page_title: Hideki Tojo
section_title: Promotion to Army high command
hierarchical_section_title: Hideki Tojo / Military career / Promotion to Army high command
caption_attribution_description: Portrait of Tojo Hideki (東条英機, 1884 – 1948)
context_page_description: Hideki Tojo was a Japanese politician and general of the Imperial Japanese Army who served as Prime Minister of Japan and President of the Imperial Rule Assistance Association for most of World War II. Tojo began his career in the Army in 1905 and steadily rose through the ranks to become a general by 1934. In March 1937, he was promoted to Chief of Staff of the Kwantung Army whereby he led military operations against the Chinese in Inner Mongolia and the Chahar-Suiyan provinces. On 22 July 1940, he was appointed Minister of War in Prime Minister Fumimaro Konoe’s cabinet. On the eve of conflict with the West, he was an outspoken advocate for preemptively attacking the United States and its allies. After being named Prime Minister in October 1941, he oversaw Japan’s decision to go to war and its ensuing conquest of much of Asia and the Pacific. During his years in power, he expanded his control over Japan’s ministries and military to the point of dominating national policy comparably to that of the genrō. He also presided over numerous war crimes including the systematic massacre and starvation of civilians and prisoners of war.
context_section_description: In 1934, Hideki was promoted to major general and served as Chief of the Personnel Department within the Army Ministry. Tojo wrote a chapter in the book Hijōji kokumin zenshū (Essays in time of national emergency), a book published in March 1934 by the Army Ministry calling for Japan to become a totalitarian "national defense state". This book of 15 essays by senior generals argued that Japan had defeated Russia in the war of 1904–05 because bushidō had given the Japanese superior willpower as the Japanese did not fear death unlike the Russians who wanted to live, and what was needed to win the inevitable next war (against precisely whom the book did not say) was to repeat the example of the Russian-Japanese war on a much greater scale by creating the "national defense state" that would mobilize the entire nation for war. In his essay Tojo wrote "The modern war of national defense extends over a great many areas" requiring "a state that can monolithically control" all aspects of the nation in the political, social and economic spheres. Tojo attacked Britain, France and the United States for waging "ideological war" against Japan since 1919. Tojo ended his essay stating that Japan must stand tall "and spread its own moral principles to the world" as the "cultural and ideological war of the 'imperial way' is about to begin".
  Tojo was appointed commander of the IJA 24th Infantry Brigade in August 1934. In September 1935, Tojo assumed top command of the Kenpeitai of the Kwantung Army in Manchuria. Politically, he was nationalist, and militarist, and was nicknamed "Razor" (カミソリ, Kamisori), for his reputation of having a sharp and legalistic mind capable of quick decision-making. Tojo was a member of the Tōseiha ("Control") faction in the Army that was opposed by the more radical Kōdōha ("Imperial Way") faction. Both the Tōseiha and the Kōdōha factions were militaristic groups that favored a policy of expansionism abroad and dictatorship under the Emperor at home, but differed over the best way of achieving these goals. The Imperial Way faction wanted a coup d'état to achieve a Shōwa Restoration; emphasised "spirit" as the principle war-winning factor; and despite advocating socialist policies at home wanted to invade the Soviet Union. The Control faction, while being willing to use assassination to achieve its goals, was more willing to work within the system to achieve reforms; wanted to create the "national defense state" to mobilize the entire nation before going to war; and, while not rejecting the idea of "spirit" as a war-winning factor also saw military modernization as a war-winning factor; and saw the United States as a future enemy just as much as the Soviet Union.
  During the February 26 coup attempt of 1936, Tojo and Shigeru Honjō, a noted supporter of Sadao Araki, both opposed the rebels who were associated with the rival "Imperial Way" faction. Emperor Hirohito himself was outraged at the attacks on his close advisers, and after a brief political crisis and stalling on the part of a sympathetic military, the rebels were forced to surrender. As the commander of the Kenpeitai, Tojo ordered the arrest of all officers in the Kwantung Army suspected of supporting the coup attempt in Tokyo. In the aftermath, the Tōseiha faction was able to purge the Army of radical officers, and the coup leaders were tried and executed. Following the purge, Tōseiha and Kōdōha elements were unified in their nationalist but highly anti-political stance under the banner of the Tōseiha military clique, which included Tojo as one of its leaders.
  Tojo was promoted to Chief of staff of the Kwangtung Army in 1937. As the "Empire of Manchukuo" was, in reality, a Japanese colony in all but name, the Kwangtung Army's duties were just as much political as they were military. During this period, Tojo become close to Yōsuke Matsuoka, the fiery ultra-nationalist CEO of the South Manchuria Railway, one of Asia's largest corporations at the time, and Nobusuke Kishi, the Deputy Minister of Industry in Manchukuo, who was the man de facto in charge of Man
caption: Maj. General Hideki Tōjō
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