How many "commanders-in-chief" did the Japanese army invade China have? There are actually only five qualified
At present, in all kinds of anti-Japanese dramas, most of them lack basic understanding of the establishment and position of the Japanese army during World War II, such as in the play "My Brother's Name is Shun slip", the "commander-in-chief" of the Japanese army in East China is a major general officer, and the titles of other commanders and commanders-in-chief are also as many as cattle hair, which is a manifestation of the lack of research on military history. In World War II, only the military commanders of the three formation levels of the "Army", "Front Army" and "General Army" could be called commanders, and there was only one situation in which they were really called "commanders-in-chief": the leaders of the troops at the level of the general army.
The second commander-in-chief of the Chinese Dispatch Army, Hata Shunroku
Throughout world war II, the Japanese Army formed a total of six general army-level units, namely the Chinese Dispatch Army, the Kwantung Army, the Southern Army, the First General Army, the Second General Army and the General Aviation Army, and in the operational sequence of the Japanese army invading China, it is obvious that there are only two units, the Chinese Dispatch Army and the Kwantung Army, so the Japanese chieftains who can be called "commander-in-chief" can only be produced in these two "general headquarters" institutions.
The first to be upgraded to the rank of General Army was the "China Dispatch Army" headquartered in Nanjing, which was established on September 23, 1939, and the first "commander-in-chief" was General Nishio Shouzo. This guy may not be familiar to everyone, he came to the Chinese battlefield from the position of commander of the Guards Division as the commander of the 2nd Army, and as a result, he was hit by a suffocating stick in Taierzhuang, and Hirohito did not like him.
On the left is Nishio Shouzo
In August 1939, Abe Nobuyuki formed a cabinet to propose him as the Minister of War, and the Emperor expelled him from the Central Army in Tokyo, and the rank of General Jin came to Nanjing to take up the post of commander-in-chief of the "Chinese Dispatch Army" and commander of the 13th Army. Prior to this, the main units of the Japanese invasion of China had no subordination to each other, and they were directly under the command of the Tokyo Military Department (General Staff Headquarters and Army Province).
The "Chinese Dispatch Army" was formed by upgrading the headquarters of the "Central China Dispatch Army" and was established to strengthen the unified command of the Guannei Battlefield, so all the previous titles of the "Shanghai Dispatch Army, the 10th Army, the Central China Front, and the Central China Dispatch Army" in East China and Central China were abolished, and all the Japanese forces invading China south of Shanhaiguan were authorized to command. However, the unfavored Nishio Shouzo was a decoration, and the real power was in the hands of the "Chief of the General Staff" Itagaki Seishiro. At this time, the operational sequences of the "Chinese Dispatch Army" were: the 13th Army of East China (Shanghai), the 11th Army of Central China (Wuhan), the North China Front, and the (Beiping) South China Front (Guangzhou).
The third commander-in-chief, Ninji Okamura
The leaders of the various armies and all sides of the Chinese dispatch army could only be called commanders, and only Nishio Shouzo could be called "commander-in-chief", and soon, by 1941, his position was replaced by Hata Shunroku. In 1944, Hata Shunroku was transferred back to China, and he was replaced by the former commander of the North China Front, General Ninji Okamura, that is, this promotion changed Okamura from "commander" to "commander-in-chief" until he signed the surrender in Nanjing on behalf of the invading Japanese army.
Another unit at the level of the "General Army" is the Kwantung Army in the northeast, which is not under the command of the "China Dispatch Army", but it is not the level of the "General Army" from the beginning. From the 918 Incident to the July 7 Incident, the Kwantung Army has always been at the level of "army", with an unequal number of divisions and regiments under its jurisdiction, and in early 1938, in order to prepare for a large number of troops against the Soviet Union, the water rose to become a "front army" structure, and the military commander was still called the commander.
Tada Jun, who was the commander of the North China Front
After the Battle of Nomonkan, the commander of the Kwantung Army, Kenkichi Ueda, and the chief of staff, Rinsuke Isotani, were "laid off", and the commander of the 1st Army in Shanxi, Lieutenant General Yoshijiro Umezu, was promoted to commander of the Kwantung Army, although the rank did not change, but the rank was already the front army, which was equivalent to the promotion of the position. Umezu Yoshijiro repaired the Kwantung Army's "Shimo Kagami" problem, and was basically able to obey the command of the Tokyo Military Department, which was praised by the Japanese government and the public, and was promoted to the rank of general in 1940.
On October 1, 1942, the Kwantung Army Command was also upgraded to the "General Command", that is, the General Army-level unit, and Umezu became the first "Commander-in-Chief" of the Kwantung Army. In 1944, he was promoted to chief of staff, and General Yamada took over as the second commander-in-chief of the Kwantung Army, and of course the last. In addition to these two general army-level headquarters, the devilish leaders of the North China Front, the 13th Army in East China, and the 11th Army in Central China could only be called commanders, and there were many changes during the war. For example, the 11th Army successively replaced seven commanders, including Ninji Okamura, Kazuichiro Enbu, Yukichi Anan, Tsukada, Isamu Yokoyama, Yoshio Umizuki, and Yukio Kasahara, so the units were not listed.
The first commander of the 11th Army, Okamura Ninji