GENERAL YASUJI OKAMURA (MAY 15, 1884 TO SEPTEMBER 2, 1966)

On this date, September 2, 1966, one of the Imperial Japanese Army’s General, General Yasuji Okamura, passed away. I will post information about him from Wikipedia and other links.

General Yasuji Okamura (岡村 寧次 Okamura Yasuji)

Native name	岡村 寧次
Born	15 May 1884 Tokyo, Japan
Died	2 September 1966 (aged 82) Tokyo, Japan
Allegiance	Empire of Japan
Service/branch	Imperial Japanese Army
Years of service	1905 - 1945
Rank	General
Commands held	China Expeditionary Army Northern China Area Army Eleventh Army 2nd Division
Battles/wars	Russo-Japanese War Second Sino-Japanese War
Awards	Order of the Golden Kite Grand Cordon of the Order of the Rising Sun

Yasuji Okamura (岡村 寧次 Okamura Yasuji, 15 May 1884 – 2 September 1966) was a general of the Imperial Japanese Army, war criminal, and commander-in-chief of the China Expeditionary Army from November 1944 to the end of World War II.

Biography

Early life

Born in Tokyo in 1884, Okamura enrolled in Sakamachi Elementary School and graduated eight years later. In 1897, he entered Waseda Junior High School. In 1898, he was transferred to Tokyo Junior Army School, and was transferred to Army Central Junior School later. Okamura entered the 16th class of the Imperial Japanese Army Academy in 1899 and graduated in 1904. His classmates included the future generals Itagaki Seishiro, Kenji Doihara and Ando Rikichi. He was commissioned a lieutenant in the IJA 1st Infantry Regiment.

In 1910, Okamura entered the 25th class of the Army War College, and was promoted to captain soon after graduation in 1913. He served in a number of staff positions on the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff during and after World War I. He moved briefly to China in the early 1920s, and served as a military advisor to a Chinese warlord.

From 1932 to 1933, Okamura was Vice chief-of-staff of the Shanghai Expeditionary Army under the aegis of the Kwantung Army. According to Okamura's own memoirs, he played a role in the recruitment of comfort women from Nagasaki prefecture to serve in military brothels in Shanghai. He also served as military attaché to Manchukuo from 1933-1934.

Okamura was promoted to lieutenant general in 1936, and assigned command of the IJA 2nd Division.

Yasuji Okamura, commander of the Japanese forces in China, had this to say about the Chinese Nationalist Army: "The center of resistance was neither the four hundred million Chinese civilians, nor the two million-strong ragtag army composed of local troops. Instead, it was the Central Army, led by the young officers of the Whampoa Military Academy, with Chiang Kai-shek at its nucleus. In numerous major battles, the Central Army not only was the main force engaged in combat, but also oversaw the local troops who were increasingly losing the will to fight. The Central Army kept the local troops from wavering. As seen, training by Whampoa was thorough, and it was impossible to resolve the China Incident peacefully with the existence of such an army.”

Source: 《大本营陆军部.上》519页 Translated from Chinese text:

侵华日军司令官冈村宁次在1939年对国军抗日的评论，他说："看来敌军抗日力量的中心不在于四亿中国民众，也不是以各类杂牌军混合而成的二百万军 队，乃是以蒋介石为核心、以黄埔军校青年军官阶层为主体的中央军。在历次会战中，它不仅是主要的战斗原动力，同时还严厉监督着逐渐丧失战斗力意志而徘徊犹 豫的地方杂牌军，使之不致离去而步调一致，因此不可忽视其威力。黄埔军校教育之彻底，由此可见......有此军队存在，要想和平解决事变，无异是缘木求 鱼" （摘自《大本营陆军部.上》519页）。

 

General Yasuji Okamura (岡村 寧次 Okamura Yasuji)

[PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/USA/USA-CBI-Command/USA-CBI-Command-11.html]

Second Sino-Japanese War

In 1938, a year after the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, Okamura was assigned as the commander in chief of the Japanese Eleventh Army, which participated in numerous major engagements in the Second Sino-Japanese War, notably the Battles of Wuhan, Nanchang and Changsha. According to historians Yoshiaki Yoshimi and Seiya Matsuno, Okamura was authorized by Emperor Showa to use chemical weapons during those battles.

In April 1940, Okamura was promoted to the rank of full general. In July 1941, he was appointed the commander-in-chief of the Northern China Area Army. In December 1941, Okamura received Imperial General Headquarters Order Number 575 authorizing the implementation of the Three Alls Policy in north China, aimed primarily at breaking the Chinese Red Army. According to historian Mitsuyoshi Himeta, the scorched earth campaign was responsible for the deaths of "more than 2.7 million" Chinese civilians.

In 1944, Okamura was overall commander of the massive and largely successful Operation Ichigo against airfields in southern China, while retaining personal command of the Japanese Sixth Area Army. A few months later, he was appointed the commander-in-chief of the China Expeditionary Army. As late as January 1945, Okamura was still confident of the victory of Japan in China.

With the surrender of Japan on 15 August 1945, Okamura represented the Imperial Japanese Army in the China Burma India Theater official surrender ceremony held at Nanjing on 9 September 1945.

General Okamura is the first confirmed officer in the Japanese army who instituted forced prostitution. Widely known as the system of "comfort women". His order can be traced back to 1932 with documentation of Japanese Lieutenant-General Okamura Yasuji’s proposal for a “shipment” of comfort women to be sent to Shanghai.

Yasuji Okamura surrendering to He Yingqin, Nanjing, China, 9 Sep 1945

[PHOTO SOURCE: http://ww2db.com/image.php?image_id=16262]

Okamura and other Japanese officers at the Surrender of China proceedings.

[PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.combinedfleet.com/AmoyEMB.htm]

War Crimes and Postwar life

After the war, Okamura was convicted for war crimes in July 1948 by the Nanjing War Crimes Tribunal but was immediately protected by the personal order of Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek, who retained him as a military adviser for the Nationalist Government (China).

While he was questioned by the investigators, he testified about the Nanking massacre:

"I surmised the following based on what I heard from Staff Officer Miyazaki, CCAA Special Service Department Chief Harada and Hangzhou Special Service Department Chief Hagiwara a day or two after I arrived in Shanghai. First, it is true that tens of thousands of acts of violence, such as looting and rape, took place against civilians during the assault on Nanking. Second, front-line troops indulged in the evil practice of executing POWs on the pretext of (lacking) rations."

Okamura returned to Japan in 1949 and died in 1966.

Okamura Yasuji, one of the major war criminals of WWII, got his promotion of General of the Japanese Army in 1941. Actually he had taken an active role in invading China since 1927. He carried out the infamous "Three All" campaign (also known as Sanguang policy) that authorized the Japanese army to kill everybody, burn and loot everything during the “Scorched-earth Sweeping” in order to prevent cooperation with Chinese guerrillas. The picture was taken while he was in trial.

[PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.kangzhan.org/www.kangzhan.org/node/50.html]