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{{Infobox country|conventional_long_name=Empire of Japan|native_name=|image_flag=RTL Flag of Japan.png|capital=Osaca|image_map=Locator_Japan.png|map_width=275px|flag_width=200px|official_languages=Japanese|government_type=Constitutional monarchy}}
{{Nation
|common_name=Japan
|full_name=Empire of Japan
|local_name=日本
|established=
|capital= Osaka
|largest_city=
|population=
|government_type=Federal Constitutional Monarchy
|languages= {{unbulleted_list | Japanese (Official) }}
|currency=Japanese Sen (JPS)
|flag=RTL Flag of Japan.png|map=Locator_Japan.png}}
 
'''Japan''' (Japanese: 日本, ''Nippon'' or ''Nihon)'' is an island country located in EasternNortheast Asia. It isshares bordereda onborder the west bywith the Sea[[Ainu ofMosir|Ainu Japan,National andRepublic]] extends fromon the Seaisland of Okhotsk in the north toward the East China Sea and [[Tauland]] in the southhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hokkaido JapanEzo] alsoand sharesa amaritime border with the [[Ainu National RepublicTauland]] on the island of Ezo.
==History==
{{Main|History of Japan}}The Tocugawa shogunate unified Japan by 1603. With the arrival of the Dutch in [[Tauland]] in the 1630s, Japan began passing the Sacocu Ordinances, restricting free contact with foreign powers. In 1637, the Christian peasant-led Ximabara Rebellion was crushed, and the Dutch trading post of Desjima was established in 1641. The early 1650s saw the [[History of Japan#The%20Keian%20Affair%20and%20the%20J%C5%8D%C5%8D%20Massacre|Ceian Affair, the Djōō Massacre]] and the arrival of [[Koxinga]] and Fukienese refugees from China, These events brought about political instability and a rise in illegal commerce. In 1655, the Lord of Ōmura executed a group of Christian peasants. This led to the [[History of Japan#%C5%8Cmura%20Rebellion%20(1656-1658)|Ōmura Rebellion]]. Around the same time, the failed Meirequi Putsch, the Great Fire of Edo, and other events triggered the Canbun Reforms of 1660.
 
When Emperor Tacacawa ascended to the throne in 1691, his reign was immediately marked with conflict and change. Tension between Corean and Japanese fishermen under the Tottori domain led to the Taquexima Dispute. The Dutch East India Company intervened in the conflict and disciplined the Lord of Tottori, leading to their deposition. This marked the first instance of a European power directly intervening in Japanese affairs. Competing with the Dutch, the Russians began expanding their influence in northern Japan in the 1740s, forging close relations with the Sacai family.
=== Early History ===
Japan has been inhabited since the Upper Paleolithic period (30,000 BC), though the first written mention of the archipelago appears in a Chinese chronicle finished in the 2nd century AD. Between the 4th and 9th centuries, the kingdoms of Japan became unified under an emperor and the imperial court based in Heian-kyō. Beginning in the 12th century, political power was held by a series of military dictators (''shōgun'') and feudal lords (''daimyō''), and enforced by a class of warrior nobility (''samurai'').
 
The Cioho Reforms, beginning in the early 18th century, was passed during a time of financial crises, corruption, and a disgruntled bourgeoisie. The Horequi Coup of 1750 destabilized the xogunate, leading to the fragmentation of the state. Emperor Momozono subsequently led the imperial Meiwa Restoration, gaining the support of multiple lords. ''De facto'', imperial authority was limited to Edo, Osaca, and Miaco. In the 1770s, the Loetsjoe kingdom, a vassal of the Ximazu family, was taken over by the Dutch East India Company (EIC), leading to the domain’s economic decline. The Russian-backed Lake Kusuri rebellion occurred on Ezo, destabilizing Japan’s northern border.
=== Tokugawa Japan ===
 
Sacai Tadamichi, the ''Tairo'', began forming a coalition of families in response to the Tocugawa government and the failure of the Meiwa Restoration. They were diametrically opposed to the pro-Dutch Hosocawa faction. In 1795, the [[Augustine Wars]] sapped the EIC’s resources, allowing the Sacai to run through the country. In 1803, Emperor Go Comei was poisoned. By 1809, the Sacai firmly established their rule over most of Japan.
==== Beginning of the Sakoku ====
In the aftermath of the Sengoku period, where the nation was in a state of nearly constant civil war from 1467 to 1615, the Tokugawa Shogunate unified the island chain. Throughout the early 17th century the Shogun started to fear the growing Portuguese & Spanish influence in the country as well as the potential for independent Daimyos armed with weapons & goods to usurp Shogunate authority. This led to a policy of gradual "closing off" of Japan to foreigners and foreign influence.
 
Under the pretence of assisting the Sacai, the Russians invaded the disobedient Odawara domain. In 1815, Russian forces seized the ports of Idzu, Maizuru, and Texio. In 1837, Russia declared support for the insurgent Ainu state in northern Ezo, instigating a minor conflict and confining Japanese rule to the Oxima peninsula. In the late 19<sup>th</sup> century, Japan began to modernize, with numerous political factions forming in response to domestic and world events. The Federalist Association was established in 1873 after the Russian Succession Crisis renewed security concerns in 1868. In 1896, the Sacura Revolution established a constitutional monarchy with Empress Sacuramachi as the head of state.
==== The Rangaku ====
In 1641 the Dutch took over the former Portuguese trading post at Nagasaki creating an artificial island in which to do business with the Japanese. Overtime western knowledge, technology and medicine diffused from these Dutch traders to Japanese merchants, elites and middle classes in a process known as the ''Rangaku''. This eventually leads to local Daimyos allowing a merchant class to develop in order to trade manufactured goods to the Dutch (and later other Europeans throughout Japanese ports).
 
== Government and Politics ==
==== The Collapse of the Bakufu ====
In the early and mid 18th century, Russian traders started to realize the untapped market of Japan which was mostly closed off by the Sakoku (besides for several allowed trading ports, one operated by the Dutch). In 1739 after a relatively successful meeting with the Tokugawa Shogun, a consortium of Russian traders were given limited access to trade with Japan through the Maizuru port but were subject to high tariffs and strict trade regulations. In 1741 the Russian Czar hearing of the wealth the Dutch were able to gain from trade with the far east and seeking to expand Russian imperial prestige through an expansionist foreign policy decided to grant an exclusive imperial charter to these traders and form the ''<nowiki/>'Russian-Japanese Company''' to manage trade between Russia and Japan.
 
== Demographics ==
Over the next decade the Russian- Japanese company expanded it's operations in Japan, petitioning the Shogun to allow a higher trade volume, gaining the ability to trade out of more ports, bribing influence Daimyos with illicit goods and kickbacks in order to gain allies and growing their influence over the islands of Ezo (building a strong trading relationship with the Matsumae clan). This in turn provoked the Dutch who feared the growth of Russian influence in East Asia would threaten their advantageous position in the region into gaining their own allies amongst the Japanese merchant classes and southern Daimyos. Eventually this tension would culminate in the 1754 Tokugawa succession crisis where the favored heir to the Shogunate of Japan was revealed to be illegitimate and both pro and anti Russian factions in the Tokugawa court seized the opportunity to put forth their own successor. When the anti-Russian & stanchly isolationist Tokugawa Naritami won over the court, a Shinobi spy hired by the Russian-Japanese Company assassinated the newly appointed Shogun 13 days later. This led to widespread anger in the Tokugawa court and a call to remove Russian influence from Japan; but unfortunately for the Tokugawa the Russians were ready. Over the next 8 months a alliance of Pro Russian Daimyos and allied clans rose up against the fractured Shogunate with Russian supplied weapons and mercenaries. This in turn led to the Dutch first supporting the Tokugawa and then their own alliance of southern Daimyos after a diplomatic dispute between the two parties over the role of Dutch merchants in a post-civil war Japan.
 
== Culture ==
Over the next 60 years Japan became a battle ground between foreign and regional powers with Russian backed, Dutch backed, Portuguese backed and independent Daimyos along with Tokugawa remnant isolationists fighting each other over control of the Japanese islands. During this period the Dutch annexed the Ryukyu islands and the Russians annexed the ports of Maizuru & Idzu. Additionally this period saw a widespread series of social changes including the explosion of Rangaku knowledge (especially in relations to war and weapons), a lucrative and exploitive trade in Japanese slaves and servants to the European colonies in Asia & elsewhere and an expansion of the homegrown Japanese merchant class who acted as the middlemen and translators between foreign traders and local Daimyos.
 
=== SakaiList Shogunateof leaders ===
{{Main|List of rulers of Japan}}
 
==== ReunificationSee ofalso Japan ====
{{Nations of the World}}
{{Nation
__FORCETOC__
|common_name=Japan (Sakai Shogunate)
__INDEX__
|flag=RTL_Sakai_Flag.png
}}
In 1795, revolutionary France invaded the Republic of the Netherlands and installed a puppet government which had numerous implications across the Dutch empire and it's allies. In Japan the southern alliance of pro-Dutch clans, merchants and Daimyos started to fall to infighting and having lost their primary European benefactor started to run low on western weaponry. This led to the numerous effects on the ongoing unstable political crisis of Japan, with the pro-russian Sakai clan, who've had success in their northern expedition against the Tokugawa remnants and the anti-foreigner '''Shiragiku'' society' movement expanding wildly in de facto controlled territory.
 
In 1807, the southern alliance officially disbanded with the merchant class wing of the alliance (along with several key coastal Daimyos) seeing the way the wind was blowing and switching allegiances to the Sakai. This allowed the Sakai to sweep in from the north and swiftly conquer the majority of former southern alliance territory. By the winter of 1808 the only territory left under Sakai rule was Hokkaido, in which the Tokugawa remnants fled to in 1803 and a collection of numerous independent catholic Daimyos in Kyushu & Shikoku. In 1809 the Sakai negotiated with the collection of Catholic Daimyos & the archdioceses of Kyushu to accept Sakai rule in exchange for policy of religious toleration of Christians by the Sakai government. By 1815, the Sakai Shogunate was recognized as the official government of Japan by most European and Asian powers besides the newly formed Kingdom of the Dutch who resented that their port on Dejima was captured during the Sakai's Sothern excursion. In 1816 the Sakai Shogunate returned Dejima to the Dutch in exchange for a annual fee and a major restriction on rights for the Dutch to bring military vessels to the island.
 
==== The Ezo Question ====
Besides Ryukyu islands and the three treaty ports in Japan, the only remaining formerly Japanese territory not under control of the Sakai was the Tokugawa remnants in Hokkaido who repelled three subsequent invasions by the Sakai in 1810, 1812 and 1816. Throughout the 1810's and early 1820's the Sakai eventually gave up on trying to actively conquer the island and instead attempted to starve the Tokugawa of political capital by issuing an ultimatum to all European & Asian powers trading with Japan to avoid trading or interacting with remnants in fear of losing access to mainland Japanese markets. By 1824 the Sakai seemed to have abandoned the idea of reconquering Hokkaido and instead spent their focus on solidifying their rule internally and building foreign relationships.
 
The Russian Empire in contrast, resented Tokugawa control of Hokkaido due to the fact that their influence on the island, which they had built up over the previous 80 years was almost entirely purged and allow with it trade with the native Ainu of the island. Additionally the Russian empire was looking to expand it's influence in North America and the north Pacific and as such decided to try to push claims on Sakhalin & the Kuril islands which started to put it in competition with the Tokugawa remnants who actively fished, hunted and settled in those regions. In 1837, the Ainu revolted against the Tokugawa after decades of forced 'Yamato-ization' and economic subservience to the Japanese minority of the island. The 'Russian-Japanese company' and their allies in the 'Kuril-island colonization company' realized that this was an opportunity to regain influence on Hokkaido and so sent in several waves of mercenaries to support the Ainu. This led to eventually the fall of the Tokugawa remnant regime and the establishment of the 'Ezo confederation' which while nominally an independent Ainu state was subject to strong economic and political influence by the Russian Empire.
 
The Ezo Confederation period led to many cultural changes on the island with the Ainu language experiencing a renascence of usage, with Orthodox missionaries adapting the Ainu language into a written form (through the Cyrillic alphabet) and printing the first Ainu language bible in 1841. Over the next several decades the Ainu gradually converted to Orthodox Christianity (though many aspects of the traditional Ainu religion persisted syncretically with Christian beliefs) and adopted Russian farming practices and numerous tools of western technology (which led to relatively large population increase amongst the Ainu). IN 1868 after the Russian Succession Crisis, the new Czar & Czarina of Russia started to see the pacific as the next pimary route of expansion of Russian power and as such wanted to expand and consolidate their holdings in the region further. In 1870 a political dispute between clans in the Ainu confederacy led to multiple assassinations of Ainu clan leaders which was used as a pretense for the Russian navy to land on the island, disband the Ainu confederation and annex the island of Hokkaido (with the promise to local leaders of semi-autonomy for internal Ainu affairs).
 
==== Changes within late 19th century Japan ====
By the 1870's there some industrialization started to occur in Japan with textile factories built by the new merchant class with the support of local Daimyos. Most of this development was homegrown with the merchant class adopting western technology, but with the Daimyos making sure that foreigners didn't gain direct control of industry outside of the treaty ports. However due to the lack of organization, increased urbanization and tension between various Daimyos new administrative and social problems started to plague Japan. During this time cracks in the outdated feudal political economy and throughout the social fabric of Japanese society started to become apparent. This would lead to the rise of the Federalist party, which sought to reform the central government to better fit the new changes brought upon by the late 19th century.
 
=== The Sakura Revolution and Japanese Reform Period ===
In March of 1896, the last Sakai shogun died without a appointed heir, leading to a secession crisis that resulted in the mostly bloodless Sakura revolution a month later. This would eventually lead to the abolishment of the Shogunate and the establishment of the Japanese Confederation lead by the Federalist faction, who would quickly bring reform to the government. By this time the Samurai class had already lost what little Bureaucratic powers they still had to the merchant class, so their abolition alongside the few still existing feudal systems faced little overall resistance. The 1899 constitution would give the Emperor (who had supported the Sakura revolution) very little, and mostly ceremonial power; however the emperor would later become a symbolic unifying figure of Japanese culture and the Japanese nation. During the 1910s the ruling Federalist enacted further reforms to central governmental power out of a necessity to streamline national administration. This led to a period of increased intranational business transactions further growing local industries, allowed for widespread infrastructural improvements, as well as the creation of a standing Army and Navy modeled off of the Kingdom of Corea’s. While this period of reform was seen by many to be the creation of modern Japanese society but to some there were widespread failures of the reforms including a discrepancy in provincial development and the failure of the national government to break the power of an autocratic local elite class.
 
=== Russo-Corean War ===
Japan joined the Russo-Corean War on the side of the Russians after they were promised Desjima and Tema (Tsushima).{{Nations of the World}}
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