The Imjin War: Japan's Sixteenth-Century Invasion of Korea and Attempt to Conquer China

by Samuel Hawley

  On May 23, 1598, Yi Sun-sin led his ships east to establish a new base on the island of Kogum-do, fifty kilometers closer to the Japanese fortress belt but still well clear of their westernmost stronghold at Sunchon. Yang Hao in Seoul was of the opinion that Yi should keep advancing and reclaim the Korean navy’s former base on Hansan Island, now in the heart of the Japanese perimeter and therefore a convenient launching point for strikes against their forts.[753] Yi did not agree. Dire circumstances had forced him to expose himself and his men to extreme peril in the Battle of Myongnyang. With the Japanese confined to their chain of forts, there was no need to take such risks again by moving ahead to Hansan. Yi’s main concern now was to rebuild his navy in a place of safety. Kogum-do, he believed, was the ideal spot for this. The island was an even better base than Hansan-do, Yi observed, first for its strategic location in the waters off Cholla Province, second for its mountainous and thus easily defensible terrain, and third for the excellent views in every direction that the tops of those mountains afforded.[754]

  Yi’s most pressing task upon arriving at Kogum-do was to secure food for the eight thousand men that had already flocked to serve under him in the wake of the victory at Myongnyang. The ample population and farmland on the neighboring islands of Chi-do and Choyak-do held the promise of future supplies. To meet his more immediate needs, Yi instituted a system of passes for the hundreds of refugee boats traversing the sea lanes around Kogum-do, many of them on their way home after fleeing the Japanese naval advance. Large vessels were required to pay a levy of three sok of rice (a sok is equal to about five bushels); medium-sized ships two sok, and small ships one. Most were glad to pay, for the presence of the Korean navy in the area meant safety. In this manner Yi Sun-sin collected ten thousand sok of rice in the space of just ten days, enough to feed his men for the next several months.[755]

  Yi now had men willing to fight and food enough to feed them. What he still did not have was ships. He had managed to stop the Japanese advance with just thirteen vessels, but to go on the offensive would require many more. Yi had set men to work building new warships and scraping together copper and iron to forge new cannons not long after the Battle of Myongnyang, when hope began to return that the Korean navy might survive.[756] Ming commander Yang Hao in Seoul aided the effort by dispatching emergency orders and presumably funds to shipyards nationwide, orders that by March of 1598 were already starting to be filled. By the twenty-eighth of the month the shipyard at Cholsan in the northwestern province of Pyongan had completed eight of an expected twenty ships; Changsangot in Hwanghae Province had churned out forty vessels and had just ten to go; Anmingot in Chungchong Province was only beginning work, but was expected to turn out ten; Byonsan in Cholla Province had refurbished thirteen vessels it had on hand and thus had just seven more ships to build from scratch to meet its quota of twenty. Shortly after Yi Sun-sin’s move to Kogum-do, therefore, sixty-one warships were finished and ready for delivery, and another thirty-nine were being built. The Korean navy was on the verge of returning to respectable strength.[757]

  * * *

  In April of 1598 news of a rebellion in Liaodong Province on China’s eastern frontier necessitated the postponement of the second Ming offensive, initially planned to begin in June. “Army Gate” Xing Jie hastened north from Seoul to take charge of the situation, and the troops then still on their way to Korea were diverted to the trouble spot until order was restored. Most of the Ming troops that had participated in the assault on Tosan were in the meantime sent south again following a month of recuperation in Seoul to establish camps in towns across central and northern Kyongsang Province. General Ma Gui himself returned south in April and made his headquarters at Sangju, halfway between the capital and the Japanese fortress chain. He and his men would spend the next several months waiting—waiting for reinforcements to arrive so that the second offensive could begin.[758]

  Ming naval forces in the meantime were amassing along Korea’s eastern coast. It had taken the Chinese government a long time to arrange for these squadrons to be sent across the Yellow Sea; throughout the first several months of the second invasion it was considered necessary to keep all naval forces on alert in home waters to protect China from a possible direct Japanese attack. Beijing, after all, was only two hundred kilometers from the coast, a distance the Japanese had shown they could traverse in ten days or less. The first fleet movements therefore did not take place until the fall of 1597, and even then were intended solely to protect China’s own eastern coastline rather than its embattled vassal across the Yellow Sea. One hundred and fifty ships from Zhejiang Province were initially sent north to the port of Lushun ( Port Arthur) on the tip of the Liaoning Peninsula. They were later reinforced by two thousand men from the Nanjing fleet and then by an additional two thousand men aboard eighty-two ships from the Wusung fleet. Few if any of these vessels were proper warships. China’s provincial authorities, as fearful as their counterparts in Beijing of a Japanese attack, were unwilling to compromise home defense by releasing the strongest vessels in their fleets. The squadrons assembled at Lushun were thus composed of lightly built galleys, useful for ferrying troops and supplies but not really suitable for naval warfare.[759]

  Chinese fears of a Japanese attack against their own coastline began to abate with the news of Yi Sun-sin’s victory in the Battle of Myongnyang in October 1597. When it became clear that the Japanese would not be entering the Yellow Sea, Beijing issued orders for its naval forces at Lushun to move south and take up positions along Korea’s east coast. Most of these ships would remain here for the rest of the war, a forward buffer to guard against any future Japanese advance by sea, but still well clear of the front.

  Admiral Chen Lin was the man selected to command those Ming naval forces that would eventually join Yi Sun-sin at his Kogum Island base. Chen was a grizzled old campaigner who had served in both the Ming army and navy going all the way back into the early 1560s. He had seen plenty of action in his time against rebellious frontier tribesmen and raiders, was reportedly an expert in the use of artillery,[760] and had won special honors for his success in combating the pirates who had for so many years plagued China’s long and vulnerable coast. Like most Ming commanders, however, his career was not unblemished. Zealous government censors had seen to that. In 1583 a mutiny by some of Chen’s troops, precipitated by his attempt to restore discipline which had grow lax during several years of peace, led to his being severely criticized and charged with treating his men too harshly. The charges were later dropped, but with his reputation tarnished Chen found it necessary to resign. He was not reappointed until after the start of the war in Korea in 1592. His return to command lasted for just one year. In 1593 he was dismissed on charges of trying to buy favor by giving an expensive gift to the Minister of War. This second period in the wilderness lasted until 1596. In that year Chen’s supporters in Beijing managed to get him restored to command to put down a tribal rebellion in Guangxi Province on the border with Vietnam. Chen took the post but declined the regular troops that came with it. Instead he summoned trusted soldiers from his former command and outfitted and supplied them with his own money. Chen’s subsequent success in quelling the rebellion, coupled with his willingness to nearly bankrupt himself to do so, proved an effective antidote to the charges that he was unprincipled and greedy, and led to a loftier appointment as naval command of the Guangdong fleet, guarding the coast near what would one day be Hong Kong.[761]

  Chen Lin arrived at Tongjak at the mouth of the Han River in May of 1598. King Sonjo, accompanied by a retinue of officials and soldiers, made the journey out from Seoul to receive him, and expressed satisfaction as he reviewed 3,400 fighting men standing in formation under the admiral’s command. Compared to them, the king observed with proper self-deprecation, the Korean army looked like “children playing.” Then, feeling obliged to reciprocate with a show of his kingdom’s homegrown martial talent, Sonjo ordered some of the Korean soldiers in attendance to give a demo
nstration of swordsmanship. Chen Lin was clearly unimpressed. As he watched the display, he deeply embarrassed the Koreans by laughing and being openly scornful of what he regarded as a sorry lack of skill. With that the affair came to an end and King Sonjo and his ministers returned to Seoul, shaking their heads at the quality of man that Beijing had sent to their aid. Word soon spread to watch out for Chen Lin—that the Ming admiral was arrogant, rude, and likely avaricious.[762]

  Chen Lin left Tongjak and headed south in July to join forces with the Korean navy under Yi Sun-sin. Korean sources say that he set off with five hundred ships. If this number is correct then many of them were probably small galleys and transports. Chen’s contribution to the coming campaign in fact would be more in terms of manpower than ships. Five thousand men from the Guangdong squadron would accompany him south aboard six warships and an indeterminate number of lighter craft.[763] In the battles to come Chen would place most of his men aboard Yi Sun-sin’s heavy warships to fight alongside Korean crews, an indication that most of the ships he had brought from China were probably unsuitable for combat and thus held in the rear.

  * * *

  In April rumors began to circulate in Korea that Toyotomi Hideyoshi had died at Fushimi Castle in Japan. The news had been picked up by a spy from one of the Japanese fortresses and was duly relayed to Seoul. The Korean government discounted the report as an unsubstantiated rumor. So did supreme Ming commander Yang Hao.[764]

  They were right. Hideyoshi was still alive—although far from in good health. He was in fact slipping fast. In a short note to an acquaintance dated July 20, 1598, the taiko expressed anguish at his rapidly deteriorating health. “As I am ill and feel lonely,” he wrote, “I have taken up the brush. I have not eaten for fifteen days and I am in distress. Since I went out for amusement yesterday to a place where some construction work is going on, my illness has become worse and worse, and I feel I am gradually weakening....[T]his one single letter is worth ten thousand letters written in normal circumstances.”[765] It was one of the last letters the taiko would have the strength to write.

  In July and again in August Hideyoshi’s wife O-Ne arranged for the imperial court to hold a sacred kagura dance to pray for her husband’s recovery. Emperor Go-Yozei sent orders to temples and shrines in and around Kyoto for prayers to be offered to restore the taiko to health. But nothing seemed to help. Hideyoshi was dying.[766]

  As his final days wound down, Hideyoshi’s thoughts focused increasingly on his son. Hideyori was still not quite five, and thus at the mercy of those men entrusted to protect him and his interests once Hideyoshi himself was gone. As he had done in 1595 and in 1596, the taiko now called upon his senior daimyo to again renew their oaths to serve his heir Hideyori just as they had served him. The first of these was signed on August 17, 1598:

  Item: I will serve Hideyori. [My] service [to him], just like [my service to] the taiko, shall be without negligence. Addendum: I will know no duplicity or other thoughts at all.

  Item: As for the laws and [Hideyoshi’s] orders as they have been declared up to the present time, I will not violate them in the slightest.

  Item: Inasmuch as I understand it to be for the sake of public affairs, I will discard personal enmities toward my peers and will not act on my own interests.

  Item: I will not establish factions among [my] associates. Even if there are lawsuits, quarrels, or disputes and [they involve] parents and children, brothers, or complainants whom I know, I resolve, knowing no partiality, [to act] in conformity with the law.

  Item: I will not return willfully to my fief without asking leave.[767]

  Would these men really serve young Hideyori once the taiko was dead? Hideyoshi’s repeated demand for loyalty oaths indicates he feared they would not. Japan in 1598 was a loose federation of powerful men, each possessing large armies, enormous holdings of land, and loyal only to Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Allowing them this degree of personal wealth and power had been one of the key factors behind Hideyoshi’s success in unifying Japan, for it had made serving him an acceptable proposition—better than fighting bitter and costly wars at the risk of losing all. There was one glaring weakness in this system, however: it all depended on Hideyoshi’s existence at the center. It was his commanding presence that kept rival daimyo in check and the unity of Japan intact. Remove Hideyoshi from the picture, and what was left? On the one hand a crowd of ambitious and independent-minded daimyo. And on the other a boy scarcely five years old.

  * * *

  In the month of July a report reached Seoul that a huge swarm of insects had descended from the north to blanket all the fields in Yonchon near the Imjin River north of Seoul. The same thing had happened back in 1592, the year imjin, just prior to the start of the first Japanese invasion and six years of war. Many considered the reappearance of these insects a sign that another calamity was about to occur.[768]

  * * *

  Chinese Board of War official Ding Yingtai was now back in Beijing to deliver his report on his investigation into the Battle of Tosan. This document, which Ding presented to the Celestial Throne on July 6, was an all-out attack not just against Yang Hao, but against the entire prowar faction in Beijing, all the way up to Grand Secretaries Zhang Wei and Shen Yiguan, the highest-ranking officials in the land. Yang, Ding charged, had tried to cover up the magnitude of the casualties he had suffered at Tosan; Zhang and Shen had participated in the cover-up, so they were guilty too. Yang had fled the battle, and was thus a coward; Zhang and Shen had hidden the truth of his flight from the emperor, submitting only those reports that made the commander look good. Yang had written false reports; Zhang and Shen had willingly accepted them. Yang had secured his appointment in the first place through bribes; Zhang’s were the palms he had greased. The list went on and on, a total of twenty-eight charges in all for which Ding felt Yang should be tried, plus ten other errors for which the commander should feel “ashamed.”

  Ding’s attack was so inflammatory and so wide reaching that there was no way for the Ming government now to lay the matter aside. Yang Hao first of all had to be dismissed. A messenger was dispatched to Seoul to relieve him of command and order him back to China to await the verdict in his case. Ding Yingtai, the new poster boy for the antiwar and in turn anti-Zhang and -Shen faction, was then sent back to Korea to conduct a more thorough investigation, not just into the Battle of Tosan but into the prosecution of the war as a whole. This time Grand Secretaries Zhang and Shen made sure that the dangerous Ding did not go alone. Xu Guanlan, a Board of War official like Ding but from the opposing prowar faction which supported Zhang and Shen, was sent along to conduct a parallel investigation of his own.

  Ten days later, on July 16, a copy of Ding’s report reached Seoul. On the twentieth a member of Yang Hao’s staff met with Korean officials to fill them in on the political struggle that was taking place in Beijing. On one side, he explained, was the prowar faction led by Grand Secretary Zhang Wei. It considered the threat posed by Japan to be real and China’s loyal vassal Korea well worth saving, and was thus intent on seeing the war through to the end. On the other side was the antiwar faction led by Board of War Minister Shi Xing and Grand Secretary Zhao Zhigao. They contended that Hideyoshi had never planned to move against China. This was just a Korean exaggeration designed to draw Beijing into a regional struggle that was really none of its concern. The Ming government therefore should stop sending military aid to Korea and end its involvement in the war.

  All this was devastating news for the government in Seoul. Ding Yingtai, it seemed, was their mortal enemy, a “malicious specter” as King Sonjo called him, out to ruin the war effort when the struggle was on the verge of being won. It was also considered a grievous insult that Ding and the antiwar faction he spoke for should besmirch the integrity and loyalty of Korea with baseless charges that it had lied about the threat posed by Japan. This stung like a slap in the face. After long discussion, it was decided that the situation was so critical that some sort of counter-
memorial had to be drawn up and sent to Beijing protesting Ding’s attack. After this was done, a public demonstration was organized in the streets of Seoul to show support for Yang Hao, and a petition was presented to the Army Gate headquarters of Xing Jie protesting Yang’s dismissal, all in the knowledge that everything would be promptly reported to Beijing. All this was done, of course, to counter Ding’s attack more than to protect Yang Hao. Yang was now little more than a pawn in a bigger game of political intrigue.[769]

  * * *

  Although the antiwar faction in Beijing was now on the offensive, it was still a long way from overturning China’s policy of prosecuting the war. Nothing therefore was preventing those Ming units previously dispatched to Korea from continuing on their way to reinforce the troops already near the front. These units had been diverted north into Liaodong Province while en route to Korea in April to help quell a rebellion that had unexpectedly arisen on the Manchurian frontier. By June order had been restored in Liaodong, and the Korea-bound troops were released and ordered to proceed to Seoul.