Of course, some of the early KMT military officers studied in Japanese military academies and so some Japanese military techniques are taught and used in KMT army. But, that doesn't mean Chinese army be it KMT army and especially PLA are heavily influenced, especially politically indoctrinated as the same way as Japanese Imperial army. KMT army and PLA have their own way of political indoctrination. PLA ways of fighting are also heavily influenced by Mao's thought on fighting too. Besides, PLA marshals such as Liu and Ye. senior generals such as navy and air force commanders Xiao and Liu and some other top Chinese commanders had studied in Soviet military academies. So, there were Soviet influences on PLA at the early stage. Although Chiang Kai Shek might be the symbolic head of Whampoa academy, but the head of political indoctrination department is Zhou En Lai, who studied in France, and military instructors are such as PLA marshal Ye, who studied in Soviet Union and other communists。If PLA were and are indeed heavily influenced by the Japanese Imperial army rather than influenced by Soviet army and heavily evolved by itself as you like to claim, then I think the PLA is in an even more precarious position than the Russian army today becos the Japanese Imperial army didn't fare any better than the Soviet army in WW II.With many graduates of Whampoa being represented in the PLA, and with Whampoa Military Academy being run by Chiang Kai Shek who was trained in Imperial Japan and even served in the Imperial Japanese Army, the PLA indeed has Imperial Japanese influence in doctrine. Imperial Japanese weapons were also used when PLA captured Manchuria.
It doesn't mean PLA politically agrees with Imperial Japan, it just means that some Imperial Japanese fighting methods were adopted.
Political commissar system was not exclusively Soviet... both KMT (ROC) and Nazi Germany used it too. Taiwan still has political commissars. PLA political commissars also have very different roles than Soviet ones.
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