M I LI TAR Y FIN A NeE 489the Defense Command (at the Namhan fort near Seoul), the ivory soldiers, and
the so-called new select soldiers (vinson) in each province. Unfortunately, these
last 400,000 were only untrained local militia (t 'odan) that could not be counted
on in an emergency.
If a household cloth tax were instituted, the men who would be paying the new
tax would be the current "idle adult males" who were neither serving nor pay-
ing support taxes, not the "household heads [hosu]" who were rotating duty sol-
diers. According to his investigation of the military registers of all yamen and in
all provinces but the northern two, there were close to 500,000 infantry and cav-
alry duty soldiers and their support taxpayers listed on the rolls, plus over Xo,ooo
Royal Division and 100,000 Royal Select Soldiers and Special Cavalry Unit Sol-
diers (of the Military Training Agency) combined, making an additional sum of
over 300,000 (why not 180,000?) rotating duty soldiers and support taxpayers.3^0
If you selected from this total the 40,000 troops who have undergone train-
ing plus another 80,000 support taxpayers who could become crack troops, you
would have a fighting force of 120,000. Then a couple of firearms soldiers
(hwabyong) could be added to each platoon (toe), and the force (of 120,000 plus)
divided into twelve groups for rotating duty ( 10,000 per group?), and assigned
to the three commanders (taejang, of the Royal Division, Royal Select Soldiers,
and Special Cavalry Unit of the Military Training Agency. Each group would
consist of 6,000 men (not 10,000?), 3,000 of which would serve on duty at the
above three divisional headquarters undergoing training for two months, and
then switch assignments. The other 3,000 would serve in the southern six
provinces at the provincial governors' or military commanders' headquarters
for a tour of two months of guard duty, and then return home. (We might also
assume that if twelve shifts served for two-month shifts, there would he an inter-
val of twenty-four months between shifts.) The whole system of rotating shifts
was based on the Forbidden Guard (Kumgun) system of the Sung dynasty. Thus
40,000 men could be trained every year (six shifts of 6,000 men each), and within
three years, the whole 120,000 would be fully trained. All musketeers would
also hecome crack shots.
He also provided figures to justify the program. He estimated the cost in grain
of supporting rotating soldiers at 500,000 som, to be paid for by converting all
household cloth taxes remitted by sea or river to the capital to grain. To meet
the room and board expenses of troops serving in the provinces, which he esti-
mated at not more than 120,000 P 'il, he recommendcd that household cloth tax
revenue could be paid to the Office of Dispensing Benevolence (Sonhyech'ong),
the agency that handled taedol1E{ tribute grain surtax payments, which would
then order its branches in the provinces to convert taedollE{ cotton taxes in the
hilly or dry-farming regions of the country to rice to be paid to the provincial
governors' and military commanders' yamen. In short, he believed that if the
system were carried out properly, there would be no need for additional taxes
on the people and all costs of the state for its troops would be met. Sukchong