In fact, the late Qing government has always wanted to cultivate the Eight Banners (especially the Manchu Eight Banners) as the main military armed forces in the outer and inner regions, and has also invested a lot of equipment, financial resources, technology, etc. The combat strength of the Eight Banners Army has never satisfied the People, but the battle has been a mess, and finally the Qing government has no choice but to pin its hopes on the Xiang Army, the Huai Army, the New Army and other Han armed forces.
Why did the Eight Banner Army, which swept through Asia in the early Qing Dynasty, collapse at the end of the Qing Dynasty?
First, the Qing court had been in peace for a long time, and the Eight Banners Army was in ruins and could not be supported in a short period of time.
The most glorious and glorious period of the Eight Banner Army was from the day when the Qing Taizu NurHachi rebelled against Dzungar, after which the Qing army gradually went downhill, and even when the Three Domains were pacified, Kangxi had to rely heavily on the green battalion of the Han army to quell the chaos, and in the late Qianlong period, there was an endless problem of army corruption.
Although the Eight Banners Army is not effective, but after all, it is a loyal Manchu army, so it was also heavily used by the imperial court at the end of the Qing Dynasty, but the battle results were unsightly, forced by the situation in the end, the Qing court rulers had to use the Han army to maintain the system of governance, nevertheless, the Qing court still did not give up the Eight Banners Army, but the training of the army can not be changed overnight, in the short term, the army's will to fight and the quality of soldiers are difficult to greatly improve, and can only rely on the brave and good Fighting Han Army to fight.
Second, both weapons and equipment and military tactics of the Eight Banner Army have been proved to have been eliminated by history.
After more than two centuries of development, the weapons and equipment of the Eight Banner Army from the beginning of the Qing Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty have not been greatly improved, and it is still mainly bows and arrows, large knives, muskets, and shotguns, and the cavalry knives have cooperated with the attack, but the weapons and equipment of the Western powers have undergone qualitative changes, and the flintlock rifles with a longer range and the more powerful Armstrong breech guns have been applied to the Chinese battlefield, and the weapons and equipment are far superior to the Eight Banners Army.
The traditional tactics of Westerners are infantry in front, artillery in the rear to suppress fire, the front team of infantry to shoot side by side with guns, after shooting, it is transferred to the rear to load, and the rear soldiers make up for the front to shoot. The Eight Banners of the Qing Army are a group of cavalry rushing forward, and then the infantry pounces, but the result of the war is often that the Qing cavalry has not yet rushed to the other side's position and is completely annihilated by the enemy's artillery, and the infantry can only flee in the wilderness, and they do not give the Qing army the opportunity for hand-to-hand combat, so the battle is very nested, which also confirms the advanced tactics of the West.
Generally speaking, even when the Qing Dynasty was destroyed, it did not give up its support for the Eight Banner Army, but the time it took to cultivate an excellent new-style army was so long, from sending generals, selecting personnel, equipment, and training, every link could not be wrong, and before the Eight Banners New Army was trained, the Qing Dynasty died.