The Ichiwa-kai was a yakuza

Yakuza

, also known as , are members of traditional organized crime syndicates in Japan. The Japanese police, and media by request of the police, call them bōryokudan , literally "violence group", while the yakuza call themselves "ninkyō dantai" , "chivalrous organizations". The yakuza are notoriously...

 gang based in Osaka

Osaka

is a city in the Kansai region of Japan's main island of Honshu, a designated city under the Local Autonomy Law, the capital city of Osaka Prefecture and also the biggest part of Keihanshin area, which is represented by three major cities of Japan, Kyoto, Osaka and Kobe...

, Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

.

It was formed on June 13, 1984 when Hiroshi Yamamoto, a top lieutenant in the Yamaguchi-gumi

Yamaguchi-gumi

is Japan's largest and most infamous yakuza organization. It is named after its founder Harukichi Yamaguchi. Its origins can be traced back to a loose labor union for dockworkers in Kobe pre-WWII....

, broke from that gang to form his own organization with over 10,000 members. The split stemmed from professional jealousy: Yamamoto had been seen as a contender for the role of kumicho, or Godfather, in the Yamaguchi-gumi, and was enraged when a rival, Masahisa Takenaka

Masahisa Takenaka

was the short-lived 4th kumicho of the Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest yakuza gang.He took the role of kumicho in 1984, but was assassinated at a girlfriend's home in Osaka early the next year by a rival faction, the Ichiwa-kai. The killing sparked a massive yakuza war, the Yama-Ichi War, in...

, was chosen.

In 1985, the Ichiwa-kai faction sent a team of hitmen to assassinate Takenaka at his mistress's home in Suita, Osaka. The killing of the Yamaguchi Godfather sparked a Kansai

Kansai

The or the lies in the southern-central region of Japan's main island Honshū. The region includes the prefectures of Mie, Nara, Wakayama, Kyoto, Osaka, Hyōgo, and Shiga. Depending on who makes the distinction, Fukui, Tokushima and even Tottori Prefecture are also included...

-wide yakuza war between the two groups in which over 20 gangsters were killed. The Yamaguchi-gumi eventually won what became known as the Yama-Ichi War

Yama-Ichi War

The Yama–Ichi War was a yakuza conflict mainly fought in the Kansai region of Japan from 1985 to 1989, between the Yamaguchi-gumi and the Ichiwa-kai gangs....

, but it proved to be a Pyrrhic victory

Pyrrhic victory

A Pyrrhic victory is a victory with such a devastating cost to the victor that it carries the implication that another such victory will ultimately cause defeat.-Origin:...

 as many of its members were arrested in the process.

Most of the Ichiwa-kai defectors were eventually allowed to return to the Yamaguchi-gumi.

Yamamoto retired, and the Ichiwa-kai dissolved in March, 1989.