Sekigahara Campaign

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Sekigahara Campaign
Part of the Sengoku period
Date 22 August - 5 November 1600 Low-level conflict from 12 July Continued Date-Uesugi conflict in Tōhoku until May 1601 Location Japan Result Tokugawa victory; beginning of Tokugawa shogunate Territorial changes Tokugawa gains nominal control of all Japan
Belligerents
Eastern Army: Forces loyal to Tokugawa Ieyasu Shinpan (daimyo) clans: Tokugawa clan Matsudaira clan Fudai daimyō clans: Ii clan Sakakibara clan Sakai clan Torii clan Honda clan Ōkubo clan Mizuno clan Tozama daimyō clans Maeda clan Mogami clan Date clan Kuroda clan Hosokawa clan Kyōgoku clan Sanada clan pro-Eastern faction Kobayakawa clan (late) Tōdō clan Asano clan Ikeda clan Katō clan Nabeshima clan Nanbu clan Yamauchi clan Tsutsui clan Horio clan Kanamori clan	Western Army: Forces loyal to Ishida Mitsunari Toyotomi clan Mōri clan Uesugi clan Ōtomo clan Shimazu clan Chōsokabe clan Oda clan Sanada clan pro-Western faction Kobayakawa clan (defected)
Commanders and leaders
Tokugawa Ieyasu Tokugawa Hidetada Tōdō Takatora Matsudaira Tadayoshi Fukushima Masanori Katō Kiyomasa Honda Tadakatsu Torii Mototada † Matsudaira Ietada † Ōkubo Tadachika Honda Masanobu Ii Naomasa (WIA) Katō Yoshiaki Sakakibara Yasumasa Sakai Ietsugu[1] Maeda Toshinaga Mogami Yoshiaki Date Masamune Kuroda Nagamasa Kuroda Yoshitaka Ikeda Terumasa Hosokawa Tadaoki Hosokawa Fujitaka  Mizuno Katsunari Nabeshima Naoshige Kyōgoku Takatsugu Sanada Nobuyuki Horio Yoshiharu Asano Nagamasa Yamauchi Kazutoyo Kobayakawa Hideaki (late)] Nanbu Toshinao Tsutsui Sadatsugu Kanamori Nagachika	Ishida Mitsunari  Ukita Hideie Shima Sakon † Ōtani Yoshitsugu † Toyotomi Hideyori Mōri Terumoto Mōri Hidemoto Konishi Yukinaga  Uesugi Kagekatsu Naoe Kanetsugu Maeda Toshimasu Ōtomo Yoshimune Tachibana Muneshige Shimazu Yoshihiro Shimazu Toyohisa † Chōsokabe Morichika Oda Hidenobu  Sanada Masayuki Sanada Yukimura Kobayakawa Hideaki (defected)
Strength
Over 75,000 initially[2]	120,000 initially[2]
Casualties and losses
4,000–10,000[3] killed	8,000[4]–32,000[5] killed ~23,000 defected

The Sekigahara Campaign was a series of battles in Japan fought between the Eastern Army aligned with Tokugawa Ieyasu and the Western Army loyal to Ishida Mitsunari, culminating in the decisive Battle of Sekigahara. The conflict was sparked by a punitive expedition led by Ieyasu against the Uesugi clan in the northeastern Tōhoku region, providing Mitsunari with an opportunity to denounce Ieyasu in the name of the infant ruling taikō Toyotomi Hideyori while the Tokugawa troops were in the field.

Much of the campaign consisted of a struggle to control key castles on the Tōkaidō and the Nakasendō, the main roads linking Edo and the capital of Kyoto. However, battles and sieges far from these key highways, both in the Tōhoku and in pockets of resistance around the capital, had wide-reaching effects on the manoeuvring and availability of troops for the decisive battle at Sekigahara. The campaign also spilled over briefly into the southern island of Kyūshū, but Ieyasu quickly ordered his forces to stand down following his victory for political reasons.

The campaign dramatically changed the political landscape of Japan, resulting in the ascendancy of the Tokugawa Shogunate over the Toyotomi clan and the shifting of political power between the various daimyō who participated in it.