Koxinga 鄭成功 May Be A Hero; But He Also Committed Atrocity Against Dutch

Facing with the advancing Ching's army together with the shame that Ching had inflicted on the Jeng's family because Ching had raped Ms. Ta-ga-Wo-Ma-Tsu 田川氏 (たがわ まつ)(1601-1646) (wife of Iquan and mother of Koxinga) and later forcing Ta-Ga-Wo-Ma-Tsu 田川氏 (たがわ まつ) to committ suicide, father 鄭芝龍 (1604-1661) and son 鄭成功 (1624－1662) had completely different responses. Iquan 鄭芝龍 chose to surrender. He betrayed Ming but himself betrayed by Ching and was imprisoned for 22 years and was eventually executed by Ching in 1661. The son, Koxinga 鄭成功 chose to fight. At the peak of his career, he successfully expelled Dutch from Taiwan in 1662 and became a hero.

Koxinga was not interested in invading Taiwan until 1658 when he lost his campaign in Nanking because of his blunder. While army and naval fleet had already encircled Nanking and were counting days for the victory, Koxinga threw a birthday party outside of the Nanking castle. His soldiers and sailors were drunk when Ching had sensed the opportunity to attack Koxinga's army. Koxinga hurriedly retreat; and from that moment, he lad lost the military upper hand against Ching. Koxinga needed a base to retake Ching; this time, he targeted Taiwan, then a Dutch colony.

Koxinga invaded Taiwan on APril 30, 1661. His fleet and army took Provincia castle quite easily on May 4. The Dutch defended Zeelandin for more than 10 months. The Dutch surrendered to Koxinga on January 25 of 1662.

When Dutch defending Provincia surrendered to Koxinga, they had expected that Koxinga treated them with the status of prisoner-of-war. Well, this was not the case. Koxinga's army killed the men and raped the women. Also during the Zeelandin siege, Koxinga hunt Dutch all around Taiwan, killing them with cruelty such as nailing them on a cross etc. In fact, in those campaign, Koxinga had committed atrocity against the Dutch.

This is part of the bloody history of Taiwan. While most Taiwanese worship a hero-like figure of Koxinga, Koxinga did have his dark side needed to be discussed.