Japanese victories continued at Xuzhou, Hankow, Canton, Wuchang, Hanyang – but still the Chinese kept on fighting. Konoe resigned in January 1939, and was appointed chairman of the Privy Council. He left a war that he had a large part in making to be finished by someone else, which bewildered the Japanese public as they had been told that the war was an endless series of victories. Kiichirō Hiranuma succeeded him as Prime Minister. Konoe was awarded the 1st class of the Order of the Rising Sun in 1939. Due to dissatisfaction with the policies of Prime Minister Mitsumasa Yonai, the Japanese Army demanded Konoe's recall as Prime Minister. On 23 June, Konoe resigned his position as Chairman of the Privy Council, and on 16 July 1940, the Yonai cabinet resigned and Konoe was appointed Prime Minister. One of his first moves was to launch the League of Diet Members Supporting the Prosecution of the Holy War to counter opposition from politicians such as deputy Saitō Takao who had spoken against the Second Sino-Japanese War in the Diet on 2 February. Yonai had refused to align Japan with the Nazis, in response the army minister Shunroku Hata resigned and the army refused to nominate a replacement. Konoe was recalled after Saionij for the last time before his death later that year endorsed Konoe one last time, upon his return Konoe set out to end the war in with China, and by way of the New Order Movement remove the political parties from control of government. Konoe successfully ended the political parties that year, thereby aiding the pro war factions in the military, he deemed the parties as too liberal, and divisive. The Imperial Rule Assistance Association (IRAA) was created in 1940 under Konoe as a wartime mobilization organization, ironically in alliance with local "meiboka", since their cooperation was required to mobilize the rural population. Konoe's government pressured political parties to dissolve into the IRAA, he resisted calls to form a political party akin to Nazi party, believing it would revive the political strife of the 1920s, instead he worked to promote the IRAA as the sole political order, additionally believing that becoming the head of a political party would be beneath the dignity of a nobleman. The Japanese invasion of French Indochina was planned by the army before Konoe was recalled as prime minister. The invasion would secure needed resources to wage war with China, cut off western supply of Kuomintang armies, put the Japanese military in a strategic location to threaten more territory, and would hopefully intimidate the Dutch East Indies into supplying Japan with oil.