The History of Korea (Vol.1&2). Homer B. Hulbert
by sea to sail up the Ta-dong River and attack P’yüng-yang. This was under the leadership of Gen. Nă Ho-a. Landing his force on the bank of the Ta-dong, sixty li below the city, he enjoyed there a signal victory over a small force which had been sent to head him off. This made the general over-confident and in spite of the protests of his lieutenants he marched on P‘yŭng-yang without an hour’s delay. With twenty thousand troops he went straight into the town, the gates being left wide open for him. This was a ruse on the part of the Ko-gu-ryŭ forces. A strong body of Ko-gu-ryŭ troops had hidden in a monastery in Nă-gwak Fort on the heights within the city. The Chinese found themselves entrapped and Gen. Nă was forced to beat a hasty retreat with what forces he had left, and at last got back to Hă-p’o (harbor) in Liao-tung. What the Emperor said to him is not known but it could not have been flattering.
The rainy season had now come and gone and the main plan of the invasion was ready to be worked out. It was necessary for the Emperor to spread out his force over the country in order to find forage, and so, in approaching the borders of Ko-gu-ryŭ, it was decided that they should come by several different routes. Gen. U Mun-sul led a detachment by way of Pu-yŭ, Gen. U Chung-mun by way of Nang-nang, Gen. Hyŭng Wŭn-hang by way of Yo-dong, Gen. Sŭl Se-ung by way of Ok-jŭ, Gen. Sin Se-ung by way of Hyŭn-do, Gen. Chang Keun by way of Yang-p’yăng, Gen. Cho Hyo-jă by way of Kal-sŭk, Gen. Ch’oe Hong-seung by way of Su-sung, Gen. Wi Mun-seung by way of Cheung-ji. It is said that they all rendezvoused on the western bank of the Yalu River, but if so there must have been great changes in the position of these wild tribes. It is more than probable that like the North American Indians they had moved further and further back from their original lands until they were far beyond the Yalu and Tumen rivers.
In the early autumn of 612 the whole army lay just east of the Yalu River.
The king of Ko-gu-ryŭ sent Gen. Eul-ji Mun-dŭk to the Chinese camp to tender the Emperor a pretense of surrender but in reality to spy out his position and force. When he appeared the Emperor was minded to kill him on the spot but thought better of it and, after listening to what he had to say, let him go. Not an hour after he had gotten beyond the Chinese pickets the Emperor changed his mind again and sent in pursuit of him; but the general had too good a start and made too good use of his time to allow himself to be retaken.
And now appeared one of the disadvantages of being far from one’s base of supplies, and in an enemy’s country. Some weeks before this each Chinese soldier had been given three bags of rice and told that he must carry them on the march, besides his other necessary accoutrements. Death was to the penalty of throwing any of it away. The result was that most of them buried a large part of the rice in their tents and so escaped detection. Now they were short of provisions, while the generals thought their knapsacks were full of rice. The Ko-gu-ryŭ Gen. Eul-ji, who had been in their camp, however, knew about it. He entered upon a geurillageurilla warfare with the object of luring the enemy far into Ko-gu-ryŭ territory and then cutting them to pieces at leisure. To this end he made a feigned retreat several times each day, thus giving the enemy confidence and blinding them to his own strength. It was decided that a Chinese force of 305,000 men under Gen. U Chung-mun should proceed straight to P’yŭng-yang. It seemed wholly unnecessary that the whole army of 1,130,000 men should undergo that long march when only a pusillanimous enemy barred the way.
On they came toward the capital without meeting anything but a few skirmishers, until they reached the Sal-su, a stream only thirty li from P’yŭng-yang. Crossing this the Chinese went into camp for a few days to recover from the fatigue of the rapid march before attacking the town.
At this point Gen. Eul-ji began operations. He wrote a very humble letter sueingsueing for mercy. When the Chinese general received this, his course of reasoning must have been something as follows: “My forces are completely exhausted by this long march; the provisions are almost gone; I shall find the capital defended by desperate men; it may be that I shall be handled as roughly as were the forces of Gen. Nă. I will accept this submission and start back in time to reach the Yalu before my provisions are entirely gone. I will thus spare my army and gain the desired end as well.”
Whether this was his course of reasoning or not, sure it is that he accepted the submission tendered him and put his army in motion toward the Yalu. But before his forces had gone a mile they found themselves attacked on all sides at once by an unseen foe which seemed to fill the forests on either side the road. When half the army had gotten across the Sal-su the other half was fiercely attacked and cut to pieces or driven like dumb cattle over the face of the country, where they were butchered at leisure. The retreat became a flight, the flight a rout, and still the Ko-gu-ryŭ soldiers hung on their flanks like wolves and dragged them down by scores and hundreds. It is said that in a single day and night the fugitive Chinese covered four hundredhundred and fifty li, and when the remnant of that noble army of 305,000 men that had swept across the Yalu went back across that historic stream it was just 2700 strong. Over 300,000 men had perished along the hill-sides and among the forests of Ko-gu-ryŭ. The Emperor in anger imprisoned the over-confident Gen. U Chung-mun.
Meanwhile what of Păk-je? She had promised that she would rise and strike Ko-gu-ryŭ simultaneously with the Emperor, but when the moment for action came, like the paltroonpaltroon that she was, she waited to see which side would be most likely to win in the end. When the Chinese fled back to the border in panic Păk-je quietly stacked her arms and said nothing about attacking her neighbor.
Winter was now at hand, or would be before another plan could be perfected and carried out. The army was without provisions. There was nothing left but to retreat. The Chinese army, still a mighty host, moved slowly back across the Liao River and Ko-gu-ryŭ was left to her own pleasant musings. All that China gained was that portion of Ko-gu-ryŭ lying west of the Liao River, which the Emperor erected into three prefectures.
If Ko-gu-ryŭ flattered herself that her troubles were all over she was wofully mistaken. With the opening of spring the Emperor’s determination to humble her was as strong as ever. All the courtiers urged him to give over the attempt. They had seen enough of Ko-gu-ryŭ. The Emperor, however, was firm in his determination, and in the fourth moon another army was launched against the hardy little kingdom to the east. It crossed the Liao without opposition but when it arrived at Tong-whang Fortress, near the present Eui-ju, it attempted in vain to take it. The Emperor decided therefore to make a thorough conquest of all the Liao-tung territory and delimit the possessions of Ko-gu-ryŭ as far as the Yalu River, To this end siege was laid to the Fortress of Liao-tung. After twenty days the town was still intact and the Chinese seemingly as far from victory as ever. Ladders were tried but without effect. A bank of earth was thrown upup as high as the wall of the town, but this too failed. Platforms of timber were erected and rolled up to the wall on trucks of eight wheels each. This seemed to promise success but just as the attempt was to be made fortune favored Ko-gu-ryŭ, for news came to the Chinese that an insurrection had arisen in China, headed by Yang Hyŭn-gam. The tents were hastily struck and the army by forced marches moved rapidly back towards China. At first the Ko-gu-ryŭ forces thought this was a mere feint but when the truth was known they rushed in pursuit and succeeded in putting several thousands of the Chinese braves hors de combat.
The following year the Emperor wanted to return to the charge but an envoy came from Ko-gu-ryŭ offering the king’s humble submission. To this the Emperor replied “Then let him come in person and present it.” This he would not do.
Four years later the king of Ko-gu-ryŭ died and his brother Kön-mu assumed control. It was in this same year 618 that the great T’ang dynasty was founded on the ruins of the Sui and the fear of vengeance was lifted from Ko-gu-ryŭ. She immediately sent an envoy to the T’ang court offering her allegiance. Păk-je and Sil-la were only a year behind her in paying their respects to the new Emperor. As a test of Ko-gu-ryŭ sincerity, Emperor Kao-tsu demanded that she send back the captives taken during the late war. As the price of peace Ko-gu-ryŭ complied and sent back 10,000 men. The next year the T’ang Emperor conferred the title of royalty upon all the three kings of the peninsula which, instead of settling the deadly feud between them, simply opened a new and final scene of the fratricidal struggle. To Ko-gu-ryŭ the Emperor sent books on the Shinto faith, of the introduction of which into Korea we here have the first intimation.
Now