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I don't disagree with Wiki's definition of a Banzai attack, but you seem to have no idea what you call a " frontal attack" is, as carried out by the U.S. Army, Marines etc. is.
The JA learned a lot of lessons fighting in China, that weren't so successful when used against better armed and trained opponents.
But their change of fighting tactics late in the war at Iwo Jima and Okinawa shows they were still capable of learning from earlier mistakes.
The Army going into Russia in 40-42 wouldn't be using the better thought out tactics of the 44-45 Japanese Army.
But this leaves out a very major chapter of IJA history, its great successes against western Allied troops in the opening campaigns of the Pacific War through May 1942, when Japan captured territory over an enormous expanse in a short time. The IJA was aided in those campaigns by Japanese superiority in air and at sea, but also consistently defeated Allied armies with inferior (Japanese) numbers. Of course these Allied armies were far from the best the Allies fielded in WWII. The British Armies in Malaya and Burma were generally second-string collections of forces which could be spared by an already highly stretched British Empire; the 'US' force in the Philippines was mainly a still poorly trained Philippine National Army with US support and leadership; the Dutch Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) was already cut off from the German occupied Netherlands even before the Pacific War. However, the fact remains the IJA showed up very well against those Allied forces, and often defeated them with manuever. But even when frontal assault was used as a tactic, those Allied armies could not always stand up to it. Japanese infantry attacks were very fierce; they didn't only work against the Chinese.The JA learned a lot of lessons fighting in China, that weren't so successful when used against better armed and trained opponents.
...Given the IJA performance v the Allies in Malaya, Burma, Philippines and DEI in 1941-42, they probably would have had overall qualitative superiority against the Soviets in the infantry-friendly terrain of Eastern Manchuria/Maritime Province as well. Red Army quality in '41 was very spotty, and the Soviets like the western Allies left relatively lower quality forces in the Far East.
Joe
I'm not sure on that, Siberian units deployed in early 42 against Finns were good quality troops with good forest fighting tactics, definitely better in forest than German regular infantry in 1941. If IJA would have attacked Eastern Siberia, it would have been Soviet troops which had been fighting in their home turf not IJA.
Juha
On advantage to the Japanese side was a concentrated attack in Eastern Manchuria. The Soviet troops were dispersed over a large area. The critical objective was the Transiberian, very close to them:
*Consideration only to the the red line.
If they cut the Transiberian, the Soviets could resist, but the outcome would be already decided.
As you may know, Jenisch, 73000 Japanese troops once stayed there during the Siberian Intervention(1918-1922) even after other allies came home.
IJA's conclusion was that the future war with the Soviet Union would be their last choice because they had not been interested in Siberia as a territory with severe climate and the ground of hard harvest. Target should not be the north.
It's not enough to cut it it also must be kept cut. Much also depended where it would be cut. Soviets were aware of the vulnerability of Trans-Siberian railway, so they probably had stockpiled much in Eastern Siberia. But as LW found out, or USAF and USN during Korea, the problem was how to keep the railways cut, not how to cut them. And in heavily forested areas the effects of airpower is fairly severely limited, of course centres of population and bridges etc are still fairly easy to find.
Juha
It's a poor commander that depends on his soldier's " spiritual powers" to make up for his bad tactical planning.