History Student Reacts to Sengoku Jidai #5: How Toyotomi Unified Japan by Extra History

Today we watch Sengoku Jidai #5: How Toyotomi Unified Japan by Extra History.

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[nanayae]

I don't have much to add about the ninja of this period since I don't know enough about the subject but I do want to add some things.

First, concerning the battle of Komaki-Nagakute (the showdown between Hideyoshi and Ieyasu). It was an interesting conflict with a weird result. It started with one of Nobunaga's adult sons - Oda Nobukatsu. When Hideyoshi cemented his position within the Oda clan, the last step was to make Nobukatsu subservient to him as he was the last Oda ruler with real power. When Hideyoshi demanded a pledge of alliegance from him, he refused and sought support from Ieyasu. This served as the spark that started the war between the Tokugawa and the Hashiba (hideyoshi's clan's name at the time, before becoming Toyotomi).

Both sides threw everything they had behind the upcoming battle which ended up with a stalemate as neither side could even attempt to dislodge the other. It wasn't until one of Hideyoshi's officers came up with the plan to take a detachment and invade Ieyasu's home territory of Mikawa which was left undefended. The plan was to draw Ieyasu's attention and give Hideyoshi's main army a chance to strike at the resulting weak point. What they didn't expect was Ieyasu personally leading a bulk of his forces to crush this detachment. He managed to do so before Hideyoshi could respond and the battle returned to the stalemate. Eventually, Oda Nobukatsu got sick of this situation and decided to go behind Ieyasu's back and submitted himself to Hideyoshi. With this the reason for war was gone and both sides made peace with each other.

And such is the outcome of this battle that Ieyasu won the only major engagement of this war but ultimately, Hideyoshi got what he wanted. In a couple of years after the battle, Tokugawa ended up officially as vassals to the Toyotomi.

Second, I want to talk about the outcome of the Imjin war - Hideyoshi's invasion of Korea. There's a portion of historians who believe that despite its failure, it wasn't such a bad thing to the Toyotomi. One of the reasons why he started that war in the first place was to pacify his own retainers who were a destabilising factor with all the animosity between each other and even towards Hideyoshi. In some ways, by losing so many men in Korea, he weakened those below him and some see that as a minor victory for him. Of course, that war proved to be a new source of resentment towards Hideyoshi, so it's dubious whether it could really be counted as a net positive, but some people see it that way and it's a point of discussion.

[kevinnorwood]

I think you're a little mistaken about what the Ninja/Shinobi actually did. We have this stereotypical idea that Ninja are the gold standard for what it means to be an assassin, but that is actually really not accurate. Ninja were primarily SPIES. Most of their assignments revolved around intelligence gathering and sabotage, and sometimes even hostage rescues (Hatori Hanzo famously rescued Ieyasu's two daughters when they were being held as political hostages by a rival Daimiyo at a castle Ieyasu really wanted to capture). Yes, Ninja/Shinobi sometimes DID go on assassination missions, but these were the RAREST of their jobs.

[dorutuzamfir]

I definitely recommend reacting to kings and generals video on the sohei, the warrior monks

[David.]

You should play crusader kings 3 as a history nerd myself I'm hooked on it and i think that people like yourself and people who watch your videos would like the game

[brian]

How do I recommend videos is it only threw comments or what