Russo-Japanese War AAR, Battle of Tawan 1904 or........

.......if I owned Posties shed on that day and Hell, I'd live in Hell and rent out Posties shed!

The Retards Rejects met up a few weeks ago for a game in Posties shed (to be called Hell during summer gaming) and I forgot to do my report after the blog whores BigLee and Ray did their AAR's, so after Postie nagged Ray and then Ray nagged me, here we go then.......

I was lucky and picked myself as c/o of the Japanese forces and picked the position at the doorway to the shed and fecking remained there all day trying to survive in a light breeze, there was a paddling pool in Rays garden that I frequented quite a bit and then there was some fecking about with a garden hose but I digress...........

1st Japanese army under the command of Gen Kuroki has orders to meet up with the 2nd and 4th armies south of Liaoyang a major town in the area and defended by a large (not large enough!) Russian army. To make matters worse the 1st army has been engaged in fighting a retreating Russian army, the main part of the Russian force has reinforced Liaoyang, but a substantial part has dug in to await the arrival of the Japanese 1st army, just outside the village of Tawan,south east of Liaoyang. The Japanese commander must attack the Russian positions as soon as possible and must not waste time.
Meanwhile the Russian commander Lt-Gen Slutshevski (what a great name) of the 10th European Army Corps must hold his position at all costs, if the Japanese 1st army cannot make the rendezvous the two armies will be seriously outnumbered and defeated and the way will be open to relive Port Arthur.

The Russians: Ray, Dave and John.........

The Russian redoubts, all troops are prone in the trenches, artillery is in reserve, all infantry and cavalry reserves are hidden behind these redoubts as well.............

The Japanese: Surjit, BigLee, Postie (contractual shot) and the rarely seen Ian.........

All that lovely blue...........

......and cavalry..........the one is the dice roll required for where reinforcements might and with Postie that's never a certainty.........

Preparing for the assault...........

Ready, ready........

The Russians looking and appearing confident........

How can we fail.........

BigLee been disciplined for his potty mouth...........

Russian artillery begins to appear, these bunkers were close topped, the Russians were slow to this initially but wised up and they had a lot of hit points and only vulnerable to shell.......

We advance.........

Russian artillery starts to cause problems (white dice starting to show)........

Great flags.............

Ray was farting all day and even offended himself........

BigLee has now shed a t-shirt and is starting get a little fruity, Ian never saw it coming.......

The Japanese guard turn up, good morale but nothing else compared to line infantry........

BigLee...when told that the last t-shirt had to stay on..........

The Russian artillery was good but the Japanese artillery was frightening, we were so lucky with dice rolls, the Russian players actually wanted to concede at lunch, shocking cowardice........

My cavalry which survived the battle intact, machine gun bringing up the rear as well.......

Aerial view from my balloon........

Getting ready for the assault, Russian fire had not been effective due to losing artillery early and infantry still prone in their trenches.........

Then Postie said we had walked into a mine field, this was Postie feeling sorry for the fecking Russians, Ray never stopped whining (he was offered a lot of cheese throughout the game to go with his whining, geddit?), the mines were the most effective item on the Russian side........... 

Russian artillery reinforcements turn up and remain behind the hills..........

Japanese artillery trying to counter battery fire.........

BigLee sweating like a page 3 photographer............

An untouched redoubt, we focused our attack on 2 of the 4 redoubts to concentrate our forces.......

They still had a lot of stuff left, cavalry and infantry abound.........

Their right hand redoubt........

.......their left hand redoubt before our assault and then they conceded but we thought they were still a viable force, troops still remained in reserve but Ray convinced the other Russians to concede and the Japanese won the day!!!!!!

Good game for the Japanese but gaming in the heat and Posties shed barbecuing Reject crackers is a tough day but not if you have access to a decent paddling pool................

Going into work tonight on another training shift but it's fecking hot today and reminded me of the game!

Ninja.

Some of the ninja from my collection, the rest (40-50 I think) are in black and I will take pictures of them at a later date, always considered this one of my favourite parts of the samurai warfare period.

 A ninja (忍者^?) or shinobi (忍び^?) was a covert agent or mercenary of feudal Japan specializing in unorthodox arts of war. The functions of the ninja included espionage, sabotage, infiltration, and assassination, as well as open combat in certain situations. The ninja, using covert methods of waging war, were contrasted with the samurai, who had strict rules about honour and combat. In his Buke Myōmokushō, military historian Hanawa Hokinoichi writes of the ninja:

“

They travelled in disguise to other territories to judge the situation of the enemy; they would inveigle their way into the midst of the enemy to discover gaps, and enter enemy castles to set them on fire, and carried out assassinations, arriving in secret.

”

The origin of the ninja is obscure and difficult to determine, but can be surmised to be around the 14th century. However, the antecedents to the Ninja may have existed as early as the Heian and early Kamakura eras. Few written records exist to detail the activities of the ninja. The word shinobi did not exist to describe a ninja-like agent until the 15th century, and it is unlikely that spies and mercenaries prior to this time were seen as a specialized group. In the unrest of the Sengoku period (15th - 17th centuries), mercenaries and spies for hire arose out of the Iga and Kōga regions of Japan, and it is from these clans that much of later knowledge regarding the ninja is inferred. Following the unification of Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate, the ninja descended again into obscurity. However, in the 17th and 18th centuries, manuals such as the Bansenshukai (1676) — often centered on Chinese military philosophy — appeared in significant numbers. These writings revealed an assortment of philosophies, religious beliefs, their application in warfare, as well as the espionage techniques that form the basis of the ninja's art. The word ninjutsu would later come to describe a wide variety of practices related to the ninja.

The mysterious nature of the ninja has long captured popular imagination in Japan, and later the rest of the world. Ninjas figure prominently in folklore and legend, and as a result it is often difficult to separate historical fact from myth. Some legendary abilities include invisibility, walking on water, and control over natural elements. The ninja is also prevalent in popular culture, appearing in many forms of entertainment media.

Iga and Koga Clans

The Iga and Kōga clans have come to describe families living in the province of Iga (modern Mie Prefecture) and the adjacent region of Kōka (later written as Kōga), named after a village in what is now Shiga Prefecture. From these regions, villages devoted to the training of ninjas first appeared. The remoteness and inaccessibility of the surrounding mountains may have had a role in the ninja's secretive development. Historical documents regarding the ninja's origins in these mountainous regions are considered generally correct. The chronicle Go Kagami Furoku writes, of the two clans' origins:

"There was a retainer of the family of Kawai Aki-no-kami of Iga, of pre-eminent skill in shinobi, and consequently for generations the name of people from Iga became established. Another tradition grew in Kōga".

Likewise, a supplement to the Nochi Kagami, a record of the Ashikaga shogunate, confirms the same Iga origin:

"Inside the camp at Magari of the Shogun [Ashikaga] Yoshihisa there were shinobi whose names were famous throughout the land. When Yoshihisa attacked Rokkaku Takayori, the family of Kawai Aki-no-kami of Iga, who served him at Magari, earned considerable merit as shinobi in front of the great army of the Shogun. Since then successive generations of Iga men have been admired. This is the origin of the fame of the men of Iga."

A distinction is to be made between the ninja from these areas, and commoners or samurai hired as spies or mercenaries. Unlike their counterparts, the Iga and Kōga clans produced professional ninja, specifically trained for their roles. These professional ninja were actively hired by daimyos between 1485 and 1581, until Oda Nobunaga invaded Iga province and wiped out the organized clans. Survivors were forced to flee, some to the mountains of Kii, but others arrived before Tokugawa Ieyasu, where they were well treated. Some former Iga clan members, including Hattori Hanzō, would later serve as Tokugawa's bodyguards.

Following the Battle of Okehazama in 1560, Tokugawa employed a group of eighty Kōga ninja, led by Tomo Sukesada. They were tasked to raid an outpost of the Imagawa clan. The account of this assault is given in the Mikawa Go Fudoki, where it was written that Kōga ninja infiltrated the castle, set fire to its towers, and killed the castellan along with two hundred of the garrison. The Kōga ninjas are said to have played a role in the later Battle of Sekigahara (1600), where several hundred Kōga assisted soldiers under Torii Mototada in the defence of Fushimi Castle. After Tokugawa's victory at Sekigahara, the Iga acted as guards for the inner compounds of Edo Castle, while the Kōga acted as a police force and assisted in guarding the outer gate. In 1614, the initial "winter campaign" at the Siege of Osaka saw the ninja in use once again. Miura Yoemon, a ninja in Tokugawa's service, recruited shinobi from the Iga region, and sent ten ninjas into Osaka Castle in an effort to foster antagonism between enemy commanders. During the later "summer campaign", these hired ninjas fought alongside regular troops at the Battle of Tennōji.

My 28mm Painted Portuguese Conquistador Artillery.

My 28mm Portuguese artillery and crews from the Wargames Foundry Elizabethan range for their time in Japan around the 1550-1600 period. Have kept the artillery piece separate because pieces were sold to the Japanese (before they started making their own) and I then add a samurai/ashigaru crew.

In all fairness I believe the Portuguese called themselves Discoverers rather than conquistadors.

Portuguese in Japan, my 28mm painted Rodrigues.

This so-called namban (literally, "southern barbarian") screen depicts some of the Portuguese who arrived in Japan in the Azuchi-Momoyama and very early Edo periods. There remain today only about 60 examples of this namban genre. This is an especially important work because the name of its painter, Kano Naizen, is known. The bottom screen shows Portuguese departing from a port in one of their colonies in Southeast Asia, and the top screen shows them entering a Japanese port and engaging in trade activities. A group of the foreigners are walking in the direction of a Jesuit chapel (nambanji). The artist was active during the Azuchi-Momoyama period and was a close associate of military and political leader Toyotomi Hideyoshi.


1543—Portuguese Arrive in Japan


Blown off course during a storm, Portuguese traders shipwrecked near Tangeshima island off the southern coast of Japan. Intrigued by the Portuguese firearms, the local daimyo warlord bought two guns from the European sailors and commissioned his swordsmith to make copies. The daimyo then asked the Portuguese for shooting lessons.



1549—Jesuit Missionaries Settle in Japan

Eager for more firearms, the Japanese warlords welcomed trade with the Portuguese. Along with trade, the Portuguese brought Christian missionaries, and in 1549, Francis Xavier established Japan's first mission at Kagoshima. Jesuit missionary Luis Frois arrived later and wrote Historia de Japan, which covered the years 1549-1593. The book provided most of the known information about contemporary Japan at that time.

I have used a mixture of wargames foundry elizabethan british and spanish figures to portray the portuguese conquistadors or sometimes known as discoverers and this figure is listed as Lord Hawksmoor in the foundry catalogue. I have about 80 portuguese in total including Jesuits and artillery and will post pictures of the rest, somebody asked how many samurai I had, I have hundreds including ninja, ronin, Ikko Ikki etc...... 

My Rodrigues bought a long time ago, bonus points for where that name comes from?

28mm Samurai Painted Japanese Temple.

A 28mm painted japanese temple from my samurai collection from the Sengoku period  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sengoku_period of Japans history, it's a lovely piece of kit from John Jenkins Designs.

I also use it as a base for my Ikko Ikki forces.

Ikkō-ikki (一向一揆?), literally "Ikkoshū Uprising", were mobs of peasant farmers, Buddhist monks, Shinto priests and local nobles, who rose up against samurai rule in 15th to 16th century Japan. They followed the beliefs of the Jōdo Shinshu (True Pure Land) sect of Buddhism which taught that all believers are equally saved by Amida Buddha's grace. They were organized to only a small degree; if any single person could be said to have had any influence over them it was Rennyo, the leader of the Jōdo Shinshu Hongan-ji sect at that time. Rennyo's attitude to the Ikkō-ikki was, however, highly ambivalent and pragmatic. Whilst he may have used the religious fervour of the Ikkō-ikki in the defence of his temple settlements, he was also careful to distance himself from the wider social rebellion of the Ikkō movement as a whole, and from offensive violence in particular.

The Ikkō-ikki were, at first, disparate and disorganized followers of Rennyo's teachings. His missionary work, and his appointment to the position of abbot of Hongan-ji, was in 1457, so perhaps it can be said that the Ikkō-ikki began then. In 1471, Rennyo was forced to flee Kyoto, and established a new Hongan-ji branch temple in Yoshizaki, in Echizen Province; it was at this temple that he began to attract a significant following among peasants and farmers. 1488 brought the first violent uprising, the first major organized action on the part of the Ikkō-ikki. They overthrew the samurai rulers of Kaga Province, and took control of it for themselves; this represented the first time in Japanese history that a group of commoners ruled a province.


Rennyo was a pacifist, and taught pacifism as any other Buddhist clergyman would. He advocated self-defense only as a guard against the particularly tumultuous times in which he lived. Daimyo, samurai warlords, fought one another for territory nearly constantly, across the entire country. Rennyo thus saw to it that the temples of his sect were fortified and defended from attackers. Though it was his charismatic leadership and populist teachings that inspired the fervor which powered the Ikkō-ikki uprisings, he never advocated or supported them.

The uprisings continued nevertheless, past Rennyo's death in 1499, and the sub-sect of Jōdo Shinshu that he had founded spread as well. They established themselves in fortresses at Ishiyama Hongan-ji, just outside Osaka, and in Nagashima, on the borders of Owari and Ise Provinces, and in a series of temples of Mikawa Province as well.

Towards the end of the 16th century, however, their growing numbers and strength caught the attention and concern of the great samurai leaders of the time. Tokugawa Ieyasu worried that the monks of Mikawa would rise up and seize the province. In 1564, his forces, with the help of Jōdo sect warrior monks, defeated the Ikkō-ikki of Mikawa in the Battle of Azukizaka.

The Battle of Azukizaka was the climatic clash between Ieyasu and the Ikki.The ikki attracted the ire of the likes of Tokugawa Ieyasu and Oda Nobunaga due to the economic and political threat they posed, more so than as a result of their military might. The Ishiyama Hongan-ji and other strongholds of the ikki lay across major trade routes and occupied the same areas that Nobunaga saw as his primary territorial objectives. Nearly every road to the capital from this western part of the country was controlled by the ikki or their allies, and the populist roots of the ikki movement gave them significant economic power as well. Nobunaga in particular sought the destruction of the Ikkō-ikki for these reasons, and because they allied themselves with nearly every one of his major enemies or rivals. Ashikaga Yoshiaki was once strongly supported in his claim to become Shogun by Nobunaga, but turned to the ikki when their relationship soured. The ikki also had powerful allies in the Mōri, Azai, and Asakura clans.

The Ishiyama Hongan-ji and Nagashima fortresses were therefore besieged and destroyed by the forces of Oda Nobunaga. After several failed attempts at seizing each emplacement, he eventually succeeded.

In the 1580s, the last of the Ikkō-ikki courted Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and fought alongside his forces against warrior monks of other sects.