Sugita prepared a withdrawal plan on behalf of Kumao Imoto, who was fighting a case of dengue fever but who as the superior officer is generally credited with the successful evacuation of Japanese troops carried out between 14 January and 7 February 1943 (Operation Ke).

[5] During the Battle of the Bismarck Sea (2–4 March 1943), Colonel Sugita, as part the plan to establish a headquarters staff in Lae, was traveling with a Japanese convoy of sixteen ships aboard the destroyer Tokitsukaze, which was hit by an Allied air attack.

His account of the surrender was incorporated into the A Nation Reborn: A short history of postwar Japan, edited by Jun Etō.

[7] In July 1946, he was held in Sugamo Prison, pursuant to accusations made by Colonel Cyril Hew Dalrymple Wild, a British War Crime Liaison Officer.

During a tour of U.S. military bases on 7 March 1961, he visited Fort Myer, Virginia, where he met with U.S. General George H. Decker, Chief of Staff of the U.S.