Comments by "August Hayek" (@hayek218) on "Extra History"
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Yi Sun-sin:
Even though Korean wants to include Yi Sun-sin (李舜臣) as one of the three Greatest Admirals of the world, Horatio Nelson of the Britain who prevailed in the Battle of Trafalgar, John Paul Jones of the America who defeated the British for its independence, and Heihachiro Togo of Japan who defeated the Russia’s Baltic Fleet, he was not even a supreme commander, nor did he prevail in the battle Koreans claim to have won.
To start with, throughout their history, Korea was the weakest in the region. Since the time of Yuan Dynasty, Korea had been a tribunary state of China for almost one thousand years. They always ask other countries to fight for Korea’s domestic issues like in the Korean War, and this is why they have no true national hero.
Yi Sun-sin was merely a commander of a fleet out of many Joseon fleets, certainly not the admiral or the commander of the Ming-Joseon Navy. Not only he failed to defeat the Japanese navy, he could not them on the sea and allowed them to land on the Korean Peninsula.
Japan at the time as the hay days of samurai and had the largest number of guns in the world with many experienced samurai in communications and modern battle tactics of the day. Korea on the other hand was merely a tribunary state of Ming with NO guns. There is no way Korean could beat Japan by itself.
In fact, in the first dispatch, Japan conquered Seoul within one month, and Pyeongyang within two month capturing the prince of Joseon as a hostage while there was NO Japanese commander who was killed except for one who was assassinated during hawking.
The only military exploit that Yi Sun-sin had against Japan was when he attacked “a supply fleet” and temporally cut off its supply route. But this is by no means being destroyed or defeated. He strategies were more like those of pirates or guerrillas such as setting fire on ships at night or attacking from the back of Japanese fleets after agreeing on cease-fire. Coward and so typical of the weak.
Later, since the military leader of Japan, Hideyoshi who planned to conquer China through Korea, died of old age in Osaka, Japan agreed on cease-fire and retreated. But it is a blatant lie for Koreans to say that Yi Sun-sin was a great admiral of the world, defeated the Japanese navy, and is the one from whom the world’s other admirals learn from.
However, you could at least say he had some brain, avoiding front-to-front battle with the mighty Japan.
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Korean History:
When you talk about Korean history, the first thing you have to know is that almost no present day Korean can read their true official history since they cannot read Chinese characters in which their entire history was written.
The second thing is that Koreans did not leave much of written history and their first written official history book, Samguk Sagi, was only written in the 12th century. But even then, they do not refer to it much because there are so many shameful things written such as the kings of Silla were Japanese from Japan.
The third thing is that their history was “created” AFTER the WWII by South Korea when its independence was given by the US. There was urgent need to create its “history” to give the Government the legitimacy and to promote national pride to fight in the Korean War. Thus it had to be patriotic. So what they did was to cherry pick some points from ancient Chinese and Japanese documents and filled the gaps with fantasies.
No Koreans read their original. Nobody can even CHECK who is telling the truth. And they can only regurgitate the fabrications that their Government blatantly cocks up in order to hide the shameful part of their history including Jumong, Gojoseon and Goguryeo were not Korean but only conquered a part of Korea; the kings of Silla were Japanese from Japan; since the time of Yuan Dynasty, the Korean Peninsula was a dependency of China for almost one thousand years; Korea was so poor and hopeless that their ancestors asked Japan to annex and modernize; the independence of South Korea was not fought for, but it was given by the US.
The truth is that the countries that existed in the Korean Peninsula were always weak since its soil is poor; weather is not favorable for crops; and there is not much resources. You can read books written by westerners who visited the Peninsula before the Japanese annexation. There are at least a half dozen of them with the most famous one being "Korea and Her Neighbors" by an English traveler, Isabella Bird. She says that Seoul was the dirtiest and smelliest place on Earth, and even in the main streets there were not cultural things like restaurants, tea houses, theaters, or even shops.
So just about everything you read and see about Korea’s history, that were “created" after the War and written not in Chinese but in Hangul (thus in English) such as Korean dramas, Wikipedia, recent history books, are likely to be fabrications and need to be checked against primary source evidences. South Korea even has a government body, the National Branding Council, to promote these fabrications by stealing other country’s history and cultures to gain the “soft power” for their economical profits. Their academics, corporations and public are all in this game led by the Government.
Several years ago, in response to China's and Korean's claims on Japan's history education, Stanford Uni. conducted research on the history education of five countries: China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and USA. They concluded that the history taught in Japan was the fairest; in China, propaganda; in Korea, fantasy.
Traditionally, being sandwiched by strong dynasties and countries such as Mongols, Chinese, Russians and Japanese, throughout its history, the weak and poor Koreans always had to lie, deceive and betray for their survival. Lies and fabrications have always been a part of their history, tradition and culture.
This is what Koreans say about themselves: according to the main editorial by the Chief Editor of Choson Ilbo, the biggest newspaper in South Korea, on Mar 6, 2012, Feb. 2, 2010 and Feb. 13, 2003 (printed version), "Koreans lie as if they breathe” and “Koreans are the world’s biggest liar of all." Korea has the highest fraud rate and is the only country whose fraud rate exceeds that of robbery in OECD. Also, all of perjury, calumny and fraud rates in South Korea are some 160-670 times higher than those of Japan.
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Yi Sun-sin:
Even though Korean wants to include Yi Sun-sin (李舜臣) as one of the three Greatest Admirals of the world, Horatio Nelson of the Britain who prevailed in the Battle of Trafalgar, John Paul Jones of the America who defeated the British for its independence, and Heihachiro Togo of Japan who defeated the Russia’s Baltic Fleet, he was not even a supreme commander, nor did he prevail in the battle that Koreans claim to have won.
To start with, throughout their history, Korea was the weakest in the region. Since the time of Yuan Dynasty, Korea had been a tribunary state of China for almost one thousand years. They always asked other countries to fight for Korea’s domestic issues like in the Korean War, and this is why they have no true national hero.
Yi Sun-sin was merely a commander of a single fleet out of many Joseon fleets, certainly not the admiral or the commander of the Ming-Joseon combined fleet. Not only he failed to defeat the Japanese navy, he could not prevent them on the sea, allowing them to land on the Korean Peninsula.
In fact, in the first dispatch, Japan conquered Seoul within one month, and Pyeongyang within two months capturing the princes of Joseon as a hostage while there was NO Japanese commander killed except for one who was assassinated during hawking.
Japan at the time was the hay days of samurai and had the largest number of guns in the world with many experienced samurai in communications and modern battle tactics of the day. Korea on the other hand was merely a tribunary state of Ming with NO guns. There is no way Korean could beat Japan by itself.
The only military exploit that Yi Sun-sin had against Japan was when he attacked “a supply fleet” and temporally cut off its supply route. But this is by no means “destroyed" or “defeated." His strategies were more like those of pirates or guerrillas, setting fire on ships at night or attacking from the back of Japanese fleets after agreeing on cease-fire. Coward and so typical of the weak. And in the end, Yi was killed in a revenge batte of attacking Japanese after the cease-fire.
Later, since the military leader of Japan, Hideyoshi, who planned to conquer China through Korea, died of old age in Osaka, Japan agreed on cease-fire and retreated.
It is a blatant lie for Koreans to say that Yi Sun-sin was a great admiral of the world, defeated the Japanese navy, or is the one from whom the world’s other admirals learn from.
However, you could say that he had some brain, avoiding front-to-front battle with the Japanese on the sea.
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