#精品长文创作季#
An overview of Japan's military strength during the Sino-Japanese War
Commander-in-chief of the Qing army
Since the founding of the Qing Dynasty, the emperor has ruled as the head of the entire army. However, after that the emperor became the titular chieftain. When there was an incident in the country, it gradually became common practice for the emperor to appoint provincial governors or generals to be responsible for the conquest. During the Sino-Qing War, Li Hongzhang, the governor of Zhili and the minister of trade in Beiyang, was in charge of handling the war.
As the organ that commanded the entire army of the Qing Dynasty, the official offices directly subordinate to the emperor were the Military Aircraft Department and the Military Department. However, after the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War, in early November of the 27th year of the Meiji era (1894), the Qing government established the Military Affairs Office as the central department for military affairs, and was in charge of military orders related to the war. This institution is the equivalent of the base camp of the Japanese army.
In peacetime, the various units of the army were stationed separately in the key areas of the provinces, and were subordinate to the governors of the jurisdictions (generals in the three eastern provinces). The Governor of Zhili was also the Minister of Trade and Commerce of Beiyang, and was responsible for the defense of the northern coast (north of Shandong Province). Therefore, outside the area under its jurisdiction, it also commands troops stationed in important defense areas such as Lushunkou, Dalian Bay, Weihaiwei, Jiaozhou Bay, etc. In addition, he had the authority to instruct the governors and generals of the northern provinces if necessary for defense. The Governor of Liangjiang was also the Minister of Trade and Commerce of the South Seas, responsible for the defense of the southern coast (south of Jiangsu Province). Therefore, the governors of the southern provinces had to be under the command of their commanders, according to the needs of the defence.
In this way, the command of the Qing army was in the hands of both civilian and military attachés. Even the highest-ranking military attaché is nothing more than a tactical commander. Strategic command is largely the responsibility of civilian officials, i.e., governors and governors. In other words, the Qing Dynasty formed a system in which civilian officials with no military experience commanded large units when there was an incident. In the Sino-Japanese War, military attachés such as Admiral Ye Zhichao and Song Qing commanded a large army in an area, which is a very rare case.
Training and Bravery
When the Qing Dynasty was founded, a military system called the Eight Banners was established, and the people who belonged to the Eight Banners were called Banner People, and they enjoyed the benefits from generation to generation. In addition, there is also a military system called the Green Battalion that emerged after the Eight Banners, and the Green Battalion is composed entirely of Han Chinese. Unlike the Eight Banners, which were only organized into armies in wartime, the Green Battalion was also subordinate to the governor, governor, admiral, commander-in-chief, general, etc., and was responsible for local police and other work. It is said that there are 200,000 people in the Eight Banners and more than 500,000 in the Green Camp.
However, after more than 200 years since the establishment of the Eight Banners and the Green Battalion, there has been no progress in their establishment and training, which means that they have lost their value as an army. Therefore, in the Sino-Qing War, the Qing government mainly relied on Yongjun (勇兵), training troops, and recruits. The Yongjun was recruited in order to make up for the lack of soldiers in the Eight Banners and the Green Battalion in order to make up for the lack of soldiers in the Eight Banners and Green Battalions in the early years of Jiaqing (the first year was 1796) when the rebellion of the White Lotus Sect was quelled (the first year was 1851). At that time, the soldiers of the Eight Banners and the Green Battalion could not play a role. Therefore, strong men from all over the country were recruited for training, and meritorious service was established in the pacification of the Taiping Army, and the prestige of the brave army surpassed that of the Eight Banners and the Green Battalion. At that time, it was generally named Xiangyong, or named after the place, called Chu Yong, Xiang Yong, and Huai Yong. After that, it began to be called the Chu army, the Hunan army, and so on.
These brave troops are temporary formations for emergency relief and are therefore not included in the scope of recurrent military expenditures. After the pacification of the Taiping Army, the Qing State retained a number of meritorious brave troops, and most of the rest were disbanded. Because most of the Eight Banners and Green Battalion soldiers at that time could not fight, they selected particularly robust soldiers from the Eight Banners and Green Battalion soldiers to form an army, which was the training army. The training army and the brave army are named after the place where they are stationed or the name of the leader at the time of their creation, or they are named after the majestic characters, and there is no number at all.
The training army and the brave army are divided into two types: infantry and cavalry, and the field artillery is organized in the infantry battalion, so that the soldiers in the infantry battalion can use fortress guns. Moreover, the Qing army did not have a system of engineers and baggage soldiers. In the infantry battalion, there was a type of soldier called a long man who did not carry a firearm, and was engaged in field sappers and carrying luggage.
Each battalion is led by a staff general (equivalent to the Japanese army's Nakasa), guerrilla (Shaosa), and a metropolitan (captain), and is called a battalion officer. A battalion is roughly divided into five or three sentinels, with the commander or garrison (lieutenant) as the sentinel, and sometimes the commander (second lieutenant) as the sentinel. The personnel of one battalion are about 500 people. Such several battalions are called armies together, and they are named as front armies, rear armies, left armies, right armies, middle armies, etc., with the general soldier (major general) or deputy general (Dazuo) as the commander. Then several armies were combined and commanded by the Admiral (Lieutenant General) (called the Admiral by Land, as distinguished from the Admiral of the Navy).
Replenishment, education, provisions, and weapons
The Qing army supplemented the army according to the mercenary law, but because the Qing originally lacked a martial culture, most of the soldiers were the children of the lower class. Moreover, due to the uncertainty of the length of service, there is a mixture of old and middle-aged soldiers, and some people are not qualified for the same military duties. As a result, the level of education and training also varies.
After the Sino-French War, the troops stationed along the Beiyang coast and several battalions along the Nanyang coast under the Beiyang Minister (abbreviated by the Beiyang Minister of Commerce) hired foreign military officers, most of whom received training from foreign armies and became the most elite units in the Qing army. In addition, the Qing State also had a training army and a brave army trained by Qing officers who had received foreign officer education. These units are basically familiar with modern tactics, but other units are still at a very naïve stage because of the lack of instructors and the short period of time they have received education.
The Qing state combined an army or several battalions, equipped with financial officers, and set up medical officers to handle supplies, treatment, and health affairs. However, the treasurers were purely civilian, and they were connected to the high officials and were responsible for the supply of the army, ammunition, etc.
In addition, the salaries of military personnel are very meager. As for the soldiers below the rank of sentry, because they could not rely on their salaries to maintain their dignity, various malpractices arose, resulting in a lack of military discipline. In addition, there is a large shortage of medical officers, and patients have to pay for their own medical expenses. This is true even in wartime. There is also a lot of shortage of veterinarians.
The Qing army possessed a wide variety of weapons. In extreme cases, several weapons are mixed in a battalion. Among them, the most numerous weapons are the "Mauser" rifle and the "Krupp" mountain cannon, which are mixed with the "Remington" rifle, the "Shaspo" rifle, the "Snyder" rifle, the carrying gun (a gun used by two people) and machine guns, and there are also people carrying broadswords, spears, flags, etc. A battalion had about 500 fighters and about 300 guns.
Wartime troops
The battalion is the basic unit for military training and brave army, usually 500 people are organized into a battalion, but in fact there are many battalions with less than 500 people. Moreover, some units are not called battalions but are called soldiers, bravery, flags, teams, etc., and the system is chaotic. There are also significant differences in the personnel of the various units. After the Qing State split or merged the troops, warriors, banners, and teams stationed in various provinces according to their size, and changed them into battalions, there were about 862 infantry battalions and 192 cavalry battalions, with a total number of more than 400,000. This was the number of Qing troops calculated by the Japanese army on the basis of the mobilization plan used by the Japanese army at that time. Based on the results of detailed post-war surveys, the most exact figures can be considered an average of 350 people for an infantry battalion and 250 for a cavalry battalion. If you calculate it this way, the total number of soldiers is about 350,000.
At the beginning of the Japanese Qing Campaign, the Qing State ordered the training army and the brave army to make preparations for the expedition, and dispatched the Huai Army under the command of the Minister of Beiyang and part of the Eight Banners Army and the training army of the three eastern provinces. On the other hand, the Qing State recruited a large number of new recruits to join the current army and set about forming a new army. In order to form a new army, the Qing State pulled out veterans who had made great achievements in the conquest of the Taiping Army and the White Lotus Sect in Shandong, and ordered the civilian officials who had repeatedly fought to gather mercenaries, let these veterans and civilian officials serve as commanders, and appoint alternate military attaches as battalion officers and sentinels. Alternate military attachés are qualified through donations and examinations, and many of them are hired while waiting for vacancies.
About 630,000 recruits were recruited in this way, so during the Sino-Japanese War, the Qing army was about 980,000. However, the territory of the Qing State was vast, and these troops were scattered in various provinces, and due to the inconvenience of transportation, they could not rush to the emergency, and in fact, many people could not be used to fight.
navy
The Qing government decided to create a navy during the period from Xianfeng to Tongzhi (the first year of Tongzhi was 1862). In 1863, the Qing Dynasty set up shipbuilding bureaus in Fuzhou and Shanghai, opened shipbuilding schools and naval schools in the shipyards of Fuzhou, and recruited Europeans as teachers. However, the cause has not progressed for a long time. In 1875, the Qing State purchased 8 gunboats to form the Beiyang Naval Division. At the same time, for the defense of the Yangtze River (Yangtze River), two more medium and small ironclad ships were purchased, laying the foundation of the Nanyang Naval Division. By 1880, the Qing State reduced the river waterproof division that had existed since ancient times, and reduced the green battalion to develop the navy, decided to purchase 4 ironclad ships to join the Beiyang Naval Division, and began to operate the Lushun military port and build forts.
In 1884, when the Qing Dynasty began to fight with France, the German commissioned the construction of the completed warships such as Zhenyuan and Dingyuan, which had not yet arrived in China. Due to the attack of 10 warships led by the commander of the French naval fleet, Gu Ba, 9 warships including the Yangwu of the Qing State were sunk, and the shipyard was also shelled. In addition, the Chengqing and Yuyuan ships that the Qing State went to Taiwan to reinforce were also sunk by French warships.
After that, the Qing government intended to expand the navy. In 1885, the construction of Weihaiwei Fort began, and the construction of Lushunkou was completed the following year. Moreover, the two battleships Zhenyuan and Dingyuan and the cruiser Jiyuan also arrived in China. In 1887, the Qing Dynasty signed contracts with British and German shipyards for the construction of four cruisers, Zhiyuan, Jingyuan, Jingyuan, and Laiyuan, and at the same time began to build the Dalian Bay Fort. The Qing navy thus achieved a leap forward.
The navy of the Qing State was divided into four naval divisions: Beiyang, Nanyang, Fujian, and Guangdong. Among them, the Beiyang Naval Division is subordinate to the Minister of Beiyang, based in Weihaiwei Bay, including Lushunkou and Dalian Bay, and is responsible for the security of Beiyang, and is the most important naval division. The Nanyang Naval Division was subordinate to the Minister of Nanyang, and based in Wusong, it guarded the coast of Jiangsu Province and the Yangtze River. The Fujian Navy Division was subordinate to the Governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, and was based in Mawei, Fuzhou, to guard the coasts of Zhejiang, Fujian, and Taiwan provinces. The Guangdong Navy Division was subordinate to the Governor of Liangguang and was based in Huangpu, Guangzhou, to guard the coast of Guangdong Province.
There are a total of 82 warships and 25 torpedo boats under each naval division, with a total tonnage of nearly 85,000 tons. In addition to this, there are several armed transport ships. Among these naval divisions, the entire Beiyang Naval Division (22 warships and 12 torpedo boats) and the three warships of the Guangdong Naval Division, Guangjia, Guangyi, and Guangc, directly participated in the Sino-Japanese War, while the other naval divisions only made preparations for battle.
The training of the Beiyang naval division was very rigorous and meticulous, and the combat preparations were also very thorough, and the fleets of all countries in the East were in awe. However, the other three naval divisions not only did not have as powerful ships as the Beiyang Naval Division, but also far inferior to the Beiyang Naval Division in terms of training and combat readiness, making it difficult for them to fight in the open sea. However, the three warships Guangjia, Guangb, and Guangc, mentioned earlier, were slightly better, so the Guangdong Navy Division organized these three warships into a team and sent them to the Beiyang Navy Division every year for joint exercises.