400,000 Japanese troops to hold the Pacific?

[keith]

I was reading in an Osprey Publishing book about the Japanese Army, by author Jowett, that Japan had only 400.000 troops defending it's Pacific holdings. Is this true? I'm no history major, but it seems to me that there were 250,000 holding the Philippines and over 100,000 garrisoned on Okinawa alone.

[cbuehler]

Not true. I dont know what the actual figure was for Japanese forces scattered throughout the Pacific areas was, but the real estimate for Japanese forces in the Philippines alone was roughly 320 thousand as of January 1945.

CB

[keith]

Thats what I thought.....

[peleliuexplorer]

I was reading in an Osprey Publishing book about the Japanese Army, by author Jowett, that Japan had only 400.000 troops defending it's Pacific holdings. Is this true? I'm no history major, but it seems to me that there were 250,000 holding the Philippines and over 100,000 garrisoned on Okinawa alone.

Be careful w/Osprey. They don't back up their facts with official sources. My buddy had a website about Peleliu and erroneously reported Japanese strength. Gordon Rottman plagerized the list of Japanese troop strength and published in his Osprey book without backing up the facts. Pretty funny, he didn't even list the website in his bibliography....

-Eric

[keith]

Yeah after looking over the book, no more than I know I took exeption to a few things in it.