page_title: Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force
section_title: Origin
hierarchical_section_title: Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force / History / Origin
caption_attribution_description: English: Japanese Tokugawa warship called Ataka Maru (from mifune map). It is an Atakebune ship. 日本語: 御船図（安宅丸） Deutsch: Ein japanisches Atakebune-Küstenkriegsschiff aus dem 16. Jahrhundert
context_page_description: The Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force, also simply known as the Japanese Navy, is the maritime warfare branch of the Japan Self-Defense Forces, tasked with the naval defense of Japan. The JMSDF was formed following the dissolution of the Imperial Japanese Navy after World War II. The JMSDF has a fleet of 154 ships and 346 aircraft and consists of approximately 45,800 personnel. Its main tasks are to maintain control of the nation's sea lanes and to patrol territorial waters. It also participates in UN-led peacekeeping operations and Maritime Interdiction Operations.
  Since 2000, the JMSDF has been the world's fourth largest navy by total tonnage.
context_section_description: Japan has a long history of naval interaction with the Asian continent, involving the transportation of troops, starting at least with the beginning of the Kofun period in the 3rd century. Following the attempts at Mongol invasions of Japan by Kublai Khan in 1274 and 1281, Japanese wakō became very active in plundering the coast of the Chinese Empire.
  Japan undertook major naval building efforts in the 16th century, during the Warring States period, when feudal rulers vying for supremacy built vast coastal navies of several hundred ships. Around that time, Japan may have developed one of the world's first ironclad warships, when Oda Nobunaga (a Japanese daimyō) had six iron-covered Oatakebune made in 1576.
  In 1588, Toyotomi Hideyoshi issued a ban on Wakō piracy; the pirates then became vassals of Hideyoshi and comprised the naval force used in the Japanese invasion of Korea.
  Japan built her first large ocean-going warships in the beginning of the 17th century, following contact with European countries during the Nanban trade period. In 1613, the daimyō of Sendai, in agreement with the Tokugawa shogunate, built Date Maru. This 500 ton galleon-type ship transported the Japanese embassy of Hasekura Tsunenaga to the Americas and Europe. From 1604 onwards, about 350 Red seal ships, usually armed and incorporating European technology, were also commissioned by the shogunate, mainly for Southeast Asian trade.
caption: A 16th-century Japanese atakebune coastal warship
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