How come such incompetent decisions are taken at the level of units of 20K people? I would more understand at 100, 500, 2000 people, but at 20K people? It boggles the mind, that it could have gone differently (I wonder how differently?) if as you say they would have skipped Kohima.
The first reason was that Sato's hatred of his boss allowed him to ignore Mutaguchi's quite sensible plan to drive on the Dimapur. The second was that Sato's interpretation of bushido forced him emotionally always to see battle, as it was through battle that he could prove his value as a samurai.
I understand that, on a personal level. My stupefaction is more, how come the overall organisation (the Army) allowed such individuals to get to this level, and make mistakes at this level.
Note I haven't read much on this theatre, and yes it matches the overall Japanese Army, but I'm still surprised.
Probably the best analogy that I've read is the "Japanese Destroyer Captain" book (part biography, part historical), and he was saying the same about the high level Navy people (emotional/driven by ideology rather than logic).
Thank you very much for your writings.
How come such incompetent decisions are taken at the level of units of 20K people? I would more understand at 100, 500, 2000 people, but at 20K people? It boggles the mind, that it could have gone differently (I wonder how differently?) if as you say they would have skipped Kohima.
The first reason was that Sato's hatred of his boss allowed him to ignore Mutaguchi's quite sensible plan to drive on the Dimapur. The second was that Sato's interpretation of bushido forced him emotionally always to see battle, as it was through battle that he could prove his value as a samurai.
I understand that, on a personal level. My stupefaction is more, how come the overall organisation (the Army) allowed such individuals to get to this level, and make mistakes at this level.
Note I haven't read much on this theatre, and yes it matches the overall Japanese Army, but I'm still surprised.
Probably the best analogy that I've read is the "Japanese Destroyer Captain" book (part biography, part historical), and he was saying the same about the high level Navy people (emotional/driven by ideology rather than logic).
Well, we should be glad they did such mistakes!