Why didn't late Qing produce any good generals?

stardave said:

Is that have to do with discrimination against woman in the old times? Or did they mostly deserve the blame for it?

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I think the answer is both. You have a weak leader who would easily be influenced. They are usually not wise and tend to like the people who flatter them and kiss their asses. It just so happens that almost all of these ass-kissers are corrupted officials and those close to the, who have evil intent.

A good example is e second emperor of the Tang dynasty, widely recognized as one of THE greatest emperors of ancient China. At his old age, he fell in love with a yong woman, named Wu. However, he immediately dumped her once some official told him that someone with the last name Wu could overthrow the dynasty. I know that this was superstition, but ancient people took it seriously. And it shows that a wise leader can make hard decisions and leave their own personal feelings behind when there is a conflict between their own needs and what the govn't needs. Yet, his son, a weak leader, could not resist the seduction of Wu and named her his queen. And she eventually killed her second husband and became the only female emperor in Chinese history. She couldn't do anything and al,ost lost her life in the hands of a wise leader, but thrived mightily when with a weak leader. So I would say the key issue should definitely be the leadership, not those women or eunuch close to them. Just like there are always talented people, there are always evil people. It is up to the leader to choose who he wants to be with. The weak leaders tend to pick those evil people to surround him.

vesicles said:

I think the answer is both. You have a weak leader who would easily be influenced. They are usually not wise and tend to like the people who flatter them and kiss their asses. It just so happens that almost all of these ass-kissers are corrupted officials and those close to the, who have evil intent.

A good example is e second emperor of the Tang dynasty, widely recognized as one of THE greatest emperors of ancient China. At his old age, he fell in love with a yong woman, named Wu. However, he immediately dumped her once some official told him that someone with the last name Wu could overthrow the dynasty. I know that this was superstition, but ancient people took it seriously. And it shows that a wise leader can make hard decisions and leave their own personal feelings behind when there is a conflict between their own needs and what the govn't needs. Yet, his son, a weak leader, could not resist the seduction of Wu and named her his queen. And she eventually killed her second husband and became the only female emperor in Chinese history. She couldn't do anything and al,ost lost her life in the hands of a wise leader, but thrived mightily when with a weak leader. So I would say the key issue should definitely be the leadership, not those women or eunuch close to them. Just like there are always talented people, there are always evil people. It is up to the leader to choose who he wants to be with. The weak leaders tend to pick those evil people to surround him.

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Actually, Wu Zetian's rule was largely benevolent, and she ruled for a long, long time. There is no way that she could've lasted that long if she was messing the country up.

The thing is, most of the women blamed as 红颜祸水 were just prizes to be fought over by the men. Cheng Yuanyuan and Diao Chan are two prime examples. It is the lust and greed of those men fighting over them that is the true cause of the downfall of dynasties and the sufferings of the people.

It can also be argued that it is due to Confucian ideas that women are blamed. Beautiful women are temptations, and wise men must resist such temptations.

solarz said:

Actually, Wu Zetian's rule was largely benevolent, and she ruled for a long, long time. There is no way that she could've lasted that long if she was messing the country up.

The thing is, most of the women blamed as 红颜祸水 were just prizes to be fought over by the men. Cheng Yuanyuan and Diao Chan are two prime examples. It is the lust and greed of those men fighting over them that is the true cause of the downfall of dynasties and the sufferings of the people.

It can also be argued that it is due to Confucian ideas that women are blamed. Beautiful women are temptations, and wise men must resist such temptations.

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Yes, but from Li family' perspective, she still stole their dynasty. The fact that she was a good emperor does not change the fact that she became the emperor by killing her husband and her own son, and interrupting the Tand dynasty, all of which were disastrous to the Tang dynasty. The point I am trying make is that all these was caused by a weak leadership of the third emperor of the dynasty, Wu's husband. If it was up to Li Shimin, Wu would have been killed long before she could have anything to do with the throne. That is the difference between a strong leader and a weak leader.

In a way, the Romans had many parallels to this sort of situation, especially in the Byzantine period of the Empire.

vesicles said:

Yes, but from Li family' perspective, she still stole their dynasty. The fact that she was a good emperor does not change the fact that she became the emperor by killing her husband and her own son, and interrupting the Tand dynasty, all of which were disastrous to the Tang dynasty. The point I am trying make is that all these was caused by a weak leadership of the third emperor of the dynasty, Wu's husband. If it was up to Li Shimin, Wu would have been killed long before she could have anything to do with the throne. That is the difference between a strong leader and a weak leader.

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Ah, but simply being able to resist temptation is no guarantee of being a good leader. Take the last Ming Emperor, Chongzhen for example. Chen Yuanyuan was initially given to him as a concubine, but he decided to give her to Wu because she was distracting him from affairs of the state. The problem is, Chongzhen was absolutely incompetent as an emperor. He had no ability to judge character, ordering the execution of his best general, Yuan Chonghuan, who had been kicking the Manchurians' collective asses.

I guess in the end, the true problem lies in hereditary authoritarianism. When one person controls absolute power, it's already bad enough. When that person gets *born* into absolute power, that's even worse. Of 2000 years of Imperial Dynasties, the bad emperors probably outnumbered the good ones by 20 to 1. It really amazing that China has managed to survive despite that!

solarz said:

Ah, but simply being able to resist temptation is no guarantee of being a good leader. Take the last Ming Emperor, Chongzhen for example. Chen Yuanyuan was initially given to him as a concubine, but he decided to give her to Wu because she was distracting him from affairs of the state. The problem is, Chongzhen was absolutely incompetent as an emperor. He had no ability to judge character, ordering the execution of his best general, Yuan Chonghuan, who had been kicking the Manchurians' collective asses.

I guess in the end, the true problem lies in hereditary authoritarianism. When one person controls absolute power, it's already bad enough. When that person gets *born* into absolute power, that's even worse. Of 2000 years of Imperial Dynasties, the bad emperors probably outnumbered the good ones by 20 to 1. It really amazing that China has managed to survive despite that!

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About Chongzhen, I think he was simply unlucky to inherit a nation already at the brink of complete collapse. He was very wise at the beginning. Yet, he became increasingly paranoid and desperate as he found out that his dynasty is going down the drain. I would imagine he would be someone we admire if he lived in another time. If you look at it, almost all e great emperors had wise predecessors and Inherited a wealthy nation. The ShiHuang Di had several generations of kings befoore him to make the kingdom of Qin the powerful state that it was when he became the king. The Martial Emperor of Han had Wen and Jing Emperors who established a strong economic and social base for him to launch all the great military campaigns. Qian long had kangxi and yongzheng who managed to save all kinds of money for him to play with.

Yet, I agree that Chongzhen could never be considered as one of the great even if he lived in another time. The truly great leaders can turn even the worst situation around. Yet, Chongzhen became clueless and completely lost any slice of possible wisdom in the end.

solarz said:

I guess in the end, the true problem lies in hereditary authoritarianism. When one person controls absolute power, it's already bad enough. When that person gets *born* into absolute power, that's even worse. Of 2000 years of Imperial Dynasties, the bad emperors probably outnumbered the good ones by 20 to 1. It really amazing that China has managed to survive despite that!

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Here is something I don't understand, China had heretical rulers for much of it is time, just like in the West, but how it is possible when you are look at Chinese history compare to the West, China often have much more successful society compare to the west. In the West when the ruler screw up, which they often do, the nation/empire breaks up and never gets back together, then it often goes into dark ages, or endless city state feudalism.

But despite the screw up of the Chinese emperors, why is the nation being governed well (by ancient standards), that China didn't face a lot of the bad consequence that the West faced.

stardave said:

Here is something I don't understand, China had heretical rulers for much of it is time, just like in the West, but how it is possible when you are look at Chinese history compare to the West, China often have much more successful society compare to the west. In the West when the ruler screw up, which they often do, the nation/empire breaks up and never gets back together, then it often goes into dark ages, or endless city state feudalism.

But despite the screw up of the Chinese emperors, why is the nation being governed well (by ancient standards), that China didn't face a lot of the bad consequence that the West faced.

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I think the established ruling classes during the Dynasty era made sure China doesn't fall back to the Three Kingdoms Era where constant warfare depleted many resources and man power, plus the political games played among the three rulers was too much to handle.

stardave said:

Here is something I don't understand, China had heretical rulers for much of it is time, just like in the West, but how it is possible when you are look at Chinese history compare to the West, China often have much more successful society compare to the west. In the West when the ruler screw up, which they often do, the nation/empire breaks up and never gets back together, then it often goes into dark ages, or endless city state feudalism.

But despite the screw up of the Chinese emperors, why is the nation being governed well (by ancient standards), that China didn't face a lot of the bad consequence that the West faced.

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First, it's "hereditary", not "heretical". Though I suppose that by Christian standards, they can be considered the latter as well, but that has no bearing on this topic.

I think there are two things that has enabled China to survive as a nation, even through periods of fragmentation.

First is the decentralized system of administration, combined with the relative centralization of military. China is a huge empire, and many of the local governors and magistrates are largely independent in their administration. However, they had access to very little military power, which means that they cannot just "break off". Even if the Emperor is an incompetent tyrant, he still has the military power to keep the empire together. Meanwhile, because of the decentralization, even if the Emperor issues horrible edicts, how those edicts affect local populace is largely a matter of discretion for the local officials. The one exception to that is taxes. If the Emperor raises taxes, then the local magistrate *have* to find that money somehow. It's no coincidence that taxation is what led to most of the peasant rebellions in Chinese history.

Despite its relatively robust system of governance, China has still experienced numerous periods of fragmentation. However, all those periods have one thing in common: they all ended up getting united again.

I think this has to do with China's strong economic foundation. In the ancient times, China was thought to be "all under heaven" for a good reason. To the north was endless grasslands of little agricultural value, populated by fierce nomadic tribes. To the east and south were seas and jungles. To the west was a great desert and the tallest mountain ranges of the world. For the ancient Chinese, they pretty much conquered everywhere they could get to.

And because they did have this ability to militarily conquer all of the known world, every warlord ended up with that ambition. Look at the 3 Kingdoms era: they could've lived in peace like France, Spain and Germany, but each one of them was determined to conquer the other two. I would say that the reason this didn't happen to Europe is because for the longest time, they simply didn't have the capability to mount such a campaign. The English fought a 100 year war against the French, and still couldn't conquer all of France. They simply didn't have the manpower to hold everything, and there was always a place for the French to regroup where the English couldn't touch them.

Having a unified language and shared custom probably also helps.

Also the great wall is the longest defense line in the world, it guard against constant nomadic threat from the north and you need a unified empire to keep it useful because it simply eats up lots of resources. Climate and conditions in the north is harsh, so if you lose a battle you are unlikely to return.

Campaign launched by Han dynasty against Xiongnu reporting 60-70% casualty rate is not uncommon. And the logistics force is always larger than the fighting force. It is estimated that a large campaign requires half a million people to be drafted for work, and for every 40 odd carts of grains sent only 1 cart reached the troop in the front line.

Also given the surrounding geography region of China, the most profitable expansion cost wise is still to unify China. Expeditions launched against surrounding less populated but more mobile society loses more than the gains and is done only out of necessity and for tributes. This is different from say Russia who decided to move east for new territory rather than compete directly against already established european powers. The same reason why the english and later on other european countries turned to outside colonies instead of fighting each other. It's always going to be a cost-profit balancing in the end.

It will be interesting to see if American can do the same in the future what China can do till now, to reunify even if it temporary splits into smaller states in the future, though I don't think we'll all live long enough to make judgements. Also the civil war is a good example of how US tries to prevent territory from breaking away, and they are willing to pay a large price for it.

---------- Post added at 10:18 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:06 AM ----------

In fact if you don't have russia and america, is it really that unfeasible that Hitler may be able to unify all of subcontinent europe, and deal with GB at its leasure?