ZHENG Chenggong (1624-1662), a household word in China today, has gone down in history as a national hero credited with liberating Taiwan from the fetters of Dutch colonists.

He is also an interesting subject of study in Japan, where he was born, and in the West, where he is known as Koxinga.

The name Koxinga is based on the Fukienese pronunciation of Guoxingye, or Bearer of the Imperial Surname, after he was honored with the surname (Zhu) of the emperors of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) after Ming had been effectively overthrown by the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).

Tonio Andrade's "The Untold Story of China's First Great Victory over the West" (Princeton University Press, 2011) tries to reconstruct Koxinga's famed engagement with the Dutch imperialists with the verisimilitude of a tale, which is based on meticulous research.

Andrade is associate professor of history at Emory University (Atlanta, Georgia).

It's well known that during the 17th century, Holland had set up a vigorous empire that eclipsed the British acquisitions and constituted serious threats to Spanish and Portuguese colonies.

But the Dutch met its match in Koxinga, who succeeded in restoring Taiwan to Chinese rule after a protracted engagement.

Legendary life

The life of Koxinga lends itself to an engrossing tale.

His father was a Chinese pirate who had amassed a fabulous fortune and later submitted to Qing rule, and his mother was Japanese.

His teacher was Qian Qianyi, one of the most accomplished scholars of all time, who also swore allegiance to the Qing.

But Koxinga chose to remain true to the restoration of the Ming to the end of his 38-year life.

Koxinga wrote good poetry, but it was his military exploits that earned him eternal fame. With his 150,000 troops, he had once come close to taking over the whole territory of China, until he suffered a devastating setback in his attempt to reclaim Nanjing.

To finance and feed his large army, he set sail from Jinmen (near Fujian Province today) to Taiwan, where after taking two strong Dutch fortresses, the colonists were forced to leave.

In 1684, Taiwan was included in the Qing territory.

This is surely a feat at once surprising and puzzling to those who traditionally assert Western military superiority as a matter of course.

Andrade's description of Koxinga's encounter with the Dutch produced a more nuanced view of this contact.

At first look this rare specimen of direct East-West military engagement seems to support the prevailing view that until 1800, many parts of Asia had developed on pace with their Western counterparts.

Western gunboats

The author admits that the Dutch did enjoy a technological edge in their powerful Renaissance fortress building and sailing against the wind, but this was more or less neutralized by excellent Chinese military leadership.

In military strategy Koxinga seemed to have outdone the Dutch at every turn.

The author has spent such effort at reconstructing the protracted siege of the Zeelandia Castle that some readers cannot but marvel at the abundance of materials at his disposal.

While there is much consensus in recognizing Western military power since 1800, in the wake of industrialization and Western lead in sciences and technology, there is a divergence of opinion in perceiving the differences before 1800.

Some say there was relative parity, which resulted in the author's initial argument that "political will, not technological prowess, was the most important factor underlying European expansion."

The author even cites one Chinese study asserting that an analysis of Koxinga's cannons and their use leaves one "astonished at his army's modernization."

If we take a more balanced view of the whole episode, we might conclude that in spite of this incident, it can scarcely change the fact that the success of the European surge over the New World and the rest of Asia lay in their guns, germs, and steel.

Divergences of opinion regarding the pre-1800 situation could be explained by the fact that there is not a sudden divergence at around 1800, but a small and accelerating divergence starting much earlier, accelerating even further during the industrialization era.

A lot of scholars, Chinese and foreign, have been baffled by the seeming incongruity that while the Chinese invented gunpowder, the compass, paper making and movable printing type, they became the technological powerhouse of the whole world only after the adoption of these tools by the West.

It can be explained. Chien Mu, one of the most respected modern Chinese scholars, observed in his "An Outline of Chinese History" that "spiritually Chinese aspire to peace, rather than prosperity; they value what they have more than what others possess ... Thus in theory Western sciences ... have little chance of growing in China."

Inherent in Confucian culture and values is a natural antipathy towards developing the killing of others into a consummate art.

By contrast, as the author points out, "scholars have argued that a hallmark of European modernization was a precocious focus on measurement, the application of mathematical principles to practical purposes, particularly to warfare."

Chinese outlook

While some scholars have noted a medal showing Louis XIV (1638-1715) conducting a military parade with all his soldiers in lockstep, it eluded many of them that a slightly later Qing emperor Qianlong (1711-1799) wrote nearly 40,000 poems in his life, making him one of the most prolific poets of all time. Less than a century ago, his ancestors were still horse-born warriors known for their fierceness and toughness.

As Western military superiority has been rooted in science, it is not an accident that Westerners turn out to be better killers. But there is also the question of willingness.

While the Dutch's and Western mariners' skill in sailing against the wind may have helped them colonize parts of Asia, a no less competent sailor Zheng He (1371-1433) reached the African coast but evinced no willingness to promote trade with military force.

Heaven knows

There are many signs suggesting Dutch military superiority.

In confronting their enemy, Koxinga's troops, while better supplied, generally outnumbered their enemies 10 to one. And Koxinga's troops were disciplined.

As the author notes, "We've seen here that Koxinga's soldiers were more disciplined than the Dutch soldiers they faced. This emphasis on drill was an ancient Chinese heritage, one that was considerably elaborated and systematized in the Ming and early Qing period."

That it took Koxinga so long to take the Zeelandia Castle on Taiwan can only prove Dutch superiority in their weapons.

One of the true insights of the book appear towards the end, when the author observes that "Yet the people of the seventeenth century recognized something that eludes many of us today: the fact that Heaven is the supreme determinant of human affairs."