One of the greatest heroes in Vietnamese history was the revolutionary royal, Emperor Le Loi, founding monarch of the latter Le Dynasty. According to myth, Le Loi was a fisherman who once caught a magical sword in his net that indowed him with superhuman powers. In truth however, Le Loi was a scholarly administrator and aristocrat from the province of Thanh Hoa. At this time Vietnam was ruled by the Ming dynasty of China. They controled every aspect of society, forcing people to wear Chinese style clothes, outlawed haircuts for men, issued I.D. cards to all families, forced Chinese religion on the people and even outlawed chewing gum.
It was in this atmosphere of tyranny that Le Loi took it upon himself to free his native country from Ming domination. He resigned his position and moved to the hills near his village in 1418 and called on the people to join him in revolt. He was called the "Prince of Pacification" and people from all walks of life, scholars, peasants and bandits rushed to his standard. Le Loi instructed his people in the guerilla tactics of the Tran Hung Dao that had vanquished the mighty Mongols. He avoided formal pitched battles against the Chinese and focused on raids and harassment methods. Soon the Chinese officials were gripped by fear and refused to venture outside of the towns after dark. Their massive armies stuck to the roads and refused to venture into the jungles.
The Chinese tried building fortified towers along the main roads but they were no more successful than the French would be in later years. Soon, the Ming forces had been so worn down by Le Loi's guerilla tactics that he was able to face them head on. He met the Ming horse cavalry with platoons of war elephants and also the all-important phsycological warfare. His advisor Nguyen Trai wrote in his famous essay on military tactics that martial strength was less importnant than moral strength. He is famous for saying, "Better to conquer hearts than citadels".
At last, in 1426, at the battle of Tot Dong the Vietnamese under Le Loi utterly routed the Chinese forces and two years later China recognized the independence of Vietnam. Le Loi was gallant to his defeated enemies. He resumed the tributary tie with China as a gurantee of Vietnamese security and gace the Chinese 500 junks and thousands of horses to carry them back to China. Other than a small effort in 1788 China never tried to attack Vietnam ever again. As for Le Loi, he was declared Emperor of Dai Viet and established his capitol at Hanoi. He distributed land among the peasants, rewarded those who were loyal to him and built many public works to encourage Vietnamese agriculture and economic freedom. Emperor Le Loi laid the foundation for the future greatness of Vietnam. |
