BRITISH AND JAPANESE MILITARY LEADERSHIP IN THE FAR EASTERN WAR, 1941–1945 CASS SERIES: MILITARY HISTORY AND POLICY Series Editors: John Gooch and Brian Holden Reid ISSN: 1465–8488 This series will publish studies on historical and contemporary aspects of land power, spanning the period from the eighteenth century to the present day, and will include national, international and comparative studies. From time to time, the series will publish edited collections of essays and ‘classics’. 1. Allenby and British Strategy in the 10. The British General Staff Reform and Middle East, 1917–1919 Innovation 1890–1939 Matthew Hughes David French and Brian Holden Reid (eds) 2. Alfred von Schlieffen’s Military Writings Robert Foley, ed. and trans. 11. Writing the Great War: Sir James Edmonds and the official Histories, 3. The British Defence of Egypt, 1915–1948 1935–1940: Conflict and Crisis in the Andrew Green Eastern Mediterranean Steven Morewood 12. Command and Control in Military Crisis: Devious Decisions 4. The Japanese and the British Harald Hoiback Commonwealth Armies at War, 1941–1945 Tim Moreman 13. Lloyd George and the Generals David Woodward 5. Training, Tactics and Leadership in the Confederate Army of Tennessee: Seeds of 14. Malta and British Strategic Policy, Failure 1925–1943 Andrew Haughton Douglas Austin 6. Military Training in the British Army 15. British Armour in the Normandy 1940–1944: From Dunkirk to D-Day Campaign 1944 Tim Harrison Place John Buckley 7. The Boer War: Direction, Experience and 16. Gallipoli: Making History Image Jenny Macleod (ed.) John Gooch (ed.) 17. British and Japanese Military Leadership 8. Caporetto 1917: Victory or Defeat? in the Far Eastern War 1941–1945 Mario Morselli Brian Bond and Kyoichi Tachikawa (eds) 9. Postwar Counterinsurgency and the SAS 1945–1952: A Special Type of Warfare Tim Jones BRITISH AND JAPANESE MILITARY LEADERSHIP IN THE FAR EASTERN WAR, 1941–1945 Edited by Brian Bond and Kyoichi Tachikawa FRANK CASS LONDON and NEW YORK First published 2004 by Frank Cass 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016 Frank Cass is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” © 2004 Brian Bond and Kyoichi Tachikawa for selection and editorial matter; individual contributors for their chapters All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with regard to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and cannot accept any legal responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions that may be made. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data British and Japanese military leadership in the Far Eastern War, 1941–45/editors, Brian Bond and Kyoichi Tachikawa.—1st ed. p. cm.—(Cass series —military history and policy; no. 17) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. World War, 1939–1945—Campaigns—Malay Peninsula. 2. World War, 1939–1945—Campaigns—Burma. 3. Strategy—History—20th century. 4. Command of troops—History—20th century. 5. Leadership—Japan—History—20th century. 6. Leadership—Great Britain—History—20th century. I.Bond, Brian. II. Tachikawa, Kyåoichi, 1966– III. Title. IV. Series. D767.5.B67 2004 940.54′2591–dc22 2004004294 ISBN 0-203-30988-X Master e-book ISBN ISBN 0-714-65659-3 (Print Edition) CONTENTS Notes on contributors vii Series Editor’s preface ix Foreword by Major-General Yoshinaga Hayashi xi Note on Japanese names xiii Introduction 1 BRIAN BOND 1 Britain’s grand strategy and Anglo-American leadership in the war against Japan 7 SAKI DOCKRILL 2 Tojo Hideki as a war leader 25 RYOICHI TOBE 3 The army level of command: General Sir William Slim and Fourteenth Army in Burma 39 BRIAN BOND 4 Leadership in Japan’s planning for war against Britain 53 KANJI AKAGI 5 Crisis of command: Major-General Gordon Bennett and British military effectiveness in the Malayan Campaign, 1941–42 63 CARL BRIDGE 6 General Yamashita and his style of leadership: the Malaya/Singapore 73 campaign KYOICHI TACHIKAWA 7 British tactical command and leadership in the Burma campaign, 1941–45 87 GRAHAM DUNLOP 8 Japanese war leadership in the Burma theatre: the Imphal operation KENICHI ARAKAWA 103 vi 9 British leadership in air operations: Malaya and Burma 121 MICHAEL DOCKRILL 10 Air operational leadership in the Southern Front: Imperial Army 131 Aviation’s trial to be an ‘air force’ in the Malaya offensive air operation HISAYUKI YOKOYAMA Notes 149 Index 175 CONTRIBUTORS Kanji Akagi is Professor, Keio University. He received an MA from Keio University in 1980 and a PhD in 1989. He is author of (in Japanese) The Origins of the Vietnam War and (in Japanese) Policy and Strategy in the Second World War. Kenichi Arakawa is Associate Professor at the National Defense Academy (NDA), Japan, and a Colonel (retired), JGSDF. He was awarded an MA from Toyo Eiwa University in 1997 and is a PhD candidate at Hitotsubashi University. He is author of (co-authored, in Japanese) New Perspectives on the Sino-Japanese War and (co-authored, in Japanese) The Manchurian Incident Revisited After Seventy Years. Brian Bond is Emeritus Professor of Military History at King’s College London and President of the British Commission for Military History. Festschrift to mark his retirement in 2002, The British General Staff, edited by David French and Brian Holden Reid, was published by Frank Cass and awarded the Templer Prize Medal for Military History. He is author of many books on military history, the most recent being The Unquiet Western Front: Britain’s Role in Literature and History (2002). Carl Bridge is Professor, King’s College, London and head of the Menzies Centre for Australian Studies there. He is author of Munich to Vietnam: Australia’s Relations with Britain and the United States since the 1930s and Between Empire and Nation: Australia’s External Relations from Federation to the Second World War. Michael Dockrill is Emeritus and Visiting Professor of Diplomatic History, King’s College, London. He received his PhD from the London School of Economics in 1969 and is author or editor of many books on British foreign policy and stratgy, the most recent being British Establishment Perspectives on France 1936–40 and (edited, with Philippe Chassaigne) Anglo-French Relations 1898–1998. viii Saki Dockrill is Professor of Contemporary History and International Security, King’s College, London. She is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and has written extensively on defence and security relations in Europe and Asia in the twentieth century; her publications include Britain’s Policy for West German Rearmament; (as editor) From Pearl Harbor to Hiroshima: The Second World War in Asia and the Pacific, 1941–1945; Eisenhower’s New Look Security Policy and, most recently, Britain’s Retreat From East of Suez: The Choice Between Europe and the World? Graham Dunlop is a Colonel (retired), Royal Marines. He is currently completing a PhD thesis at the University of Edinburgh. He served in Northern Ireland, the Mediterranean, the USA, Hong Kong, Iraq and Bosnia, before retiring in 1997. Kyoichi Tachikawa is Senior Research Fellow, Military History Department, National Institute for Defense Studies, Tokyo, Japan. He was awarded an MA from Sophia University in 1990 and a PhD in 1999. He is author of (in Japanese) World War II and French Indochina: A Study of French—Japanese Collaboration. Ryoichi Tobe is Professor at the National Defense Academy (NDA), Japan. He received an MA from Kyoto University in 1973 and a PhD in 1991. He is author of (in Japanese) Japanese Peace-Feelers in the China Incident and Army of Paradox. Hisayuki Yokoyama is Associate Professor at the National Defense Academy (NDA), Japan, and a Lieutenant-Colonel in the JASDF. He was awarded an MA from Obirin University in 2003. SERIES EDITOR’S PREFACE The subject of military leadership is at once one of the most fascinating and yet intractable in the canon of war studies. The precise qualities demanded by leaders at all levels are perhaps easy to enumerate in list form but more difficult to nurture, because they depend not only on personal qualities but on environment, culture, opportunity, and above all on the capacity to learn from past experience. The perspective in this volume is comparative, and all students of the Burma Campaign will learn a lot from it. The Burma Campaign is characterised by dazzling Japanese successes at the beginning, and an equally dazzling British riposte at the end. A long period of stalemate occurred in the middle, as each side sized the other up and simultaneously attempted to come to terms with the grave problems posed by climate and terrain. In this crucial phase the balance of success shifted from the initial victors to the defeated. Japanese commanders revealed themselves tactically bold but strategically irresolute. Consequently, they drew far too heavily on the warrior ethos of their troops. They neglected logistics, medical treatment, and left casualties to die, and tended to assume good morale would continue rather than attempt to nourish it. Even the bravest soldiers will not continue to fight if the very basics of their daily needs are neglected. The British problem was the converse. At first they stumbled tactically, but more rapidly solved their strategic problems. Defeat had impressed on them the enormous significance of logistics, communications and rapid medical treatment in such an inhospitable environment. Leadership consists of far more than adopting courageous poses. The British commander, Slim, developed a style of leadership well suited to the arduous conditions. His greatest achievement was binding together a disparate coalition of different races, cultures and military styles, and instilling it with the will to win. These fine, meticulous essays also offer a warning of the dangers of accepting uncritically crude racial stereotypes of the enemy. First, the British thought the Japanese incompetent, then after the spring of 1942 jumped to the opposite extreme of believing them supermen. The Japanese thought the British ‘gin and