Why couldn't the Mongols conquer Japan? (Short Animated Documentary)

0:00 The Mongols are historically most famous

0:02 for conquering all of this.

0:03 From humble beginnings on the step to their

0:05 conquests of places like the Kievan Rous

0:07 in Eastern Europe, the Kurasmian Empire

0:09 in the Middle East and most notably the

0:10 Jin and Song dynasties in China.

0:12 Now obviously they couldn't subjugate

0:14 everything in the history of the Mongol

0:16 Empire is filled with places that they

0:17 simply couldn't beat.

0:18 And one of the

0:19 most notable examples is that of Japan,

0:21 which sat just off the coast of the core

0:22 of Mongol wealth and power, the great

0:24 empire of China, the Yuan dynasty.

0:26 This dynasty was established by a certain

0:28 Kubla Khan who was himself a very

0:30 capable general and leader.

0:31 And yet even this combined with the incredible wealth

0:33 of manpower that ruling China gave him,

0:35 Kubla was never able to conquer Japan

0:37 despite two attempts and after this no

0:38 other ruler of China would ever make an

0:40 attempt to do so again.

0:41 Which raises a pretty obvious question.

0:43 Why couldn't the Mongols conquer Japan?

0:45 Why was such a large and militarily capable empire

0:47 not able to crush his much smaller

0:49 neighbor?

0:49 So to backtrack a bit, when

0:50 the Kagan, that is the emperor of the

0:52 Mongol Empire, Monk Kakar, died from a

0:54 medical condition known as being shot

0:55 with an arrow in 1259, rulership of the

0:58 empire went to his younger brother

0:59 Kubli, who was seen by some Mongol

1:01 nobles as being far too Chinese in his

1:03 habits.

1:03 As such, they wanted his younger

1:05 brother Ari to rule instead.

1:06 Now when a ruler was challenged, the Mongols had a

1:09 long history of settling this with

1:10 reason debate.

1:11 By which I mean brutal

1:12 and bloody civil war.

1:13 This ended with the Reek surrendering and the Mongol

1:15 Empire fracturing with Kubla remaining

1:17 as the titular ruler of the empire.

1:18 But in fact, he was just a notional

1:20 figurehead, and the great Mongol Empire

1:21 was really no more.

1:22 Kubla would go on to

1:23 prove his opponents wrong and would not

1:25 only subjugate Korea, but would also go

1:26 on to crush the remainder of the Song

1:28 Dynasty in the south, which would then

1:29 cement the new Chinese dynasty that he

1:31 had founded.

1:32 Now, it won't shock you to

1:33 know that a man like Kubla wasn't

1:34 exactly satisfied with all that he had.

1:36 And so, it was obviously time to conquer

1:38 more.

1:38 And whilst he was finishing off

1:39 the song and deciding where to go next,

1:41 Kublai was sure to establish diplomatic

1:42 relations with the Japanese government

1:44 next door.

1:44 This government was the

1:45 Kamakura Shogunut.

1:46 And as you'll likely

1:47 know, for much of its history, Japan's

1:49 emperors were simply a puppet of the

1:50 shogun.

1:51 However, at this time, the

1:52 shogun was also a puppet under the

1:53 shiken, that is the regent, which was

1:55 occupied by a man called Hojo Tokimune,

1:57 who had just gotten the job when Kubla's

1:59 messengers turned up.

2:00 The message they carried was simple.

2:02 You're our vassel, so pay his tribute or we'll hurt you.

2:04 His response was that he didn't respond

2:06 and just sent them back to China.

2:08 This didn't go down well with Kubli, who now

2:10 had an excuse to invade.

2:11 Now, those of you with a keen knowledge of military

2:13 strategy will know that the Mongol

2:14 method of mounted warfare wasn't very

2:16 applicable at sea.

2:17 And so, Kubla had to

2:18 build an armada to carry his army to

2:19 Japan and potentially defeat any naval

2:21 or coastal defenses on the way.

2:22 And for this, he turned to the Koreans who had a

2:24 long history of ship building and naval

2:26 warfare.

2:26 And also, they couldn't say no.

2:28 So, Kubla figured that a naval invasion

2:29 of a highly militarized island would be

2:31 easy enough.

2:32 And by 1274, the fleet was

2:33 ready to go.

2:34 And so, off they went.

2:35 The Mongols or more accurately the Mongol

2:37 led Yuan Chinese and Korean army quickly

2:39 captured the island of Tsushima before

2:40 landing in Japan proper.

2:42 Kubla of course couldn't go himself because he and the

2:44 bulk of his army were still trying to

2:45 secure the Mongol group from China, but

2:47 he wished them well.

2:48 Anyway, upon landing in Japan, the Yuan had to fight

2:50 and establish a beach head.

2:51 And during this initial skirmish, the samurai

2:53 defending Japan did very poorly.

2:55 Now, there's a common misconception that this

2:57 was due to the samurai tradition of

2:58 jeweling and that in battle they would

3:00 challenge individual yuan soldiers or

3:02 leaders to honorable combat only to then

3:04 get shot in the face.

3:05 The actual reason that they struggled was that whilst

3:07 gunpowder weaponry wasn't entirely new

3:09 to Japan, it wasn't something commonly

3:10 used in warfare there.

3:12 And so, when the

3:12 mass ranks of Yuan soldiers fired volley

3:14 of hand cannons into the Japanese lines,

3:16 they had no idea how to respond, which

3:18 meant that it was just easier to run

3:19 away and resort to hit and run tactics.

3:21 The Yuan army pushed forwards, but it

3:23 didn't take long for its leaders to

3:24 realize that they didn't have the

3:25 resources to actually conquer the place.

3:27 And also, the sailors that had taken

3:28 them there warned them of an impending

3:30 storm, which if they remained could

3:32 strand them on Japan.

3:33 And so, before any

3:34 real damage could be done, the Yuan

3:35 retreated and sailed away and promptly

3:37 into affforementioned storm, which

3:39 drowned a third of them.

3:40 So, attempt number one hadn't gone too well, and

3:42 Kubla wanted revenge.

3:43 His main priority was that he still had to finish off

3:45 subjugating the rest of China.

3:47 But as this was going on, he ordered his

3:49 advisers to plan a much grander invasion

3:50 to punish those who had resisted him.

3:52 And the Kagan, because he was just so

3:54 nice, sent more emissaries to Japan to

3:55 give them yet another chance to pay him

3:57 tribute.

3:58 However, unlike the last time

3:59 these envoys were ordered not to return

4:00 from Japan until they got an answer and

4:02 so Tokimune, realizing that he couldn't

4:04 get rid of them, agreed to meet Kubla's

4:06 representatives in the capital where

4:07 they were promptly beheaded because as

4:09 far as the Shikim was concerned, he had

4:11 just defeated them.

4:11 So why would he pay

4:12 them tribute?

4:13 I mean, he wouldn't even

4:14 listen to his own emperor, let alone

4:15 someone else's.

4:16 Now, the Japanese didn't

4:17 know it, but they were now a part of a

4:18 noble history of states killing Mongol

4:20 envoys.

4:20 And like the other times, there

4:22 would be consequences.

4:23 And the shogunut was quick to start preparations for the

4:25 inevitable round two.

4:26 The government ordered the building of coastal

4:28 fortifications to make landing even

4:29 harder, as well as forming militias to

4:31 increase the number of soldiers

4:32 available to repel an invasion.

4:34 The Kamakura government also began

4:36 preparations for an invasion of Korea.

4:37 The Shikans hope was that they would

4:39 simply be able to conquer it swiftly and

4:40 thus deprive the Mongols of a staging

4:42 ground for any further expeditions.

4:43 And if not, the plan was that they'd at

4:45 least be able to seize these islands off

4:46 of Korea's coast, which would then be

4:48 aortioned out to those who had just

4:49 defeated the Mongols.

4:50 This plan was dropped after a couple of months because

4:52 one, the Kamakura shogunut wasn't

4:54 exactly the most stable government, and

4:55 its leaders were concerned that many of

4:56 their nominal vessels would simply

4:58 rebel.

4:58 And two, the number of men

5:00 required for such an overseas invasion

5:01 meant that the previously announced

5:02 coastal walls would take much longer to

5:04 build, which the Shiken saw as a

5:06 priority.

5:06 And in 1281, the Yuan army

5:08 returned, but this time it was a much

5:09 larger force.

5:10 Sources from the time

5:11 claimed that the invasion numbered about

5:13 135,000 to 150,000 men sailing to Japan.

5:16 However, if you know anything about

5:17 medieval and classical historians and

5:19 their approach to reporting on numbers

5:20 involved in wars, they have a tendency

5:22 towards exaggeration.

5:23 But either way, this force was almost certainly many

5:25 times larger than the last one.

5:27 Kubli planned for a smaller first fleet to

5:29 leave Korea and take these islands here,

5:30 which would give the main fleet

5:32 departing from China somewhere to

5:33 assemble before launching the invasion

5:34 of the Japanese mainland.

5:36 That was the theory.

5:36 But when the first fleet arrived

5:37 in Japan and took the Tsushima and Nikki

5:39 islands again, its leaders decided that

5:41 they would lead a small detachment of

5:42 their own to secure a footing before the

5:44 Japanese could react.

5:45 They briefly established a small beach head here, but

5:47 the Japanese fortifications and fierce

5:48 resistance meant that they couldn't

5:49 advance.

5:50 The remnants retreated to here,

5:51 Shikoshima Island, until raiding by

5:53 samurai forced them to yet again retreat

5:54 back to Iki Island, where as planned,

5:56 they would await the arrival of the main

5:58 force.

5:58 Slight problem though, the plan

6:00 had changed.

6:00 Yuan military leaders worried that landing in the same place

6:03 as the first invasion was stupid.

6:04 And so they decided to land here on Herado

6:06 Island, which they were able to take

6:08 with relative ease.

6:09 The main force then

6:09 sent two small detachments to the north.

6:11 One to tell the first force where to

6:12 meet them, and the second to take the

6:14 island of Takushima as a midway point

6:15 between the two.

6:16 Yet more samurai raiding meant that the first force were

6:18 more than happy to depart and they

6:19 quickly abandoned Iki Island.

6:21 They joined up with the main force and after

6:22 some skirmishes, Yuan leaders were

6:24 preparing for the long march up through

6:25 Japan.

6:26 However, this would have to be

6:27 delayed because of a famous typhoon,

6:29 Kamakazi, the Divine Wind.

6:31 This wrecked the overwhelming majority of the Yuan

6:33 fleet and stranded the army.

6:34 But that was okay because the leaders of the

6:36 expedition had a plan that would fix

6:37 everything.

6:37 But before they could put it

6:38 into action, they quickly just had to go

6:40 and see this thing.

6:41 But don't worry about it.

6:43 They're not coming back.

6:45 So, with the army abandoned, it wasn't long before

6:46 the Japanese attacked and finished off

6:48 the rest of it.

6:48 And whilst it goes

6:49 without saying that the typhoon was

6:50 disastrous for the Mongol design on

6:52 Japan, it's important to note that even

6:53 without them, the Japanese were more

6:54 than capable of repelling the invaders

6:56 at a high cost to themselves.

6:57 And whilst it's impossible to know how things would

6:59 have gone without the kamicazi, we do

7:01 know that the Yuan would have struggled

7:02 to supply such a large army the further

7:04 they advanced into Japan.

7:05 And we also know that the vast majority of the

7:07 shogunuts forces were still waiting and

7:08 ready to fight.

7:09 Back in China and

7:10 undeterred by two catastrophes, Kubla

7:12 immediately began to set in motion a

7:13 third invasion.

7:14 And it was at this point

7:15 that basically everyone advised him not

7:17 to do so.

7:17 The last two had obviously

7:18 been terrible for everyone involved and

7:20 at this point there were now rebellions

7:21 across China and so taking tens of

7:23 thousands of soldiers and moving them

7:24 away would only serve to undermine his

7:26 rule.

7:26 Kublai begrudgingly agreed and

7:28 spent the rest of his reign invading

7:29 Burma which went pretty well as well as

7:30 Vietnam and Java which very much did

7:32 not.

7:33 Now after Kubla's death, the

7:34 Mongols remained in charge of China

7:35 until the Yuan dynasty fell to the Ming

7:37 and no emperor after Kubli gave any real

7:39 thought to conquering Japan.

7:40 Much of this was because the Yuan emperors

7:42 struggled with maintaining stability in

7:44 China and so their resources were

7:45 stretched already and the Ming whilst

7:47 maintaining that the Japanese were

7:48 rightfully their vassels were often

7:49 reminded of Kubla's failures whenever

7:51 they tried to get involved in Japan's

7:52 internal affairs.

7:53 For example, when Japan had a donastic dispute between two

7:56 different emperors, the Ming interfered

7:57 and gave its support to one claimant,

7:59 simply demanding that the other submit

8:00 immediately.

8:01 But the shogun, who was now

8:02 back in charge, told him to butt out and

8:04 made it clear that China wasn't capable

8:05 of doing anything about it anyway.

8:06 And so for the Ming, it was better to just

8:08 focus on trade and being amicable.

8:10 That was of course until Japan launched their

8:11 own invasion of Korea in the late 16th

8:13 century and relations between the two

8:15 got really bad again, but that's a whole

8:16 other episode.

8:17 I hope you enjoyed this

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