the tang dynasty was founded by tangkoku whose personal name was li yuen but it was really his son tang tatong whose personal name was li suming who turned it into a superpower economically culturally and militarily thus he was traditionally known as the greatest emperor in chinese history and in this episode we will look at how he did it lee zuming came into power at a very desperate time in 626 just as the eastern turkic cabinet was attacking his brothers plotted to kill him and seize their father's throne so he launched a tragic counter-coup that resulted in him killing them and seizing the throne for himself capitalizing on the ensuing chaos the turks were able to penetrate deep into tongue territory and within a few days of lisuming's reign they are already knocking at the gate of the capital tang oh looks like his reign is going to be a short one but nah lee simming wasn't a quitter he was a prodigious general with legendary track records so he met them on the field with banner streaming and armor glistening under the sun he led his imperial army from the front then without the protection of any guards he rode up to the turks leader illihan he looked at him with the stain for preaching that existing treaty and then he renegotiated the peace treaty lisumi had to put up a strong front if he showed any weakness then they would bury him he had been around the turks long enough to know how their society worked in fact some of his relatives were turks due to the political marriages between the turkic cabinets and the previous dynasties that joint ruler tulis kahan whose personal name was ashina shibobi was even his sworn brother whether it was justified or not lee si ming was confident that if push comes to shove he could still defeat them with the right application of tactics and traps but then the ensuing war would devastate both sides not only that it will further ruin the tang empire which is already hurting from the recent wars it would also unite the various turkic tribes in hatred against tongue so he had to swallow his pride this time and pay them tribute for peace besides he can already see the tears at the seams of their cagnet elihan was proud and greedy he treated the smaller tribes within his cagnet poorly so the opportunity to strike back was bound to present itself eventually but for now he has to rebuild his own empire the succession war he fought with his brothers had split his government apart and he had to reunite his administration so he had to let bicons be by guns and appoint the most meritorious and talented people to the right position he even appointed waitsung who was once his treacherous brother's advisor to be his own lee ming relied on him a lot to guide him along the right path but he needed more than just one voice so the young emperor ordered all his officials to speak to him honestly and encourage free speech no minister shall ever be punished for pointing out his mistakes in fact he actually rewarded them for doing so despite him wanting to recruit more soldiers to bolster his defenses against the turks he followed their advice to focus on working on their domestic affairs first thus the warrior prince learned to be a statesman his reign was called the zhengguan era which can be translated literally as correct observation and it became the subject of study for future emperors it was actually quite lucky for him to have focused on domestic affairs first there was a series of natural calamities such as droughts and unseasonal snow so he was able to provide relief to his people and came through with minimal harm as for the turks they were caught unprepared by these calamities as the ilichan was too preoccupied trying to extract taxes from the various tribes under him the eastern turkey coconut operated in a similar fashion to other historical nomadic empires such as the shonu their empire is led by the royal family ashina and was made up of smaller groups within larger groups the chile confederacy for example is a group within the cabinet but the confederacy itself is made up of a leading tribe chile and smaller tribes such as the australian tour uighurs and so on feeling dissatisfied with the ilikkahan the tribes started to split apart and abandoned him frustrated by the insubordination and his loosening grip to power the elihan started to persecute those tribes and sent tulikahan to do the job unfortunately tuli was defeated by them and he himself was punished by illich so he decided to rebel too and requested his sworn brother for help now this is a turning point lee suming never expected that the eastern turkey cagnet would start to unravel so soon he wanted to help his pro but he had to be a responsible ruler so he consulted his ministers and generals and finally launched his campaign in 629 once he received their support through the years the smaller tribes that had left the eastern turkey cagnet such as the shuiyanto and the kitans had defected to tongue and sought its patronage with tongue's help shuiyanto was able to form its own cagnate and other smaller tribes such as the uyghurs and sea came under them so by the time the war against the eastern turkic cabinet started general li jin commander-in-chief of the tang army received lots of military assistance from the defected tribes and together they defeated the eastern turkey cabinet easily by 630. in the aftermath the members of the turkic tribes nominated resuming to be their new ruler the khan of heaven chen kehan which is the chinese translation of dhingri kahan dangri ism is the majority religion of the ancient turks and other tribes in the area it is often translated as tian in chinese and this is the beginning of the cosmopolitan tang empire li zuming considered himself to be as much a chinese emperor as he was the kahan of the turkic tribes he even boasted that he was the first chinese emperor who treated the nomadic tribes equally as subjects instead of their inferior as sign of goodwill he even kept the elihan alive and gave him a governor's position in a few generations the streets of tangan would be bustling with turkic soldiers persian generals korean officials indian teachers and japanese delegates all this was made possible by a combination of excellent domestic and military policies in the following years the tang empire grew more powerful and was able to effectively defend against other threats such as the tu yohun and the tibetan empire but the teething troubles of a cosmopolitan empire soon manifested in 639 in the form of an assassination attempt on summing by some of the dissatisfied members of the eastern turkey cagnet royal family the ashina luckily the plot failed to prevent more of this kind of incident from happening lis ming recreated the eastern turkey cagnet and sent the ashina and their subjects back to their land but by then the sri lento their former vessel turned enemy had also formed their own cagnet and became more powerful so li suming had to promise protection to both sides to fulfill his role as the tengri kahan the tang dynasty could have actually become a lot more culturally turkic because lisu ming's first crown prince li chang chen was a turcophile he preferred to dress and speak like the turks and that wasn't considered an issue by his dad his downfall however started when it was discovered that he had sexual relationship with a young boy the tongue dynasty is famous for being socially liberal but i guess that was too much even for lisuming apparently it was his obese brother li thai who snitched on him he was after the crown prince position himself thus the ensuing rivalry for the throne between a turkophile with a lame leg and a fat scholar who was too heavy to walk must have been quite a sight to behold and as you would expect it ended poorly for both of them as lee chengchen pressured by his brother's plot decided to organize a coup but his two-bit plot was eventually discovered and he was the post believing that lita was also to blame for this plot lee simming disqualified him from the crown prince position too eventually the position was given to his ninth son liz but of course there are always more than one side to every story their affinity towards the turks could be interpreted differently the orcon inscription was erected around 100 years after lisiming died after the second turkic cagnate declared independence from tang it depicted the chinese to be a corrupting influence who drew away their people with rich gifts and ingratiating words only the good and stout people like them could resist their cunning lies ming died of dysentery in 649 and received the posthumous name tangtatsung he was just 51 years old and left a thriving empire to his son he was remembered as a great emperor for generations to come for his heroism and just rule but was he really all he cracked up to be now here comes the controversy apparently the importance of his role in the uprising against the sui dynasty mike had been embellished the court journal of an official who worked under his father when daya presented a different account to the official histories of tang dynasty in that book the initiative for rebellion against the sway dynasty was mostly attributed to his father and some of lisuming's successors was actually credited to his eldest brother lee jinsung instead lisumi was also known to have interfered in the writing of court history generally emperors were not allowed to look at their own history as they are being recorded however he insisted to look at them so that he could learn from his past mistakes and he just sometimes need to sort a few things straight 4. historical accuracy well alright he might not be the sage king superman he wanted to portray himself to be but still it is hard to deny the fact that the dynasty prospered under him and its military dominance the tongue dynasty hardly ever lost a major engagement except for that one occasion when tang taitung himself was humiliatingly defeated when he attacked gokurio korea in 644 on the next episode we will look at the siege of ansel the lone fortress that withstood the might of tang taetong and the powerful army of tang dynasty so subscribe to the channel if you don't want to miss it if you would like to participate in the discussion and vote on future topics then be a pro and join us on patreon you can also help the channel by liking sharing and commenting because it boosts the algorithm until next time stay cool my bros