Ultimately a failure, the invasion attempts are of macro-historical importance because they set a limit on Mongol expansion and rank as nation-defining events in the history of Japan.

The inner circle of the Hōjō clan had become so pre-eminent that they no longer consulted the council of the shogunate (Hyōjō (評定)), the Imperial Court of Kyoto, or their gokenin vassals, and they made their decisions at private meetings in their residences (yoriai (寄合)).

[13] Kublai sent a general, U-ya Son-dal, to demand that Yi Changyong and Kim Chun, the two most influential officials of Goryeo, be brought to the Yuan court.

From time immemorial rulers of small states, the borders of which closely adjoin, have always endeavoured to maintain friendly relations with each other and have manifested mutual respect and trust.

We therefore ordered a cessation of hostilities, restored their land, and returned the captive Koreans, young and old.In gratitude both ruler and people of Korea now present themselves at our court.

A man from Shandong named Qi Gongzhi who helped Kublai design ships was ordered to Korea where he spent a few months before being sent to Xiangyang for the invasion of southern China.

At Sasuura, the invasion fleet was spotted offshore, allowing the deputy governor (jitodai) Sō Sukekuni to organize a hasty defense.

[26] With just 80 mounted samurai and their retinue, Sukekuni confronted an invasion force of what the Sō Shi Kafu describes as 8,000 warriors embarked on 900 ships.

[27] The small garrison force was quickly defeated, but according to the Sō Shi Kafu, one samurai, Sukesada, cut down 25 enemy soldiers in individual combat.

Like Sukekuni, Taira no Kagetaka, the governor of Iki, gave a spirited defence with 100 samurai and the local armed populace before falling back to his castle by nightfall.

Knowing that defeat was inevitable, Kagetaka sent his daughter with a trusted samurai, Sōzaburō, on a secret passage to the shore where a ship was waiting to take them to the mainland.

Mongol archers spotted them and fired on the ship; Kagetaka's daughter was killed, but Sōzaburō managed to reach Hakata Bay and report Iki's defeat.

[31] The Yuan fleet crossed the sea and landed in Hakata Bay on 19 November, a short distance from Dazaifu, the ancient administrative capital of Kyushu.

As they advanced, they also threw paper and iron casing bombs on occasion, frightening the Japanese horses and making them uncontrollable in battle.

Our soldiers were frightened out of their wits by the thundering explosions; their eyes were blinded, their ears deafened, so that they could hardly distinguish east from west.

Takezaki and his five companions charged the small Yuan detachment that Kikuchi had previously encountered, but their horses got stuck in the mud, and they were wounded by a barrage of arrows.

[40] The Japanese were preparing to make a last stand at Mizuki (water castle), an earthwork moat fort dating back to 664.

One of the three commanding Yuan generals, Liu Fuxiang (Yu-Puk Hyong), was shot in the face by the retreating samurai Shōni Kagesuke and seriously injured.

Holdon wanted to keep advancing through the night before more Japanese reinforcements arrived, but Hong was worried that their troops were too exhausted and needed rest.

According to a Japanese courtier in his diary entry for 6 November 1274, a sudden reverse wind from the east blew back the Yuan fleet.

The invading force was drawn from several sources, including criminals with commuted death sentences and even those mourning the loss of their parents—a serious affair in China.

[50] Unable to land, the Mongol invasion force occupied the islands of Shika and Noko from which it had planned to launch raids against Hakata.

Sensing the oncoming typhoon, Korean and south Chinese mariners retreated and unsuccessfully docked in Imari Bay, where they were destroyed by the storm.

[57]According to a Chinese survivor, after the typhoon Commander Fan Wenhu picked the best remaining ships and sailed away, leaving more than 100,000 troops to die.

[63] On the other hand, in Japan there was no newly acquired land because it was a defensive war, and so the Kamakura shogunate could not give rewards to gokenin who participated in the battle, and its authority declined.

[64] Later, taking advantage of the situation, the number of Japanese joining the wokou began to increase, and attacks on the coasts of China and Korea intensified.

The fact that the typhoon that helped Japan defeat the Mongol navy in the first invasion occurred in late November, well after the normal Pacific typhoon season (May to October), perpetuated the Japanese belief that they would never be defeated or successfully invaded, which remained an important aspect of Japanese foreign policy until the very end of World War II.

The Nihon Kokujokushi, written around 1300, mentions huo tong (fire tubes) at the Battle of Tsushima in 1274 and the second coastal assault led by Holdon in 1281.

"[72] The Taiheiki mentions a weapon shaped like a bell that made a noise like thunder-clap and shot out thousands of iron balls.

For example, Wang Yun, who served Kublai, and Zheng Si-xiao, a surviving retainer of the Song dynasty, mentioned in their book that "Japanese swords are long and extremely sharp."