Includes bibliographical references (page 94) and index.
Introduction: The historical context -- Kinsmen and vassals: Soldiers and fortune ; The creation of a kashindan ; The Hojo of Odawara ; The Ukita of Okayama ; Alliance by adoption and marriage -- The creation of samurai armies: From tax to troops ; The composition of armies ; The call to arms -- Command and control: The role of the bugyo ; The hatamoto -- On campaign: The campaign season and economic warfare ; The army on the march ; Battlefield formations ; Battlefield communications and intelligence ; Weaponry and the development of tactics -- Strategic engagement and battlefield movement: Surprise and ambush: Okehazama and Imayama ; Fighting by night: the three Japanese classics ; Firepower: the genius of Oda Nobunaga ; Rapid response: Toytomi Hideyoshi, 1582-83 ; Shock and awe: the conquests of Shikoku, 1578 and 1585 ; The false retreat and the Shimazu family -- Armies and battles of the Tokugawa shoguns: Young Ieyasu ; Mikata ga Hara, 1572 ; Komaki-Nagakute, 1584 ; From Odawara to Osaka ; The creation of the 'Japanese Army" -- Chronology.
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The Sengku Jidai, or "age of Warring States', was the age of the samurai - the military aristocracy of Japan. Lasting from the outbreak of the Onin War in 1467 to the establishment of the Tokugawa Shogunate - the government of united Japan - in the early 17th century, it was a period of endemic warfare, when a lack of central authority led to constant struggles between the great families of Japan. A details account of the famous samurai armies, this title examines the complicated nature of family and clan that governed so much of their initial organization, an how their battlefields tactics developed over a series of major encounters such as Nagashino and Sekigahara. [back cover].