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Korea, Japan, and the Imjin War
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Sienna Kang
ABSTRACT
The Imjin War began in 1592 when a well-trained and experienced Japanese army landed in the port city of Pusan on the southern tip of Korea and quickly conquered most of the peninsula. Although the Japanese were repulsed after several years of brutal fighting that culminated in an intervention by Ming China, the Imjin War represented a devastating humiliation for Korea. The Japanese, whom Koreans had long viewed with condescension, had easily and brutally defeated Korea's own armies, and Korea had required outside help to protect the integrity of its own kingdom.This paper examines the writings of two of the most important Korean figures from the Imjin War: Yi Sun-Shin, the commander of the Korean navy, and Yu Song-nyong, the Prime Minister. I show how Yi and Yu focus more closely on Korean failures and not on the extensive incidents of Japanese cruelty and violence during the war. Indeed, they almost seem to blame the weakness of the Korean state, rather than Japanese aggression, for much of their country's suffering. The reason for this, I argue, is that Yi and Yu wanted to recapture a Korean worldview defined by a close relationship with China and condescension towards Japan. The initial success of the Japanese invasion would seem to have shattered these biases; but by blaming the invasion on temporary Korean failings, which could be fixed, rather than acknowledging Japanese progress, Yi and Yu were able to preserve the belief in Korean superiority to Japan.
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