Chapter 47: Qingzhou Alliance

  In January of Eiroku 5, when the Takeda family's footsteps were getting closer and closer to Joshu Province.

  But at this time, an event that seemed insignificant at the time but had a profound impact on the entire Warring States history occurred. Tokugawa Ieyasu (still named Matsudaira Motoyasu at this point), relying on his uncle Mizuno Tadashige's relationship, got in touch with Oda Nobunaga of Owari Province, and the two families formed an alliance in Kiyosu, known as the Kiyosu Alliance.

  Tokugawa Ieyasu formally severed his vassal relationship with the Imagawa clan and entered into an alliance with Oda Nobunaga's Oda clan, beginning a twenty-year-long defensive and offensive alliance between the two houses.

  It is said that even when Tokugawa Ieyasu was still a hostage in the Oda family, he and Nobunaga had already become good friends.

  At that time, Oda Nobunaga, as described by later generations, had ambition in his eyes and grasped the hand of Tokugawa Ieyasu with a domineering attitude. With a wave of his large hand pointing to the horizon, he said: "Takechiyo (Tokugawa Ieyasu's name before his coming-of-age ceremony), you and I will compete for the world in the future. I will conquer the west, while you will conquer the east."

  Thus began their lifelong friendship.

  However, this story is probably 90% nonsense. At that time, Tokugawa Ieyasu was only six or seven years old, roughly equivalent to a preschooler, while Oda Nobunaga was already a teenager of fifteen or sixteen years old, which would be a high school student in modern times. Can you believe that a high school student would say to a little kid who doesn't even know how to wipe his nose, "Let's conquer the world together someday"?

  Rumors are rumors, and later generations often referred to the first two as the Three Heroes of the Warring States. There was also another person who was still under Oda Nobunaga's command at that time, and had not yet made a name for himself - Kinoshita Tōkichirō, who would later become Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the Taikō.

  These three men, apart from having approached or achieved the goal of unifying Japan in different ways, also shared a common birthplace in what is now Aichi Prefecture.

  There is a famous Japanese story, the title of which asks how to make a cuckoo sing. Here are quotes from three wise men:

  Nobunaga Oda said: "It's not worth killing it."

  Hideyoshi Toyotomi said: "Entice it to sing."

  Ieyasu Tokugawa said: "Don't rush, wait for it to sing."

  The Japanese often use these three sentences to reflect on the different personalities, approaches to things, and later fates of the three people.

  Oda Nobunaga was rebellious from childhood, belonged to the category of juvenile delinquents, later became a daimyo, had some changes in his views, and fantastically killed the powerful daimyo Imagawa Ujizane with fewer troops at Okehazama, and then captured the strongholds of Inabayama Castle and Gifu Castle.

  He renamed Inabayama Castle to Gifu, emulating the story of Zhou Wen Wang, and issued a nationwide proclamation of the "Tenka-fubu" edict, starting the unification of Japan through military force or martial law (two different accounts).

  He spent his life killing countless people, claiming to be Chapter 047, even after unifying the warring states and becoming the "Son of Heaven", he ate very frugally, rarely eating fish, and every day just eating pickled radish with plain rice.

  Tokugawa Ieyasu was not only stingy with himself, but also with others. One time when he was strolling around his house, he overheard a maid complaining in private that the current food was really too poor, and there were only pickled radishes as side dishes. After listening to this, Tokugawa Ieyasu smiled and said, "Alright, if you don't like it, then just don't eat it."

  From then on, even pickled radish as a side dish was cancelled for the maidservants of the Tokugawa family, and they ate plain white rice every day.

  It was Tokugawa Ieyasu who, when asked what the treasure of the Tokugawa family was, replied: "Five hundred mounted samurai from Mikawa."

  In the Tokaido region, there is a folk song that says: "People from Tōtōmi go to plant grains, people from Mikawa go to fight wars, and people from Suruga hold banquets and sing loudly every day." It can be seen that the bravery of Mikawa samurai is famous in Japan.

  After the Battle of Mikatagahara, Baba Nobuharu surveyed the battlefield and said to Takeda Shingen: "The corpses of the Mikawa army that fell with their heads towards our side all had their faces down, while those who fell with their heads towards Hamamatsu all had their faces up. This shows that these soldiers were killed in a forward charge, not one was beheaded for trying to flee."

  In the Battle of Nagashino, the combined forces of Oda and Tokugawa totaled 38,000 men, with the Oda army consisting of 30,000 and the Tokugawa army only 8,000. After the battle, the number of Takeda heads taken by both armies was surprisingly equal.

  In the fifth year of Eiroku, in January, when the Takeda family was still focusing its main efforts on the Uesugi family, the Tokugawa-Oda alliance, which would later become their greatest threat, had already been formed and would rise to prominence. This military alliance would later become the biggest obstacle to Takeda Shingen's advance on Kyoto.