this is something i found intersting from a guy who likes to study japanese samurai. the following is about hideyoshi and the imjin war:
‘Unfortunately for Hideyoshi’s dreams of true ascendancy, the Korean expedition bogged down after initially impressive gains. In May Seoul had been occupied, and on 16 June Konishi Yukinaga marched into Pyongyang. At the same time, Kato Kiyomasa was driving hard up the eastern half of the peninsula and would even cross briefly into Manchuria. Within four months, then, Japanese forces had cleared a road into China. Three factors would combine to slam that door shut: Koran guerillas, the arrival of large numbers of Chinese troops around Pyongyang, and the Korean Navy, which under Admiral Yi Sun Shin proved almost invincible. Admiral Yi inflicted a series of naval defeats on the Japanese that cut deeply into Hideyoshi’s logistical organization. Korean guerillas further harassed supply lines while tying down significant numbers of Japanese warriors behind the lines attempting to ferret them out. The Chinese, while not militarily the equal of the Japanese, outnumbered Konishi’s command and forced him to retreat from Pyongyang in February to avoid being isolated. Kato had no choice but to retreat as well, and by July the operation was clearly stalemated and in danger of ultimately developing into a complete disaster. Hideyoshi found it wise to negotiate, and stated that he would agree to a peace if, among other things, a daughter of the Ming Emperor was given to the Emperor of Japan. The Chinese, while probably amazed at the audacity of that demand (which, needless to say, was never fulfilled), agreed to a ceasefire. Hideyoshi, whose forces still controlled some territory in Korea’s southern-most province (Kyongsang), could boast to Luis Frois later that year that “he had already conquered the kingdom of Korea.” and that the Chinese “had sent him their submission”.4 He further demanded that Luzon show him obedience, threatening to invade if this was not done.
The birth of Hideyoshi’s second son, Hideyori, in 1593 both distracted the Taikô from the depressing results of his Korean misadventure and created another problem. The threatening clouds of a potential succession struggle must have haunted Hideyoshi, who had already named Hidetsugu heir and yet devoted himself to Hideyori. The matter was brutally decided in 1595, when in August Hidetsugu was exiled to Mount Koya and then ordered to commit suicide. Those of his family who did not follow suit were murdered en mass in Kyoto, including 31 women and a number of infant sons and daughters. The specific reasons behind Hidetsugu’s fall are entirely unclear, so much more the reasons for the excessive brutality with which Hideyoshi treated the family. Scholars continue to make assertions regarding this event; in truth, the specifics will never be more then a matter of speculation, except that a possible succession dispute had been dealt with. On 19 March 1597 Hideyoshi ordered a resumption of the war in Korea after the Chinese had disregarded Hideyoshi’s demands for a princess and actually acknowledged him as the ‘King of Japan’, a humiliating incident for Hideyoshi. While a man known for his skill at negotiating, nothing in Hideyoshi’s record leads one to believe that he ever entered a negotiation without intending to get everything he wanted.
This 2nd Korean Invasion was almost perfunctory, and the Japanese bogged down without having seen any significant gains beyond the capture of Namwon in August. At this same time, Hideyoshi and Hideyori were amusing themselves at Osaka with the spectacle of an elephant provided by the Spanish (perhaps to smooth over relations). The ‘Miracle of Myongyang’ on 19 September, in which 16 ships under Yi Sun Shin defeated a Japanese fleet of 133 vessels, probably sealed the fortunes of the invasion. Kato Kiyomasa and Asano Yukinaga were actually isolated in the fortress of Ulsan and underwent a long and brutal siege that lasted into 1598.
In the summer of 1598, Hideyoshi fell ill and summoned his most important vassals to his bedside. During August he established a council of regents (Tokugawa Ieyasu, Meada Toshiie, Môri Terumoto, Ukita Hideie, and Uesugi Kagekatsu) to rule while Hideyori came of age as well as a team of five administrators (bugyo) to handle domestic matters. These bugyô included Ishida Mitsunari, Natsuka Masaie, Maeda Gen-I, Mashita NagaMôri, and Asano Nagamasa. Each man was made to sign a pledge of loyalty to the five-year old Hideyori, providing the scene with an element of pathos. Hideyoshi insisted again and again that the five men he had chosen as regents (whom he hoped would keep one another in check) be loyal to Hideyori, and no doubt counted on Maeda Toshiie, the powerful lord of Kaga who was close to Hideyoshi and shared rural Owari roots. Finally, he succumbed to his illness and finally died on 18 September 1598. The war in Korea was called off and the peninsula abandoned; Maeda Toshiie died in 1599 and within two years of Hideyoshi’s death the council of regents would be broken and Tokugawa Ieyasu would rise supreme, assuming the title of shôgun in 1603. Hideyori resided in Osaka Castle until 1615. After two sieges (Winter and Summer, 1614 and 1615) by Tokugawa forces, he committed suicide, along with the Lady Yodo. The Toyotomi name was eliminated.
Toyotomi Hideyoshi was truly a remarkable figure, an anomalous character in the pageant of Japanese history that continues to provoke debate and study. Few Japanese leaders have attracted as much adulation and hero-worship from both scholars and the general public, to the extent that Hideyoshi is recreated, it seems, every twenty years in a new, ever-more relevant image. Eiji Yoshikawa, in his famous book Taikô (also published much more recently in America), presents Hideyoshi in the role of an infallible, spunky metaphor for the author’s idealized version of Japan itself. Mary Berry’s 1982 biography sifts through Hideyoshi’s career, attempting to place his decisions and activities in a manner compatible with modern assumptions regarding developments in Japanese history. Modern Japanese television dramas and novels continue to popularize Hideyoshi’s life (updated, of course, to account for more modern social standards), essentially regurgitating events portrayed in the Taikô sujoki and Taikô-ki, some of which are historically shaky, to say the least.
All of these tend to distract us from a clear and well-rounded picture of Toyotomi Hideyoshi the man. Hideyoshi is often portrayed as a hero, a shining figure and the progenitor of a golden age. The inconsistency his later actions create is often simply ignored. Yoshikawa, for instance, even in the original (unabridged) Taikô, elects to end the story prior to 1590, conveniently avoiding the less-than flattering events that follow. Furthermore, few works on Hideyoshi care to mention the almost unbelievable suffering his ill-advised invasions of Korea caused the Korean people. Few structures dated prior to 1592 can today be found anywhere in the country south of Pyongyang, a mute testimonial to the savagery of the war. One damaging result of Hideyoshi’s Korean endeavors to the Toyotomi house may have been that it denied him the sort of peace in which to cement his control over the country that Ieyasu would enjoy between 1600 and 1603. One of the subtle consequences of the Korean war was that it sapped the strength of those families who might be counted on to support the Toyotomi cause in the future while sparing the potential usurpers - namely, Tokugawa Ieyasu.
The Korean Invasions aside, Hideyoshi deserves much of his acclaim. More then Hôjô Soun, Saitô Dosan, or Takeda Shingen, Hideyoshi embodied the spirit of his age, and as fate would have it, was the one to bring it to a close. His policies and initiatives made the Tokugawa shogunate possible, shaping and changing Japanese history in ways still discernable today. For good or bad, Toyotomi Hideyoshi looms large in Japanese history, larger, perhaps, than any man before or since.’
Korea is definitely turning to the Right. Lee MyeungBak, the candidate for pro-America and pro-economy, is leading at the poll with high numbers, 54%.
Even Rho has approved the FTA between Korea and the US. And, only 5000 (Commies) showed up for the anti-FTA demonstration. Average Koreans are for the FTA.
Only bad thing about FTA is that average Koreans will not see the benefit. I expected the rice and the meat prices to be slashed by half.
It looks like that won’t happen any time soon. The US should insist on Korea opening up rice and meat market. Average Koreans drenched with Commie rhetorics will be against it at first, but when that goes through and the rice and meat become cheap they will sing Hallejuah to the US.
Some of us do believe Jesus has literally resurrected from the grave and has ascended to heaven after showing his resurrected body(can go through walls and eat fish) to his disciples.
We will know the truth when we die.
Till then, I will sing praises to my Risen Savior, Jesus the Christ.
“Even Rho has approved the FTA between Korea and the US. And, only 5000 (Commies) showed up for the anti-FTA demonstration. Average Koreans are for the FTA.”
I was surprised - in a good way - about the poor attendance at anti-FTA demonstrations, at least when compared to a lot of other protests over the past few years. Amazingly, Roh has managed to do something: a) popular and b) likely of benefit to Korea.
It won’t be anything new to 90%+ of the readers here, but I am hoping it will be surfed onto by those who don’t know about that stuff, and my ultimate hope is that they entice people to learn more and even more so hopefully donate a little money to the groups whose websites I highlight…
Baduk, I think prices will fall and Joe six-pack will see a positive improvement. By the way, Jesus popped out of his hole this morning, saw his shadow and returned. Does that mean six more weeks of basketball?
I’ve been thinking a lot about hospitals. Just spent 4 hours at Yonsei Severance Hospital’s emergency room where my wife was examined and probably further infected. An aggressive infection has hit her eyes, and it isn’t conjunctivitis. During her examination by the ophthalmologist he repeatedly put his fingers in her eyes. He didn’t wash his hands. There wasn’t a sink in the examination room. His hands weren’t gloved. There was a box of latex gloves in the examination room. While examining her I noticed the doctor rub his nose a few times. He had the sniffles. In the course of the examination he would roll over to the computer and type a few notes. The keyboard was your typical keyboard. Filthy. At one point he started sneezing. Of course he made no effort to cover his mouth. He should have probably been wearing a mask. Looked liked he had the flu. Continued typing away on the keyboard he just sneezed all over. And he returned, putting his fingers back in her eyes.
Seouldout, if I were you I would write the hospital a letter and ask for satisfaction. If they ignore you, go to the papers. That’s just fucking nasty.
Nah…..Drinking and smoking your balls off for 20 years weakens your esophagus and causes acid reflux. Once in that state your esophagus/stomach can no longer handle booze, smoking, chili pepper, garlic, onions, tomatoes, chocolate, caffeine, citrus fruits, carbonated drinks and deep fried/fatty foods. And then you either cut all that crap out or there’s a good chance you might end up (tits up) with esophagus/stomach cancer.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the comment sheriff. And the esteemed lurkers. And the new commenters.
It’s been a month or so since we were called off the playground, scolded, and told to get dressed for church. Has the number of daily hits increased? Is the number of new commenters registering greater that than before? Any VIPs?
man oh man! I just got off an hour’s worth of slogging through some boxing blogs following the latest weekend fights. Some of the sludge I had to wade through there makes the Hole seem like sunday school in comparison, even pre-sheriff. Some complete drivel there.
Personally, I like the readability of the Hole a tad more under the watchful eye of O-kay but that’s just me. At least it beats the inane tone of “which side of the pond has better boxers,” and with fewer spelling errors to boot ^^. Anyway, we still have the occassional booby links here to placate us after being scolded.
here’s a less biased look at korea’s fta with the us. this comes from ‘the australien’:
US-Korea agreement shows Australia is losing out in bilateral deals
Rowan Callick, China correspondent
April 09, 2007
THE international trade tide is turning in a dangerous direction for Australia.
The new deal carved out by the US and South Korea last week, just minutes before President George Bush’s trade negotiating powers expired, is a massive one.
Forecasts show two-way trade could surge from $US75 billion last year to $US100 billion ($122 billion) in a few years.
The Wall Street Journal said: “For Mr Bush, the deal shows that the US can forge a major trade pact with another industrial power, not just the smaller economies it has so far reached deals with, such as Chile, Jordan and Australia.”
Being patronised is not the worst part. It’s that the agreement leaves out rice, so Koreans will thus continue to eat, as a staple, rice that costs four times the international market price.
The lesson will not be lost on South Korea’s neighbours: yes, we can choose what precious sectors we protect and still make trade progress as the World Trade Organisation’s Doha round continues to flounder.
The worst scenario result of such a process could be impasse on the multilateral front and progress on the regional or bilateral fronts limited to areas that can be levered open by political muscle.
The big winners of the US-Korea deal are American farmers and Korean manufacturers, especially car makers - with a long list of exemptions and caveats which has yet to be published in detail. This matters intensely to Australia for two reasons.
First, because South Korea is our third largest export market. It’s big, and could be bigger, with an economy that is advanced but still growing at 5 per cent a year. Last financial year we sold $11.7 billion in goods there and bought in return $6.5 billion.
Commodities, led by coal, oil, iron ore, liquefied natural gas, sugar and wheat dominate Australia’s merchandise sales. Services exports comprise another $1.5 billion - an obvious area for potential growth.
Beef is another promising sector. But now our biggest rival, the US, has got in first, winning an end to a boycott and a steady lowering of a 40 per cent tariff. And the relationship with Korea has never warmed, remaining very remote.
This, as we have feared ever since a crushing combination of European, American and developing world intransigence halted the multilateral opening of markets, means that it will become ever harder for Australia to broaden its export base.
The big-ticket items in which Australia is among the world leaders and for which demand continues to rise - like the resources we ship to China, for example - will be unaffected. But for the rest the going is starting to get tougher.
The continued firm prospects for minerals effectively takes some of Australia’s biggest companies out of the picture when it comes to lobbying for better trade deals.
What are the chances now of the farming, manufacturing and services sectors managing to gain better access than their rivals in other countries to our most promising markets?
The Howard Government has done its best to put them in the frame. Japan is Australia’s top export destination, with $31 billion of goods in the last financial year, and China is second, buying $18 billion.
Free trade agreement negotiations have been under way for a couple of years with China and have just started with Japan. And the feasibility of FTA talks with South Korea is now being examined by both sides.
In all, north Asia - including Hong Kong and Taiwan - buys half Australia’s exports. The stakes couldn’t be higher for an open, trade-driven nation like ours.
The free trade purists like Professor Ross Garnaut rightly point to the major benefits coming from opening your own economy, even more than from gaining special access elsewhere.
This lesson has been taken on board over the years since Garnaut played a key role in advising the Hawke government to open the windows back in 1983 - to the extent that, in the FTA game of tit-for-tat bargaining, we don’t have so much to give away.
But our north Asian negotiating partners are likely to become less susceptible to listening to the case for openness, each time a “dirty” deal is cut, like the new one that enables Seoul to lock out efficient American rice growers.
Despite the impressive efforts put in by the Australian negotiating team with China, led by Ric Wells, and the disciplined “Australia Inc” support from most of the business world, progress has been almost imperceptible.
Chinese leaders keep stressing the “complementarity” of our economies - code for keep shipping us your commodities; what we really want is guaranteed access and below-market prices.
China has signed a succession of dirty FTAs with eager partners that cut out whole sectors. Services and investment are usually missing entirely. And agriculture is also usually only very partially opened, despite the Government’s contradictory commitment to modernising the sector, where most Chinese are occupied.
Recently, Australian Oxfam applauded this protection of Chinese farmers, opposing Australian access to Chinese agricultural markets. There are indeed reasons to empathise with these often dirt-poor 800 million people, though whether maintaining the great wall around China’s rural sector is in their long-term interests is another matter.
New Zealand will conclude its own “dirty” FTA with China before Australia. But it lacks the range of interests that Australia needs to consider and will be delighted just to get its dominant dairy industry better placed. This would of course cause our own dairy farmers grief, but that’s the nature of the FTA game.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said in Beijing at the end of last week that in official talks the Chinese said that they, like the Australians, viewed the visit of President Hu Jintao in September - to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation summit, followed by a state visit - “as an opportunity to take some significant steps forward”.
This would be very welcome. But it is now impossible for a deal that is truly comprehensive to be concluded by then. Downer rightly added that he had never said it would be easy. It is actually becoming harder, as trade and foreign investment slide down the list of priorities in China, whose leadership is now more focused on the domestic economy.
Downer pointed out that obtaining better access to services - 70 per cent of the Australian economy but only 14 per cent of our total exports to China, with two-thirds coming from students - would comprise the biggest single gain, with agriculture also especially important.
He said of the new Korea-US FTA: “We want these agreements to be comprehensive and if certain agricultural commodities are left off, that can be used by others as a precedent and doesn’t make it any easier for us.”
Progress with Japan could even steadily overtake that with China. But few Australian businesses are even aware we’re talking to Japan - which, bizarrely, has been all but written off by most non-resources sectors even as it approaches something of a boom.
A recent DHL survey showed that just 13 per cent of businesses knew of the Japan FTA talks, compared with 44 per cent who knew of the China negotiations. Austrade chief economist Tim Harcourt says Japan’s demographics are working in Australia’s favour, with the feminising of the population. “If you think Bill Clinton’s ’soccer moms’ were important in 1996, just wait until you see the economic and political influence of Japanese women in future years.” The whole lifestyle sector, formerly closed, is being opened up to foreign trade and investment.
But the US-Korea deal is now stimulating Japan to look to talks with the US, linking the world’s top two economies. Trade Minister Akira Amari compared it with the arrival of the US fleet that triggered the opening of feudal Japan in the 1850s. “It is like a ‘black-ship’ effect. I think it will be a stimulus to gather everyone’s wisdom so that we will not be left behind as other countries pursue more and more free trade pacts.”
The talks with Australia are thus increasingly being viewed in Tokyo as a valuable audition for potential negotiations with the US. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe talked of “using wisdom to be gained from a breakthrough in negotiations with Australia”. But our rice growers will be lucky to get a look in.
Morgan Stanley chief economist Stephen Roach warned last week that “the US Congress now appears to be on a firm course to enact anti-China protectionist legislation. Increased trade frictions can take the world down a very slippery slope. Rising protectionist risks could well be the biggest macro event in many a year. Yet the overwhelming majority of investors remain steeped in denial.”
Leading Hong Kong-based business commentator Philip Bowring said the “defensive” US-Korea deal “makes the global reform of farm trade less likely than ever”.
And it has to be said: Australia’s sugar-free agreement with the US hardly helped this woeful prospect.
””’
i wanted to provide this article as a contrast to the coverage you usually find here.
A better question is “Did anyone READ the article about Hideyoshi?” I rarely read comments longer than a couple of paragraphs unless the poster is a “must read.”
Ban: Let’s just take a looksee … hmmm
Click on that one…WTF??!?!? He’s got two naked Korean women taking a bath ??? I can’t make out what they’re saying … they must be Norks!
Kim: No, sir, those are just naked Filipinas, they’re speaking Tagalog.
Ban: Well, some Cholla farmer will be a happy man tonight! Now, let’s see what nulji has to say… ah feck him! At times like this only baduk’s sage advice will do!
“Kim is China’s bitch! Nuke him!”
Well, there’s our answer right there! Call Bushie, Kim …
that’s too bad, sonagi. if you read the article i posted, it would go a long way in explaining why the japanese revere hideyoshi.
anyway, i really posted it for future reference when some expat makes another attempt to tell us that the koreans won the imjin war only because of china. owen, you out there?
and would you not call me ‘oppa’ in the future? ‘pawi’ is just fine.
As for your question, if you choose to believe that “Koreans” “won” a war in which the entire peninsula south of Pyongyang was completely devastated and the north was saved only by the Chinese victory in the second battle of Pyongyang (after the Koreans had lost every significant land battle in the war) and the rest of Japanese occupation forced were ejected by force of Chinese arms, then I salute your capacity for self-deception. And I don’t mean to take anything away from the justifiably celebrated martial accomplishments of Admiral Yi, whose successes at Busan and the southwest coast in interdicting Hideyoshi’s lines of supply in the initial push north, did contribute to slowing the Japanese advance long enough for Chinese force to be effectively deployed thus creating the initial stalemate that eventuated in Japanese withdrawal. In terms of Korean history, as distinct from the biography of Yi, of course, the most interesting thing is the way in which Korea nearly prevented Yi from even having the opportunity to do his thing.
29 Comments
this is something i found intersting from a guy who likes to study japanese samurai. the following is about hideyoshi and the imjin war:
‘Unfortunately for Hideyoshi’s dreams of true ascendancy, the Korean expedition bogged down after initially impressive gains. In May Seoul had been occupied, and on 16 June Konishi Yukinaga marched into Pyongyang. At the same time, Kato Kiyomasa was driving hard up the eastern half of the peninsula and would even cross briefly into Manchuria. Within four months, then, Japanese forces had cleared a road into China. Three factors would combine to slam that door shut: Koran guerillas, the arrival of large numbers of Chinese troops around Pyongyang, and the Korean Navy, which under Admiral Yi Sun Shin proved almost invincible. Admiral Yi inflicted a series of naval defeats on the Japanese that cut deeply into Hideyoshi’s logistical organization. Korean guerillas further harassed supply lines while tying down significant numbers of Japanese warriors behind the lines attempting to ferret them out. The Chinese, while not militarily the equal of the Japanese, outnumbered Konishi’s command and forced him to retreat from Pyongyang in February to avoid being isolated. Kato had no choice but to retreat as well, and by July the operation was clearly stalemated and in danger of ultimately developing into a complete disaster. Hideyoshi found it wise to negotiate, and stated that he would agree to a peace if, among other things, a daughter of the Ming Emperor was given to the Emperor of Japan. The Chinese, while probably amazed at the audacity of that demand (which, needless to say, was never fulfilled), agreed to a ceasefire. Hideyoshi, whose forces still controlled some territory in Korea’s southern-most province (Kyongsang), could boast to Luis Frois later that year that “he had already conquered the kingdom of Korea.” and that the Chinese “had sent him their submission”.4 He further demanded that Luzon show him obedience, threatening to invade if this was not done.
The birth of Hideyoshi’s second son, Hideyori, in 1593 both distracted the Taikô from the depressing results of his Korean misadventure and created another problem. The threatening clouds of a potential succession struggle must have haunted Hideyoshi, who had already named Hidetsugu heir and yet devoted himself to Hideyori. The matter was brutally decided in 1595, when in August Hidetsugu was exiled to Mount Koya and then ordered to commit suicide. Those of his family who did not follow suit were murdered en mass in Kyoto, including 31 women and a number of infant sons and daughters. The specific reasons behind Hidetsugu’s fall are entirely unclear, so much more the reasons for the excessive brutality with which Hideyoshi treated the family. Scholars continue to make assertions regarding this event; in truth, the specifics will never be more then a matter of speculation, except that a possible succession dispute had been dealt with. On 19 March 1597 Hideyoshi ordered a resumption of the war in Korea after the Chinese had disregarded Hideyoshi’s demands for a princess and actually acknowledged him as the ‘King of Japan’, a humiliating incident for Hideyoshi. While a man known for his skill at negotiating, nothing in Hideyoshi’s record leads one to believe that he ever entered a negotiation without intending to get everything he wanted.
This 2nd Korean Invasion was almost perfunctory, and the Japanese bogged down without having seen any significant gains beyond the capture of Namwon in August. At this same time, Hideyoshi and Hideyori were amusing themselves at Osaka with the spectacle of an elephant provided by the Spanish (perhaps to smooth over relations). The ‘Miracle of Myongyang’ on 19 September, in which 16 ships under Yi Sun Shin defeated a Japanese fleet of 133 vessels, probably sealed the fortunes of the invasion. Kato Kiyomasa and Asano Yukinaga were actually isolated in the fortress of Ulsan and underwent a long and brutal siege that lasted into 1598.
In the summer of 1598, Hideyoshi fell ill and summoned his most important vassals to his bedside. During August he established a council of regents (Tokugawa Ieyasu, Meada Toshiie, Môri Terumoto, Ukita Hideie, and Uesugi Kagekatsu) to rule while Hideyori came of age as well as a team of five administrators (bugyo) to handle domestic matters. These bugyô included Ishida Mitsunari, Natsuka Masaie, Maeda Gen-I, Mashita NagaMôri, and Asano Nagamasa. Each man was made to sign a pledge of loyalty to the five-year old Hideyori, providing the scene with an element of pathos. Hideyoshi insisted again and again that the five men he had chosen as regents (whom he hoped would keep one another in check) be loyal to Hideyori, and no doubt counted on Maeda Toshiie, the powerful lord of Kaga who was close to Hideyoshi and shared rural Owari roots. Finally, he succumbed to his illness and finally died on 18 September 1598. The war in Korea was called off and the peninsula abandoned; Maeda Toshiie died in 1599 and within two years of Hideyoshi’s death the council of regents would be broken and Tokugawa Ieyasu would rise supreme, assuming the title of shôgun in 1603. Hideyori resided in Osaka Castle until 1615. After two sieges (Winter and Summer, 1614 and 1615) by Tokugawa forces, he committed suicide, along with the Lady Yodo. The Toyotomi name was eliminated.
Toyotomi Hideyoshi was truly a remarkable figure, an anomalous character in the pageant of Japanese history that continues to provoke debate and study. Few Japanese leaders have attracted as much adulation and hero-worship from both scholars and the general public, to the extent that Hideyoshi is recreated, it seems, every twenty years in a new, ever-more relevant image. Eiji Yoshikawa, in his famous book Taikô (also published much more recently in America), presents Hideyoshi in the role of an infallible, spunky metaphor for the author’s idealized version of Japan itself. Mary Berry’s 1982 biography sifts through Hideyoshi’s career, attempting to place his decisions and activities in a manner compatible with modern assumptions regarding developments in Japanese history. Modern Japanese television dramas and novels continue to popularize Hideyoshi’s life (updated, of course, to account for more modern social standards), essentially regurgitating events portrayed in the Taikô sujoki and Taikô-ki, some of which are historically shaky, to say the least.
All of these tend to distract us from a clear and well-rounded picture of Toyotomi Hideyoshi the man. Hideyoshi is often portrayed as a hero, a shining figure and the progenitor of a golden age. The inconsistency his later actions create is often simply ignored. Yoshikawa, for instance, even in the original (unabridged) Taikô, elects to end the story prior to 1590, conveniently avoiding the less-than flattering events that follow. Furthermore, few works on Hideyoshi care to mention the almost unbelievable suffering his ill-advised invasions of Korea caused the Korean people. Few structures dated prior to 1592 can today be found anywhere in the country south of Pyongyang, a mute testimonial to the savagery of the war. One damaging result of Hideyoshi’s Korean endeavors to the Toyotomi house may have been that it denied him the sort of peace in which to cement his control over the country that Ieyasu would enjoy between 1600 and 1603. One of the subtle consequences of the Korean war was that it sapped the strength of those families who might be counted on to support the Toyotomi cause in the future while sparing the potential usurpers - namely, Tokugawa Ieyasu.
The Korean Invasions aside, Hideyoshi deserves much of his acclaim. More then Hôjô Soun, Saitô Dosan, or Takeda Shingen, Hideyoshi embodied the spirit of his age, and as fate would have it, was the one to bring it to a close. His policies and initiatives made the Tokugawa shogunate possible, shaping and changing Japanese history in ways still discernable today. For good or bad, Toyotomi Hideyoshi looms large in Japanese history, larger, perhaps, than any man before or since.’
“”My wife is eight months pregnant, and he’s been asking, ‘Is that what mommy’s going to have?’” said Frank Doll, 31, of Mastic.”
Read the whole story about a movie mix-up here:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200....._mistake_2
Korea is definitely turning to the Right. Lee MyeungBak, the candidate for pro-America and pro-economy, is leading at the poll with high numbers, 54%.
Even Rho has approved the FTA between Korea and the US. And, only 5000 (Commies) showed up for the anti-FTA demonstration. Average Koreans are for the FTA.
Only bad thing about FTA is that average Koreans will not see the benefit. I expected the rice and the meat prices to be slashed by half.
It looks like that won’t happen any time soon. The US should insist on Korea opening up rice and meat market. Average Koreans drenched with Commie rhetorics will be against it at first, but when that goes through and the rice and meat become cheap they will sing Hallejuah to the US.
Everybody likes cheap foods.
Happy Easter to everyone.
Some of us do believe Jesus has literally resurrected from the grave and has ascended to heaven after showing his resurrected body(can go through walls and eat fish) to his disciples.
We will know the truth when we die.
Till then, I will sing praises to my Risen Savior, Jesus the Christ.
“Even Rho has approved the FTA between Korea and the US. And, only 5000 (Commies) showed up for the anti-FTA demonstration. Average Koreans are for the FTA.”
I was surprised - in a good way - about the poor attendance at anti-FTA demonstrations, at least when compared to a lot of other protests over the past few years. Amazingly, Roh has managed to do something: a) popular and b) likely of benefit to Korea.
After a year of having it in mind, I’ve gotten enough time and space to work on some North Korea Human Rights videos which I’ve posted at You Tube.
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=NorthKoreaHR
It won’t be anything new to 90%+ of the readers here, but I am hoping it will be surfed onto by those who don’t know about that stuff, and my ultimate hope is that they entice people to learn more and even more so hopefully donate a little money to the groups whose websites I highlight…
yup-gi-juk-in Noh Moo Hyun.
re: KORUS FTA.
Baduk, I think prices will fall and Joe six-pack will see a positive improvement. By the way, Jesus popped out of his hole this morning, saw his shadow and returned. Does that mean six more weeks of basketball?
“Mummy! Mummy! The goldfish left a lincoln log in my sock drawer!”
“That’s the story of Jesus, dear.”
Bill Hicks explains Easter
?
I’ve been thinking a lot about hospitals. Just spent 4 hours at Yonsei Severance Hospital’s emergency room where my wife was examined and probably further infected. An aggressive infection has hit her eyes, and it isn’t conjunctivitis. During her examination by the ophthalmologist he repeatedly put his fingers in her eyes. He didn’t wash his hands. There wasn’t a sink in the examination room. His hands weren’t gloved. There was a box of latex gloves in the examination room. While examining her I noticed the doctor rub his nose a few times. He had the sniffles. In the course of the examination he would roll over to the computer and type a few notes. The keyboard was your typical keyboard. Filthy. At one point he started sneezing. Of course he made no effort to cover his mouth. He should have probably been wearing a mask. Looked liked he had the flu. Continued typing away on the keyboard he just sneezed all over. And he returned, putting his fingers back in her eyes.
And I correct to assume his snot is medicinal?
Seouldout, if I were you I would write the hospital a letter and ask for satisfaction. If they ignore you, go to the papers. That’s just fucking nasty.
“Korean food causes cancer”
Nah…..Drinking and smoking your balls off for 20 years weakens your esophagus and causes acid reflux. Once in that state your esophagus/stomach can no longer handle booze, smoking, chili pepper, garlic, onions, tomatoes, chocolate, caffeine, citrus fruits, carbonated drinks and deep fried/fatty foods. And then you either cut all that crap out or there’s a good chance you might end up (tits up) with esophagus/stomach cancer.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the comment sheriff. And the esteemed lurkers. And the new commenters.
It’s been a month or so since we were called off the playground, scolded, and told to get dressed for church. Has the number of daily hits increased? Is the number of new commenters registering greater that than before? Any VIPs?
Just curious.
Happy Easter to you, Baduk.
man oh man! I just got off an hour’s worth of slogging through some boxing blogs following the latest weekend fights. Some of the sludge I had to wade through there makes the Hole seem like sunday school in comparison, even pre-sheriff. Some complete drivel there.
Personally, I like the readability of the Hole a tad more under the watchful eye of O-kay but that’s just me. At least it beats the inane tone of “which side of the pond has better boxers,” and with fewer spelling errors to boot ^^. Anyway, we still have the occassional booby links here to placate us after being scolded.
Baduk, re: #4: I am with you all the way on this one. Happy Easter.
here’s a less biased look at korea’s fta with the us. this comes from ‘the australien’:
US-Korea agreement shows Australia is losing out in bilateral deals
Rowan Callick, China correspondent
April 09, 2007
THE international trade tide is turning in a dangerous direction for Australia.
The new deal carved out by the US and South Korea last week, just minutes before President George Bush’s trade negotiating powers expired, is a massive one.
Forecasts show two-way trade could surge from $US75 billion last year to $US100 billion ($122 billion) in a few years.
The Wall Street Journal said: “For Mr Bush, the deal shows that the US can forge a major trade pact with another industrial power, not just the smaller economies it has so far reached deals with, such as Chile, Jordan and Australia.”
Being patronised is not the worst part. It’s that the agreement leaves out rice, so Koreans will thus continue to eat, as a staple, rice that costs four times the international market price.
The lesson will not be lost on South Korea’s neighbours: yes, we can choose what precious sectors we protect and still make trade progress as the World Trade Organisation’s Doha round continues to flounder.
The worst scenario result of such a process could be impasse on the multilateral front and progress on the regional or bilateral fronts limited to areas that can be levered open by political muscle.
The big winners of the US-Korea deal are American farmers and Korean manufacturers, especially car makers - with a long list of exemptions and caveats which has yet to be published in detail. This matters intensely to Australia for two reasons.
First, because South Korea is our third largest export market. It’s big, and could be bigger, with an economy that is advanced but still growing at 5 per cent a year. Last financial year we sold $11.7 billion in goods there and bought in return $6.5 billion.
Commodities, led by coal, oil, iron ore, liquefied natural gas, sugar and wheat dominate Australia’s merchandise sales. Services exports comprise another $1.5 billion - an obvious area for potential growth.
Beef is another promising sector. But now our biggest rival, the US, has got in first, winning an end to a boycott and a steady lowering of a 40 per cent tariff. And the relationship with Korea has never warmed, remaining very remote.
This, as we have feared ever since a crushing combination of European, American and developing world intransigence halted the multilateral opening of markets, means that it will become ever harder for Australia to broaden its export base.
The big-ticket items in which Australia is among the world leaders and for which demand continues to rise - like the resources we ship to China, for example - will be unaffected. But for the rest the going is starting to get tougher.
The continued firm prospects for minerals effectively takes some of Australia’s biggest companies out of the picture when it comes to lobbying for better trade deals.
What are the chances now of the farming, manufacturing and services sectors managing to gain better access than their rivals in other countries to our most promising markets?
The Howard Government has done its best to put them in the frame. Japan is Australia’s top export destination, with $31 billion of goods in the last financial year, and China is second, buying $18 billion.
Free trade agreement negotiations have been under way for a couple of years with China and have just started with Japan. And the feasibility of FTA talks with South Korea is now being examined by both sides.
In all, north Asia - including Hong Kong and Taiwan - buys half Australia’s exports. The stakes couldn’t be higher for an open, trade-driven nation like ours.
The free trade purists like Professor Ross Garnaut rightly point to the major benefits coming from opening your own economy, even more than from gaining special access elsewhere.
This lesson has been taken on board over the years since Garnaut played a key role in advising the Hawke government to open the windows back in 1983 - to the extent that, in the FTA game of tit-for-tat bargaining, we don’t have so much to give away.
But our north Asian negotiating partners are likely to become less susceptible to listening to the case for openness, each time a “dirty” deal is cut, like the new one that enables Seoul to lock out efficient American rice growers.
Despite the impressive efforts put in by the Australian negotiating team with China, led by Ric Wells, and the disciplined “Australia Inc” support from most of the business world, progress has been almost imperceptible.
Chinese leaders keep stressing the “complementarity” of our economies - code for keep shipping us your commodities; what we really want is guaranteed access and below-market prices.
China has signed a succession of dirty FTAs with eager partners that cut out whole sectors. Services and investment are usually missing entirely. And agriculture is also usually only very partially opened, despite the Government’s contradictory commitment to modernising the sector, where most Chinese are occupied.
Recently, Australian Oxfam applauded this protection of Chinese farmers, opposing Australian access to Chinese agricultural markets. There are indeed reasons to empathise with these often dirt-poor 800 million people, though whether maintaining the great wall around China’s rural sector is in their long-term interests is another matter.
New Zealand will conclude its own “dirty” FTA with China before Australia. But it lacks the range of interests that Australia needs to consider and will be delighted just to get its dominant dairy industry better placed. This would of course cause our own dairy farmers grief, but that’s the nature of the FTA game.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said in Beijing at the end of last week that in official talks the Chinese said that they, like the Australians, viewed the visit of President Hu Jintao in September - to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation summit, followed by a state visit - “as an opportunity to take some significant steps forward”.
This would be very welcome. But it is now impossible for a deal that is truly comprehensive to be concluded by then. Downer rightly added that he had never said it would be easy. It is actually becoming harder, as trade and foreign investment slide down the list of priorities in China, whose leadership is now more focused on the domestic economy.
Downer pointed out that obtaining better access to services - 70 per cent of the Australian economy but only 14 per cent of our total exports to China, with two-thirds coming from students - would comprise the biggest single gain, with agriculture also especially important.
He said of the new Korea-US FTA: “We want these agreements to be comprehensive and if certain agricultural commodities are left off, that can be used by others as a precedent and doesn’t make it any easier for us.”
Progress with Japan could even steadily overtake that with China. But few Australian businesses are even aware we’re talking to Japan - which, bizarrely, has been all but written off by most non-resources sectors even as it approaches something of a boom.
A recent DHL survey showed that just 13 per cent of businesses knew of the Japan FTA talks, compared with 44 per cent who knew of the China negotiations. Austrade chief economist Tim Harcourt says Japan’s demographics are working in Australia’s favour, with the feminising of the population. “If you think Bill Clinton’s ’soccer moms’ were important in 1996, just wait until you see the economic and political influence of Japanese women in future years.” The whole lifestyle sector, formerly closed, is being opened up to foreign trade and investment.
But the US-Korea deal is now stimulating Japan to look to talks with the US, linking the world’s top two economies. Trade Minister Akira Amari compared it with the arrival of the US fleet that triggered the opening of feudal Japan in the 1850s. “It is like a ‘black-ship’ effect. I think it will be a stimulus to gather everyone’s wisdom so that we will not be left behind as other countries pursue more and more free trade pacts.”
The talks with Australia are thus increasingly being viewed in Tokyo as a valuable audition for potential negotiations with the US. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe talked of “using wisdom to be gained from a breakthrough in negotiations with Australia”. But our rice growers will be lucky to get a look in.
Morgan Stanley chief economist Stephen Roach warned last week that “the US Congress now appears to be on a firm course to enact anti-China protectionist legislation. Increased trade frictions can take the world down a very slippery slope. Rising protectionist risks could well be the biggest macro event in many a year. Yet the overwhelming majority of investors remain steeped in denial.”
Leading Hong Kong-based business commentator Philip Bowring said the “defensive” US-Korea deal “makes the global reform of farm trade less likely than ever”.
And it has to be said: Australia’s sugar-free agreement with the US hardly helped this woeful prospect.
””’
i wanted to provide this article as a contrast to the coverage you usually find here.
btw, concerning the article about hideyoshi, does anyone disagree with anything that is written within the article? owen?
@Pawi Oppa:
A better question is “Did anyone READ the article about Hideyoshi?” I rarely read comments longer than a couple of paragraphs unless the poster is a “must read.”
Judge Judy wrote:
Scene: U.N. Secretary General’s Situation Room
[Enter Gen. Sec. Ban Ki-moon]
Flunky: Sir, intelligence claims our comrades to the Nor^H^H^H the Norks are going to test a second nuclear bomb within 24 hrs.!!!
Ban: Get a grip on yourself, Mr. Kim! Let’s just all be calm…
Kim: What are we going to do?!?? It will start WWIII!!! Gaaaaaaah….
Ban: I know! Get your laptop plugged in and let’s see what Koehler has to say …
[Kim types http://www.rjkoehler.com on his laptop]
Ban: Let’s just take a looksee … hmmm
Click on that one…WTF??!?!? He’s got two naked Korean women taking a bath ??? I can’t make out what they’re saying … they must be Norks!
Kim: No, sir, those are just naked Filipinas, they’re speaking Tagalog.
Ban: Well, some Cholla farmer will be a happy man tonight! Now, let’s see what nulji has to say… ah feck him! At times like this only baduk’s sage advice will do!
“Kim is China’s bitch! Nuke him!”
Well, there’s our answer right there! Call Bushie, Kim …
…And happy Easter to you, Baduk, and to JK and everyone else.
Happy Easter to you also, sewing….and to EVERYONE.
that’s too bad, sonagi. if you read the article i posted, it would go a long way in explaining why the japanese revere hideyoshi.
anyway, i really posted it for future reference when some expat makes another attempt to tell us that the koreans won the imjin war only because of china. owen, you out there?
and would you not call me ‘oppa’ in the future? ‘pawi’ is just fine.
Interesting quote, goose; what’s the source?
As for your question, if you choose to believe that “Koreans” “won” a war in which the entire peninsula south of Pyongyang was completely devastated and the north was saved only by the Chinese victory in the second battle of Pyongyang (after the Koreans had lost every significant land battle in the war) and the rest of Japanese occupation forced were ejected by force of Chinese arms, then I salute your capacity for self-deception. And I don’t mean to take anything away from the justifiably celebrated martial accomplishments of Admiral Yi, whose successes at Busan and the southwest coast in interdicting Hideyoshi’s lines of supply in the initial push north, did contribute to slowing the Japanese advance long enough for Chinese force to be effectively deployed thus creating the initial stalemate that eventuated in Japanese withdrawal. In terms of Korean history, as distinct from the biography of Yi, of course, the most interesting thing is the way in which Korea nearly prevented Yi from even having the opportunity to do his thing.
‘interesting quote, goose….’ sperwer
‘if you believe koreans ‘won’….’ sperwer
‘expats who say koreans only won because of china.’ pawi
you can’t see the nuance there? sure, you can. source? find it yourself. the page is out there if you look. and don’t call me ‘goose’ again, k?
‘nulji has to say.. feck him.’ dogbert
‘goose…’ sperwer
and yet, i can’t call a group of three a triad. why the double standard? when are you going to start implementing these rules fairly?
you know, i’ll give you the source so you can make sure that the guy who wrote the ‘hideyoshi’ article isn’t some korean or zainichi…
samurai-archives.com
btw, what’s your source?
Hawley’s Imjin War, among others
Kim is China’s bitch! Nuke him!
And, shoot him in the head repeatedly to make sure that he is dead. Total obliteration of head is allowed.
Korea had suffered enough under Kim IlSung and Kim Jongil. They are like DaDa Amin.
Just kill ‘em. Kill ‘em good.
LOL Baduk… Kill the head! Kill the head!
Don’t worry, Corey Corona is keeping an eye on Kim:
http://www.nrojr.gov./NROjr/index.htm