Editing Dutch Formosa (section)

===Japanese trade===
[[File:Capture of Nuyts by the Japanese in 1629.jpg|thumb|Capture of [[Pieter Nuyts]]]]
The Japanese had been trading for Chinese products in Taiwan since before the Dutch arrived in 1624. In 1593, [[Toyotomi Hideyoshi]] planned to incorporate Taiwan into his empire and sent an envoy with a letter demanding tribute. The letter was never delivered since there was no authority to receive it. In 1609, the [[Tokugawa shogunate]] sent [[Harunobu Arima]] on an exploratory mission of the island.{{sfnp|Wills|2006}} In 1616, [[Nagasaki, Nagasaki|Nagasaki]] official [[Murayama Tōan]] sent 13 vessels to conquer Taiwan. The fleet was dispersed by a typhoon and the one junk that reached Taiwan was ambushed by headhunters, after which the expedition left and raided the Chinese coast instead.{{sfnp|Huang|2005|loc=Chapter 3}}<ref>{{cite book | title=Theories and Methods in Japanese Studies: Current State and Future Developments (Papers in Honor of Josef Kreiner) | editor-first=Hans Dieter | editor-last=Ölschleger | location=Göttingen | publisher=Bonn University Press via V&R Unipress | year=2007 | isbn=978-3-89971-355-8 | chapter=Recent Trends in Scholarship on the History of Ryukyu's Relations with China and Japan | chapter-url=http://www.personal.psu.edu/faculty/g/j/gjs4/Smits_bonn06_Revised.pdf | first=Gregory | last=Smits | pages=215–228 | access-date=July 6, 2023 | archive-date=March 2, 2012 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120302074408/http://www.personal.psu.edu/faculty/g/j/gjs4/Smits_bonn06_Revised.pdf | url-status=dead }}</ref>

In 1625, Batavia ordered the governor of Taiwan to prevent the Japanese from trading. The Chinese silk merchants refused to sell to the company because the Japanese paid more. The Dutch also restricted Japanese trade with the Ming dynasty. In response, the Japanese took on board 16 inhabitants from the aboriginal village of Sinkan and returned to Japan. Suetsugu Heizō Masanao housed the Sinkanders in Nagasaki. Batavia sent a man named [[Peter Nuyts]] to Japan where he learned about the Sinkanders. The shogun declined to meet the Dutch and gave the Sinkanders gifts. Nuyts arrived in Taiwan before the Sinkanders and refused to allow them to land before the Sinkanders were jailed and their gifts confiscated. The Japanese took Nuyts hostage and only released him in return for their safe passage back to Japan with 200 picols of silk as well as the Sinkanders' freedom and the return of their gifts.{{sfn|Andrade|2008b}} The Dutch blamed the Chinese for instigating the Sinkanders.{{sfn|Andrade|2008c}}

The Dutch dispatched a ship to repair relations with Japan but it was seized and its crew imprisoned upon arrival. The loss of the Japanese trade made the Taiwanese colony far less profitable and the authorities in Batavia considered abandoning it before the Council of Formosa urged them to keep it unless they wanted the Portuguese and Spanish to take over. In June 1630, Suetsugu died and his son, Masafusa, allowed the company officials to reestablish communication with the shogun. Nuyts was sent to Japan as a prisoner and remained there until 1636 when he returned to the Netherlands. After 1635, the shogun forbade Japanese from going abroad and eliminated the Japanese threat to the company. The VOC expanded into previous Japanese markets in Southeast Asia. In 1639, the shogun ended all contact with the Portuguese, the company's major silver trade competitor.{{sfn|Andrade|2008b}}