Kenpeitai

Motto: "Duty is heavier than a mountain, death is lighter than a feather"
Founded in 1881 to combat increasing internal threats to the state, the Kenpeitai are a special police force under the jurisdiction of the Imperial Japanese Army. They are better armed and have greater area of operations and authority than the local police. For this reason they are often tasked with assignments that are larger than what can reasonably be handled by local police. These roles include:

• Counter-Terrorism
• Counter intelligence
• Espionage
• Investigation
• Handling or eliminating supernatural threats and phenomenon
• Enforcement of the nation’s laws.

Most often the Kenpeitai is tasked with combating the activities of a number of internal organizations that threaten the authority of the state. Among these groups are:

• Crime Syndicates - Yakuza and Triad groups
• Political Dissidents - Communists, anarchists, republicans and separatists
• Religious Dissidents - Xinyang cults as well as foreign religious activity
• Social Dissidents - People or groups that work in opposition to the social and cultural purity and virtues of society and the nation
• Foreign Infiltrators - Spies, smugglers of illegal foreign goods, and illegal immigrants

Authority

The Kenpeitai have a lot of autonomy and power to accomplish the tasks they are assigned with. Within the scope of their missions they are usually given the power of judge jury and executioner with most suspects. Typically the limitations on their power has more to do with the efficacy of their methods in accomplishing the goals of the army and the government as a whole more than it does with any particular code. This is to say that whether an action is permissible is often determined by how well it accomplishes the mission. Here is a list of the powers and limitations that the Kenpeitai operate under:

Powers

• Authority to enter any establishment outside of the premises of political and religious figures of prefectural status or lower
• Authority to arrest any individual for any reason outside of political and religious figures of prefectural status or lower
• Authority to injure or kill anyone who is intentionally obstructing the accomplishing of the assigned mission outside of political and religious figures of prefectural status or lower
• Authority to seize or destroy any property that may be deemed as necessary evidence, or obstructive in a case outside of the belongings of political and religious figures of prefectural status or lower
• Authority to request a warrant for any of the previous exceptions from an officer of Major rank or higher. With exception of individuals entirely above the law such as the emperor.

Limitations

• Officers are limited to only those things that are pertinent to the case to which they are assigned. While officers are given a lot of leeway in determining what is "pertinent", if called upon by a superior, must be able to justify why their actions were in service to their mission.
• Officers may not knowingly take actions that run in opposition to the accomplishment of the mission. For example killing a suspect that was to be apprehended, destroying necessary evidence, or any other failure to accomplish any critical task when ample opportunity presented itself.
• Officers may not disobey the orders of their superiors, nor break relevant laws.
• Officers may not display behavior unbecoming of their position, such as drunkenness, sleeping on the job, breaching codes of etiquette and protocol, displaying overly casual behavior, wasting time while on the job, especially while on a mission, etc.

Organization

The Kenpeitai have numerous Headquarters throughout the empire, each one operating largely autonomously to deal with their local jurisdiction. These Kenpeitai headquarters and their areas of domain are called "Directorates, numbering 20 in total. Each of these Headquarters is commanded by a Major General, who will have 4 colonels working out of field offices as his subordinates. Within other cities within a prefecture or province will often be field offices that act as offshoots of the main provincial headquarters for the directorate. A field office is commanded by a colonel with 4 majors as his subordinates. Each major will have a captain who will command 4 to 5 Lieutenants who compose a squad. The captain and his squad will comprise the on the ground authority of the Kenpeitai, as ranks major and above act as overhead roles. These squads will carry out the hands on work like searches, interrogations, on site investigations, arrests, and so on. A typical Kenpeitai squad will also have roughly 60 or so additional personal to carry out their orders. The Kenpeitai as of yet only has authority within the borders of Torogishi proper, and policing matters within imperial territories is handled by the army proper within those areas.
Directorate - A Kenpeitai directorate commanded by a General, is tied to a specific army, typically being stationed and having jurisdiction over the area the army is also stationed in. The general has roughly 4 colonels under his command, 4 field offices, and 1,000 dedicated reserve personal. An additional secret directorate exists called Directorate 21 is the only exceptional directorate, as it does not have a limitation on its area of operation, and the entire nation is considered its jurisdiction. For this reason, directorate 21 is called a national directorate rather than a provincial directorate. D21 operates out of the The Akagi within the Imperial General Headquarters in Tokyo, and is considered the most important and prestigious of the directorates, from the few who know their existance.
Field Office - A Kenpeitai company commanded by a colonel, and will coordinate with other colonels to divvy up work within the province. A field office will have roughly 4 majors, and 250 dedicated reserve personnel in its garrison.
Section - A section is a subdivision of a field office, commanded by a Major, who will have a captain as his adjutant, along with a section secretary, and the ability to request the colonel for assistance from the field office reserve personnel in its garrison.
Squad -Commanded by the captain of a field office, as well as 4 or 5 lieutenants, a squad is the on the ground force of the Kenpeitai that does the dirty work. While a major will rarely do field work himself, a captain will be the one to lead operations.
Reserve Personnel Garrison - The reserve garrison are infantry pulled from the army or marines to act as an enforcement arm under the jurisdiction of their superior officers. These personnel do not participate

Section Code

Every section within the Kenpeitai has a section code which identifies them. The code is "Directorate.Office.Section". For example Major Ishikawa's section code is "21.4.3", and this code can be given to other government organizations to notify them of who they're working with, and follow up with them if need be. All members of a section must have this code ready if asked to identify their affiliation.