China at that time
During Alexander's reign, it was equivalent to the Eastern Zhou Dynasty in ancient China, but at that time, the Zhou Dynasty had already left its dominant position over the whole country, and the various princes were divided into one side, and we usually call this time the Spring and Autumn Warring States Period.
Moreover, at this time, the two major princely states of Wei and Qin were actively changing the law, Gongsun Yan of the State of Wei launched the "Five Kingdoms Xiangwang" movement, while the Qin State was undergoing the Shang Martingale Transformation Law, and their military strength benefited from the change of law.
Especially the State of Qin, as its military strength became stronger and stronger, its ambitions also grew larger, and after the Wei state's power gradually weakened, it slowly infiltrated its power out of Hangu Pass and spread to the territory of the Six Eastern Kingdoms.
The history books have detailed records of the spread of the Qin State, we will not elaborate on them here, and among them we can draw a conclusion, that is, the combat effectiveness of the Qin Army at that time was quite strong, after all, the Army of the Six Kingdoms that was wiped out by the Qin Army in this process can be said to be more than one million.
Alexander's army
Looking at China at that time, we will go back to Alexander's side. As we all know, Alexander the Great's dominance is among the best in the history of the world, but the objective factors of his untimely death are doomed to prevent Alexander from continuing to march east to China in the East.
However, although it did not hit the East, the combat effectiveness of Alexander's army at that time could not be underestimated. Although Alexander's army was small, it was less than 40,000 men—30,000 of whom were heavy infantry and less than 10,000 cavalry.
However, the battles that Alexander experienced were very valuable, for example, in the Battle of Issus, Alexander led 35,000 horses against the Persian army of 120,000, but the result was that the 120,000 Persian army was defeated by Alexander's 35,000 people.
Which is stronger or weaker?
If Alexander did not die young that year, he led the crusade to China, at that time, Alexander faced the most powerful and most likely opponent than the Qin army, which was known as the "Tiger and Wolf Division" in the Warring States period.
Why? First of all, the strongest is not the main reason, the main reason is that if Alexander's army really arrives in China, it must also be west of Qixiong, and the geographical location of the Qin State is precisely west of China.
So, in the face of the powerful Qin army, can Alexander really successfully defeat the Qin army? In fact, the possibility of this situation is very small, if there is a real exchange of fire with the Qin army, Alexander may not have a chance of winning, unless the Qin army stands there waiting for Alexander and his army to slaughter.
Many people know that the reason why Alexander's more than 30,000 troops were strong was because of the Macedonian phalanx, which seemed to make the entire Alexander army extremely strong, defensive and offensive, and both sides were very advantageous.
Even if the "Tiger and Wolf Division" of the Qin State had no chance of winning against Alexander's Macedonian phalanx with the same number, it would not necessarily be replaced by a larger number of Qin troops.
After all, the number of Qin troops was twenty times that of Alexander's army, although it was impossible to use all of them against the 35,000 Macedonian phalanx, but it was very easy to draw out 100,000, and the Qin iron horse was different from the Persian army, and the combat effectiveness was not comparable to that of the Persian army.
In addition, the mountainous terrain in the west of our country, the Macedonian phalanx is too dependent on the terrain, to say that it is a kind of tactic produced by local conditions, but it is also subject to the objective fact that the terrain is not subject to human will.
Even if Alexander had to go on a crusade and travel long distances to engage the Qin army, and their physical strength and supplies had always been sufficient, how could they arrange the same powerful phalanx as before due to the mountainous terrain?
What would it be like? It should be an arrangement, a charge, and if there is no accident in the formation, it will disperse. And the scattered Macedonians are like headless flies, and sometimes they don't even need the Qin army to come out, they may be in disarray themselves.
Why? Because the weapons of the soldiers in the Macedonian phalanx are mostly spears, although the spears are easy to kill the enemy, they are also easy to injure teammates by mistake. If there is a formation, it is fine, because the spear and the spear have an appropriate distance directly, but if the formation is chaotic, it is quite easy to accidentally injure.
If the Macedonian phalanx were above the plains, the frontal impact of this organizational model was indeed so strong that almost no one could engage it, but it was different on other terrains.
Therefore, in summary, it can be seen that Alexander's army will not be the opponent of China at that time, and its tactical core Macedonian phalanx will be easily broken.