During the War
Military and Technology
Japan was forced to have very adaptable and well rounded weapons as warfare for Japan ranged from the cold fronts of Russia to the tropical climates of Indonesia. With the coming of WWII, Japan obviously began developing weapons and vehicles to give them an edge against the allies. The efforts in development were mainly split between the IJA (Imperial Japanese Army) and the IJN (Imperial Japanese Navy).
The navy received more funding in order to continue development on new submarines, cruisers, etc. The army had to deal with the low amount of resources coming their way throughout most of the war. They had only gotten priority funding at the end of the war after it was too late. This resulted in the unique way Japan used equipment and strategy for their infantry units during WWII.
There was also a rivalry between the Japanese army and navy. The army mainly consisted of less educated people from all over Japan. They also had a much harder training regiment and often times, training seemed to be worse than fighting. The navy on the other hand, consisted mainly of people from suburbs and they generally had a snobby attitude towards the army which led to the rivalry between the two groups. |
When it came to ranking the arsenal of the major countries that fought in WWII, the Japanese arsenal was considered to be one of the worst, being just slightly better than Italy. Their infantry weapons were generally very heavy, commonly misfired, and were usually weapons that were brought back from WWI. Their artillery wasn’t any better either and it was known that their heaviest anti-tank guns had trouble damaging even the lightest tanks from the American and Soviet forces. Their artillery was usually also dated back to WWI.
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In terms of vehicles, they had actually dominated the air in the beginning of WWII. Their one fatal flaw with most of their aircraft was that they sacrificed armour for speed and when better planes were developed by the Allies, Japanese aircraft simply became a nuisance to Ally fighters. The same went for their ground vehicles as they struggled to match even the worst of the Ally force's vehicles. The one place where Japan completely dominated though was when it came to warships. It was considered that Japan and the US were somewhat evenly matched when it came to warships even though the US had the slight advantage because of production capabilities and technological advancements. Just like usual, Japan was sacrificing armour for speed but in this case, they also managed to create some of the biggest battleships ever built as the Yamato and Musashi trumped all other ships around them.
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Life as a Soldier
In WWII, training for the Japanese began when they were 20 years old and conscripted into the army. Training lasted 3 months and during this training period, the goal was to harden the soldiers' minds, spirits and bodies. They had a lot of standard training but a lot of focus was put into fighting with a bayonet which was based off ancient samurai traditions. While training, the soldiers had to follow strict rules and if they did not follow them or did not lead up to their general's expectations, they were beaten and punished.
The Japanese soldiers were known for being utterly ruthless and brutal towards opposing forces. They were ferocious fighters and when they were losing battles, they charged forward in huge suicidal attacks against the allies as it was encouraged to die for their country in these attacks. The allies came to call these “Banzai Attacks as when rushing forward, the Japanese soldiers would yell “Tennōheika Banzai!” which translates to “long live the emperor.”
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While in battle, the soldiers were equipped with one of several different types of machine guns, a helmet, a cloth head piece and a bayonet on the end of their gun. Training camps were placed all over Japan and by the end of the war, about 6.3 million men had served in the Japanese army and 1.3 million had died or were MIA.
Some soldiers were so loyal to japan that when given orders to never surrender or take their own life, they followed them even after the war ended. One such soldier named Hiroo Onoda did not surrender from WWII for nearly 30 years after it ended. He was stationed in the Philippines and refused to believe the war had ended until he was released from military duties from an old commander. He was given a heroes welcome back to Japan and started a new life and died only a few years ago when he was 91. |
Major Battles
Pearl Harbour
Japan and the US had been edging towards war for decades. Japan had been trying to take over China and the US didn’t want that to happen. The US government showed aggression towards Japan and tried to limit access to their resources so they wouldn’t be able to take over China. War between these two countries was inevitable and on December 7th, 1941, Japan decided to have the first attack on America and their target was a naval base in Pearl Harbour.
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Hundreds of Japanese fighter planes attacked the base early on that Sunday morning while many people were still sleeping. Their main advantage in this attack was the element of surprise. No one knew they were coming. They managed to destroy/damage almost 20 American naval vessels, including 8 battleships. They also damaged more than 300 airplanes. More than 2,400 Americans were killed, including civilians and another 1000 were injured. The day after the attack, the US president declared war on Japan, officially bringing the US into WWII.
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The Doolittle Raid
After the bombing of Pearl Harbour, the US wanted to get back at Japan and they decided to bomb Tokyo. They sent 16 B-25 bombers with about 16 tons of bombs off of an aircraft carrier nearby. It took the bombers three hours to get there and they arrived much earlier than Japan was expecting. They had 10 targets and hit them all. Although this didn’t cause much physical damage, it did scare the Japanese. They were humiliated because their emperor could have been killed by those bombs.
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Three days after the attack, the current president at the time, Franklin Roosevelt declared that the bombers had been launched from a secret (and fictional) base in Shangri-La. when the Japanese discovered that China had helped with the attack, they sought out for revenge. The Japanese Army launched an offensive to capture Chinese airfields along the coast. In the process, they unleashed germ warfare and other atrocities, massacring as many as 250,000 civilians, according to Chinese estimates at the time. It was a horrific price that China paid but it was not in vain as the Doolittle raid decimated Japan’s confidence and showed them how weak they really were.
Battle of the Coral Sea
Japan wanted to take control over the Coral Sea. On May 4th, 1942, Japan landed in the area and were met by the allied forces. They came under attacks from the aircraft carrier planes of the American task force. Although both sides suffered damages to their carriers, the battle left the Japanese without enough planes to cover the ground attack of Port Moresby, resulting in a strategic Allied victory. This was the first air-sea battle in history and it did not turn out well for Japan.
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Unit 731
In WWII, Japan started a top secret project called Unit 731 which sought to learn more about human physiology. They did all their experiments on humans with no sedation. They tortured their test subjects in ways that seemed like they were straight out of a horror movie. Japan committed many war crimes through WWII which ranged from inhuman torture on prisoners to cannibalism but the worst torture happened during Unit 731.
The majority of the test subjects were Chinese. The test subjects were often strapped down to tables and dissected while still alive and under no anaesthesia. They would remove organs and reattach them in strange ways. For example, they would remove a test patient's stomach and attach the esophagus directly to the lower intestines. They would also remove limbs and attach them to other parts of the body. The test subject would be screaming in agony and this would continue until they died and a new subject would be rolled in.
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They did many other awful things to people including putting them in high pressure tanks until they blew up, injecting them with different chemicals, and giving them diseases. Even though these experiments were awful and should have never happened, the Japanese scientists did learn ways to treat people. Doctors now know that the way to treat frostbite is by immersing it in water just over 100 degrees Fahrenheit, but not over 122 degrees. They learned this from the experiments in Unit 731.
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As the loss of the war became imminent to the Japanese, they decided to destroy all evidence of Unit 731. They tried to make it so no one would ever know about the unspeakable crimes they committed. Of course, there were photos taken during the experiments and they eventually surfaced many years after the war. The mad scientists who did these experiments were never caught and punished for their crimes. It took many years for the witnesses to speak out about what they saw and it is only now that we know to the full extent what awful things happened in Japan during WWII.