"Immortal Admiral Yi Soon-shin" (there are at least three ways of transcribing it into English) tells the true story of a Korean naval officer who forged the fleet at his disposal into the greatest naval power on Earth in the 1590s, far away from the empire-building exploits of the Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese, and English -- and thus far from consideration in Western history books . Closer to home for him, Japan, which was such a terror to the European powers, had overrun Korea as a prelude to conquering the declining Ming Empire in China.
The poorly organized, badly trained, and ill-equipped Koreans were no match on land for the Japanese, who were fresh from their civil wars, which had seen their forces develop from primitive feudal levies into crack modern formations which would not be matched in Europe for two hundred years. With Korea on the verge of becoming a mere footnote to history, Yi soon-shin appeared to command one of Korea's fleets. What Themistocles was to Greece and Nelson to England, Admiral Yi was to Asia.
In engagement after engagement he beat the numerically superior Japanese fleets, sometimes destroying dozens of Japanese ships without a single ship of his own being lost. Yi's most famous contribution to naval warfare was the "turtle ship," the culmination of a technology which had been developing for years in Korea. The hulls of the turtle ships were clad with iron, and a steeply pitched, iron-clad roof prevented Japanese cannonballs from penetrating the deck, while spikes pointing outward from the superstructure prevented boarding. Aside from the spikes, the turtle ship technology was nearly identical to that used by the Confederate Navy when they converted the wooden ship _Merrimac_ into the iron-clad _Virginia,_ which terrorized Hampton Roads until the little _Monitor_ appeared to fight it to a standstill.
The Japanese, glorifying land warfare above all else, made no effort to copy the turtle ships and Admiral Yi went from victory to victory, completely cutting the Japanese supply line and leaving the tens of thousands of Japanese troops on the Korean peninsula to be slowly ground under the Ming army.
Admiral Yi bears comparison to another commander besides Themistocles and Nelson, General George S. Patton. Like Themistocles, Yi had to wheedle and maneuver to get the resources and the permissions he needed to wage a successful naval war; like Patton he was periodically reprimanded and removed from power, only to be replaced as soon as his successor proved incapable of using the navy as successfully as had Yi. "Bulmyeolui Lee Soon-shin" portrays Yi Soon-shin from childhood to adulthood, as do so many Korean historical soap operas, and, typically, we see the ups and downs of his life, and see how good friends helped him to attain the rank of Admiral and attempted to deflect criticism of him.
We also see the officers and men who made up the fleet, from wandering vagabonds turned courageous sailors, to nobles who learn to subordinate their Confucian family loyalties to the greater needs of the navy and the country.
"Bulmyeolui Lee Soon-shin" is in Korean with English subtitles, and I am pleased to say that I was the one who submitted the basic information to IMDb for it. I hope that those who know Korean will please contribute more details of the cast and crew.
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*SPOILER WARNING*
I compared Admiral Yi to Lord Nelson for the influence he had upon world history. Yi, Nelson, and Themistocles must surely rank as the three greatest fighting admirals in history. There is another eerie similarity between Yi and Nelson: both were shot and killed by enemy snipers in their final battles, which they both won posthumously. In Admiral Yi's case, his death is particularly sad because there was little doubt that the engagement in which he was killed would have been the final one of the war -- he won the war but he was not destined to see the peace.
The poorly organized, badly trained, and ill-equipped Koreans were no match on land for the Japanese, who were fresh from their civil wars, which had seen their forces develop from primitive feudal levies into crack modern formations which would not be matched in Europe for two hundred years. With Korea on the verge of becoming a mere footnote to history, Yi soon-shin appeared to command one of Korea's fleets. What Themistocles was to Greece and Nelson to England, Admiral Yi was to Asia.
In engagement after engagement he beat the numerically superior Japanese fleets, sometimes destroying dozens of Japanese ships without a single ship of his own being lost. Yi's most famous contribution to naval warfare was the "turtle ship," the culmination of a technology which had been developing for years in Korea. The hulls of the turtle ships were clad with iron, and a steeply pitched, iron-clad roof prevented Japanese cannonballs from penetrating the deck, while spikes pointing outward from the superstructure prevented boarding. Aside from the spikes, the turtle ship technology was nearly identical to that used by the Confederate Navy when they converted the wooden ship _Merrimac_ into the iron-clad _Virginia,_ which terrorized Hampton Roads until the little _Monitor_ appeared to fight it to a standstill.
The Japanese, glorifying land warfare above all else, made no effort to copy the turtle ships and Admiral Yi went from victory to victory, completely cutting the Japanese supply line and leaving the tens of thousands of Japanese troops on the Korean peninsula to be slowly ground under the Ming army.
Admiral Yi bears comparison to another commander besides Themistocles and Nelson, General George S. Patton. Like Themistocles, Yi had to wheedle and maneuver to get the resources and the permissions he needed to wage a successful naval war; like Patton he was periodically reprimanded and removed from power, only to be replaced as soon as his successor proved incapable of using the navy as successfully as had Yi. "Bulmyeolui Lee Soon-shin" portrays Yi Soon-shin from childhood to adulthood, as do so many Korean historical soap operas, and, typically, we see the ups and downs of his life, and see how good friends helped him to attain the rank of Admiral and attempted to deflect criticism of him.
We also see the officers and men who made up the fleet, from wandering vagabonds turned courageous sailors, to nobles who learn to subordinate their Confucian family loyalties to the greater needs of the navy and the country.
"Bulmyeolui Lee Soon-shin" is in Korean with English subtitles, and I am pleased to say that I was the one who submitted the basic information to IMDb for it. I hope that those who know Korean will please contribute more details of the cast and crew.
.
.
*SPOILER WARNING*
I compared Admiral Yi to Lord Nelson for the influence he had upon world history. Yi, Nelson, and Themistocles must surely rank as the three greatest fighting admirals in history. There is another eerie similarity between Yi and Nelson: both were shot and killed by enemy snipers in their final battles, which they both won posthumously. In Admiral Yi's case, his death is particularly sad because there was little doubt that the engagement in which he was killed would have been the final one of the war -- he won the war but he was not destined to see the peace.
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