The Imperial Japanese Army, 1868-1945 Quiz

Answer: Choshu

Field Marshal Yamagata Aritomo, the creator of the modern Japanese Army, cultivated officers from his native Choshu to fill most of the highest positions. For the details of how this "clan" dominance was finally broken in the 1920s, consult the excellent book by Leonard Humphreys, "The Way of the Heavenly Sword" (Stanford University Press, 1995).

Men from Satsuma could also be found in high positions in the IJA, but were clearly second fiddle to Choshu. (Satsuma men dominated the Imperial Japanese Navy, however.) Hizen, a smaller domain, played only a supporting role in the Meiji Restoration and made a lesser contribution. Aizu had fought bitterly against the Meiji Restoration, and thus was even less well represented.

Answer: Yasukuni Shrine

The Yasukuni Shrine has not been supported by the Japanese government since the implementation of post-World War II reforms abolishing State Shinto, but in recent decades the visits of prime ministers to pay their respects has been controversial. The number of spirits (kami) now enshrined at Yasukuni is more than 2,466,000.

Answer: French

Oui, c'est vrai! French officers served as trainers and advisers for the Japanese army throughout the 1870s, the time period in which the movie is set. The number peaked at around forty officers. They were sent home in 1879, and a much smaller German advisory mission arrived in 1885. Britain provided some instruction for the Imperial Japanese Navy, but not for the IJA. Americans had a role in setting up Japan's modern, civilian education system during the Meiji period. Of course, had Tom Cruise been cast as either a mild-mannered academic or a Frenchman, the film would have had a short run at a few art houses and then vanished into obscurity.

Answer: 1873

This modernizing reform, which made the IJA a force with far more peasants than samurai, was pushed through by Yamagata Aritomo. Financial and administrative constraints dictated that only a small percentage of the eligible males were actually conscripted, and exemptions could be purchased by the well-to-do. (A substitute cost 270 yen, a much larger sum then than now.) Conscripts had a seven-year obligation, including three years of active duty and four more years in the reserves.

Answer: True

Yamagata had been born into a low-ranking warrior family in Choshu in 1838. He learned the techniques of spear fighting as a youth and continued to practice them throughout his life. The story, perhaps slightly romanticized, is that Yamagata's favorite sparring partner was a large tree in his garden.

The tree is said to have succumbed to its wounds shortly before Yamagata himself passed away in 1922.

Answer: He captured Weihaiwei from the Chinese during the first Sino-Japanese War

During the first Sino-Japanese War Nogi captured Port Arthur from the Chinese, not Weihaiwei. It was Field Marshal Oyama Iwao who took Weihaiwei, an important sea port and naval base on the coast of Shandong, in 1895.

Answer: Reduced the army by four divisions, with some of the savings being used to buy aircraft, armor, and artillery

A relative liberal among Japanese military men, Ugaki served as Army Minister from 1924 to 1927. The assassination of the Manchurian warlord Zhang Zuolin occurred in 1928, but there is no evidence that Ugaki had anything to do with it. A clandestine effort was indeed underway to purge the army of "clan" (that is, Choshu) influence, but the principals were Nagata Tetsuzan, Okamura Yasuji, and Obata Toshishiro (with Tojo Hideki joining the cabal somewhat later).

Ugaki was elected as a representative to the Diet, Japan's parliament, after World War II and continued to serve his country in that capacity until his death in 1956.

Answer: Araki Sadao

He is also quoted as saying that a Japanese division armed with bamboo spears would be sufficient to destroy the Soviet Far Eastern Army.

Araki, who served as Army Minister in the Inukai and Saito cabinets in the early 1930s, was a strong advocate of "spirit" (seishin) as the decisive factor in war. He was revered by officers of the Imperial Way Faction. Interestingly, he was a native of Saga (Hizen), where Yamamoto Tsunetomo had dictated the "Hagakure" two centuries earlier.

The other generals listed were associated with the Control Faction, which opposed Araki and had a lot more interest in modern weaponry.

Answer: 15 percent

This tidbit comes from Meirion and Susie Harries, "Soldiers of the Sun" (Random House, 1991), p. 168.

The long-term trend was toward meritocracy, with less and less attention paid to family background. Until almost the end of the Meiji period (1868-1912) more than half of officers had been shizoku.

Answer: False

To put it bluntly, the emperor was mad as hell. After all, several of his most trusted advisers had been brutally murdered during the coup attempt.

The officers were tried by court martial behind closed doors, and thirteen of them were executed by firing squad in July 1936. Two others had committed suicide before they could be put on trial.

Answer: Nomonhan

In this battle fought on the Mongolian-Manchurian border, the main Japanese unit involved (Lt. Gen. Komatsubara Michitaro's 23rd Division) was almost entirely wiped out by the larger and much more heavily mechanized Soviet forces.

Changkufeng on the Soviet-Korean border was the site of a much smaller clash in 1939. Manzhouli was where the Soviets defeated the forces of the Chinese warlord Zhang Xueliang in 1929. Nothing of great interest happened at Blagoveshchensk.

Answer: Marco Polo Bridge Incident

In July 1937, then Colonel Mutaguchi was in command of the Japanese provisional regiment stationed near Peiping (Beijing) under the terms of the Boxer Protocol. It was some of his troops that were involved in the clash at Marco Polo Bridge (Lugouqiao) that touched off the second Sino-Japanese War.

As Mutaguchi began his drive on India, he is supposed to have boasted that since he was the one who started the war he should also be the one to finish it.

Answer: He commanded the Japanese forces defending Iwo Jima in February 1945

The role of Kuribayashi is played by Japanese actor Ken Watanabe in the movie "Letters from Iwo Jima."

Answer: Ichigaya

The GHQ and the Military Acadamy were both in Ichigaya, and became the venue for the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (that is, the Tokyo war crimes trials) in 1946-1948. The Japanese Ministry of Defense is located on the site formerly occupied by the Ichigaya Military Academy.

Answer: First Ministry of Demobilization

Losing the final round of Imperial Japan's long-running Army-Navy competition, the Navy Ministry became the Second Ministry of Demobilization. Both were downgraded to bureau status in mid-1946 and effectively abolished in October 1947.

The National Police Reserve and the Self-Defense Agency came later, in 1950 and 1954 respectively. Ministry of Peace is, of course, Orwellian rather than Japanese.