The Dzungar Mongols, where Kaldan was located, were strictly subordinate to the Qing Dynasty in the strict sense of the word, not to the Qing Dynasty.
After the fall of the Yuan Dynasty, the Yuan Shun Emperor fled north to establish the Northern Yuan Dynasty, but the Northern Yuan regime soon collapsed, and the Various Mongol departments fell into division and struggle, and finally in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties, they were gradually divided into three branches, namely The Southern Mongolia, the Northern Mongolia and the Western Mongolia.
The Dzungar, where Kaldan is located, belongs to the Western Mongols, also known as Erut Mongols or Veyrat Mongols. Western Mongolia is divided into four major tribes, namely: the Heshuo Tribe, the Dzungar Department, the Durbert Department, and the Turbat Department, of which the leader of the Heshuo Tribe is the leader of the Alliance of Western Moses Mongolia, also known as the Verat League Lord.
In the ninth year of the Later Jin Dynasty (1635), Gushi Khan, the leader of the Werat Alliance and the head of the Heshuo Tribe, declared in the name of the ally that Western Mongolia belonged to the then Later Jin regime, and in the third year of Shunzhi (1646), the chiefs of the various tribes of Western Mongolia jointly submitted to the Qing Dynasty, and entered Beijing every two years to pay tribute.
At this time, Western Mongolia was different from Southern Mongolia. After the death of Lin Dan Khan, the leader of the Chahar tribe, the southern Mongols had all surrendered to the Qing Dynasty, and their territory and population were all under the rule of the Qing Dynasty, and even the titles of tribal leaders were no longer "Great Khan" and "Taiji", but "Prince" and "Belle". It can be said that compared with southern Mongolia, Western Mongolia maintained relative independence, but it was still in a master-servant relationship with the Qing Dynasty, and the change of chiefs was also to obtain the canonization of the Qing Dynasty, and also to be called a tribute by the Qing Dynasty.
During the same period, like the Western Mongolia, the relationship with the Qing Dynasty was maintained by the Northern Mongolia, that is, the Khalkha Mongols, and the Qinghai-Tibet region.
The reason why Kaldan is called a rebellion is because Kaldan no longer paid tribute to the Qing Dynasty and established the Dzungar Khanate as an enemy of the Qing Dynasty.
The early Kaldan was actually a living Buddha of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism, the Fourth Wensa Living Buddha. After ten years of study in Tibet, Kaldan returned to the Dzungar Department.
However, in the ninth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1670), the leader of the Dzungar clan, the brother of Kaldan, was assassinated, and the Dzungar clan was torn apart. It was at this beginning that Kaldan reconvened the old sangha and unified the divided Dzungars, and Kaldan also resigned from the priesthood of the living Buddha in the eleventh year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1672) and officially became the head of the Dzungars.
In the fifteenth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1676), Kaldan, with the support of the Dalai Lama, defeated the leader of the Heshuo tribe, Oziltu Khan, established the leadership of the Dzungars in the four parts of Western Mongolia, and established the Dzungar Khanate. Later, in the seventeenth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1678), Kaldan swept through the Yarkand Khanate established by the Uyghurs, and kaldan unified the entire Xinjiang region.
During this period, Kaldan had asked the Kangxi Emperor to crown him as Dzungar Khan, but the Kangxi Emperor rejected Kaldan on the grounds that Kaldan had launched a war without authorization to annex other tribes, and was himself from a golden family descendant who was not genghis Khan, and Kaldan began to fight against the Qing Dynasty.
In the twenty-seventh year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1688), Gardan suddenly led his army across the Hangai Mountains and directly attacked Tushetu Khan, thus surrendering the entire Northern Desert Mongols, and the Northern Mongolian tribes that did not want to submit to Kaldan also fled south to the area south of the Great Wall.
At this time, Kaldan had also expanded the sphere of influence of the Dzungar Khanate to the highest peak.
The Kangxi Emperor marched three times and finally destroyed Kaldan.
In order to completely eliminate Kaldan and the Dzungar Khanate under his command, the Kangxi Emperor marched three times to conquer Kaldan.
The first was in the twenty-ninth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1690), when the Qing army defeated Kaldan at the Battle of UlanButong, stopping Kaldan's advance.
The second time was in the thirty-fifth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1696), when the Kangxi Emperor took the initiative and defeated Gardan in the Battle of Zhaomoduo, and Gardan only led dozens of people to escape, and could not make a comeback.
The third time was in the thirty-sixth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1697), when the Kangxi Emperor again marched in person, and Gardan chose to commit suicide in the midst of rebellion.
In this regard, the Kangxi Emperor completely eliminated his confidant Gardan.
As early as the twenty-seventh year of Kangxi (1688), Gardan's nephew, the son of the former Dzungar chief Sangha, Tsedu Alabutan, turned against Kaldan and assisted Kangxi in cleaning up Kaldan's lair, and actively cooperated in the process of Kangxi's personal conquest to support Kangxi, so after Kaldan's death, Cedu Alabutan was crowned by Kangxi as the Great Khan of Dzungar.
It was not until the Qianlong period that the Qing Dynasty completely pacified the Dzungars and incorporated them into the territory.
In the fifty-sixth year of the Kangxi Dynasty (1717), he rebelled against Alabutan and led his troops into Tibet, once again posing a threat to the Qing Dynasty. The Kangxi Emperor's fourteenth son Yin Yu (胤禵) was made the "Great General King" and led an army to quell the rebellion in Qinghai and Tibet, and Tsui Alabutan fled back to Xinjiang until Yongzheng's death in the fifth year (1727).
It was not until the twentieth year of Qianlong (1755) that the Qianlong Emperor took advantage of the civil unrest in Dzungar and finally sent troops to destroy the Dzungar Khanate and completely conquered Western Mongolia.
Previously, when Kangxi destroyed Kaldan, he incorporated northern Mongolia into the territory of the Qing Dynasty, and when he quelled the rebellion of Alabutan to drive him out of Qinghai and Tibet, he also took over the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau region, and during the Qianlong Dynasty, he completely pacified the Dzungars and then completely attributed the Xinjiang region to the Qing Dynasty, at this time the territory of the Qing Dynasty also reached its peak.