I have
always been morbidly fascinated by how the Japanese managed to conduct serious
warfare while spurning the use of firearms for more than two centuries because
they debased the nobility of combat.
"Alone among countries that
acquired and mastered guns, Japan effectively banned and repudiated these
weapons, while simultaneously cutting itself off from the outside world. This
meant that Japan was defenseless when U.S. Commodore Matthew Perry arrived with
gunships in 1853, a culturally shocking moment, which vaulted Japan into a
civil war caused, in part, by conflict between those who wanted Japan to
continue to hold to its traditions -- and those who wanted to rapidly modernize
Japan and catch up with the rest of the industrializing world:
"Warfare ensured that once states had acquired guns, they could not give
them up. To this rule, there is one glaring exception: Japan. The Japanese
first encountered firearms when Portuguese adventurers arrived in 1453 with two
matchlocks, guns in which the powder was ignited with a match. Japanese
blacksmiths quickly learned to produce such weapons in large quantities. The
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries are known as the Age of the Country at War,
when powerful lords battled for control of the country. At the Battle of
Nagashino in 1575, an army of 38,000 men, of whom 10,000 carried guns, defeated
an army of sword-wielding samurai (or Japanese knights). Japan soon had more
guns than any European country. Warfare and the proliferation of guns had serious social consequences,
however. The battles showed that even a poorly trained peasant with a gun
could kill a samurai, no matter how courageous, well trained, or expensively
armored he might be. This threatened the position of the warrior class, who
numbered half a million and were jealous of their status and their privileges,
such as the right to carry swords.
In the
early seventeenth century, Tokugawa Ieyasu and his descendants defeated their
rivals and established a military dictatorship. In the 1630s, they began
restricting the manufacture and sale of firearms. Only in two towns could
gunmakers practice their trade. Civilians were forbidden to buy guns.
Gradually, the government cut back its orders of firearms; by 1673, it was
buying 53 large matchlocks or 334 small ones on alternate years. It also
expelled all foreigners and forbade Japanese people from traveling abroad
under penalty of death. For the next two centuries, no foreign power
threatened Japan. The country was practically cut off from contact with the
outside world and saw no reason to keep up with technological changes occurring
elsewhere. Guns were forgotten until 1853, when American warships arrived in
Tokyo Bay and, by firing their cannon, awoke Japan to the power of modern
technology.” – Daniel R. Headrick: Technology: A World History (Oxford University Press)
The secret
word is Loaded
Dave
Brubeck – RIP
