MLTH 551 - The Samurai and the Japanese Military Tradition

Credit Hours: 3

A study of the rise of the Samurai warrior tradition during the Heian period, the emergence and endurance of military government in Japan, the Japanese defeat of the Mongols, the feudal Warring States period, Hidoyoshi’s invasion of Korea and the start of the First East Asian war, the de-militarization of the Samurai during the Tokugawa period, the infusion of Samurai values during the modernizing Meiji period, the Samurai ethic and the Japanese soldier in the Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War, the militarization of the pre-war Japanese government and the invasion of Manchuria, and the Samurai legacy connection with atrocities and Kamikaze during WWII.