Imperial Way Faction

The Empire of Japan had enjoyed economic growth during World War I but this ended in the early 1920s with the Shōwa financial crisis. Social unrest increased with the growing polarization of society and inequalities, such as trafficking in girls, with the labor unions increasingly influenced by socialism, communism and anarchism, but the industrial and financial leaders of Japan continued to get wealthier through their inside connections with politicians and bureaucrats. The military was considered "clean" in terms of political corruption, and elements within the army were determined to take direct action to eliminate the perceived threats to Japan created by the weaknesses of liberal democracy and political corruption.

The founders of the Kōdōha were General Sadao Araki and his protégé, Jinzaburō Masaki. Araki was a noted political philosopher within the army, who popularized the term "Kōdōha" (the Imperial Way) in 1932 to describe a movement centered on spiritualism and anti-materialism. He linked the unique Japanese spirit with concepts of state reform, arguing that the Emperor and the people were indivisible. Araki was opposed to the over reliance on the material industry and extensive economic planning of the Tōseiha, which he considered akin to communism.^[5] To the Kōdōha, the spiritual training of the Army and the belief in Yamato-damashii was more important. Araki's ideology was deeply rooted in traditional Japanese concepts such as the bushido code, emphasizing spiritual power and linking the Emperor, the people, land and morality as one and indivisible. Domestically, the Kōdōha envisioned a pure Japanese culture, a return to the traditional values of Japan.

The faction emerged as a reaction against the long-standing hegemony of the Chōshū domain clique within the army. Araki became Minister of War in the cabinet of Prime Minister Inukai in 1931, and Masaki became Vice Chief of the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff. Araki purged followers of his rival General Kazushige Ugaki from important posts.^[3] Araki additionally purged the Chōshū-affiliated officers, replacing them with his own regional clique from Tosa and Saga.^[6]

The faction often overlapped with and gained the support of the "Young Officers' Movement," consisting largely of junior officers. As they spent their careers in line combat units, these officers bonded strongly with their men who originated from impoverished agricultural areas. As a result, the movement developed anti-capitalist sentiments, viewing the zaibatsu, wealthy politicians, and corrupt bureaucrats as exploiting the rural poor.^[2] The Kōdōha envisioned a Shōwa Restoration where these advisors would be removed, restoring direct rule to Emperor Hirohito and alleviating rural poverty.

In a news conference in September 1932, Araki first mentioned the word "Kōdōha" ("The Imperial Way"), from which his movement received its popular name.

The Kōdōha met opposition from the Tōseiha (Control Faction), an institutional alignment of staff officers guided by Tetsuzan Nagata.

Fundamental to both factions, however, was the common belief that national defense must be strengthened through a reform of national politics. Both factions adopted some ideas from totalitarian and fascist political philosophies, and espoused a strong skepticism of political party politics and representative democracy. However, their methods and ideologies were fundamentally opposed. The Tōseiha favored central economic and military planning, technological modernization, and preparation for an industrialized total war. Rather than the confrontational approach of the Kōdōha, which wanted to bring about a revolution, the Tōseiha believed the army had to work within the legal system and cooperate with the existing bureaucracy and the zaibatsu conglomerates to maximize Japan's industrial and military capacity.^[7] The Kōdōha, however, rejected these foreign concepts of total war economics and modernization. Instead, they placed their emphasis entirely on spiritual and emotional matters under the National Polity and actively despised the zaibatsu and the politicians with whom the Tōseiha wished to cooperate.^[8]

The Kōdōha was strongly supportive of the Strike North strategy of a preemptive strike against the Soviet Union, but the Tōseiha wanted a "more cautious" defense expansion of the Strike South strategy.^[9] The Kōdōha thought war in China was a strategic trap that would bleed Japan dry before they could fight a supposedly unavoidable war with the Soviet Union during the "Crisis of 1936".^[10]

After the Manchurian Incident, the two cliques struggled against each other for dominance over the military.^[11] The Kōdōha was initially dominant under Araki's tenure as War Minister. However, Araki's focus on spiritual training and ideological fervor hindered comprehensive economic and modernization programs desired by the majority of staff officers in the Central Headquarters.^[4] Furthermore, his blatant favoritism towards officers from the Saga and Tosa regions alienated the staff officers.^[12]

Araki's tenure was marked by political ineffectiveness, as he frequently failed to push the army's demands against the Finance Minister and the Navy, causing his supporters to realize he could not be relied upon.^[13] Araki resigned in January 1934, officially due to ill health, leaving the Kōdōha without their leader and causing a decline in their influence. Araki was replaced by General Senjūrō Hayashi, an officer with Tōseiha sympathies.^[10]

In November 1934, the Military Academy plot, discovered before it could be implemented, was alleged to have been orchestrated by Kōdōha army officers to murder a number of important politicians. Tetsuzan Nagata used this to force the resignation of Masaki from his position as Inspector General of Military Education (the third most powerful position in the Japanese Army hierarchy) for his complicity in the plot, and demoted some 3,000 other officers.

In retaliation, a Kōdōha officer, Saburō Aizawa, murdered Nagata in the Aizawa Incident. Aizawa's military tribunal was held under the jurisdiction of the First Infantry Division in Tokyo, whose commander, General Heisuke Yanagawa, was a follower of Araki. The trial thus became a vehicle by which the Kōdōha was able to denounce the Tōseiha, portray Aizawa as a selfless patriot, and Nagata as an unprincipled power-mad schemer.^[14]

At the climax of the Aizawa trial, to reduce tensions on the Tokyo area, the First Infantry Division was ordered from Tokyo to Manchuria. Instead, this caused the situation to escalate further, as the Kōdōha decided that the time was right for direct action, and backed the First Infantry Division in an attempted coup d'état on 26 February 1936 known as the February 26 Incident. The failure of the coup three days later resulted in the almost complete purge of Kōdōha members from top army positions and the resignation of their leader Sadao Araki.

Thus, after the February 26 Incident, the Kōdōha effectively ceased to exist. The Tōseiha became completely unopposed in the military, and essentially lost most of its raison d'être as a faction.^[15] Although the Tōseiha gained control of the army, the Kōdōha ideals of spiritual power and imperial mysticism remained embedded in the lower levels of the army, as did the tradition of insubordination of junior officers (gekokujō). These elements resurfaced with the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937.^[16]

• Hakkō ichiu (ie. "all the world under one roof"), the belief that the Emperor should rule over the whole world.