Imperial Guards Overrated?

[Rising_Sun]

What’s in a name?

One of the great glories of the Australian experience on Kokoda is that we fought the Imperial Guards, as if they were the elite of the IJA as their title might imply.

It’s interesting to compare that with the assessment of Colonel Masanobu Tsujii, the planner of the Malayan campaign, who didn’t want to use the Imperial Guards in Malaya because he regarded them as unreliable show ponies who, unlike many Japanese units which had served in China, weren’t battle hardened or even experienced in war.

After a few months in action the Imperial Guards were seasoned and very good troops by the time to got into Papua, but they weren’t necessarily the cream of the IJA as they’re often portrayed because of their grand title in Australian heroic accounts.

The SNLF were probably better at the sort of operations attempted in the early stages of Japan’s Papuan campaign.

And there wasn’t any shortage of IJA units that were at least as good as and probably better than the Imperial Guards in any sort of warfare.

But the myth lives on, through the impression that the title Imperial Guards means the cream of the IJA, that they were the best troops Japan had.

In reality, they were ceremonial troops who had no battle experience until December 1941, although after that they went out of their way to prove themselves.

[Firefly]

In the past Guards Regiments etc were the Elite. I think by ww2 the Kudos for this was in name only.

[tom]

Hi.

Until 1941 the japanese Imperial Guards Division was not much more than a ceremonial formation for political events. Only men with very good physical conditions and certain size were taken and trained. Most men only received the basic field training and since 1905 got no battlefield experience at all, as Rising Sun* stated.

Yes, armament was the same as in standard IJA divisions so also no elite at all.

In fall 1941 the 1st Imperial Guards Divison was rated as second-line formation only, not avaliable for important task. During the Malayan Campaign it was held reserve for the 25th Army.

So it is not surprising that the highly trained and experienced SNLF and IJA line formations did a better job early in the war.

Yours

tom!

[Rising_Sun]

@tom

During the Malayan Campaign it was held reserve for the 25th Army.

Not quite.

The Guards fought their way down the Malayan Peninsula with other units, although Yamashita wasn’t too impressed with them on various occasions.

At Gemas / Muar the Guards were mauled by the Australians in one of the few strong actions in the Commonwealth retreat.

This was repaid by the Parit Sulong massacre by the Guards of about 150 Australian and Indian troops, getting some practice for slaughtering Chinese and others when they got into Singapore.

The Guards wanted the honour of being the first troops across to Singapore , then baulked after Yamashita agreed to it. Yamashita forced them to press on.

There was quite a bit of conflict between Yamashita as overall commander and Nishimura who commanded the Guards. It doesn’t reflect well on Nishimura or the Guards as practical soldiers.

Nishimura was rebellious and arrogant in the closing stages of the campaign when faced with Yamashita’s orders to do things that offended Nishimura’s vain and misplaced sense of the Guards’ military entitlements and skills.

It’s fair to say that Yamashita had higher standards and his troops generally performed better than Nishimura’s Guards.