Marco Polo Bridge

     The Big Day for the Japanese is July 1, 1937.  That's the earliest I can initiate the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, and thus begin the warmongering.  Over the last year and a half I've built an additional 50 brigades; most of these were artillery, but I made another three imperial guard brigades and a few engineer units.  My opponents over the next few years will be the various Chinese states, who have many infantry brigades, and not much else.  Thus, the artillery will come in handy, while anti-tank, anti-aircraft, and most other units aren't as helpful.  More bombers would have been nice, but past experience indicates my biggest obstacle will be supply throughput, not firepower.
     The Marco Polo decision gives a few other benefits, in addition to the war declaration and neutrality drop.  I get a modest 100 points of manpower, which is nice; more important, however, I get -10 to my dissent.  Over the course of June I dropped my consumer goods production to zero and stockpiled some supplies; they will be needed.
     Imperial Japan was renowned for intricate invasion plans, interweaving land, sea and air forces from many directions, with a wide variety of semi-independent organizations and multiple interlocking phases.  The invasion of China was no exception, with independent land and sea invasions all along China's coast.

The historical Japanese invasion plan, courtesy of "Their Finest Hour"

My plan is simpler.

My rather less sophisticated plan

My nod to "planning" is to keep several chindai divisions in reserve, which I can use to occupy victory points along the coast if I find them unoccupied.