JAPAN: Discipline & Secrets

For the first time in Japanese Army history all garrison and division commanders were summoned to Tokyo last week for a conference at the Imperial War Office. Subject: discipline. To the distress of Japanese who thought that in discipline at least their army topped all others, War Minister General Senjuro Hayashi issued the following order at the conference:

"Heads of units must be kind and patient in their dealings with subordinates, but, if these latter commit offenses and are not repentant, punishment should be firm. Subordinates must be respectful toward their superiors, and even when expressing firm convictions must not forget the important rules of discipline. The Army, in brief, must be united from head to foot in a consciousness of its high mission to serve the nation and the Emperor."

Even more distressing in its implications was the War Minister's further order: "Officers must be careful in their speech and actions so that the Army's prestige shall not be compromised and the Army's secrets revealed."

Who has been blabbing what Army secrets General Hayashi did not say, sent Japan's garrison and division commanders away under a public cloud of suspicion. Still the darkest of current Japanese Army secrets remained the reason why General Nagata, Director of Military Affairs, was run through the chest by Army Swordsmanship Instructor Colonel Aizawa (TIME, Aug. 26), who sat in jail last week purse-lipped. In general Japan's scrappy little war machine suffers from chronic super-patriotism in the lower ranks, jampacked with zealots who imagine that their generals are too soft and that Japan's current Premier, whoever he may be, must be a pacifist hireling of "The Bankers."*