How professional was the IJA compared to the Heer/Waffen SS?

I would highlight a lack of discipline at all levels of the Japanese army. At the top they were too involved in politics, in the middle there was too much plotting, factionalism and willingness to attempt coups as well as start wars with foreign powers. Meanwhile at the bottom the soldiers appear to have lived a rotten life and behaved poorly when exposed to civilians or prisoners.

Despite that both the German and Japanese armies can probably be fairly credited with being willing to innovate and pretty flexible in their actions.

Equipment wise the Germans were superior, along with having a better logistics system. But the Japanese could probably function on less which had its advantages.

The issue of discipline is I think the greatest factor and makes the Japanese far less 'professional'.

It depends. Certainly the Japanese enlisted and NCOs obeyed their orders to a T, sometimes even at the cost of battlefield flexibility. In the Japanese Army the individual fighting units almost always retained combat effectiveness far beyond the point where the Germans or anyone else would have scattered or surrendered. A lot of the problems with Japanese treatment of civilians and prisoners of war, like the German experience in Eastern Europe and the USSR, didn't necessarily stem from a lack of discipline but rather their racist ideology and the release pent up aggression on the defenseless. In light of this, I'm not so sure if that was indicative of a lack of discipline so much as a reflection of the military and political culture at the time.
 
It depends. Certainly the Japanese enlisted and NCOs obeyed their orders to a T, sometimes even at the cost of battlefield flexibility. In the Japanese Army the individual fighting units almost always retained combat effectiveness far beyond the point where the Germans or anyone else would have scattered or surrendered. A lot of the problems with Japanese treatment of civilians and prisoners of war, like the German experience in Eastern Europe and the USSR, didn't necessarily stem from a lack of discipline but rather their racist ideology and the release pent up aggression on the defenseless. In light of this, I'm not so sure if that was indicative of a lack of discipline so much as a reflection of the military and political culture at the time.

As you highlight it was an odd combination of following orders almost all the time and yet at the same time there was a streak of disobedience in certain matters. I think it all worked well when everyone was going in the same direction, hence it was not fixed as that was usually the case.

I suppose I highlight the wilingness to pick on the defenceless as it went against their briefings to try win over hearts and minds and sometimes orders from on high. It probably did reflect pent up aggression, but the inability to rein it in even when they wanted to is a sign of a lack of discipline.
 
This literally lasted until the end of the war. It was a small group of field grade officers that attempted to capture and destroy the recording the Emperor had made for broadcast announcing the surrender. They not only were willing to disobey their direct CO, but the EMPEROR.
If the IJA were so obsessed with the Emperor to the point of worshipping him as a god, how could something like this happen?
In the Japanese Army the individual fighting units almost always retained combat effectiveness far beyond the point where the Germans or anyone else would have scattered or surrendered.
Was this due to their ideology/fanaticism?
 
I suppose I highlight the wilingness to pick on the defenceless as it went against their briefings to try win over hearts and minds and sometimes orders from on high. It probably did reflect pent up aggression, but the inability to rein it in even when they wanted to is a sign of a lack of discipline.

Maybe it was a matter of combat vs non combat environments. Taken out of a battle situation without a clear cut set of directives, ie, 'take position x,' 'hold objective y,' the Japanese soldiers were left with time on their hands to act out their violent tendencies. Of course, it didn't help that a large number of atrocities were also premeditated, carried out on the express orders of superior officers.

Was this due to their ideology/fanaticism?

That, and the fact that the Japanese as a society were used to harder conditions than the Germans, something reinforced by their training.
 

CalBear

Moderator
Donor
Monthly Donor
If the IJA were so obsessed with the Emperor to the point of worshipping him as a god, how could something like this happen?

Was this due to their ideology/fanaticism?
You are expecting logic from folks who WANTED to fight on after two nuclear weapons AND a declaration of war by the USSR? There excuse was that the Emperor had been "misled by his advisors". This sort of mental gymnastics is rather commonn going back through Japanese history, clear back to the pre-Shogunate era.

The Japanese soldier had been taught that their lives belonged to the Emperor. They were also taught that if they were captured they were dead to their families and friends As an example: Sakmaki Kazuo, the sole survivor of the five mini-subs that attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7th, was literally erased from official IJN records when his capture become know. A mural was commissioned that honored the heroism of the sub crews. Sakmaki was not shown (ironically he tried to do a stupidly brave act after his boat was grounded, but had the misfortune to survive, meaning he had lost his honor One unexpected off-shoot of this is that the IJA put no effort into teach troops the "Name, Rank & Serial Number" routine that is so famously shown in movies, with the result that Japanese PoW were often ready to turn into collaborators since their honor was already gone.
 
Last edited:
As an example: Sakmaki Kazuo, the sole survivor of the five mini-subs that attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7th, was literally erased from official IJN records when his capture become know. A mural was commissioned that honored the heroism of the sub crews. Sakmaki was not shown (ironically he tried to do a stupidly brave act after his boat was grounded, but had the misfortune to survive, meaning he had lost his honor). One unexpected off-shoot of this is that the IJA put no effort into teach troops the "Name, Rank & Serial Number" routine that is so famously shown in movies, with the result that Japanese PoW were often ready to turn into collaborators since their honor was already gone.
Damn.

That just goes to show how insane and demented their worldview was that they would go to such lengths to the point that the Reich would probably see it as bizarre.
 
with the result that Japanese PoW were often ready to turn into collaborators since their honor was already gone.

Probably the most notable instance of this was the case of Lt. Minoru Wada of the Intelligence Department of the IJA 100th Division on Mindanao.. After his capture by US forces, he was convinced by his interrogators to assist the Americans for the sake of saving lives on both sides, then jumped into a B-25 before personally acting as a pathfinder for a massive air strike that obliterated his own division headquarters, killing the commanding General and wiping out his entire staff.

Wada was a bit of an outlier in that he never really bought into the concept of Emperor-worship and Japanese Imperialism, and he was further disillusioned and disgusted by the brutality of the Japanese officer corps and the horrifying conditions in the camps run by Japan and her German ally, but this is still an interesting example of the above concept in action.
 
Top