Tank to tank combat was very uncommon in the Pacific theater. This was partly a function of geography; the terrain (jungles, mountains, islands) inhibited the deployment of large numbers of tanks by either side. But the anemic state of Japan's tank arm also played a significant role in the relatively rare armored encounters. Japanese production of tanks and self-propelled guns from 1941-1945 numbered only 5,495 (by contrast, the US produced over 100,000 and Germany approximately 50,000). Added to this shortfall was the fact that Japanese tanks were of indifferent quality. The Japanese did not keep pace with the developments in tank design that favored increases in armor and gun calibers. Furthermore, Japan kept a number of its tanks in reserve both in the home islands and in Manchuria.

This is not to say that tank combat did not happen at all. The Japanese 4th Tank Regiment's Type 95 tanks encountered the 192nd Tank Battalion's M3s in the Philippines on 22 December 1941. This was one of the few times in the Pacific War where Japanese tanks meet their opposite on a relatively equal footing both in quantity and quality.

The Japanese also deployed its tanks and tankettes in penny packets in its advance in the Southwest Pacific. But rather than falling victim to American tanks, these lightly-armored vehicles tended to be knocked out by anti-tank artillery, such as the Marines' 37mm guns which stopped a Japanese armored attack in Guadalcanal while the Japanese crossed the Matanika River.

Tank to tank combat increased as the Americans pierced Japan's inner defense perimeter. Both Guam and Saipan featured organized Japanese tank battalions form the 9th Tank Regiment. The best Japanese tank in the Marianas, the Type 97-Kai Shinhoto Chi-Ha was no match for the Marines' newly organized tank units and combined arms doctrine.

The largest clashes of tanks for the Pacific War would occur in Luzon between 1944 and 1945, where the Japanese 2nd Tank Division faced the hopeless task of defending the Philippines. The same script repeated itself: poor quality and obsolescent tanks fell afoul of Allied combined arms and general superiority. A sign of the desperation and impotence of the Japanese tank arm was in April 1945. Yamashita's headquarters were defended by the 2nd Division's five remaining tanks and were equipped with frontal charges so they could be rammed in a kamikaze attack on oncoming Shermans.

Aside from losing the battle of both quantity and quality, the Japanese did not keep apace of the evolution of tank doctrine that the Second World War ushered in. The Japanese tanks seldom deployed with a sufficient infantry component and the Japanese Army preferred to break up armored formations into smaller units. The latter exacerbated the technical shortcomings of Japanese tanks as since poor Japanese radios meant such small units had little influence on the battlefield. August Storm, the Soviet invasion of Manchuria, caught the Japanese units flat-footed and managed to capture 369 of the Kwantung Army's tanks because Soviet units could breakthrough and surround the relatively static Japanese formations.

Although it was uncommon, the results of the Japanese use of armor against Allied tanks was often the same: defeat.

Sources

Zaloga, Steve, and Peter Bull. Japanese Tanks: 1939-45. Oxford: Osprey, 2007.

Zaloga, Steve. M4 Sherman Vs Type 97 Chi-Ha: The Pacific 1945. Oxford: Osprey, 2012.