Following the conquest of China by the Mongolian general and statesman Kublai Khan he established himself as the first emperor of the Mongolian dynasty. But in Khan’s success, could he have ever imagined that the furtherance of his empire would be thwarted by the power of typhoons?

The Mongolian empire extended from the eastern Korean peninsular to as far as the limits of Russia and Poland. When Kublai came to power, he set his sights on conquering Japan as a useful addition to the Mongol’s already far-reaching kingdom. Preparations for the invasion were made and in the autumn of 1274, a combined army of 40,000 Mongolian and Korean soldiers set out for Japan.

One part of the army landed on Hakata Bay in Japan, which forced the Japanese defenders to retreat into the country – an indication of just how strong the Mongolian force was in comparison to the Japanese defence. However, the weather was about to turn the tables. Out of nowhere, a violent typhoon appeared and wrecked more than two hundred of the Mongolian and Korean fleet, which forced the surviving crew to abort the invasion and return home with many of their soldiers dead or swept away in the powerful storm.

Despite this set-back, the Mongols started to prepare for a second invasion, not thinking that the weather may prove yet again to be a violent adversary. The Japanese anticipated a second attack and started to prepare by strengthening coastal fortifications, and erecting a huge stone wall around the bay in order to stop Mongolian cavalry in their tracks. The Mongols created two armies that combined forces from all over the empire, and amounted to 140,000 men.

They started a combined attack on the Japanese at Hakata Bay, and managed to get round the extensive coastal fortifications. But before the attack went any further, another violent typhoon welled up and destroyed practically all of the Mongolian invading fleet. Again, the Mongolians were forced to return home or be captured by the victorious Japanese.

Their victory was important to Japan’s history, as it meant that they were isolated from China for a whole century. The victory, aided by the typhoons, also created a great sense of unity throughout Japan, and the mystery of the presence of typhoons at both invasions made them believe that they were a people who were divinely guarded. Japan may also have been irreversibly altered if the Mongols had taken control, and certainly would not have allowed Japan to develop into what it has become today.

But was the twice intervention of typhoons a mere coincidence or was there some form of divine intervention working on the foreign affairs of the twelfth century?

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