Newsletter

I attended the academic conference held between April 13 to 15 at Shandong University under the theme “Imjin War and the Political Ecology in Japan, Joseon, and Ming Dynasty.” A total of 50 or so scholars from Korea, China, Japan, and Hong Kong attended the conference and enthusiastically participated in discussions related to the conference’s theme.

Professor Chen Shang-sheng, who organized the conference, began by introducing a multi-year project named “The Collection, Organization, Translation, and Research of Historical Material Related to the Imjin War” that Shandong University’s School of History and Culture has been working on with support from China’s National Social Science Fund. Professor Chen explained that the conference was being held annually so that the university may share and review the project’s outcomes. This year’s conference was the second following the first conference held last year on historical memory. Through future conferences, the university plans to look at the Imjin War from various aspects such as economics and diplomacy. Although it has been stated that the Shandong University project’s focus lies in systematically accumulating and digitalizing historical material related to the Imjin War, those involved in the project seemed to be very careful about discussing the project’s details and how they plan to share its outcomes internationally.

Turmoil Versus War

A total of twelve papers were presented at the conference, but due to limited space, I can only discuss a few of them in this article. Through his presentation, Professor Hur Nam-lin of the University of British Columbia made a rather controversial argument suggesting that there is no concrete evidence to prove that Toyotomi Hideyoshi had been preparing to invade Ming during the Imjin War and that such a rumor had been fabricated by Joseon over the process of asking Ming to send troops over as reinforcement. Suggesting that the Japanese army would have been destroyed by cold and hunger if it had actually attempted to advance up to Liaodong, Professor Hur claimed that the hereditary use of the expression “Jeongmyeong gado” referring to Japan’s demand for Joseon to facilitate its troops in attacking Ming is but an exaggeration made by Hideyoshi. As I was to serve as moderator for the paper’s discussion, Professor Hur’s argument took me by surprise, but I did come to regard it as meaningful for serving as a reminder that all aspects of the Imjin War should be examined within a broader, strategic context.

Another notable presentation involved an analysis Professor Bu Yong-jian of the Chinese University of Hong Kong performed on the Ming dynasty’s political ecology. Titled “Beijing, the Alternate Battlefield of the 1592-1598 Imjin War,” Professor Bu’s paper investigated the structure and process through which the Ming dynasty made policy decisions during the Imjin War. The paper seemed to offer implications that may prove to be quite useful in understanding the present significance of the Imjin War. Looking back on the intervention of foreign powers and the helpless predicament Joseon had been in at the time, I felt the urge to rectify the war’s name by using the word war rather than turmoil as in the war’s Korean name. There must have been other contexts for using the term “Imjin War,” but using the more impassioned word “turmoil” could be what is making it challenging for Koreans to pursue a scientific understanding of the war and to properly retain the historical lessons it offers.

Korean National Treasure no. 76: Nanjung ilgi (War Diary), Imjin jangcho (Drafts of the Imjin War Reports), and Letters by Yi Sun-sin

Source: Cultural Heritage Administration

Assistance Against Japan and the United States

It is a widely known fact that Chinese academia has recently become increasingly interested in the Imjin War from a policy point of view. According to Chinese scholars, they have so far invested much of their efforts into studying the First Sino-Japanese War, but in order to better understand Sino-Japanese relations during late Qing, they have come to recognize the need to understand what those relations were like during late Ming. This interest is inseparable from the matter of how to understand and be prepared for maritime powers currently trying to keep the rise of China in check. China considers the Imjin War as assistance against Japan and the Korean War as assistance against the United States, which is a sign that the Chinese take an interventionist approach regarding issues on the Korean peninsula. This is why Korean scholars must remain especially aware that Chinese academia’s interest in the Imjin War goes beyond scholarly research.

For the Japanese, the Imjin War has been a memory with a hidden desire to revive a failed empire’s dream, whereas for the Koreans, it has been a source of unshakeable fear toward being divided and ruled by foreign powers. What would happen if China’s interventionist view of the war gains weight and begins to have a political context? Talking to Chinese scholars makes it fairly easy to recognize that their research on the Imjin War is aligned with the so-called Chinese notion of a New Tianxia.

Korean National Treasure no. 132: Jingbirok (The Book of Correction)

Source: Cultural Heritage Administration

War as a Cruel Teacher to Mankind

Based on what has been hinted above, gaining an accurate understanding of a historical event like the Imjin War is necessary for conceiving peace on the Korean peninsula and the future East Asian order. To learn from a war that left the Korean peninsula drenched in blood, Korea must decipher the war and gain a broader, deeper, more introspective grasp of it than China and Japan in the strategic realm.

On my way back home, it occurred to me that the Northeast Asian History Foundation also needs to do its share in reconsidering the Imjin War with renewed determination and awareness in order to thoroughly explore and prepare for a future that may unfold in a totally different direction and force. Thucydides once said, “War is a violent teacher.” As we now stand struggling at the center of a historic transition to peace rather than war, I kept thinking throughout the three-day conference that Korea may be lacking strategic insight in its review of the Imjin War and that frankly facing the tragic war that furcated East Asia might just be what policy makers charged with “snatching the fleeting edge of god’s clothes” need to do to become more creative and courageous.