During the 15th Century, the Samurai started to improve in their combat tactics. Schools of swordsmanship were abundant and many became rivals. During this time ashigaru were seen by the thousands. This term refers to the foot warriors that were employed by the shogun. The term itself latterly meant light foot, and referred to the lowest warrior class the “light Armor class” which consisted of either low class warriors or commoners who had decided to join the army. For them, the weapon of choice was the Naginata which was a pole weapon, and they were typically seen on horseback.

In the 16th century the emergence of the aruebus also changed the Samurai. The aruebus came into the hands of the Samurai from Portugal in 1543, and was quickly assimilated. The aruebus was a different kind of weapon, a weapon that is most prevalent now a day. That’s right; it was a firearm, a hook gun. It was however a primitive firearm, the predecessor of the musket and rifle. Although, needless to stay it was still powerful. This weapon came in handy especially against enemies in steel plate armor.

Pretty soon, and by pretty soon I mean at the end of the feudal period, firearms wee seen by the thousands in Japan. Army size also soared to numbers of well over 100,000! The Japanese were certainly getting ahead of themselves! Most other countries were not even near this amount of shear power.

At the end of the 16 century, in 1592, Toyotomi Hideyoshi decided to invade Korea. This invasion was also known as the seven year war, because it lasted seven years from 1592 to 1598. An army of 160,000 samurai were sent to Korea, and at first all seemed to be going well. The Japanese appeared to be taking in a victory; however this was not the case. The Japanese had seen consistent success on land, and failure at sea. However, they began to suffer due to lack of communication and supply lines. The Korean forces were also starting to become victorious; their navy successfully starved the Japanese from their vital resources of communication and supply lines. They did this by intercepting their supply fleets on the western side of the peninsula. In fact, they interjected the waters of which, most major Korean rivers flow. To add more, China also became involved in the war.

Emperor Wanli of China tried to bring in a diplomatic intervention. This stalled the war for five years, as negotiations went on, although peace failed to arrive as Japan invaded Korea for yet a second time in 1597. This time however, they were shot down. The war was over at the naval battle of Noryang. At last, after seven years, Japanese forces retreated, and returned to Japan after a horrible and shocking defeat against the Korean Navy.