The Kokoda myth’s view of Japanese supply arrangements is a simplistic one. It stresses that Nankai Shitai supply was poorly organised and that their retreat and defeat was largely because the Japanese ran out of food. Those who subscribe to the myth imagine that the members of the Nankai Shitai were issued with between 15 and 20 days food and expected to be in Port Moresby by then, or risk starvation. It is a startling claim that a 20th-century regular army such as the IJA would conduct operations in this way. And it is quite untrue. In fact the Japanese in Papua were supplied in the conventional manner of regular armies, but with certain important Japanese characteristics. The 15–20 days food supply each man carried on his back on arrival in Papua did not constitute the Japanese supply plan, but was rather a measure to allow time for a permanent supply system to be put in place.