Kurt
Junior Member
Nope, the Chinese fought the Hsiung-Nu who received Roman POW from the Parthians after Carrhae. These Roman POW were not very happy with their new masters and were outmost happy when they could desert into Chinese service where they showed themselves very capable soldiers. The Chinese possibly gave them the dream of every Roman soldier then, a plot of land for their service, where they settled together and helped defend their adopted homeland China. After the Hsiung-Nu power was crushed by the Chinese, who in turn occupied the merchant center of Samarkand, some major displacements took place among the Central Asian nomads. In the end another tribe, not consisting of people who constituted the Hsiung-Nu, got kicked out and went West on a large scale plunder tour. The very mobile horse based troops were difficult to counter with less mobile infantry of the line and irregular infantry was a hopeless match. Thus by a serious of raids these original raiders with a strong component on horseback (not all Central Asians rode to war) were able to destabilize their ever changing neighbours' political organizations with lightning raids and destruction. All the while Germanic and other marauders joined them and gave the Hunnic army regular infantry and heavy cavalry, creating a very successful force that by Roman deserters even learned some siegecraft. After the death of the great military leader Attila, the Germanic allies grumbled and wiped out the Huns that no longer offered them an option for more success through plunder. The Hunnic case often gets overstated because the Roman writers were looking for reasons outside of the empire instead of realizing that the apple was rotten within, making it hard to convince people to fight for it (thus creating enforced soldier dynasties and sometimes draconian measures against men who cut their thumbs to avoid the draft). That should clarify the Hsiung-Nu and Hun issue that was only based on very sloppy linguistic guesswork leading to an equation that does not stand up to archaeological evidence and by no means says that Eastern or Western Eurasian military institutions were superior or inferior.
So who is the among the greatest Chinese warriors?
I think the Roman POW would have been glad to show themselves worthy to be ranked as such, because this was the greatest good they received after many years of misfortune and, as far as I know, the Chinese soldiers were quite impressed by the Roman ability of constructing field fortifications.