The Korean Peninsula, known as the "Hermit of the East," has been a silent country in East Asia for a long time in its history.
Probably because of its long-term attachment to the ancient Chinese dynasty, it was often regarded as a vassal of China, so it was not taken very seriously. Compared with popular areas in the Western world, such as Jerusalem, the famous religious city, which has been mired in religious conflicts for many years, the Korean Peninsula is much quieter.
However, even in such a "low-key" place, it is still occasionally harassed by neighboring countries. This country is Japan, which is across the sea from the Korean Peninsula. Japan has invaded the Korean Peninsula many times in history, but most of the results have been fruitless. Among them, the Japan-Korea War at the end of the 16th century, which is known in China as the Wanli War of Aid to Korea, is a typical example.
Around 1588, Toyotomi Hideyoshi eliminated the daimyōs of various regions and basically unified Japan. At this time, the Ming Dynasty, once the most powerful country in East Asia, was in decline. The ambitious Toyotomi Hideyoshi wanted to take advantage of this opportunity to invade China's Ming Dynasty through the Korean Peninsula. Soon after, Toyotomi Hideyoshi's emissaries came to the Korean Peninsula and expressed Japan's intentions to the then Korean Emperor Xuanzu, hoping to get Korea's cooperation.
Who would have thought that Xuanzu had driven him out of Gyeongbokgung Palace without waiting for the Japanese emissaries to finish speaking, and ruthlessly rejected Japan, saying that it was absolutely impossible for Korea to jointly attack the Ming Dynasty with Japan. Learning that Korea was so "ignorant of good villains", Toyotomi Hideyoshi was greatly angered, so he sent troops to attack the Korean Peninsula on this pretext, and the Nongchen War broke out.
In 1592, Toyotomi Hideyoshi sent Ukita Hideya as commander-in-chief, leading more than 300,000 soldiers to attack the Korean Peninsula. The korean army and civilians preferred to die unyieldingly and stubbornly resisted, and finally won the victory with the help of the Ming Dynasty, driving the Japanese out of the Korean Peninsula. The Korean people called this war the Battle of the Bulge, also known as the Nongchen Rebellion.
The act of the military and the people of the Korean Peninsula in uniting their efforts to resist Japanese aggression is impressive. In this war, a very large number of national heroes emerged, who led the Korean people to heroically resist the enemy and defend their homeland. Among them, General Li Shunchen, who commanded the Battle of Mingliang, is still remembered by the people of the Korean Peninsula to this day.
In the battle against the Japanese, General Li Shunchen used a special kind of ship, the Turtle Ship, to defeat the Japanese Navy, which had long occupied the naval superiority, and won the Victory at the Battle of Mingliang. You must know that under the circumstance of the disparity in strength between Japan and The DPRK at that time, the victory in the Battle of Mingliang was very remarkable.
Some people will ask, are there a big difference between Korea and Japan, which are also peoples who rely on the sea to eat the sea? Yes, the gap in strength between Japan and Korea during this period was very large.
The Japanese have historically been known as "Wokou". What is a "Wokou"? This is actually the meaning of "pirate", however, Japanese pirates are the prototype of Japanese sailors.
From the 13th century onwards, the Japanese began to engage in the business of piracy, they usually went to sea together, came to the coastal areas of East Asia or Southeast Asia, met the rich merchant ships, jumped on each other's ships, and then "PK" with the people on board until the Japanese pirates completely occupied the other side's ships. This is called "gang jumping war".
Battles like this are usually "narrow paths meet the brave one wins", whoever has the courage and the sharpness of the knife can win. It just so happens that the Japanese are a people who are good at using knives, whether it is making knives or fighting with knives, the Japanese are a must. Qi Jiguang, the Ming Dynasty's anti-Wu general, must have deeply understood this.
The Japanese pirates, who have long been mainly engaged in "jump gang warfare", have brought this advantage of being good at close combat to the Japanese marine division. In addition, Japan had only experienced a long civil war before this, so at this time, the combat effectiveness of both the navy and the army was quite high. In contrast, the North Korean army has experienced a sharp decline in combat effectiveness due to long-term slack training.
When a group of Japanese wielding sharp knives jumped onto a Korean warship, the North Korean navy was killed by them in minutes. Therefore, in the early days of the Nongchen War, in the face of the fierce Japanese sailors, the Korean sailors could not do anything at all.
After the Korean marine division was completely defeated by the Japanese, General Li Shunchen calmed down and re-analyzed the strength of the two armies. He found that Japanese sailors were good at close combat, always preferring to approach quietly and then single out one-on-one. In the face of white-knife warfare, the Korean sailors who have long neglected training are naturally not their opponents, and the Japanese are mainly light weapons, such as bows and arrows, muskets, swords, etc., they move quickly and flexibly, and it is even more difficult for the Korean sailors to react in time.
Close combat and flexible light weapons were the strengths of the Japanese marine division, but this also allowed General Li Shunchen to find the weaknesses of the Japanese. This has been the case since ancient times, and on the battlefield, an army that is good at close combat must be short in long-distance combat; a sensitive and active army must not have many heavy weapons.
The same is true of Japan, although the Japanese sailors, who are good at close combat, can easily defeat Korean soldiers with their unpredictable knife techniques, but the number of Japanese artillery is obviously insufficient, and in naval battles, the power of artillery is very large.
For Japan at that time, making an artillery was too luxurious, it required a lot of iron and shells, and for an island country with limited resources, it was more willing to use its limited iron resources to make knives that it was good at.
In contrast to Japan, Korea, which received extensive military support from the Ming Dynasty, was well stocked with artillery. In the war with Japan, the Ming dynasty troops who came to the aid of Korea also preferred to use artillery to attack Japanese military camps.
It can be seen that Japan is good at close combat by virtue of the combat superiority of a single soldier, however, once the distance between the two sides is too long, it is difficult for Japan, which lacks artillery, to pose a threat to the Korean water army. Therefore, based on this analysis, in order to give full play to the advantages of the Korean naval forces, General Lee Shun-chen specially designed and built a turtle ship to use in a maritime confrontation with the Japanese army.
The name "Turtle Ship" comes from because it has a shell that is as hard as a turtle and is not easy to break. The appearance of the turtle ship resembles that of a turtle, with a rounded body and covered with a large area of armored iron shells covered with spikes. At first glance, the ship looks very bulky, and because of its round appearance, it will also give people a stupid and cute illusion. In fact, the fighting power of this kind of ship is very strong, and it is not stupid at all.
When fighting the Japanese, all combatants could hide in the ship, operate muskets, arrows, artillery and other weapons, and launch attacks on the enemy through the fire ports opened in advance around the ship. This can be a good use of the attack power of heavy weapons in long-distance combat, so that the enemy can not get close.
At the same time, Japanese sailors can only use cold arrows for long-range attacks most of the time, and the iron armor outside the turtle ship is like a natural protective shield, completely shielding the attack of the arrows. Moreover, even if the Japanese were lucky enough to board the Korean turtle ship, they would not be able to engage the North Korean sailors in close combat on the spiked surface.
In addition to this, the turtle boat has some unexpected designs. For example, General Li Shunchen considered the large size of the turtle ship and the ease of being subject to lack of flexibility in battle, and in order to solve this problem, he installed many oars on the side of the turtle ship.
In this way, when fighting the enemy, the turtle ship can not only use the wind to travel, but also artificially operate the hull to speed up, making up for the shortcomings of its slow speed due to its large size. Unlike the traditional bottom, the bottom of the turtle boat has been changed to a U-shape, which allows the hull to be flexibly steered in a small area and drive more smoothly.
Admittedly, just as there is no perfect leaf in the world, everything has shortcomings that it cannot overcome on its own, and turtle boats are no exception. The turtle boat itself also has many shortcomings, such as its high cost. It is said that North Korea cost five times as much to build a turtle ship as an ordinary warship, and according to the national strength of North Korea at that time, it was really difficult to fully use the turtle ship in confrontation with the Japanese.
But fortunately, at that time, North Korea received a lot of help from the Ming Dynasty, and in order to help North Korea build turtle ships, the Ming Dynasty also spent a lot of money, which North Korea still remembered. In addition, the turtle ship is too small and the firepower is not strong enough, and if it faces an enemy with more powerful firepower, the turtle ship's chances of winning will not be very large.
Fortunately, the Korean turtle ship rampaged in the sea, causing heavy losses to the Japanese, so they did not have time to carefully analyze the advantages and disadvantages of the turtle ship, and they did not find a way to conquer the turtle ship. The victory at the Battle of Mingliang is the best proof.
It can be said that the DPRK's turtle ship perfectly uses the military ideology of "using its own strengths to defeat the enemy's weakness", just as the so-called "hitting the snake and hitting seven inches", each of its functional designs is an attack on local shortcomings, and every defense of it makes the place have nowhere to break through.
Under the circumstances at the time, the Turtle Ship was indeed the most suitable warship for North Korea. The reason why the turtle ship was able to reverse the situation and defeat the Japanese marine division was due to the careful design of General Li Shunchen, who fully understood the advantages and disadvantages of the enemy and us, and designed the turtle ship based on these analyses. Without Li Shuncheng's turtle ship, the outcome of the Renchen War might not have been what we know today.
Text/Genki Girl QMQ
Reference: Naval Battle on Korean Won, Liu Yang