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There are plenty of threads in the "Must Reads" geared towards the Allied player defending China, but none for how the Japanese should go about their side of things.

I'm in my first PBEM as the red team and I'm struggling mightily with what I should be doing in China.

What have you veterans found in terms of philosophy, strategy, and organization as far as China goes for the Japanese?

Depends on what you play. Stock, CHS, RHS, Nikmod, Bigb...?

In stock and all mods I´ve played (Nik and BigB) it´s basically the same: form a land death star, move on one base after another, use your tanks for mobile warfare and try to flank every base you attack and cut them off. Bomb the airfield to score as much supply hits as possible and prevent fort building, then knock out one hex after another. The only thing that can stop you is an Allied player that knows how to do mobile warfare himself. If you play one that is just sitting in place with his Army then you have already one.

And don´t forget to keep enough troops in your bases where the enemy can mount a counteroffensive. 1000 assault points behind level 9 forts is usually enough to hold back 200.000 Chinese troops long enough until you can move in massive reinforcements.

The only thing that usually makes China really hard to conquer is a non stock map. On the stock map, China is really hard to hold if the Japanese knows how to play it out.

Yup, even my last opponent who formed two lesser death stars (of 7-8 divisions + support each) made me run from one place to another without rest to stop him.

As to geographical thing: Take out northern china first, then roll through the rest.
Holding china with allies is close to nightmare - I have more fears about it than about 2 Bdes supported by KB trying to reach Noumea. Almost none artillery, poor leadership, experience, long travelling routes, almost continuous combat, inability to prepare for defence of one spot because japs could strike everywhere, low on supplies, undeveloped air bases, majority of oil in northern china while the central and south are dry, many possible enemy routes of approach while your own attacking routes are blocked by city fortresses (in stock map - 1 division + 4x city + 3x by forts level 9 + japs experience can easily give you 6000AV defence - equivalent of 20 chines corpses easily )...

Clear nightmare [:)]
Jap player could do almost whatever he wish!

Good ideas above.  My comments are almost grace notes:
1)  Don't build bases that you don't have to - it eats supply and increases garrison costs. 
2)  Fortify wherever you don't attack - the forts don't add to garrison requirements.
3)  You can redeploy Kwantung LCU's to China to beef up the "deathstar", just be sure to make sure that your assault value remains above 8000 in Manchuria.  HQ, aviation, and engineer units are pretty safe to pull out, but you can bring out your armor and some ground LCU's, too.
4)  Manchurian air units have to pay political points to base outside of Manchuria.  If you move these squadrons go ahead and give them a non-restricted HQ like Southern Area so you can redeploy them again without paying more political points.
5)  I usually toggle captured resources to "No" and captured oil to "Yes" on repair (but that is in stock where there are plenty of resources and less oil).  Depending on the mod I think the general guidance is to only repair what you need to so your supply points are available to support combat operations. 
6)  R&R:  You may find that divisions get worn down after a long campaign.  I usually set up a R&R base with plenty of support so divisions set back to regroup will see their disruption drop to zero and then morale recovers.  
7)  Pin him down:  If you attack it disrupts and stops movement from a hex.  Use that to prevent isolated stacks from retreating from your encircling columns. It may be worth taking some 0:1 results. Remember that so you keep some reserves free to maneuver so your opponent doesn't turn the trick on you. 
 
For what it's worth, I usually grab Changsha and Nanchang right away to split the Chinese front.  The north is next and then I roll up the south. 
 
The real nugget up above is the advice about surrounding the enemy.  You can take a hex with a high odds attack, but if you wait a bit to envelop the enemy and then attack, you kill the enemy.  Patience is a virtue

All good suggestions.

On a more strategic note, my experience is simply this: as Japan, the game is not won or lost in China. You can really kick butt, however, it does little good when you've neglected island defenses as a result.

Using the above tactics, I do an early push -- and then I gradually ramp down efforts to a defensive posture and send LCU's to stop the U.S. and U.K. in Burma and the islands.

Regards,
Feltan