Hatazō Adachi

was a general in the Imperial Japanese Army during World War II.

Early career Adachi was born into an impoverished family, originally descended from samurai, in Ishikawa Prefecture in 1890 (the 23rd year of the reign of Emperor Meiji, which is why his father, who had been a professional officer in the Japanese military,

Promoted to lieutenant general in August 1940, he was commander of the IJA 37th Division at the Battle of South Shanxi. In 1940, he became a Chief of staff of the North China Area Army from 1941 to 1942, during the height of its scorched earth campaigns against the Chinese forces.

Pacific War On 9 November 1942, Adachi was appointed commander in chief of the newly formed 18th Army on Rabaul and the north coast of New Guinea from 1942 to 1945. The 18th Army contained the IJA 20th Division and IJA 41st Division, both of which arrived safely. However, the IJA 51st Division, including Adachi and his senior staff, came under Allied air attack while en route from Rabaul to Lae, in the Battle of the Bismarck Sea. All eight transport ships and four destroyers were sunk with the loss of 3,664 men, and only 2,427 men of the division were rescued.

With the defeat of the Imperial Japanese Navy in the Solomon Islands campaign, and with landings of US forces led by Douglas MacArthur at Aitape and Hollandia from 22 to 27 April 1944, the vast majority of Adachi's forces became isolated. His forces, suffering from malaria, heat exhaustion and malnutrition were rendered ineffective for the remainder of the war, despite Adachi's efforts to achieve some form of self-sufficiency by planting crops and giving priority in rations to the sick. As ammunition began to run low, many of Adachi's commanders resorted to banzai charges against the Allied beachhead at Aitape rather than surrender. By the end of the war in September 1945, most of his forces had been annihilated. Of Adachi's original 140,000 men, barely 13,000 were still alive when the war ended. He surrendered to the Australian 6th Division at Cape Wom, by Wewak, New Guinea.

Postwar

At the end of the war, Adachi was taken into custody by the Australian government and charged with war crimes in connection with mistreatment and arbitrary execution of prisoners of war. Although not personally involved in any of the atrocities mentioned, Adachi insisted on absorbing command responsibility for the actions of his subordinates during the military tribunal. On 12 July 1947 he was sentenced to imprisonment for life. On 10 September that year he killed himself in his quarters with a paring knife in the prisoners' compound at Rabaul, having first written a number of letters.