial subscription price to others. This, too, was a speculation and a relatively small one. Durant’s fifty shares had a par price of $50,000, but his 10 percent down represented an investment of only $5,000, and since only $500, or $10 per share,, had to appear in the corporate treasury in cash , it is unclear how much actual money was ever involved. By 1863,Durant had gotten enough stock subscription to organize the Union Pacific.“^[67]

Fumimaro Konoe

Fumimaro Konoe was born on October 12, 1891 to a distinguished noble family in Tokyo. He was admitted to Kyoto Imperial University where he studied socialism and courted the support of the influential genrō, Saionji Kinmochi. While still at the university, he assumed his father’s seat at the House of Peers in 1916. Following his graduation, Konoe worked as a civil servant in Japan’s home ministry before accompanying the Japanese delegation to the Paris Peace Conference in 1918. There, he pushed to have a Racial Equality Clause incorporated in the Covenant for the League of Nations. After the clause was rejected by the United States, he became an outspoken detractor against what he saw as pervasive anti-Japanese sentiment in the West.

On 4 June 1937, Konoe was appointed Prime Minister of Japan by Emperor Hirohito. Upon taking office, he presided over the Japanese invasion of China following a series of skirmishes with the Chinese Kuomintang. During the course of the ensuing conflict which came to be known as the Second Sino-Japanese War,……

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Peacetime Leadership of the German Army

After becoming Chief of the German General Staff, Moltke devoted much of his time reviewing and fine-tuning the war plans set in place by his predecessor, Count Schlieffen. What came to be known as the “Schlieffen Plan” was based on the likelihood that Germany would be forced to fight both France and Russia in a two-front war. Therefore, in the event of conflict with Russia, it simultaneously called for a decisive offensive against France. In order to outflank French defenses, the offensive would entail an invasion of the Low Countries, thereby theoretically enabling German forces to swing behind Paris and decisively defeat the whole of France’s armies in a battle of encirclement. In 1913, Moltke discarded the Germany’s sole alternative to the Schlieffen Plan, the Eastern Deployment Plan, which confined hostilities to Russia alone in the event of a Russo-German conflict. Thus, by the time of the July Crisis, there was no way for Germany to go to war to with Russia without simultaneously opening hostilities against the West.

Despite agreeing with the strategic aims of the plan, Moltke made several significant modifications to its implementation.

Sources

• Asada, Sadao (2006). From Mahan to Pearl Harbor : The Imperial Japanese Navy and the United States. Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-1-55750-042-7.
• Coox, Alvin D. (1992). “Japanese Net Assessment in the Era Before Pearl Harbor”. In Murray, Williamson; Millet, Allan (eds.). Calculations: Net Assessment and the Coming of World War II. New York, N.Y.: MacMillan, Inc. ISBN 1-4165-7684-3.
• Evans, David C.; Peattie, David (1997). Kaigun: Strategy, Tactics and Technology in the Imperial Japanese Navy,1887-1941. Annapolis,MD: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 978-0-87021-192-8.
• Hotta, Eri (2013). Japan 1941: Countdown to Infamy. Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 978-0-307-59401-3.
• MacMillan, Margaret (2014) [2013]. The Road to 1914: The War That Ended Peace. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks. ISBN 978-0-8129-8066-0.
• Meyer, G.J. (2015) [2006]. A World Undone: A Story of the Great War 1914-1918. New York: Bantam Books. p. 94. ISBN 978-0-553-38240-2.
• Mosley, Leonard (1966). Hirohito: Emperor of Japan. London, UK: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
• Wetzler, Peter (1998). Hirohito and War: Imperial Tradition and Military Decision Making in Prewar Japan. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 0-8248-1925-X.

Citations