우가키(宇垣) 군축으로의 길 －1920년대 초 일본 육군 내의 군비 축소 논의－

초록

This article examines the discussion on disarmament in the Japanese Army in the early 1920s, before Yamanashi reductions(1922-23) and Ugaki reductions(1925). Since Meiji Restoration, the Imperial Japan incessantly expanded the size of the Army under the doctrine of so-called ‘a wealthy country and a powerful army’ and by waging several wars, and it reached the zenith before the end of The First World War. However, the postwar depression and the financial difficulty made further military expansions impossible. Also, with the Washington Conference in 1921-22, the voice demanding army reductions was growing from the Diet and the Japanese people. Under the above circumstances, some high-ranking officers like Tanibayashi Tokutaro, Yuhi Mitsue and Tachibana Koichiro submitted their opinions about disarmament to the Army leadership. They varied in posts or factions in the Army, but their opinions had something in common. At first, they felt the necessity of modernization of arms after the First World War so seriously, that they insisted the Army should secure budget for it by its own efforts, even by cutting its personnel or eliminating some divisions. Secondly, they did not turn their eyes away from the public antagonism against the Army, but wanted to restore the national support toward the Army by reducing the arms, shortening the period of active service, and lessening the soldiers’ burden of miscellaneous services. Thirdly, from the view of economic effectiveness, they proposed to unify some army organizations, or transfer those to the Cabinet or the other Ministries. In doing so, they intended to abandon the Army’s monopoly of the responsibility for national defence, and share it with the Japanese people and other national agencies. Of course, the Army did not reach the entire agreement to accept disarmament. Particularly, before and after the Washington Conference, Army General Staff made anti-disarmament propaganda inside and outside the Army. They urged that it is impossible to reduce the arms, in order to win a future war against Russian, Chinese and U.S. allied forces in Asian Continent. Also, because of the complexity of modern weapons and the importance of each soldier’s decision-making skills in combat, they stressed the necessity to maintain the current period of active service. However, the 35% of the units belonging to the 7th Division in Hokkaido disagreed this anti-disarmament propaganda. And their opinions about disarmament had some features in common with the above high-ranking officers’ opinions. In another words, the thinking that it is necessary to accept disarmament to some degree for modernization of arms was being infiltrating into the Army, from high-ranking officers to the first-line units, and this laid the groundwork for arms reductions carried out soon after.

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