80 EARLY CHOSON DYNASTY
gwan system that placed command responsibilities in the hands of local garri-
son commanders. Yu blamed the scholar-officials of early Choson whom he
claimed had allowcd the venerated institutions of the early dynasty to become
moribund while they concerned themselves only with polishing their literary
style or indulging in idle gossip. He believed that the new system of command
was the product of the "victory strategy" (chesung pangnyak), introduced first
in Ch6lla Province by Kim Sumun at the time ofthe Wak.6 pirate attack of 1555,
the Ulmyo waebyon. Under this "victory strategy," the Towonsu (supreme field
commander), the mobile border commander (Sunbyonsa), the defense com-
mander (Pang'osa), and the auxiliary defense officer (Chobangjang) were sent
out from the capital to assume field command over local garrison troops and
district recruits.53
When a report of an invasion of pirates was received, all the troops in the
province were immediately called out and stationed on the provincial border,
but their commanders were not given the authority to move them around until
the field commanders arrived. Since the latter had to travel as much as 250 miles,
the trip might take three or four days while the troops were left disorganized
and in exposed positions, usually on flat ground, as the enemy vanguard
advanced. Then, according to Yu, when the enemy drew near, the troops would
run otf "like startled birds or frightened beasts." By the time the capital field
commanders arrived on the scene, "the runaway soldiers were hiding in the moun-
tains and valleys," and no men were left on reserve. Furthermore, what was sup-
posed to be a temporary remedy for an emergency against a small force was,
unfortunately, left in place until Hideyoshi's forces arrived in 1592. Yu Songnyong
insisted that this error in strategic planning could not be repeated in the future.
Yu, however, was mistaken in his facts. The author of the chesling pangnyak
system in 1555 was not Kim Sumun but the then provincial army commander
(Pyongma ChOltosa) for North Hamgyong Province, none other than the same
Yi II who was dispatched to Mun'gyong in 1592. Yi, who had been responsible
for the suppression of the Nit'anggae uprising of Jurchen people in the north-
east in 1583, was appalled by the disarray in the military forces in North Ham-
gyong. He designed his pangyak strategy to carry out just the same kind of reform
that Yu Songnyong favored in the 1590s. He reorganized the six garrisons
(yukchin) in the province into Five Guards (Owi) in which one district magis-
trate (a Pusa) was placed in charge of seven subordinate units headed by mili-
tary officers, probably with jurisdiction over local districts or garrisons. Instead
of waiting for the arrival of a commander sent from the capital each time there
was a raid across the northern border, a practice already in place at the time, the
provincial army commander would exercise field command immediately.
Another of his requests, subsequently rejected by the Border Defense Com-
mand in Seoul, was that in case of invasion from the north, troops from south-
ern provinces would also be assigned to the various guards under command of
their own district magistrates functioning as military commanders with sepa-
rate military titles. The Border Defense Command at thc capital refused because