Imperial Japanese Armed Forces

The Imperial Japanese Armed Forces were the unified military forces of the Empire of Japan, known in Japanese as Teikoku riku-kaigun or, for short, Nippon-gun. They were formed during the Meiji Restoration in 1868 and were disbanded in 1945, shortly after Japan's defeat by the Allies of World War II. The Imperial Japanese Army and the Imperial Japanese Navy were the two primary service branches, and air power was split between the Army Air Service and the Navy Air Service rather than held by a separate air force. The reorganization of army and navy during the Meiji period raised Japanese military strength and brought major victories in the First Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War. The forces also served in World War I and World War II. After the war the revised Constitution of Japan, drafted during the Allied occupation, replaced them with the present-day Japan Self-Defense Forces.