ABSTRACT
This chapter gives an overview of the social composition of the armed forces, force structure, doctrine, training, combat motivation and combat experiences of the principal antagonists of the Asia-Pacific War. An attempt is made to show the transition in the armed forces of the major combatants from the pre–World War II period to the era of Total War. Strengths and weaknesses in the theory and praxis of war within the different military establishments are brought to the fore. As this volume deals mainly with jungle warfare in the tropics and tropical jungle war was mainly a ground war, the bulk of the attention in this chapter goes to the ground forces. It goes without saying that the experience gained by the Imperial Japanese Army and especially by the Japanese pilots while fighting China and the USSR gave them an advantage during the clash with the Western armed forces in the initial period of the Second World War.
