1945 CINCPOA War Plans Planning Map for the Occupation of Japan (Operation CAMPUS)

Planning to Win the Peace.

This is the official CINCPOA Operation CAMPUS plan for the occupation of Japan, issued on August 12, 1945, 3 days after the second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki (August 9), Japan, and 3 days before the Japanese surrender (August 15). This map shows cities prioritized for occupation and provides a summary of how the occupation zones were to be divided.

A Closer Look

The map depicts from Paramushiru To in the Kuril Islands south to northern Taiwan (Formosa). Red, green, and blue highlight the areas of occupation projected for Phases I, II, and III of Operation CAMPUS/BLACKLIST. Most of these areas are centered around large metropolitan areas, such as Tokyo and Yokohama, Kobe and Osaka, Nagasaki, Hiroshima, and Nagoya. Several other cities are labeled in Japan, and a handful are identified in Korea. Shanghai is the only city in China labeled. Lines illustrate the zones of occupation assigned to the 10th Army, 6th Army, and 8th Army. Notes concerning the occupation, the boundaries of the occupation zones, and the number of soldiers committed to Phase I and Phase II appear to the right of Japan in the Pacific Ocean.

Operation BLACKLIST and Operation CAMPUS

In June 1945, the United States military was planning for the invasion of the Japanese home islands. There was a firm belief among military commanders that a full-scale invasion would be the only way to compel a complete Japanese surrender. Nonetheless, the U.S. Joint Chiefs knew that, even as they were in the middle of planning to win the war, they also had to 'win the peace'. This meant that they directed both Admiral Chester Nimitz (Commander in Chief U.S. Pacific Fleet and Commander in Chief Pacific Ocean Areas) and General Douglas MacArthur (Supreme Commander, Southwest Pacific Area) to draft plans for the immediate occupation of Japan following the Japanese surrender, no matter when that happened, which the Joint Chiefs called the 'sudden collapse or surrender of Japan'. MacArthur's plan was known as Operation BLACKLIST, and Nimitz's as Operation CAMPUS. Eventually, the plan for the occupation of Japan became known as Operation BLACKLIST, and CAMPUS was subsumed into BLACKLIST and became the naval and amphibious part of BLACKLIST. These included the rapid occupation of Tokyo Bay and other strategic areas as a prelude to the entry of U.S. Army forces, conducting the amphibious phases of BLACKLIST, supporting the land phases of the operation, clearing minefields, ensuring the destruction or seizure of the remaining Imperial Japanese Navy fleet, maintaining lines of communication to Japan, and establishing naval and naval air facilities. BLACKLIST was first distributed by MacArthur on August 8, a week before the Japanese surrender, 2 days after the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, and the day before the second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. It planned for 'prompt action upon termination of organized resistance in the areas to be occupied'. Under BLACKLIST, 14 areas across Japan and parts of Korea were to be progressively occupied to ensure American control of the Japanese 'instruments of national power'. It also included provisions for using Japanese military and political organizations to reduce the number of American soldiers required for the occupation. Nonetheless, the plan still called for an occupation force of 700,000 U.S. soldiers.

Publication History and Census

This map was created by CINCPOA (Commander in Chief Pacific Ocean Areas) War Plans and printed by the 64th Engineer Topographic Battalion on August 12, 1945. Given that it is referred to as 'Appendix I to Annex C', it was almost certainly published in a report detailing plans for Operation BLACKLIST, but we have been unable to identify the exact report.

Condition

Very good. Light toning and soiling.

References

Shuster, Richard J., and Takuya Shimodaira, 'Conditional Surrender',Naval War College Review, Vol. 73, No. 3, 2020, pp. 113-138.