http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_Japan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_Japan
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The appearance of gunboat diplomacy in Japan in the 1850s, and the forced so-called "opening of Japan" by Western forces underscored the weaknesses of the shogunate and led to its collapse.
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From 1867, Japan requested various Western military missions in order to help Japan to modernize its armed forces. [...] In 1873, the Imperial government enacted the conscription law and established the Imperial Japanese Army. As class distinctions were all but eliminated in attempts to modernize and create a representative democracy, samurai lost their status as the only class with military obligations.
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Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895) was the first major conflict between Japan and an overseas military power in modern times. Japan forced China to open ports for international trade and ceded the southern portion of China's Liaoning province as well as the island of Taiwan to Japan. However, almost all if it was lost by Japan due to the diplomatic "Triple Intervention" by Russia, Germany, and France in 1895. Japan was in no position to militarily resist the three major European powers, withdrew, and Russia immediately occupied the entire Liaodong Peninsula and Port Arthur. Germany, France, and even Great Britain took advantage of the weakened China to seize port cities on various pretexts. This humiliation at the hands of the European powers helped lead to the Gashin Shōtan or Persevering through Hardship (for the sake of revenge) ideology in Japan to increase heavy industry and strength of the armed forces, especially the navy, at the expense of individual wants and needs.

It was also a direct cause of the Russo-Japanese War (1904–05), which Russia's lost, triggering Russian Revolution of 1905, and Japanese victory marked the emergence of Japan as a major military power, demonstrating that it could apply Western technology, discipline, strategy, and tactics in an effective war. Victory formalized in Russia-Japan Treaty of Portsmouth (1905) and affected Taft-Katsura US-Japan Agreement (1905),  and Anglo-Japanese treaty (1905).
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Japan was a member of the Allies during World War I and was rewarded with control of German colonies in the Pacific.
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Kwantung Army invaded Manchuria (Northeast China) in 1931. Full-scale invasion of China began in 1937. In Sep 1940, Germany, Italy, and Japan became allies under the Tripartite Pact. Pearl Harbor attack on US was Dec 7, 1941, and Japan surrender was Aug 15, 1945.

Since then Japan doesn't do war.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_Japan

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