Imperial Japanese Army Academy Site (Camp Zama)

The Imperial Japanese Army Academy (陸軍士官学校, Rikugun Shikan Gakkō) was the foremost officer training institution of the Imperial Japanese Army. Established in 1874 at Ichigaya, Tokyo — succeeding the earlier Heigakkō founded in Kyoto in 1868 — it served as the gateway to commissioned service in the Imperial Army for over seven decades. By the 1930s, Japan's rapid military expansion demanded a larger, purpose-built campus, and in 1937 the Senior Course Academy was relocated to a sprawling new facility straddling the municipalities of Zama Town and Shimizu Village (now part of Sagamihara City) in Kanagawa Prefecture.

The new campus was inaugurated at the 50th graduation ceremony on December 20, 1937, attended by Emperor Hirohito himself. The Emperor was so impressed by the scenic setting against the Tanzawa Mountains that he bestowed the name "Sōbudai" (相武台, literally "Sagami-Musashi Platform") upon the academy. A special road — now known as Route 51 — was constructed from Machida Station to allow the Emperor to travel directly to the school for reviewing graduating classes. An emergency imperial shelter was also built on the grounds, which still exists within Camp Zama today.

From 1937 to 1945, approximately 18,476 cadets passed through the Academy's rigorous two-year training program. The curriculum combined military theory, tactics, weapons proficiency, physical conditioning, and the spiritual education (精神教育) that was central to the Imperial Army's ethos of absolute loyalty to the Emperor. Graduates were commissioned as second lieutenants and assigned to units across the rapidly expanding empire — from China and Manchuria to Southeast Asia, the Pacific Islands, and eventually the defense of the Japanese homeland. Many of the junior officers who led infantry platoons and companies in the most brutal campaigns of the Pacific War, including Guadalcanal, Imphal, Iwo Jima, and Okinawa, received their training at Sōbudai.

As the war situation deteriorated in early 1945 and American air raids intensified, the Academy was relocated to Saku in Nagano Prefecture under the guise of "long-term field training." The school was formally abolished when the Imperial Japanese Army was dissolved following Japan's unconditional surrender on August 15, 1945.

On September 5, 1945, a battalion of the U.S. Army's 1st Cavalry Division entered the former academy grounds, and the post was for a time designated the 4th Replacement Depot. The transition was remarkably swift — within days, the barracks that had housed Japanese officer cadets were occupied by American soldiers. The installation subsequently became known as Camp Zama; after a fire destroyed five former academy buildings in 1952, a new U.S. Army headquarters building was erected on their site in 1953. The base played a critical logistical role during the Korean War and later the Vietnam War as a staging and support facility.

Today, Camp Zama remains one of the most important U.S. military installations in Japan, serving as the headquarters of U.S. Army Japan (USARJ) and hosting elements of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force's 4th Engineer Group. The base covers approximately 234 hectares across both Zama and Sagamihara. Several structures from the Imperial Japanese Army Academy era survive, including original barracks buildings, the theater workshop formerly used for army ceremonies, and the restored Sōbudai stone monument — a carved stone erected in 1940 to commemorate the Emperor's visit, buried by Japanese soldiers in 1945 for fear that it would be destroyed, and unearthed and returned to its original location two years later on the orders of Lieutenant General Robert L. Eichelberger. In 2024, U.S. and Japanese soldiers jointly cleaned the monument in a symbolic act of bilateral cooperation. Kastner Army Airfield, a small heliport within the base, occupies what was formerly the academy's parade and drill ground.