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Before the 17th century, that is, before 1600 AD, the Wanli Korean War can be said to be the last large-scale war stage of the ancient firearms system in the East. Pen ~ Fun ~ Pavilion www.biquge.info please search and see the most complete!

Since then, China and Japan have entered another period of large-scale upheaval.

In China, the Jurchen rebellion broke out successively, and many events including the famous peasant uprising in the late Ming Dynasty.

Under this series of changes, the Ming Empire finally became the dust of history.

In Japan, Toyotomi Hideyoshi died of illness in the castle tower of Fushimi Castle shortly after the end of the Korean War, and Japanese history entered a period of turmoil between the Azuchi-Momoyama period and the Tokugawa shogunate.

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Because of this, the ancient firearms confrontation between China and Japan has also become a historical term.

But even in the West at this time, flintlock pistols, which had an advantage over arquebuses in terms of efficiency, had already appeared on the stage of Western history.

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The flintlock pistol, invented by Mahan, a Frenchman born in a family of gunsmiths, locksmiths and watchmakers, was improved on the basis of the revolver musket, the clockwork wheel was removed, a piece of flint was clamped on the jaws of the hammer, and a blow anvil was provided on the side of the fire hole, and when firing, the trigger was pulled, and under the action of the spring, the flint was hit heavily on the edge of the fire door, and a spark appeared, igniting the gunpowder and firing it. The firing process is greatly simplified, the firing rate and shooting accuracy are improved, it is easy to use, and the cost is low, which facilitates mass production. In the middle of the 17th century, many European armies were generally equipped with flintlock pistols until 1848, which was more than 200 years old.

Born in the mid-16th century into a family of gunsmiths, locksmiths and watchmakers, Mahan was determined to change the evils of the revolver. In his eyes, the revolver musket was complex, expensive to build, and could not reliably fire when the drum was contaminated.

Mahan's delicate hands finally removed the clock-bearing steel wheel and instead clamped a flint between the jaws of the hammer. He also had an anvil on the side of the fire hole, and if he needed to shoot, he pulled the trigger, and under the action of the spring, the flint hit the side of the fire door heavily, and sparks appeared, igniting the gunpowder.

This firing mechanism is called a percussive flintlock machine, and a firearm equipped with an impingement flintlock mechanism is called a percussive flintlock pistol.

The advantages of the percussive flintlock pistol are self-evident, it greatly simplifies the firing process, improves the rate of fire and accuracy of shooting, is easy to use, and has a lower cost, which facilitates mass production. Just after Mahan made his first flintlock pistol, his fame quickly spread across the continent.

Mahan's invention won the French a reputation in Europe, and King Henry IV of France couldn't help but be overjoyed. In 1598, Henry IV summoned Mahan to this purpose, and he was surprised to find that the inventor of the flintlock pistol was not only an invention of firearms, but also a rare genius in the field of painting and engraving. Henry IV then appointed Mahan as his "court's valet".

Mahan's fate was thus rewritten, but the fate of the flintlock pistol was not so smooth.

On May 14, 1610, Henry IV was stabbed with a knife on his way to visit his minister Sully in a carriage. With the death of Henry IV, the process of equipping the troops with flintlock pistols stalled. Many French generals objected to the arming of flintlock pistols on the grounds that "the sparks from the flint were not enough to ignite black powder." ”

But the torrent of history is unstoppable. In the middle of the 17th century, many European armies began to be armed with flintlock pistols. What is shocking is that after the flintlock pistol was equipped with the army, it was out of control and was used until 1848, when the equipment was ended.

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But the invention of the flintlock pistol was controversial in the West.

The development of flintlock pistols is divided into revolt muskets to flintlock pistols. The revolver musket was created on the basis of overcoming the inconvenience of the arquebus, but there is no accurate account of its birth.

Some people believe that the German watchmaker Johann Kiefers invented this gun, others say that it was the Italian scientist who invented the rotary firing device, and some people vividly say that the inventor of this gun is an Italian chicken thief, and make up such a plausible story: this chicken thief often goes to be a gentleman at night, and the main tool he uses to steal chickens is the arquebus, but the arquebus is easy to expose the target, so he used his brains to invent this more concealed revolver musket.

The story of the invention of the revolver by the German watchmaker Johann Kiefers is generally considered to be more credible. According to the story, Kiefers, who was born in the early 16th century, was famous in the world of watches, not only for his ability to make all kinds of beautiful watches, but also for all kinds of firearms, and to make many beautiful arquebuses himself. One day, a guest came to Kievers's house, and when the guests smoked and lit the fire, they used the ancient flint friction method to light the fire instead of the popular matches, and the shining sparks of flint instantly aroused Kiefers's inspiration, and he combined the serrated rotating steel wheel on the clock with the flint capable of producing sparks, and with his experience and wisdom, he succeeded in developing the world's first revolving rifle in 1515.

Kiefus's invention of the revolver attracted the attention of the German military, and soon the gun began to be equipped with German cavalry and infantry, and in 1544, when Germany went to war with France, the German cavalry was armed with a revolver and the French army was still armed with arquebuses. In the course of the battle, the French army armed with arquebuses barely fired a single shot, while the German cavalry, which used the revolver musket as the main weapon, became more and more brave and defeated the French soldiers. Soon, the defeated king of France also hired a considerable number of cavalry of the same kind, which were also armed with revolver muskets. In this way, the revolver musket slowly became the main weapon of the cavalry.

However, the revolver is not perfect, it is not only complex in structure, expensive to build, troublesome to use, and can not reliably fire when there is contamination on the steel wheel, so people began to develop a new "ignition" method.

Soon, the Spaniards living in the Iberian Peninsula invented the flintlock pistol, they removed the clock-bearing steel wheel, but clamped a flint on the jaws of the hammer, there was an anvil on the side of the fire transmission hole, if it was necessary to shoot, the trigger was pulled, and under the action of the spring, the flint was hit heavily on the side of the fire door, sparks appeared, and the ignition powder was ignited, this firing mechanism was called a percussive flintlock machine, and the firearm equipped with an impingement tunnel firing mechanism was called a percussive flintlock pistol. The impact flintlock pistol greatly simplifies the firing process, improves the firing rate and shooting accuracy, is easy to use, and has a low cost and facilitates mass production. By the 80s of the 16th century, the armies of many countries were armed with such ramming flintlock pistols.

It is likely that Mahan improved the design of this percussive musket, which eventually made the flintlock pistol another key work in the history of warfare.

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Later generations believed that the basic structure of the flintlock pistol was like a lighter, that is, the flint on the hammer was used to strike to produce sparks and ignite the gunpowder. The average caliber of the flintlock pistol is about 13.7 mm, because the reloading musket has not yet been invented, so this has made high requirements for the ammunition loading technology at that time, according to the previous loading method, when loading the projectile, the projectile needs to be put into the muzzle, and the cartridge is sent with a wooden hammer, and the gun is pushed into the chamber, which is very time-consuming, and on the battlefield, it means a waste of life. Later, gunsmiths in Pennsylvania, USA, created a method of speeding up reloading, using a sheet of linen or deerskin soaked in grease to wrap the projectile and load it into the muzzle, which reduced friction, not only accelerated the reload, but also played a breath-holding role, which increased accuracy and range.

It is said that the history of the United States was almost rewritten by a flintlock pistol.

During the 200 years of tunneling, many political and military events were closely related to the flintlock guns, especially the history of the American Revolution, which was almost rewritten by the tunnels. During the American Revolution, a militia organized by the American People's Volunteers fired the first shots at the British colonialists. Both Britain and the United States used flintlock pistols to fight from April 19, 1775, until September 1783, when the British government was forced to agree to American independence. On the day of the third year of the Revolutionary War, British and American troops faced each other on positions yard apart, and Major Forkaisen, a sharpshooter of the British colonial army, received an order to kill an important American figure, Washington, the commander-in-chief elected by the people of the thirteen North American states.

One day, a casually dressed officer appeared on the American position, not even a single guard, and there was only a person who looked like an adjutant standing beside him, and when Forchemsen was holding a tunnel gun and scolding the formation, this careless American kept staring at the British position, and did not look like he wanted to flee at all, and Forkaisen thought that he could not be a big officer, and was not worthy of his life as a sharpshooter, so he did not shoot. Later, Forkesen learned that this person was not only a high-ranking official, but also a well-known Washington. Imagine that when Forcaison fired a gun and Washington might lose his life, then the history of the United States could really be different.

The authenticity of this legend will not be said to be true or false, but one thing can be confirmed, that is, at the end of the eighteenth century, the flintlock pistol had a great improvement in performance and accuracy.

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And this situation also affects a war that is considered a disaster for the Chinese.

This war was the First Opium War.

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The First Opium War, often referred to by Britain as the First Anglo-Chinese War or the "Trade War", was a war launched by Britain against China and the beginning of modern Chinese history.

After closing the country, the Qing Dynasty gradually lagged behind the tide of the world, but in foreign trade, it has always been in a position of trade surplus. In order to reverse the trade deficit with China, Britain began to smuggle drugs and opium into China to obtain huge profits.

In the winter of 1838 (the eighteenth year of Daoguang), Emperor Daoguang sent Lin Zexu, the governor of Huguang, as the minister of the Qincha to Guangdong to ban opium. After Lin Zexu took office, he strictly confiscated more than 20,000 boxes of opium and destroyed them all in Humen Haikou. In order to open the door to the Chinese market, the British government decided to send an expeditionary force to invade China under this pretext, and the British Parliament also passed the appropriation bill for the war in China. In June 1840, 47 British warships and 4,000 army men, led by Rear Admiral Yilu and Charles Liott, the commercial superintendent in China, arrived outside the Pearl River Estuary in Guangdong Province and blockaded Haikou, marking the beginning of the Opium War. Although this war was only one part of the Opium War, it is sometimes referred to as the Opium War.

The war has been fought on and off, with a series of battles and military operations unrelated to each other.

In the early stage of the war, the Chinese army and people rose up to resist and dealt a heavy blow to the British invaders, but the decaying feudal system could not resist the British aggression, and the war ended in China's defeat and reparations. The Treaty of Nanjing, the first unequal treaty in Chinese history, was signed. China has begun to cede land, pay compensation, and negotiate tariffs to foreign countries, seriously jeopardizing China's sovereignty. The Opium War reduced China to a semi-colonial, semi-feudal society, lost its independent status, and promoted the disintegration of the natural economy. At the same time, it opened a new chapter in the history of modern Chinese people's resistance to foreign aggression.

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Before the First Opium War, at the beginning of the 19th century, Britain became the most powerful capitalist country in the world and established an empire on which the sun never sets. Its next major target of aggression in Asia is China.

From the early days of the Qing Dynasty to the eve of the Opium War, the Qing Dynasty was still an independent feudal country. Feudalism has seriously hampered the development of a new modern economy. The budding capitalism that emerged in the middle of the Ming Dynasty developed very slowly. Until the Opium War, the self-sufficient natural economy, which combined small agriculture and cottage industry, had always dominated China's social economy. Land annexation is becoming more and more serious and has become a common phenomenon throughout the country. The rule of officials was corrupted, and the feudal **** developed to the extreme. The Qing government used the "Four Books" and the "Five Classics" to imprison people's minds and brutally suppress those who were dissatisfied or commented on current politics. The national air defense is weak, and the armament is sluggish. In terms of foreign relations, the Qing Dynasty practiced a policy of seclusion for a long time, which seriously hindered China's foreign trade and social, political, and economic development.

With the increasing corruption of the Qing Dynasty and the aggravation of the exploitation and oppression of the people, the class contradictions in China became increasingly intensified, and the resistance and struggles of the masses of the people rose one after another. The rule of the Qing Dynasty faced a deep crisis, and Chinese feudal society had come to its end.

While the Qing Dynasty was in decline, capitalism in Britain, France, and the United States was developing rapidly. The industrial revolution began in Britain in the sixties of the eighteenth century, and by the thirties and forties of the nineteenth century, the large machine industry gradually replaced the factory handicraft industry. The development of British industry, the sharp rise in industrial output, and "the need to constantly expand the sales of products drove the bourgeoisie to run around the world" in an effort to find new resources and product living space.

France is the second capitalist country after Great Britain, and by the eve of the Opium Wars, France was the second largest country in the world in terms of industrial output. The capitalist industry in the United States on the eve of the Opium War was not developed, but it was on the rise. In the thirties of the 19th century, the American bourgeoisie was plundering the lands of the Indians and Mexicans in the south, excluding the power of European capitalism in Latin America and taking full control of the market, so the United States did not have enough power to invade China in the middle of the 19th century.

The United States acted as a helper for the British invaders, following the British in their invasion of China. After the reform of serfdom in Russia in 1861, capitalist industry and commerce developed rapidly. Russia is watching China from the north and is ready to seize Chinese territory at any time.

In the 40s of the 19th century, Western capitalist countries were thriving with the majestic wind of the industrial revolution. In order to expand the commodity market and compete for the origin of raw materials, the European and American powers stepped up their activities of conquering colonies, and China's neighboring countries and neighboring regions successively became their colonies or spheres of influence. As a country with a vast territory and the enslavement education of ancient feudal Confucianism, China naturally became the best target for colonialist aggression and expansion.

On this basis, the Qing Empire, under the premise of insufficient understanding of the Western powers and the weakening of its own national strength, finally broke out the First Opium War with Britain through a series of historical choices. (To be continued.) )

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