There is a popular view that the Manchus entered the customs with their bows and horses, so they did not want to make progress on firearms under the national policy of riding and shooting, which led to the history of humiliation in modern China, so the Manchus became the object of scorn and the Manchus became sinners through the ages, but is this really the case? Let us look for the truth from historical facts.

Let's first take a look at the Ming and Qing dynasties, the Ming army's firearms and equipment table:

Full battalion strength: 3,600 infantry (fully equipped with firearms);

1,000 cavalry;

400 artillery personnel (management of field heavy artillery and large continuous artillery);

A total of 5,000 officers and soldiers were counted.

Armament of firearms: 3,600 bolts (infantry guns);

9,000 pounds of medicine;

900,000 heavy eight coins;

200 large cannons (multi-barreled fire);

675 kg of combined medicine;

400 rods (artillery self-defense with a hand);

160 generals (field heavy artillery).

Sun Chengzong's training information (standard car camp):

Strength: 3,200 infantry;

2,400 cavalry;

512 heavy drivers;

515 officers of all ranks, attendants, heralds, and miscellaneous servants;

A total of 6,627 officers and soldiers were counted.

Armament firearms: 1984 guns,

Among them, 256 were birds;

1,728 guns with 3 eyes;

a total of 256 large and small Francophiles;

88 pieces of artillery of all kinds (Hongyi, Shenfei, Annihilation, etc.).

Equipment: 128 vehicles (chariots).

256 heavy cars.

It stands to reason that such a firepower configuration, even if it can't win, there should be no problem with self-preservation, but under the Ming and Qing dynasties, as long as it is a field battle, the Ming army is wiped out nine times out of ten, which forms a very strange phenomenon, the side with weapons, personnel, and resource advantages has repeatedly lost the battle over and over again in the past few decades, and once it fails, the whole army is annihilated, which is very rare in the war of the cold weapon era. You must know that it is much more difficult to completely annihilate the enemy in the era of cold weapons than in the era of hot weapons. General historical researchers blame these reasons on the political corruption and darkness of the Ming Dynasty, the incompetence of the generals, and so on, and the demons do not want to talk about these big aspects, but just want to make a specific analysis of the specific tactical aspects of the Ming and Qing Dynasty field battles.

The first was the Battle of Fushun, the first large-scale field battle of the Ming and Qing dynasties, against the two sides of the Guangning general Zhang Chengyin's more than 10,000 reinforcements against Nurhachi's 20,000 Qing troops, when the Ming army was divided into three places, according to danger, trenches, and firearms camp. Zhang Chengyin attempted to fight Houjin in a decisive battle with 3 battalions. On the 21st, the two sides fought fiercely outside the eastern border of Fushun Guan. Later, the Jin soldiers risked their lives to fall into battle, and when the battle was not long, they were about to besiege the three major battalions of the Ming army. The Ming army was invincible, and the guerrilla Liu Yujie of the right battalion took the lead in escaping, and the battalions broke out one after another. The Houjin soldiers then pursued and killed, and the Ming army suffered numerous casualties. More than 50 people, including Zhang Chengyin, deputy general, staff general, guerrilla, general officer, and general general, were killed. The Houjin army pursued and killed more than 40 miles, annihilated eight or nine out of ten reinforcements from the Ming Dynasty, and obtained more than 9,000 war horses, more than 7,000 pairs of armor, and other equipment. This battle seems to be a curse, and the future field battles of the Ming army are almost all lost in one field according to the pattern of this battle.

Then there is the well-known Battle of Sarhu, first of all, the world-criticized division of troops into four routes, divided into a combined attack. Compared with the battle of Fushun above, do you see any similarities? Yes, the Ming army began to divide the troops in a patterned way again, and what to do to divide and attack, the commander-in-chief Yang Hao committed this problem, and the generals under him continued to commit it, like an infectious disease. First of all, the main general of Fushun Road, Juniper, after he arrived at Salhu, he immediately divided his troops into two, and personally led a part into the Jilin Cliff to attack Jiefan City. while the other was encamped at the foot of the Sarhu Mountain, digging trenches, and arranging firearms. Then there was Marin, the main general of the Kaiyuan Road, who immediately divided the army into three after hearing that Juniper had been completely annihilated, and also divided it into three places, digging trenches, and setting up camp with firearms, really trying to disperse his army and give the other side a chance to break through. In the end, the Ming army's four-way army was completely annihilated on three routes, and more than 310 civil and military generals of the Ming army died, more than 45,870 soldiers died, and more than 28,760 horses and mules were lost.

And then there is the battle of the Hunhe River that was evaluated by the Ming people as a dignified and vibrant battle, this field battle was actually carried out within the framework of the Liaoshen War, the chief soldier Tong Zhonghua, Chen Ce, the deputy chief soldier Sichuan Shizhu Du Si Qin Bangping, the guerrilla Zhou Dunji and others knew that the Qing army was approaching Shenyang, so they led more than 10,000 people to rescue Shenyang, but Shenyang fell halfway, and the generals of the Ming army were very courageous, all

said angrily: "My generation can't save Shen, what are you doing in the past three years!" So he still has to take Shenyang back. Of course, it is a good thing to have this spirit, but then the Ming army began to play the routine of dividing troops and camping like an evil spirit, and the history of the Ming Dynasty contained "Dunji Gu please cross the river first with Qin Bangping, the north of the camp bridge" This solid word is really interesting again and again, which shows that Qin Bangping's original intention was not willing to divide the troops, and the result was still driven ducks on the shelf. If this person hadn't died in battle, the demon would have really suspected that he was a spy of the Qing army! The final result is not to be known, except for the previously defeated deputy generals Kan Wanliang and Jiang Bi, the Ming army was once again annihilated.

It stands to reason that even if you are a fool, you should be aware of such repeated failures, but the Ming army is not like this, the end of the Liaoyang War of Liaoshen, the Ming army is in danger in Liaoyang, the city is "less than 10,000 soldiers", and "the body is not intermediary, the instrument is not fine", Liaodong "generals and strong soldiers", half of the loss of the battle of Shenyang, half of the support in various places In such a situation, Yuan Yingtai of the Ming Dynasty and Zhang Quan of the patrol took advantage of Nurhachi's delay and mistakes, and quickly recruited reinforcements, withdrew the tiger skin post and Fengji fort soldiers back to Liaoyang, within five days, Finally, he gathered an army of 130,000. It stands to reason that at this time, the whole army should be based on the city, but at this time, the Ming army began to fall ill again, and actually divided 50,000 troops to camp in the teaching field five miles away from the city. As a result, Liaoshen was all occupied, Yuan Yingtai committed suicide, and Zhang Quan was captured and died unyieldingly.

The above examples, in addition to showing that the Ming army has the bad habit of dividing troops, is not enterprising in tactics, whether it is offensive or defensive, as soon as it engages with the enemy, it is a picture of a turtle with a shrunken head, and it is generally a battle in a car, and even more is a deep ditch and high base, a large trench pit, Fushun, Salhu, Hunhe, all of which are like this, they do not know how to forge ahead, and always hope that the opponent will come to death, and the initiative of the battlefield is handed over to the opponent in vain. If it is said that the previous station examples were that the Qing army had the advantage of troops, and the Ming army had to shrink into the car formation, then the Ming army in the later battle of Daling River paid a huge price for such an unenterprising tactic.

At that time, the Qing army besieged Dalinghe City, and the guard general Zu Dashou led 30,000 people to defend it, and the Qing army could not attack it for a long time, so it began to besiege the city. At this time, the Ming army supervised Zhang Chun, the general soldier Wu Xiang and others led an army of 40,000 to rescue, at this time, in view of the situation, the Qing army had to divide the troops to block, in the case of insufficient troops, only 20,000 to intercept. At this time, the Ming army was twice as numerous as the Qing army, and did not think of taking the initiative to attack and crush the opponent in one fell swoop, but began to camp again, waiting for others to attack. The Qing army was naturally not polite in the face of this situation, so "the right wing soldiers suddenly entered Zhang Chun's camp, the enemy was defeated, and Wu Xiang and the deputy general Sang Azhai ran first." Zhang Chun and others reassembled the rout and set up camp, the wind will be strong, the enemy will take advantage of the wind and set fire, and our army, the sky will suddenly rain, the wind will be reversed, and the battle will be resumed, and Zhang Chun and 33 deputy generals will be captured. ”

If the Ming army is only one or two people like this, then it can also be explained that the generals are incompetent and do not understand tactics, but the reality is that almost all the generals of the Ming army invariably camp in formation when facing the enemy army, waiting for the enemy to attack the routine, so the problem is big, where is the root cause? We know that due to the strong and weak branches of the Song Dynasty, the strength of the warriors was greatly weakened, although the Ming Dynasty took the Song Dynasty as a mirror, and refused to negotiate, but the Song Dynasty's heavy literature and light martial arts style has learned a full ten, especially what kind of civil servants do martial arts, it seems that those who have read through the eight strands of the text can be invincible, and the sage's words are top 10,000 soldiers, so the previous Liaodong Jinglu (that is, the highest military and political chief of Liaodong), from Yang Hao to Wang Zhichen, are actually Jinshi who read Bagu Wen, none of them are professional generals! Yuan Chonghuan, who was the most outstanding among them, was just barely maintaining, and he did not lose his teacher and land. As for wanting to rely on them to counterattack, it was even more of a day when the moon in the mirror was in the water, and it was almost not realized. And the situation in Liaodong is also being corrupted day by day in the hands of these martial ministers. These are just the big ones, but who is responsible for the tactical failures? Here I have to cite two famous generals of the Ming Dynasty, Qi Jiguang and Yu Daxuan, which may sound incredible, but it was the Ming Dynasty chariot battle tactics established by these two people that finally made the Ming army defeat the Qing army at the tactical level. If you look at the demons' brief talk about the firearms of the Ming Dynasty, the article on naval warfare and chariot warfare, you will know that the ultimate goal of the chariot tactics of the two generals Qi Yu is to turn the chariot into a city with feet, a horse without socks, and a mobile artillery, integrating the city's defensive toughness, chariot loading mobility and artillery lethality, so that it can attack, defend, and move. It's a pity that the goal is ambitious, hope is good, but the reality is cruel, the Ming army expects the tank to achieve the goal until the emergence of the tank is not fully realized, before that, the Ming army's tank has neither mobility nor impact, but also has high requirements for the terrain, every time you meet the enemy, not caught off guard, too late to arrange the time-consuming and laborious car formation was defeated, that is, you can only wait for the enemy to attack in a rigid way, once the enemy opens an opening, then even the superior forces will still collapse the whole battalion,. And the car was lined up on the front line to resist the horse, but the car was carrying various types of artillery of the Ming army, so the artillery of the Ming army became the first line to resist the enemy, and the artillery was placed in the most dangerous place, so the fate of the Ming army's artillery can be imagined. The Qing army was easily able to attract the first wave of firearms of the Ming army with a special defensive firearm cart, and then use a rapid charge of heavy cavalry to destroy the Ming army that had no time to load ammunition in one fell swoop. Even if you are lucky enough to repel the enemy army, you can't gather and annihilate it at all, and the enemy army can soon come back, the battle of the Daling River is the best example, with superior forces to repel the Qing army, but the Qing army immediately reorganized its forces, launched another attack, and finally broke through one section and collapsed on the whole front. In fact, in the Ming Dynasty, there was a very strong cavalry team, Ming Chengzu Zhu Di's five expeditions to Mongolia, relying on strong cavalry, but unfortunately the cavalry that could compete with the Guanwai tribes under the tactics of car warfare, gradually consumed their sharpness, and finally could not afford to fight. The Ming Dynasty successive Liaodong economic strategy, only Yuan Chonghuan recognized the role of cavalry, and finally formed the Guanning Iron Cavalry, trying to fight a decisive battle with the Qing army in the field, but unfortunately such an excellent cavalry finally only appeared outside the Guangqu Gate in Beijing, and finally with Yuan Chonghuan was killed, some were wiped out under the command of stupidity, and some followed Wu Sangui to the Qing Dynasty, and finally disappeared in the long river of history.

Flowers bloom two flowers each table a branch, the Qing army in Liaodong and the Ming army in the process of continuous fighting, gradually also realized the power of firearms in the hands of the Ming army, although the power of firearms in the hands of the Ming army, the rate of fire and the matching tactics are not good, but after all, firearms are the trend of the future development of the world, in the process of fighting with the Ming army with firearms, the Qing army's own losses are not negligible, Nurhachi generation heroes, naturally will not see the advantages of firearms, so the Qing army soon learned from the Ming army, began the application of firearms. In the battle of the Hunhe River, due to the good fighting of the white pole soldiers, the initial attack of the Qing army was not successful, but the damage was not small, so Nurhachi urgently dispatched the city fire artillery in Shenyang City, and carried out artillery bombardment on the infantry phalanx of the white pole soldiers, resulting in a great chaos in the formation of the white pole soldiers, and the whole army was annihilated. Tasted the sweetness of firearms, so after the war, the Qing army continued to improve its firearms equipment and created firearms tactics that were completely different from those of the Ming army.

In the fourth year of Ming Chongzhen, after the fifth year of Jin Tiancong (1631), the Qing Dynasty finally cast the Hongyi cannon under the supervision of Tong Yangxing, and used them in the battle of the Daling River in the same year. Huang Taiji actually went out ten miles to the suburbs to greet Kong Youde's surrender, which shows the importance that the Manchurians attach to firearms.

Although the Qing army knew the importance of firearms in the continuous battles with the Ming army, it naturally disdained the vehicle combat tactics that led to the Ming army's repeated losses and losses, and created a new firearms tactics according to its own superior cavalry team. And this method of warfare, in the Qing Dynasty's foreign wars, continued to mature and reveal one by one, and the battle of Ulan Butong in Pinggaldan is one of the most classic examples.

In the twenty-seventh year of the reign of Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty (1688), Galdan, the chief of the Dzungar tribe of the Erut Mongols, led 100,000 cavalry under the instigation of Tsarist Russia to defeat the Khalkha Mongolian Tushetu Khan, Chechen Khan, and Zasak Khan. In 1690, the Khalkha Mongol Three Khans retreated to Inner Mongolia, and in the name of chasing out the Khalkha Department, Galdan marched eastward along the Klulun River, crossed the Hulunbuir steppe, invaded along the Khalkha River, and on June 10, entered the Urzahui River on the border of Mongolia today. After Kangxi heard the news, he organized his troops, personally conquered Galdan, and led the Fuyuan general Prince Yu Fuquan to leave Gubeikou for his left army, and ordered Chang Ning, the general of Anbei, to go out of Xifengkou for the right wing army. In July, Galdan advanced to the area of the Wuzhumuqin Banner of the Xilin Gol League, engaged the Changning Department of the Qing army, and the Qing army lost the first battle. Galdan took advantage of the victory and drove straight in, and went south to the foot of the Ulan Butong Peak of the Keshiketeng Banner, and the Qing court was shocked. Kangxi actively adjusted the deployment of the campaign, and ordered Prince Kang Jieshu to fortify in Guihua (now Hohhot) to cut off Galdan's retreat to Xinjiang; Ordered Suo Etu and others to lead troops to garrison Bahrain and resolutely hold the Bahrain Bridge. The troops of Ming Fuquan, Changning, Sunu, and Mahaan quickly assembled in Ulan Butong, and drew strong troops from Gyeonggi, Shengjing, Jilin, Xi'an and other places to participate in the battle. On July 20, Kangxi arrived at Boluo and Tun (now Longhua), and Fuquan waved 100,000 troops and camped on the front line of the Tuligen River (the upper source of the Luan River). "Shengwu Ji" records: "The Qing army has 40 camps, 60 miles of company camps, 20 miles of Zhou, the first end is connected, standing like a mountain" (there are 12 company camps today). Galdan grabbed the favorable terrain of Zhanan, set up the command post on the top of the Ulan Butong Peak, ascended to the distance, commanded in battle, and set up a "camel city" to fight, and the history recorded: "The thief rode 100,000 Chen Mountain, blocked the water by the forest, tied the camel's feet to the ground, carried the box stack, covered with wet felt, and the ring was like a fence, and the number said: Camel City." The soldier fired the cannon from the gap in the grate, and the spear was ......". In the early morning of August 1, the Qing army and Galdan fought at the foot of Ulan Butong Peak. The Qing army separated the Ulangong River, set up antlers and guns, and soldiers advanced in Xu. In the middle of the day, the artillery of both sides shook the sky, the sound of killing was everywhere, the right wing army of the Qing army was blocked by the mud and water swamp of the river, and the Minister of the Interior Tong Guogang (Kangxi's uncle) led the left wing army to follow the river, "suddenly hit by a thief, died in battle...... Brother Guowei led the left wing soldiers, swept in from the mountainside, and attacked it." In the fierce battle, the Galdan army took cover from the camel city and fired bird guns. The striker led Geste to fly his sword, and rode alone to "go straight into the thief camp, impact left and right, and re-enter the person who came out and re-entered", detecting the reality of the camel city. Therefore, the Qing army bombarded the "camel city" with iron-core artillery and sub-mother artillery, and the "camel city" was broken into two, opening the gap, and Tong Guowei took advantage of the situation to "attack it from the mountainside, and the infantry and cavalry rushed to fall into battle first, and then broke its base", and defeated the Galdan army.

It is clear from the Battle of Ulan Butong how much the Qing army attached importance to the use of artillery, and the victory in this battle was almost entirely won by the cooperation of firearms and elite cavalry. The firearms and cavalry of the Qing Dynasty can not only fight together, but also fight separately, the field cavalry wins, the fortification is by artillery to open the gap, the cavalry is attacked, the defense is deep ditch and high fortress with firearms to attract the enemy to attack, and the cavalry flanks and flanks. The flexible and powerful fire horse cooperated to lay a huge country in the Qing Dynasty.

From the beginning of Huang Taiji, the Qing Dynasty attached great importance to the development and application of firearms, and in the Kangxi era, a gun factory was set up in the palace office, Jingshan and the blacksmith camp, and the guns made were exclusively for the use of the royal family and the Manchurian Eight Banners, and a firearms battalion equipped with bird guns and artillery was also established. In order to quell the rebellion of the three feudatories, Kangxi specially ordered the Belgian missionary Nan Huairen to manufacture artillery that adapted to the terrain characteristics of the south and was convenient for mobile use on the battlefield. Nan Huairen "cast a new cannon in the foreign style" and presented the book "Shenwei Tushuo", which introduced the theory and method of Western cannon making. In the 14th year of the Kangxi reign (1675) to the last year of the Kangxi reign for more than 40 years, the central government alone supervised or restructured nearly 1,000 artillery pieces of various types such as the Invincible General of Shenwei, the Golden Dragon Cannon, the Winning General, and the Weiyuan General. Not only the number is large, but also a lot of types, Qianlong 21 years (1756) promulgated the "King James Ministry of Industry Rules for Firearms Style" contains a total of 85 kinds of artillery, the same year of the "Imperial Ritual Instrument Schema" in the bird gun, the red cannon, the mother cannon these three firearms became the standard weapons. There were also a lot of military books on firearms in the Qing Dynasty, such as Xue Xi's Records of Practicing and Reading Firearms Formations, Shen Shanxuan's Explanation of Firearms, Wang Daquan and Wang Tao's Brief Explanation of Firearms, Xue Fengzuo's Chinese and Western Fire Methods, Chen Yang's Gun Specification Diagram, and Dong Zu's Summary of Artillery Methods. But why do people always like to blame the Qing Dynasty for not paying attention to firearms because of the widespread use of firearms in the late Ming Dynasty? So much so that the Qing Dynasty emperor said that the sentence based on mounted archery has become the evidence of the backwardness of firearms in the Qing Dynasty, but the above examples have proved that the Qing Dynasty did not attach importance to firearms at all, but why is the gap between firearms at the end of the Qing Dynasty and the world so big? This can be summed up in one sentence, that is, "although the country is big, forgetting the war will be dangerous" in the late Qianlong period, the territory of the Qing Dynasty has been very stable, the Qing Dynasty forced Tsarist Russia, Ping Galdan, set Taiwan, and Tibet Qinghai, there is no opponent around, so Wen Tian Wu Huan, even the ancestral training based on cavalry and archery has become "archery, arrows are false; Galloping horses, people fall to the ground" The development of firearms has gradually been abandoned, so that China's firearms, which had lagged behind the times in the Ming Dynasty, began to lag even further behind the world. It can be said that the peak martial arts of the early Qing Dynasty led to the miserable situation that followed, let us imagine what the situation would have been if Tsarist Russia had not competed for hegemony in Europe during the Kangxi era, but had turned back to compete with the Qing Dynasty for hegemony in East Asia. I believe that if history develops in this way, the development of firearms in the Qing Dynasty will never stop there, and the history of firearms in China will inevitably write a more colorful stroke.