Li Wanyong's evaluation

Li Wanyong has been dependent on foreign countries all his life. Pro-Russian and pro-American in his early years. Later, he completely fell to Japan and finally betrayed his motherland. Therefore, Li Wanyong is regarded as a pro-Japanese and traitor in the main discourses of North Korea and South Korea, and has always been called a "running dog" and a "traitor". Not only on the Korean Peninsula, but also in China, Li Wanyong is also synonymous with "traitors". During the late Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China, there appeared a large number of literary and dramatic works describing Li Wanyong, including Hatred of Treason, Revenge of Slavery, Secret History of Treason in Li Wanyong, etc., which made the image of Li Wanyong a traitor deeply rooted in China's hearts, so that "Li Wanyong" or "Li Wanyong II" was widely used in China's political and intellectual circles at that time. For example, Zhang Xueliang once said in a secret letter, "My brother is very sad. There are really people who are not people. He really wants to be the second in Li Wanyong. He just wants to earn a little money at present, so he can't help crying ... ",and when Wang Jingwei published Yan Dian at the end of 1938, Chongqing Xinhua Daily also published an editorial called Wang Jingwei's Treason, in which it was written that the word" Li Wanyong "was quite common in China at that time.

The contemporary government of the Republic of Korea regards Li Wanyong as a pro-Japanese and anti-national actor. In 2005, South Korea promulgated a special law on the property ownership of pro-Japanese and anti-national actors. The South Korean government decided to confiscate the land of the descendants of nine pro-Japanese activists, including Li Wanyong, after the investigation by the property investigation committee of pro-Japanese anti-national activists. But later, some people thought that Li Wanyong was pro-Japanese and agreed to merge for the sake of the overall situation, while Li Wanyong was only pro-American and pro-Russian in the early years when the country was expected to be rich and strong, and actively participated in independent associations and advocated independence. Later, forced by the situation to take refuge in Japan, Li Wanyong repeatedly stressed that this was the general trend. When the 1905 Yasukuni Treaty was concluded and South Korea became a protectorate of Japan, Li Wanyong, who was in favor of signing the treaty, declared that his purpose was: "We only temporarily hand over a diplomatic power to our neighbors, and the day will come when our country will become rich and strong, so we should actively support each other with Japan. Japan not only has superior geographical conditions, but also it is their consistent policy to develop South Korea. Although Japan is fully capable of annexing South Korea, it has not done so, but has made unremitting efforts to support South Korea's independence ... ". He also repeatedly stressed that without Japan's guidance, South Korea's internal affairs reform could not be carried out smoothly. Li Wanyong himself was deeply moved by this. After he was assassinated by Li Zaiming, he wrote a poem while recuperating in Wenyang: "When Yuanji was occupied by Korea Hospital, the window was opened and the machine sat alone. I'm dead, I'm still alive. This heart is only known to future generations. " Expressed his pain that people didn't understand his difficulties at that time. Therefore, some Korean scholars rated him as "patriotic and traitorous".

Interestingly, although Li Wanyong is a die-hard pro-Japanese, he never speaks Japanese. He only talks to the Japanese in English and doesn't take Japanese names. In addition, Li Wanyong was also a calligrapher, and was called a "famous pen" by people at that time. It is said that he wrote the Chinese tablet of the famous building "Independence Gate" in Seoul (some people say it was written by Jinjiazhen). His nephew Jin Mingxiu wrote a chronicle of Li Wanyong's life story.