Supreme Council for the Direction of the War

The Japanese name was 最高戦争指導会議, Saikō Sensō Shidō Kaigi. Established under Prime Minister Kuniaki Koiso’s cabinet after Hideki Tojo’s fall, it replaced the Liaison Conference and was intended to formulate basic war policy and manage consultation between the government and the military. In practice, the government avoided intervening in operational command, so the council’s coordinating authority remained limited and its agreements were not formally binding.

In August 1945 its members were Prime Minister Kantarō Suzuki, Foreign Minister Shigenori Tōgō, Army Minister Korechika Anami, Navy Minister Mitsumasa Yonai, Army Chief of Staff Yoshijirō Umezu, and Navy Chief of Staff Soemu Toyoda. Civilian ministers, including Tōgō, sought acceptance of the Potsdam terms with protection for the imperial institution, while Anami and other army leaders demanded continued resistance and a decisive battle on the home islands. The council remained divided after the Soviet entry into the war against Japan and the atomic bombings, and the surrender policy was settled only after imperial intervention.

The council was dissolved on 22 August 1945. Its history shows that wartime Japanese policy was shaped not by the cabinet alone, but by institutional military veto power and the emperor’s decisive intervention.