Authors: Samuel Hawley
Father de Cespedes remained in Korea until April 1594, ministering to the men under the Christian commanders he knew as Augustin (Konishi Yukinaga), Darius (So Yoshitoshi), Sancho (Omura Yoshiaki), Protius (Arima Harunobu), Damien (Kuroda Nagamasa), and others. He had no opportunity to meet Koreans during this time other than the unfortunate wretches being sent back to Japan as slaves. The father in fact was kept in close confinement in the camps of the Christian daimyo between Pusan and Ungchon, for news of his presence in Korea would have posed some danger to Konishi if it reached the ears of Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Back in 1587 Hideyoshi had issued an edict expelling the Jesuits from Japan in response to their overaggressive proselytizing, which at its height had extended to the destruction of Buddhist temples and shrines.
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The order was not rigor
ously enforced; it had been intended more to slap the Christians into line than snuff them out entirely. After a period of lying low the Jesuit fathers were able to resume their work, albeit with more caution, and were soon joined by a second order, the Franciscans of Spain. The taiko’s edict, however, was never rescinded, and thus Konishi’s harboring of a Jesuit in 1594 remained technically illegal. If Hideyoshi were to find out about this, the repercussions could be severe.
Hideyoshi did find out. He was informed by Kato Kiyomasa, the ardent Buddhist daimyo Father de Cespedes described as Konishi’s “arch rival.” Upon receiving word that he was now in the taiko’s bad graces, Konishi sent de Cespedes back to
Japan. Then, in the summer of 1595, he made a hurried trip himself to Kyoto to repair the damage that Kato had done. He succeeded very handily, explaining to Hideyoshi that he had summoned the Jesuit to his camp in Korea to inquire why the annual “Black Ship” from Macao, laden with the foreign trade goods Hideyoshi so desired, had not come to Japan the previous year. Konishi, in short, had merely been looking out for the taiko’s interests. Hideyoshi accepted this explanation, and the checkmated Kato, when he found out, knew better than to press the matter further.
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With the forged letter of submission from Hideyoshi now in hand, and with King Sonjo of
Korea having provided his own written support for negotiations with Japan, the Ming government granted Naito Joan permission to proceed to Beijing. He arrived in the city toward the end of 1594 and was questioned closely by officials there for a month while the Chinese considered how best to proceed. The option of resuming hostilities to punish Hideyoshi for what everyone regarded as his unpardonable conduct had by this point been discarded; the war had already cost about ten million taels of silver, and the dangerously depleted imperial treasury could afford no more. The only matter for debate was thus the terms for peace that would be offered to Naito. Minister of War Shi Xing took a conciliatory approach, suggesting that Hideyoshi be granted both investiture as a vassal king and the right to engage in tribute trade. Others thought this was too generous. It was finally decided to deny the Japanese request for tributary trade relations, and to grant Hideyoshi only investiture as a vassal king—an empty formality that would cost nothing more than a silk robe and a large sheet of paper.
In an audience before the Wanli emperor on December 17, 1594, Naito Joan was presented with the following three conditions for peace:
Naito accepted these terms and swore an oath to abide by them. He then prepared to leave Beijing for the long trip back to Japan.
The Ming court now set about making preparations for the investi
ture of Toyotomi Hideyoshi. An edict conferring upon him the title of King of Japan was drawn up and transcribed onto an appropriately elegant piece of paper. A golden seal was forged, royal vestments tailored, and a regal crown crafted and boxed. For the task of transporting these accoutrements to Japan and bestowing them upon Hideyoshi, an imperial mission was formed in February 1595 with Li Zongzheng serving as ambassador and Yang Fangheng as vice-ambassador. Li and Yang, together with an entourage of several hundred people, proceeded east from Beijing and arrived in Korea in May. Here they learned that the Japanese were still encamped on the southern tip of the peninsula, in contravention of the three conditions for peace that Naito Joan had carried on ahead of them. They thus settled down in Seoul and refused to continue any farther.
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The
Army’s Strategic Power
states: “When the army is mobilized and advances into the field, the sole exercise of power lies with the general. If in advancing or withdrawing the court interferes, it will be difficult to attain success.”
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Three Strategies of Huang Shih-kung
1st century
B.C.
On Korea’s southern coast, Japanese naval activity had all but ceased following the loss of thirty-one ships to the Korean navy in April of 1594. There was little on the water for Supreme Naval Commander Yi Sun-sin to attack. Yi remained for the most part at his base on Hansan Island, fighting regular bouts of fever, practicing his archery, and fretting over his ill son and mother, whom he was unable to visit owing to the duties of his office. He often resorted to fortune-telling to see what the future held. The results were usually propitious. But he could not help but worry.
A particular source of concern continued to be Won Kyun, the resentful Kyongsang naval commander whom Yi now described in his diary as “a monstrous coward....His evil and refractory acts cannot be expressed fully.”
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Throughout 1594 Won continued to hammer away at Yi’s reputation in his dispatches to the court in
Seoul, accusing him most damagingly of refusing to attack the Japanese despite Won’s own urgings to do so. This was misleading at best, and at worst a lie. So long as the Japanese remained within the safety of their fortified coastal positions and kept their vessels anchored near shore or hidden up inaccessible inlets, there was little any naval commander could do to fight them. The task obviously was better suited for the army. It also bore mentioning that when Yi
had
led his ships to the attack earlier that year, the Chinese commander in the south had promptly ordered him to desist on the grounds that he was upsetting the negotiation process.
Such considerations were lost on many a government minister in
Seoul. Official communications started flowing south reprimanding Yi Sun-sin for being idle and for not taking a more aggressive stance against the Japanese. These calls to action from scholars who knew nothing of warfare caused Yi a great deal of aggravation. “Though I swore with other captains of war to avenge our slaughtered countrymen...,” he fumed in his diary, “the enemy has taken his positions in deep trenches and high fortresses on steep hills inaccessible to us. It is not wise to proceed frivolously. A wise captain of war should keep to the rule ‘Know yourself and know the enemy is the surest way to secure success in a hundred battles.’ ”
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Finally, in November, Yi received an official letter ordering him into action from Kwon Yul, the hero of the Battle of Haengju who in July had replaced Kim Myong-won as commander in chief of
Korea’s armed forces. Yi suggested that for a sea attack to have any chance of success it should be undertaken in coordination with a landward assault by army units. Kwon Yul would not comply. Yi therefore had to proceed into battle alone, with a fleet of ships to fight an enemy on land. He set sail on the ninth of the month, on what would prove an entirely fruitless campaign:
November 11:
Our warships weighed anchor and dashed into... Changmunp’o, but the enemy, perched on the steep heights, did not come out to fight....
November 12:
The enemy with their vessels pulled alongside the shore did not come out to fight....
November 17:
Early in the morning, ordered advance guard out to the enemy lairs in Changmunp’o, but the Japanese planted a sign in the ground reading “Japan is now talking peace with Ming China, so we need not fight.”
November 19:
Made an early departure and arrived at the enemy base in Changmunp’o, but as previously the enemy did not come out.
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The government in Seoul in the meantime was looking into the strained relationship between Yi and Won Kyun. An investigator was sent south to question both men regarding the matter, and the strengths and weaknesses of each were debated and weighed in a series of discussions in court. It was conceded to Yi that Won Kyun did habitually refuse to obey his orders and that he was often belligerent and hostile toward his ranking superior. The general attitude, however, was that such conduct should be forgiven, for Won had formerly been senior to Yi and thus had a right to be resentful now that Yi outranked him. Won’s counter-accusations, on the other hand, were accorded considerable weight. Many came to believe that Yi Sun-sin had lost his former fighting spirit and was now reticent to attack the Japanese, even when he received direct orders to do so.
The affair was finally settled in early 1595. Won Kyun, it was decided, was guilty of refusing to obey Yi’s orders, but did not deserve to be punished. His enmity toward Yi, however, was too great to leave him in his current post, and so in March he was transferred north to command the army of
Chungchong Province. It could scarcely be called a reprimand; the new post in fact carried a higher court rank. Won nevertheless was displeased with the reassignment, and initially refused to perform the bowing-out ceremony relinquishing his naval command.
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After much persuasion he complied, and was replaced as Kyongsang Right Navy commander by Bae Sol, “a haughty man,” observed Yi Sun-sin’s nephew Yi Pun, “who would bend his head to no one.”
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As for Yi Sun-sin, the Border Defense Council (
bibyonsa
) concluded that he did deserve punishment for ignoring government orders to attack the enemy. Since there was no one suitable to replace him as supreme naval commander, however, Yi was left where he was for the time being. The threat of punishment hanging over his head, the bibyonsa observed, “will encourage him to do a better job.”
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After serving for a year as army commander of
Chungchong Province, Won Kyun was transferred back to the south, this time to the post of Cholla Province army commander, and so was able to observe his nemesis at close hand once more, watching for any misstep, real or imaged, that could be reported to the capital to blacken Yi’s name. Yi himself remained on Hansan Island throughout these months, wracked by anxiety for his country, his family, and himself, as the government in Seoul scrutinized his every move. It was at about this time that he composed his now-famous poem “Hansan Isle,” expressing the loneliness and cares of his embattled command:
By moonlight I sit all alone
in the lookout on Hansan isle.
My sword is on my thigh,
I am submerged in deep despair.
From somewhere the shrill note of a pipe...
will it sever my heart strings?
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Despite the best efforts of Won Kyun and his Western faction support
ers, Yi Sun-sin managed to maintain his position, if not his reputation, throughout 1595 and 1596. Other military leaders were not so lucky. The fate of Kim Dong-nyong, commander of an army of civilian volunteers in the southern province of Cholla, is a good example of what could happen to a man in the deadly serious game of personal rivalry and factional strife.
Kim Dong-nyong was born into an upper-class yangban family in the southwestern
province of Cholla in 1567. At the start of the Japanese invasion he was living in a mountain hut, undergoing the customary three years of mourning for his deceased mother, wearing rough clothes, not shaving, and eating simple meals. He did not leave his retreat right away, and so the early months of the war passed him by. But then his brother was killed alongside guerrilla leader Cho Hon at the Battle of Kumsan, one of the so-called Seven Hundred Martyrs. With that Kim came off his mountain to look for ways to help the cause.
At the urging of his father, Kim sold his family’s home and land and used the money to outfit a private army of five thousand civilian volunteers. He raised this force too late to participate in any of the great battles of 1592 and early 1593. His combat experience was confined to small-scale actions such as the combined land and sea attack against the Japanese camp at Changmunpo, which Kim under
took in November 1594 together with fellow uibyong leader Kwak Jae-u, the “Red Coat General,” and Supreme Naval Commander Yi Sun-sin.
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A tremendous reputation nevertheless started to grow up around the man, sparked, perhaps, by his personal flamboyance and charisma, then fueled by yarning around uibyong campfires. Stories were told of how he could fall off a roof and jump up unhurt; of how he had caught a tiger and sent it into a Japanese camp, instilling such fear among the enemy that they trembled at the mere mention of his name; of how he could ride his horse into a forest and cut down all the trees with his slashing sword. These tales of supernatural power spread throughout the king
dom, and led Crown Prince Kwanghae to bestow upon Kim the title “Flying Tiger General.” Others called him “God General.”
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