Terauchi Hisaichi

Field Marshal Terauchi Hisaichi (right) together with General Hata Shunroku (left) near Xuzhou (1938)

Terauchi Hisaichi (also Terauchi Juichi , Japanese 寺内 寿 一 ; * August 8, 1879 in Yamaguchi Prefecture ; † June 12, 1946 in Malaya ) was a Field Marshal ( Gensui ) of the Imperial Japanese Army .

Life

Terauchi was born as the eldest son of the then officer and later marshal and 18th Japanese Prime Minister Terauchi Masatake .

After graduating from the military academy , he joined the army as a young officer in 1900. From 1904 to 1905 he took part in the Russo-Japanese War and then attended the Army University , which he graduated in 1909. He spent some time teaching at a military school in Germany before being promoted to colonel in 1919 and appointed commander of the 1st regiment of the Imperial Guard . Furthermore, after the death of his father in November 1919, he inherited the title of Hakushaku . From 1922 on, he served as chief of staff of the Imperial Guard Division. In 1924 he was appointed major general and was given command of the 19th Brigade of the Japanese Army. In 1927 he went to Korea as chief of staff of the Chosen Army stationed there . In 1930 he was promoted to lieutenant general and took over the 5th Division of the Japanese Army, and then the 4th Division two years later .

In 1935 Terauchi, who had led the Formosa Army in Taiwan since 1934 , was promoted to general and a member of the Supreme War Council. After the failed coup d'état by Japanese officers in February 1936, he became Minister of the Army in the Hirota Cabinet . At the end of August 1937, after the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War , he took over command of the newly formed Northern China Regional Army . He held this post until December 1938, after which he returned to the Supreme War Council.

On November 6, 1941, he took over the leadership of the Japanese Southern Army . Together with Admiral Yamamoto Isoroku , he worked on the Japanese war plans that were to ensure the conquest of the entire Indonesian archipelago . After the successful campaigns of conquest in Southeast Asia , which he monitored in their entirety, Terauchi set up his headquarters on December 4, 1941 in Singapore . He was known to always include the opinion of his subordinate generals and admirals in his decisions. In June 1943 he was appointed field marshal .

In May 1944, Terauchi moved its headquarters to the Philippines . When the islands were threatened by American troops, he moved his headquarters to Saigon , Indochina, in November . There he had the administration of the country ended on March 9, 1945 by French colonial troops under Admiral Jean Decoux . He suffered a stroke on April 10, 1945 while being briefed on the loss of Burma . He was unable to recover from the resulting cerebral hemorrhage and was unable to attend the general surrender ceremony of the Japanese armed forces in Singapore on August 21. He surrendered to Lord Mountbatten on November 30, 1945. Terauchi Hisaichi died in 1946 in a prisoner-of-war camp.

Web links

Commons : Terauchi Hisaichi  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Newspaper article about Terauchi Hisaichi in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Hsu, Chang: History of The Sino-Japanese War , p. 184

Japanese name: As is common in Japan, the family name comes before the first name in this article . Thus Terauchi is the family name, Hisaichi the first name.