CONTROL DEVICE FOR INTERNAL COMBUSTION ENGINE

An internal combustion engine is provided with an EGR device and is configured to be capable of executing an operation based on a first air-fuel ratio and an operation based on a second air-fuel ratio leaner than the first air-fuel ratio. In a case where an ECU decreases the amount of air flowing into a combustion chamber and decreases an EGR rate in response to a predetermined torque reduction request for the internal combustion engine, the ECU performs the operation based on the first air-fuel ratio in a case where an immediately preceding EGR rate immediately before the torque reduction request is made is lower than a first threshold and performs a stratified combustion operation based on the second air-fuel ratio in a case where the immediately preceding EGR rate is equal to or higher than the first threshold.