SinoDefence Forum

handifei880210

anyone seen the film Alexander and Hero (both are old films)
from the film, we know the way how this two troops fight.
spears of Macedonia or bow of the Qin dynasty, which will be the winner
(old topic, just like rome phalanx and han dynasty)

pla101prc

well ummm you do realize the Qin army is like 10 times bigger than the macedonian army right? but not all of them are professional though.

Qin's bow will give them an early advantage, but if the Macedonians have enough soldiers left to get close, than its hard to tell.

you have to remember Alexander has a really good calvary as well. but again Qin's bow can take em out at a pretty far range and calvary werent that effective without stirrups.

in Shi Ji it is recorded that Wei had the best armour and prolly a pretty good phalanx as well, but they were still no match for Qin's army. so i guess Qin must have something that can defeat those phalanx.

overall in real life Qin would obviously win but if you have the same number of troops from each side then its hard to tell.

FriedRiceNSpice

In ancient times, cavalry was the bane of skirmishers and missile troops. In fact, cavalry evolved from a light mobile force tasked with eliminating such troops. It was only later on, after the invention of the stirrup did heavy cavalry forces make their appearance.

Alexander defeated a million-man Persian force.

The Macedonian infantrymen were not even very heavily armored. They prevailed through superior training and tactics.

In the end though, I believe that the Qin forces do have the advantage. Terrain will be a major factor in deciding the victor though. On open plains, even with Macedonian cavalry I believe the Qin will easily be victorious.

handifei880210

a million-men? you sure? you mean the whole campaign or just one battle?

handifei880210

i search the internet, the result show me that the number of Persian army is 0.24 ~ 0.25 million in one battle, may be you mean a million-men in the whole campaign?

crobato

By studying the Terra Cotta army of the Qin, archeologists are able to ascertain that the Qin Army also uses formations similar to Macedonian Phalanx, that using 18 to 21" pikes.

With matrices of pikemen and crossbows, the Qin Army resembles more like the Swiss army in the 16th Century.

__________________
"Lets do a thermal sweep."

pla101prc

there is no way persia had a million man army. and i have said this before but defeating the persian army maybe great but it is not as hard as you think. first of all they had an idiotic leader which makes things ten times easier. second of all their army was consisted of soldiers from different states so they had different ways of fighting, you end up with a bow of salad that cant even hold themselves together. also we must not forget that xenophon fought his way right across persia with just 10000men...it shows you how crappy the persian army is...with the exception of the immortals.

Raptoreyes

Many of the comments so far assume a fairly comparable supply situation and equally skilled commanders. While this is fun because it forces a focus on hardware, decisive factors would include terrain, leadership, intelligence gathering, who was invading whom, logistics and support of the local population.

Let us assume for this that Alexander was invading and the Qin were defending (at least initially). Most forum participants seem to unconsciously take that line anyway. Next let us get a list of the sorts of commanders that the Qin would field against Alexander and let us assume the first commander the Qin field fails against Alexander before the Qin tap their best talent against the legendary western commander. Until we know more about who Alexander would be fighting (once the Qin understood the true magnitude of the threat). Then we could talk about the differing known psychology of Alexander vs ??? of the Qin.

One question I would have is the state of Chinese military rocketry at the time. While not very effective in terms of destruction, if invented by then the Qin would have an excellent means of disordering Alexanders best cavalry units. This was similar to the problems Alexanders army had with those featuring war elephants. (elephants apparently scare the heck out of horses, according to historical records).

As for terrain China's is very flat and open on the whole, but is it so in the region that Alexander would most likely enter from? The Chinese would initially have an advantage over knowledge of terrain and local support, but not for a very long time. Alexander was extremely adept at the politics of "winning hearts and minds" in a way no modern army or commander has ever been. (a possible exception of Douglas MacArthur administering postwar Japan which in any case was much smaller then Alexanders Persian domains).

For this discussion to really sizzle we should determine the most likely scenarios under which ancient east and west would fight. Would the first Emperior of the Qin more likely be in his prime during Alexanders invasion or be weeks from deaths door by the time Alexander made it to as far India and China. Can we assume that if Alexander drove for China first he might have avoided the disease that weakened him in his abortive India invasion?

I hope this post inspires additional research and a very through discussion as I think it just might.

crobato

Rocketry didn't exist in China that time and won't be for another thousand years.

Of far greater concern is that China as a civilization has mastered steel mass production, though not for weapons at first but for farm implementation. By using mass produced steel for farm tools to blow fields and build canals, China became an agriculture super power like no other in the ancient world, which led to an enormous population increase, the reason why China is still the most populous country in the world today.

Qin is a very blood thirsty and ambitious army. Its a literal decapitating machine. They chop heads here and there of prisoners, captives and general population. There is a head quota going on which means more heads, the higher the stature and there are head quotas for officer promotion. You can imagine the sheer terror this army evokes on its opponents.

__________________
"Lets do a thermal sweep."

pla101prc

it complicates things way to much that way. if you include all those stuff then i say Qin wins, war has always been a battle of the countries' military, economy, leadership and whole bunch of other stuff. the talent of Chinese emperors is defined by his ability to keep his subordinates subordinate...its very rare to have good emperors that are super talented at military on a tactic level in China, you have Li Shimin of Tang, Zhao Kuangyin of Song, Zhu Yuanzhang of Ming, Xuanye of Qing, and Mao Zedong of PRC...those are the only ones that can match Alexander's talent. the Qin emperor is nowhere close in that catgory...what he has is a really good pool of talent and a social and political system that is designed to fight wars. but still, it complicates things way too much due to all the political considerations you have to make, so i say keep it to the tactical level.

pla101prc

i thought Qin was able to make better copper weapons than steel at the time?

crobato

Qin mainly uses bronze weapons, even though its opponents were actually using steel weapons. The reason why is that steel is prized, and people thought they could make faer better use of it in the farms and canals, a policy that did pay off.

__________________
"Lets do a thermal sweep."

pla101prc

haha that;s what i meant, bronze not copper.

the historians were making reference to the assassination attempt, how Qin had the technology to make really long swords...

ccL1

The Persians did not have a million man army in a single battle. I believe the largest they had was at the Battle of Issus, where they had about 300,000 (or a bit more) -- an army which Alexander defeated anyways with 10 times less troops.

If I were a betting man, I would place my money on Alexander and the Macedonians. The guy had the skill, intelligence, and strategic perception to defeat anyone. Plus his troops, especially his Companion Cavalry, were just awesome.

I'm not saying I'm 100% correct. I could totally be wrong, but if I were forced to choose, I would choose Alexader and the Macedonians.

Mightypeon

I woudl assume that Logistics (hell, the Logistic train would go through some very nasty terrain) would assure a victory by the defender.