That's exactly what it was: a myth. They achieved most of their best-known victories with speed & surprise against unprepared & stunned enemies, who had inadequate or incomplete training to boot. When they faced skilled opponents, like Marines at Guadalcanal, they were slaughtered.
IJA wasn't helped by having without question
the worst general officers in the world.


Their company grade officers weren't much better.

Nitwits, dimwits, cowards, & hypocrites, the good ones were a rarity.
They led the finest fighting infantry in the world: disciplined & tough like you've never seen. If IJA officers had been a tiny fraction as competent, the war could've gone into 1950. (Yes, I know, the Bomb...

) I don't know of a 20th Century example of troops so poorly led & so poorly served.


They deserved better.