The Ming Dynasty used to have the most powerful weapons in the world why couldn't it dominate the world but headed for extinction?

When it comes to the Ming Dynasty being replaced by the Qing Dynasty, many people always blame Li Zicheng, blaming his rebellion for wasting the national strength of the Ming Dynasty, leading to its exhaustion and fighting on both sides, thus giving the Manchurian Qing Dynasty the opportunity to occupy the Central Plains. But was the Ming's loss in the Qing war really only due to fighting on both sides?

In fact, the Liaodong army was the most elite army of the Great Ming, *** with an army of 120,000, and the country's rations and food supplies were also dominated by Liaodong. But why was such an elite army unable to destroy the Manchu Qing Dynasty, which had a population of only a million and only 100,000 soldiers? Even Yuan Chonghuan said, "With fortified cities and cannons, it is very late to acquire firearms."

Be aware that this was the 17th century, when nomadic cavalry collapsed. Both European countries and Turkey had infantry and artillery as their core strength. Due to the widespread use of firearms, the cavalry fell from its dominance and became an adjunct to the infantry.

Just 100 years before the fall of the Ming, Ottoman Turkey used artillery to completely crush the Mamluk cavalry that had defeated the Mongols. Just over 60 years ago, Elmak, relying on just 840 Cossacks, easily exterminated the Mongols' Siberian Khanate with firearms, while European knights were rendered useless by the tactics of spears and muskets.

At this time, nomadic tribes around the world were in great rout. They were either reduced to appendages of the agrarian empires or were easily wiped out. Why was the situation so special in Daming? Why couldn't they win a decent battle even with many advanced firearms?

Firearms in Daming, why don't they work?

Poor quality of firearms due to backward system

While Daming kept importing advanced firearms from the West since its first encounter with the Portuguese, its backward mechanism prevented it from giving full play to its existing technological advantages.

On the surface, soldiers were holding the latest Western firearms, but due to the backwardness of the army's system, these firearms were often treasures that were actually just a pile of shoddy junk.

How worrying is the quality of firearms in the Ming? Let's take a look at the record of Qi Jiguang in the year of Practicing the Actual Records:

"Only firearms are my specialty, but firearms have pain. Or put the lead in first, or forget to put the lead in. The mouth is already crooked and the lead is not the same size. The lead won't fit in the mouth, and the nibs are different. There are people who can't put it in for a while, people who just put it in their mouths, people who put it out when their mouths are too big, people who twist the threads of medicine together with the lead, but there are people who put out the fire. None of these people could get out, there were already 20 sticks. Those who can't race, those who are damp and don't burn, over 40 sticks. The winner, but 20 strokes or so. It's not fatal, but you can't kill him. Among other things, he was killed, but only a dozen died. Thousands of enemy troops rushing in, can you kill a dozen to let them go? Now you and I have lost before we even go out and see the enemy."

In the above, Qi Jiguang remembers the poor quality of the firearms sent, some barrels often do not match the size of the projectile, resulting in the soldiers in the war can not load the projectile into the barrel; some of the starter device is faulty, and often can not fire; and the firing is unstable, fluctuating heights and lows, a little bit of water will be malfunctioning, and does guarantee accuracy.60 rounds of only 20 rounds to ensure power, but this 20 rounds only The 20 rounds can only guarantee the power, but this 20 rounds can only guarantee the power. In other words, the passing rate of each batch of firearms in Daming is only about 15%. So many defective products can't play a role in the battle, or even be killed, it's more than normal.

So, why were there so many defective firearms in Da Ming? Zhao Shizhen, a famous firearms expert at the time, summed it up perfectly:

"Overseas spears are finely crafted, summer, why? ___: customs and habits still make the ear. Countries still have the ancient intention of putting soldiers by agriculture, soldiers and people are not divided, public and private. The chiefs of the Tusi class, with their weapons as the very best in the temple and themselves as their profession, are conservative and rich. If the murder weapon is not good, it is only afraid of the law, afraid of the classmates laugh, and it is still a family affair, so be sloppy. I'm a public official, China. I don't know how to do it, or use it, or put it away or clean it up. When it comes to public **** matters, smiths don't do their best; as supervisors, those who love themselves seek only to be saved and those who don't will fall. Once they have saved and fallen, it is hard to act. There is no profit tied to the front and no fear of being tied to the back. Size confused, up and down simple, expect fine work is enough? I heard that the east-west trade, wide world foreigners are buying spears. Sell to foreigners are extremely sophisticated; become a government maker is to abuse evil. From this point of view, I China refuses to be proficient, I must be proficient."

In this article, Zhao Shizhen argued that it was not that China could not produce excellent firearms, but that the stupid and backward system discouraged craftsmen from handing over first-rate firearms to the government, leading to the dilemma of first-rate exports, second-rate internal exchanges, and third-rate deliveries to the government.

Since the Ming craftsmen turned in their firearms only as a way of offsetting taxes, the government did not buy them at market price, resulting in the craftsmen always handing over the worst second-rate products to the government. The Ming government wanted fine firearms and didn't want to pay for them. How in the world could it be so good? Coupled with the exploitation of various officials, large and small, the quality of the firearms that eventually ended up in the hands of the officials and soldiers was not a worrying one!

Ming Dynasty officials and soldiers with such poor firearms, the effect can be imagined. According to the original Manchu records written by Qing Taizu, female cavalrymen were not afraid of firearms during the Ming Dynasty. Some female Zhen were shot multiple times but were unharmed. Another soldier's helmet was hit by a bullet in the seam, but his head was unharmed, which shows the poor quality of firearms in the Ming Dynasty.

According to Xiong Tingbi's investigations, Nurhachu opened a forge stretching for miles across his territory. These forges made armor and weapons day and night, and the quality was outstanding. Inferior firearms on the Ming side, heavy armor on the Manchu side. It was no surprise that firearms didn't work in the field.

Imagine a good quality fire-rope spear penetrating plate armor with a single blow. If Ming spears were of acceptable quality, how could they not penetrate Manchu cloth armor?

Difficulty of substitution due to conservative ideas

In addition to the constraints of a backward military system, firearms manufacturing in the Ming was also hampered by people's conservative ideas. Firearms expert Zhao Shizhen railed against this. He said:

"The northern soldiers heart anxious drama, holding a fast gun three-eyed large caliber short gun convenient too spear, shooting on the teaching field, short gun hit ten times fast gun, five times the bow and arrow, still not convinced. This Qi Shaobao language also. Close to the general's people are not the only northern rarely pay attention to this, is the South also feel less. The reason for this is that they know nothing about the country and have no intention of destroying the thieves and gaining fame and fortune. How can they say that? How do you know all this?"

In this article, Zhao Shizhen pointed out that the power of the spear was far superior to the traditional bow and arrow and the three-eyed large-caliber short gun. But northern border guards have been reluctant to upgrade to more advanced spears because of too much inertia.

Daoming's enemy, the Manchu Qing Dynasty, was dominated by heavy armor. Although the three-eyed large-caliber short spear had a faster rate of fire, its power, accuracy and range were far from adequate. Only spears with great penetrating power could penetrate the heavy armor. But Daming's northern border guards remained stubborn and indulged in their previous experiences.

Besides the conservative outlook of some of the army, the ministers of the imperial court were also obstructing it in every possible way. When Xu Guangqi said to introduce more Western cannons and gunners, some ministers still believe that "firearms are j

China "will not cast firearms, big weapons powerful, kill tiger squat, small weapons three eyes fast." They are all short, don't take much medication, don't put bombs far away, and it's hard to get them without a license. Spear pools are wide on the outside and narrow on the inside, not round and clean, bullets are not in the mouth, bullets are not fast and straight, no violent power. The head is heavy and earless, it does not rotate, the tail is thin and light, the charge is too tight, it is a burst upside down."

While the advantages of Western artillery were so great, Xu Guangqi's plan never got off the ground because of opposition from North Korean conservatives, and it took five years before he was allowed to buy a number of guns and gunners from Macao to bolster the army's fighting strength. But for the Ming at home and abroad at this time, it was a waste of time, and the opposition of the ministers undoubtedly greatly accelerated the demise of the Ming dynasty.

Misuse due to poor quality of generals

Besides the poor quality of firearms and slow renewal, the use of firearms during the Ming Dynasty also had huge problems.

In addition to famous Ming generals such as Qi Jiguang, Sun Chengzong, and Yuan Chonghuan, most of the generals had a big misunderstanding about the use of firearms, that is, although the Ming Dynasty had a large number of people who threw firearms, there were no lancers to provide cover for them.

Then firearms, while powerful, were not enough to defeat a cavalry charge with a single round of fire. The firing of firearms also required cover and cooperation from other soldiers.

Qi Jiguang tried to solve the problem of firearms needing cover, and the convoys he created typified this. The outer chariots covered the firearms personnel, allowing them to fire comfortably behind cover and avoid cavalry. The Qijia army also relied on convoys to make the Eight Banners suffer heavy losses in the Battle of Hun River.

But unfortunately, most of the Ming generals were still backward and uninformed. When they confronted the Manchu again, they still simply put musketeers and artillery at the forefront. As a result, often after the firearms had been fired for a while, the Eight Banners cavalry had already rushed to the front and unleashed a massacre. Throughout the Ming Dynasty in Salhu and later with Huang taiji several field battles, almost all cavalry close to the rapid rout, without any effective resistance.

Also, most of the Ming artillery was not professionally trained and often did not understand math, so the artillery was very inaccurate. This led to the cavalry charges of the eight banners being almost impossible to restrain in the Ming Dynasty, which is why Xu Guangqi Sun Yuanhua has been advocating the introduction of Portuguese gunners.

Western spearmen used to cover the muskets, and they were at each other's throats. Cossacks and Qi Jiguang used chariots as barriers so that the firearms could be released with ease.The 17th century was still in the transitional era of hot and cold weapons, not the true era of hot weapons. It is undoubtedly a tragedy that most of the Ming generals did not recognize this in time.

An inefficient system, a conservative and backward outlook, and a group of generals with no knowledge or skills ultimately wiped out the technological advantage brought by the introduction of firearms to the Ming Dynasty.

The Manchu dynasty also performed the only miracle of the 17th century. While nomadic cavalry around the world were being brutalized by firearms, the Manchus were still able to suppress the Ming army at every turn on the battlefield and then take advantage of the chaos to occupy the Central Plains.

And the inferior performance of Ming firearms on the battlefield undoubtedly determined the Manchus' view of firearms, indirectly leading to China's future tragedy.

The decline of China's ancient military was never just about technological backwardness, but more from the corrupt system behind it and the old-fashioned arrogance in people's minds.