Ch 6 - Koryo Under the Mongols

The Yuan Dynasty

The Koryo government gave up its struggle against the Mongols and returned the capital to Kaesong. Kublai Khan adopted the dynastic name "Yuan" and launched his first major invasion of Japan. After holding out for nearly twelve years, the Song Dynasty fell to Kublai Khan and his Mongol armies.

Koryo's military officer corps, whose own private armies formed the core of Mongol resistance and the foundation for military rule in Koryo, never supported the government's peace initiative with the Mongols. Any move toward such a peace seriously undermined their power. This opposition burst to into the open when Im Yon murdered Kim Chun, the unenthusiastic and pliable military officer who helped engineer the death of Ch'oe Ui in collusion with Yu Kyong and a group of civil bureaucrats in the coup of 1258. Im Yon realized that the perpetuation of military rule and the pursuit of resistance to the Mongols were inseparably linked and went after King Wonjong, the man who put Koryo's pro-Mongol policy into effect. Although he deposed Wonjong in a bloodless coup, it was too little, too late. Im Yon soon discovered that Koryo's improved relations had already reached the point where the country began to suffer from strong Mongol interference in its internal affairs. As a result, the military repeatedly failed in its attempts to stir up significant resistance to the Mongols.

The Ch'oe military regime's past abuses of Koryo's peasants decimated the national solidarity of the population. Having strangled its base of support, the military regime virtually ensured that the weakened and overburdened citizenry could no longer be rallied behind any policy of resistance. When military leader Im Yu-mu took the reigns of power from his father, Im Yon, after his father's death, he quickly discovered that just when he most needed the peasants, the very backing he depended on to resist the Mongols had virtually disappeared. The Mongols soon restored King Wonjong to the throne and, at his request, brought in Mongol troops to restore order. Wonjong quickly commanded Im Yu-mu's execution, and with his death, the barely flickering pulse of military rule in Koryo finally extinguished itself.

In 1270, the Koryo government gave up its struggle against the Mongols. It left the sanctuary of Kanghwa Island and returned the capital to Kaesong. The government even ordered the destruction of the defensive walls on Kanghwa Island as an outward sign of its intent to cease resistance. Koryo's military bitterly resented the return to Kaesong and immediately rose in revolt and created an anti-Mongol regime that stood in direct opposition to the government in Kaesong. The futile rebellion had little chance for success however, since the Koryo government now worked hand-in-hand with the Mongols. Within a period of three years, a combined force of Koryo-Mongol troops suppressed the rebellious military and virtually ended all effective resistance to Mongol rule in Koryo. Nevertheless, the hatred of foreign rule first demonstrated during the reign of the Silla kings showed itself again. It would not be the last time.

The year after Koryo fully submitted to Mongol domination, Kublai Khan, the Great Khakan, Ruler of the World, proclaimed the emergence of a new dynasty. He adopted the Chinese dynastic name Yuan, meaning "The First Beginning," or "The Origin," the first dynastic name not derived from a place name. This dramatic development not only wrenched the Mongol Empire in an entirely new direction, it altered the future destiny of Asia.

The Mongols set up Koryo as a springboard for the conquest of Japan by establishing a special unit formed to oversee the upcoming invasion, the Office for the Conquest of the East. As an ancillary duty, the Office for the Conquest of the East also provided a useful method of checking any independent tendencies of the Koryo court. Caught in the middle of the diplomatic tug of war between Japan and the Yuan imperial court in Khanbalik, the court of Koryo urged the Japanese to submit to Kublai Khan's demands. At the same time, they tried to persuade the Mongols of the extreme difficulty of launching a major invasion from Korea. Undeterred, the Mongols compelled a work force of some 35,000 men to begin construction of a massive fleet of nearly 900 ships. While readying for war, Kublai Khan sent a second embassy to Japan guided by Koryo officials. The Japanese dismissed the Mongol emissaries with even less ceremony than the first.

The Mongol invasion force comprised of Mongol cavalry and Chinese infantry assembled in Koryo during the spring and summer of 1274 and readied itself for war. Mongol General Hol Don commanded an army of 20,000 men, which was joined by 5,000 Koryo warriors under the command of General Kim Bang-gyong. By early fall, Kublai Khan's fleet sat anchored at the port of Masan on the southern end of the Korean peninsula, ready to take aboard tons of war materiel including supplies, foodstuffs, weapons, and siege equipment. On October 29, 1274, the huge invasion fleet set sail for Japan.

During the two week crossing of the 120 mile-wide Tsushima Strait, the invaders seized the small offshore islands of Tsushima and Iki. The armada reached the island of Kyushu on November 19, where it anchored at the Japanese port of Hakata near the modern city of Fukuoka.. The sudden appearance of massive Mongol cavalry formations charging off the beach came as an tremendous surprise to the Japanese defenders, whose own martial traditions called for single-handed combat between knightly warriors. In the day long battles that ensued, the Mongols effectively pushed the hastily assembled defending force several miles inland, captured several small outlying villages, and proceeded to assault the city of Hakata. The Japanese could do little but fight a fierce delaying action until reinforcements arrived from other parts of Kyushu and the main island of Honshu.

As fierce fighting raged throughout the day along and behind the beaches of Hakata Bay, gradually worsening weather captured the attention of senior Koryo captains aboard ships in the harbor. These experienced mariners, men who knew well the vagaries of autumn weather in the Tsushima Strait, read the signs of an approaching typhoon. If the storm caught them still anchored in the harbor their ships would be battered on the rocks. The captains succeeded in convincing reluctant Mongol commanders that their only salvation was to recall their forces immediately, load them aboard the ships and sail to open water. The fleet hurriedly weighed anchor and scattered into the Tsushima Strait. A violent storm broke across the southern end of the Japanese islands by sundown, washing the battlefield with strong winds and driving rains. The Japanese had resigned themselves to a last-ditch defense of their homeland, but at dawn the next morning they were both amazed and delighted to see the last few ships of the Mongol armada sailing out of Hakata's harbor headed for home. The disastrous invasion attempt cost the Mongols nearly 13,000 casualties.

The Japanese felt no smugness about their military prowess after the stunning Mongol invasion. After sober reflection, the Japanese found their first test in battle against the Mongols to be less than encouraging. Furthermore, the surprising turn of events surrounding the Mongol's departure left the dire threat of a possible return engagement. No one had the least doubt that it would happen. The Mongols displayed a distinct edge in weaponry, including an early form of explosive ordnance fired from a catapult. Arriving by sea, the could Mongols pick and choose their own point of assault, an option that would give them the initial advantage of numerical superiority in combat. Once ashore, the Mongols could use superior battle formations against the Japanese. The Japanese would have to protect extended sections of the coast against all possible landing sites to defend against such an assault. The Japanese had little doubt of what was in store for them should the Mongols return.

News of the Mongol defeat angered the Yuan imperial court at Khanbalik. It astounded Kublai Khan that Japan felt itself not just willing, but capable of resisting an empire that had already overwhelmed most of the known world. To give the Japanese one more chance to submit, Kublai sent another embassy to Kyoto's imperial court in 1275. This time however, instead of merely running the Mongol envoys off without ceremony, the government underlined its contempt for their message by summarily beheading all six men. The Japanese immediately began to construct a series of continuous stone walls behind the beaches at Hakata Bay and Imari Bay in northwestern Kyushu. The most capable warriors in the nation manned the command posts hoping to effectively impede the Mongol cavalry. The Japanese fully believed that the next Mongol visit would bring far more warriors and they would come prepared to stay much longer. They were correct.

No amount of planning could overcome the perennial problems faced by Mongol troops in their assault on southern China. The terrain was unsuitable for wide-open cavalry tactics and provided virtually no open grazing land to feed the large number of horses and remounts taken into battle. Parasites, disease, heat and humidity all took their toll on the Mongols. Even their sturdy horses suffered from the debilitating climate of southern China. As Mongol losses steadily mounted, gaps in the ranks had to be filled by drafting native Chinese into service, most of whom were infantrymen. The Mongols initially despised these "foreign" troops, but the Chinese quickly proved themselves to be not only hardy fighters, but better able to cope with the debilitating climate. Progress was painfully slow. At a time when most opponents considered themselves fortunate to survive twelve weeks, the Song Chinese successfully resisted the Mongols for twelve years.

Simultaneous with the operations against Japan, Kublai's able commander-in-chief, General Bayan, marched his field armies deeper into southern China. The heavily fortified twin cities of Xiangyang and Fancheng, the last Song strongholds blocking the Mongol advance south toward the Yangtze River basin, sat on opposite sides of the Han River in northern Hubei Province. General Bayan at first hoped to simply starve the defenders into submission, but he soon realized that to set an effective blockade he would need a small river fleet to control the Han River all the way to its juncture with the Yangtze. Even if this could be achieved, and even if all overland relief efforts could be defeated, the fortresses would eventually have to be stormed. The strong castles, massive walls and deep moats protecting these two mighty cities also meant that without the best available siege engines Mongol losses would soon reach unacceptable levels.

The Mongols began their siege of Xiangyang and Fancheng in 1269 by gradually tightening a blockade around the two cities, which had already taken in huge supplies of food and water. Experts were recruited throughout the Mongol Empire to bring their skills to bear on the siege. Korean and ex-Jin craftsmen from northern China built some 500 small patrol boats for use along the Han River. Within months, the Mongols began construction of field fortifications south of the twin cities to interdict supplies arriving from the Yangtze River. Numerous battles were fought in the surrounding countryside and along the Han River, but the situation remained a stalemate for years.

The Song realized that the ultimate fate of their empire hinged upon that of Xiangyang. Lü Wenhuan, one of Song China's most tenacious generals, commanded the fortress at Xiangyang and, although his command was increasingly isolated, refused to submit. The Song court in Hangzhou did what it could to get supplies into the beleaguered cities and offered big rewards and promotions for any man who could smuggle messages into or out of the Xiangyang. In September 1272, a force of about 3,000 Song fought their way into Xiangyang, but lost one of their senior officers and most of the supplies they brought with them. Worse, the surviving troops ended up trapped in the city.

The Mongols steadily tightened the noose around the stubborn Song until it had a virtually perfect blockade in force, but General Bayan was still not strong enough to mount a full-scale assault. In late 1272, Ismai'l and Ala al Din, two specialist siege engineers from far distant Muslim Iraq arrived to supervise construction of new siege engines. They first directed their massive modern artillery against the city of Fancheng, which fell in an overwhelming assault after a few days of heavy bombardment. General Lü Wenhuan's sense of impending doom heightened as the Iraqi engineers moved their artillery to the southeastern corner of Xiangyang and began an almost continuous and massive rock bombardment of the city. The end came in late March 1273, when Lü Wenhuan at last surrendered.

The epic five-year-long siege of Xiangyang, the turning point in Kublai Khan's conquest of southern China, was a devastating blow to Song morale. General Bayan proved himself a master of siege warfare, a branch of the military art in which the nomad Mongols had now become world leaders. City after city fell as the Mongols pressed toward the ultimate target of their vengeance, the Song capital city of Hangzhou, the so-called Venice of the East. Some 1,600,000 families lived in Hangzhou at the time, undoubtedly the wealthiest market and seaport town of the thirteenth century and the largest and finest city in the contemporary world. Hangzhou's huge population, its enormous military garrison, its mighty walls, its stone towers in nearly every street and a network of urban canals reportedly spanned by 12,000 bridges presented General Bayan's army with a besieger's nightmare.

By the time the Mongols reached the outskirts of Hangzhou in January 1276, the old Song Emperor had died and a nine-year-old child emperor sat on the throne. The Dowager Empress ruled the dynasty. To General Bayan's surprise and great relief, she agreed to hand over the Song Imperial Seal in an unmistakable symbol of surrender. Instead of laying siege to Hangzhou, destroying the capital and slaughtering its inhabitants, Kublai's officers made a peaceful and triumphant entry into the ancient capital. General Bayan and his army simply moved in, took over, and administered city affairs. Mongol warriors did not pillage the capital, but on orders they carefully removed and shipped all official seals of Chinese power, works of art, books, and maps together with the whole store of imperial wealth to Kublai Khan's court in Khanbalik. The submission of the nine-year-old emperor and the Dowager Empress brought an end to the Song Empire's ruling elite.

The fall of Hangzhou did not end the Mongol war against the Song. Pockets of resistance in southern China kept up the struggle for another three years, led by a cabal of former Song ministers residing in the port city of Canton. When Canton finally fell in early 1279, the last holdouts of the former empire put to sea aboard the imperial fleet. Even after the Mongols captured every seaport along the southern coast this fleet fought a heroic but losing battle from bases among nearby coastal islands. Mongol troops commandeered numerous Chinese warships and, in a day long sea battle on March 19, 1279, attacked the imperial fleet near Yai-shan Island and destroyed or captured some nine hundred ships. Only nine ships are said to have escaped destruction. Trapped aboard the imperial flagship, a vessel too cumbersome to escape, a Song Admiral tossed his wife and children into the sea to avoid capture. After taking the young Song Emperor Diping in his arms and allegedly shouting, "An Emperor of the Song chooses death rather than imprisonment!" the admiral jumped overboard, drowning himself and the boy emperor rather than falling into Mongol hands.

After forty years of warfare, Kublai Khan's armies finally ended the more than three hundred year reign of the Song Dynasty in China. For the first time since the fall of the Tang Dynasty in the tenth century, the whole of China was united under a single ruler. For the first time in China's entire history, the Middle Kingdom was under foreign rule.