12. The military used their police forces to intimidate the civilian population
The Japanese Army military police, the kenpeitai (sometimes rendered Kempetai) continually enlarged and expanded throughout the home islands and the occupied territories during the early Showa period. It consisted of uniformed police forces, often recruited from the region it patrolled, as well as secret police forces, modeled during the Showa period on the German Gestapo, with which it exchanged officers and information. It also worked with the Italian secret police. The kenpeitai was used by the militarists to suppress dissent, carry out assassinations and sabotage operations, and in general ensure compliance with the designs of the militarists.
Officially a civilian arrested by the Kempetai was to be turned over to civil authorities for trial and custody, but the practice was seldom followed in occupied territories such as Korea and Manchuria. By the end of the 1930s, it was seldom seen in the home islands as well. In the occupied territories the Kempetai used extortion to fund its own operations, with many of its senior officers also using it to enrich themselves, operating in a manner similar to an organized crime protection racket. It was primarily a terrorist organization, used to ensure that the Japanese people and others under Japanese authority remained loyal to the emperor and the desires of the militarists who ruled over Japan.
