Die meisten westlichen Leser kennen Admirale wie Horatio Nelson oder Francis Drake, aber nur sehr wenige wissen etwas über Admiral Yi Sun-sin, einen koreanischen Marinekommandanten, der im späten 16. Jahrhundert zahlreiche Gefechte ohne eine einzige Niederlage bestritt.
Das Besondere an Yi ist, dass sein Leben und seine Taten sehr früh von Menschen dokumentiert wurden, die ihn direkt beobachteten, und ungewöhnlich detaillierte Berichte über seine Führung während der japanischen Invasionen in Korea (1592–1598) lieferten. Diese frühen Aufzeichnungen beschreiben nicht nur seine bekannten Seesiege, sondern auch seine Verwaltungsarbeit, seine Problemlösung unter starkem Druck und die Art und Weise, wie er eine beschädigte Flotte in Momenten wieder aufbaute, in denen ein Zusammenbruch unvermeidlich schien.
Berichte aus dieser Zeit zeigen ihn als:
- ein äußerst disziplinierter Anführer,
- ein Stratege, der sich schnell angepasst hat,
- jemand, der in der Lage ist, Streitkräfte unter extremen Umständen zu organisieren und auszubilden,
- und eine Persönlichkeit, deren Pflichterfüllung den Verlauf des Krieges prägte.
Seine Fähigkeit, wiederholt Flotten zu konfrontieren, die um ein Vielfaches größer sind, hat einige Historiker zu der Ansicht veranlasst, dass Yi Sun-sin neben oder sogar über bekannteren Marinekommandanten der Weltgeschichte Anerkennung verdienen könnte.
Wenn jemand daran interessiert ist, über die ostasiatische Seekriegsführung, die während des Imjin-Krieges angewandten Taktiken oder den breiteren geopolitischen Kontext Ostasiens im 16. Jahrhundert zu diskutieren, würde ich mich freuen, Ihre Gedanken zu hören oder Fragen zu beantworten.
https://www.reddit.com/gallery/1s204fo
19 Kommentare
Because 1) Asian history is generally poorly understood in the West and 2) Japan-washing of history
he is often talked about recently as korean history is being a point of interest nowadays. He’s often ranked one of the best admirals of history.
Because during that time, no insta no Twitter no Naver no kaokao no Google to spread the word haha jk
As a popular stand up said „local jokes get local laughs“. Admiral Yi fought hard and beat Japan despite being out numbered. That being said, I didn’t know about El Cid until I played Empires.
International interest in Korean history in general had been pretty low up until very recently because the country itself was quite overshadowed by China and Japan, culturally and economically, from the Western point of view. Think of it this way – when you’re thinking about history of the African continent, you may know a bit about Egypt, but how about, say, Botswana? (Apologies to anyone who’s from there…)
As someone who grew up in North America for several years, it came as quite a bit of shock when the textbook I received in the World History class illustrated the timeline of Korea as starting in 1945. Yeah, it basically didn’t treat it as an independent country before then. And no, it’s not like there was a line before 1910, either. That’s the sort of world view that you’re running up against.
Most Western readers vaguely recognize the names Horatio Nelson and Francis Drake.
To be fair, I don’t think the average westerner can name a single famous admiral (east or west) if you put them on the spot. In terms of overall military leaders, generally the famous ones are conquerors…. Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, etc.
Who is the Japanese Admiral that never lost a battle?
Who is the British Admiral that never lost a battle?
Who is the Indian Marati General that never lost a battle?
You don’t know because you haven’t looked it up, the same as other people in the world. Also „never lost a battle“ is kind of a broad statement. If you only had 10 battles and never lost, thats just the same as being undefeated too. There are many many „undefeated“ military leaders out there. But he still is pretty cool and so is his turtle ship.
Look at the history textbooks of the curriculum of schools around the world. It’s not just Yi that’s missing, but rather, it’s most, if not the entirety, of the Korean history that’s missing.
On the other hand, history nerds and military enthusiasts do tend to know Yi.
Gotta thank Extra History a lot for making many non korean history fans knowing Yi Sunsin, I’m sure the majority of them know him cause of the Admiral Yi series.
1.Korea doesn’t have the same influence as Britan or US.
2. It was a reletively small battle during short period of time agaisnt, despite great number, highly untrained marine combatant. (Still an amazing feat but not as impossible as it sounds)
3. It’s just history of another country. No real reason to know about. Vast majority of koreans probably also don’t really know about horatio nelson(at least i’ve only heard of their name)
4. Despite all this, Yi is still quite well known. The fact that he is sometimes talked about still surprises me.
Honestly, how many admirals are well known?
Age of Empire 2 players know him. I barely know who Francis Drake is, some English sailor I assume. People like land conquerors, naval commanders were never popular except in very naval oriented countries like the UK.
:Here something interesting US Naval Institute published in July **1929**
[https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1929/july/naval-hero-korea](https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1929/july/naval-hero-korea)
People were not interested in Korea until very recently. Most of the Western scholars who bothered to study Asia at all focused all their efforts on Japan and China.
Additionally most of the greatest generals in history are known for their battles against armies from various nations. YSS‘ exploits were mostly against just the Japanese. Who knows, maybe if he faced other nations‘ armies and won against them he would be better known and more talked about.
Never knew who he was until a couple years ago when I watched “The Admiral: Roaring Currents”. Growing up most of my history lessons about Korea came from the TV show MASH. It wasn’t until later in life that I started to dive into Korea’s history.
In school most history lessons were focused on Europe, with a semester or two glancing over Russia and China. And it didn’t help, my history teacher was also the basketball coach, so most of the lesson time was talking about sports.
While impressive, the battles were part of a war that was mainly a Japan vs Korea affair that had a limited impact outside of these two countries. Trafalgar was the beginning of the British empire and end of Napoleon, Tsushima was the beginning of Japan’s imperialist expansions across Asia which then were stopped at Midway.
because he didn’t conquer any countries. people remember conquerors, not so much defenders
Unknown? He’s very well known globally. I just googled „most famous admirals“ and he appears in almost all the lists. My results
* 2nd here https://www.warhistoryonline.com/featured/historys-best-admirals.html
* 2nd comment https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/dqj8hw/greatest_admiral_in_history/
* Not listed https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/dqj8hw/greatest_admiral_in_history/
* Only korean admiral here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fleet_and_grand_admirals
* 1st greatest admirals https://www.thetoptens.com/leaders/admirals-history/
* 1st Most battles won https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKib_P44I5c
* not listed https://worldhistoryedu.com/most-famous-admirals-of-all-time/
* 1 of 2 most important admirals ever meme https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/comments/14vn3pv/probably_the_two_best_admirals_ever/
6 out of 8 on my first list of US based English results seems pretty famous.
I mean, similar to the Gulf War where people don’t often talk about it compared to Iraq because it was over so quickly. The Gulf war isn’t really often remembered because the conflict was so one sided that it was over in a few months. Similarly, even though the Japanese had a numerical advantage, knowledge of the rivers, straights and ship types made the Battle one sided even before it began. It’s the equivalent of one M1 Abrams vs a Dozen WW1 Tankettes. Sure it would be cool to see them fight but you already know the ending
BTS should name a song, Admiral Yi. Interest will skyrocket.