The Great Wall
May. 24th, 2007 09:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stoutfellowIt's annoying, but forgiveable, when Terry Pratchett does it. Pratchett is, after all, a writer of fantasy, and not someone you would consult on matters of historical fact.
It's more than annoying when James Wimberley, writing at a serious and generally worthwhile political blog, does it in order to make a point about contemporary politics.
I'm talking about making silly statements about the Great Wall of China. The rant is under the cut.
I should start with a caveat. I am not an expert on Chinese history; I have read only a handful of books on the subject, and my understanding may be incomplete. If anyone who knows better wants to correct me, feel free; my main source for what follows is Alastair Johnston's Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History.
Let's start with Pratchett, in Interesting Times. Cohen the Barbarian, viewing the Great Wall that surrounds the Agataean Empire, sarcastically comments:
Okay. Pratchett's a humorist and fantasist; he's trying to make a completely different point; and the Agataean Empire isn't China, anyway. Let's turn to Wimberley, who writes:
The building of the Great Wall began under the Qin emperor, Shi Huangdi, shortly before 200 BC. (There had been fortifications there already; Shi extended and unified them.) Thus, it served as a northern bulwark for some two thousand years. During that span of time, barbarians from the north occupied substantial parts of China on three occasions. After the breakdown of the Han dynasty in 220 AD, a string of barbarian-ruled kingdoms sprang up in the north; most of them, however, were not invaders, but non-Chinese who had been incorporated into the empire. In the early thirteenth century, Genghis Khan's Mongols overran all of China. Finally, in the seventeenth century, the Manchus conquered the empire. Three conquests (and it's stretching things to apply that word to the first instance) in some two thousand years: that's pretty respectable, it seems to me.
The point that both Pratchett and Wimberley miss (and, oddly, the producers of the film Mulan do get) is that the Great Wall was not merely a static barrier; it was the front line of a flexible defense in depth. Signal towers were placed at intervals along the wall, whereby a string of garrisons set well back from the wall could be warned of incursions; armies issuing from those garrisons could reinforce threatened points as needed. The garrisons themselves had signal towers of their own, and warnings of danger could be relayed to yet another layer of defenders, and another, all the way back to the capital. As long as those garrisons could be maintained, the system was quite capable of repulsing invasions.
At the time of the Mongol invasion, China had fissioned into three kingdoms, the Hsia, the Chin, and the Song, and the Song actually assisted the Mongols in their attack on the Chin; none of the three kingdoms was capable of maintaining the northern defences properly. Likewise, when the Manchu attacked, the Ming dynasty was in political and financial crisis - and, in any case, the Manchu attack came from the northeast, not the north or northwest where the Great Wall lay. Defenses had been built in the northeast, but they were much smaller-scale and thoroughly inadequate.
Not an adequate defense? On the contrary, so long as they were properly maintained, the Great Wall and the supporting garrisons were quite capable of protecting China, and it is simply silly of Wimberley to denigrate it as he does.
It's more than annoying when James Wimberley, writing at a serious and generally worthwhile political blog, does it in order to make a point about contemporary politics.
I'm talking about making silly statements about the Great Wall of China. The rant is under the cut.
I should start with a caveat. I am not an expert on Chinese history; I have read only a handful of books on the subject, and my understanding may be incomplete. If anyone who knows better wants to correct me, feel free; my main source for what follows is Alastair Johnston's Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History.
Let's start with Pratchett, in Interesting Times. Cohen the Barbarian, viewing the Great Wall that surrounds the Agataean Empire, sarcastically comments:
oh, my goodness, there's a twenty-foot wall, dear me, I suppose we'd just better ride off back over a thousand miles of steppe and not, e.g., take a look at the ladder possibilities inherent in that pine wood over there.Which is a fair enough point; it is, certainly, possible to scale any given wall, given a sufficient supply of materials for building ladders and such. But it misses something important. You and your barbarian horde build your ladders, scale the walls, butcher the garrison and descend on the other side. There you are, inside the empire, ready to begin a rampage. There's just one problem: your horses are still on the other side. The one element that makes you a genuine threat to the empire... is on the other side of the wall.
Okay. Pratchett's a humorist and fantasist; he's trying to make a completely different point; and the Agataean Empire isn't China, anyway. Let's turn to Wimberley, who writes:
[T]he Wall follows the crests of mountain ridges, with steep slopes not only either side but along its length - the only way the soldiers could use to move along it. It's of course hugely impressive, but I couldn't help thinking of the Maginot Line. The Great Wall had no military value against a determined enemy with a real army like Genghis Khan.Let's think about this. The Great Wall did not ward off one of the greatest military geniuses in history, at the head of the most technologically advanced army in the world, and therefore it was of no more value than the Maginot Line. Rubbish.
The building of the Great Wall began under the Qin emperor, Shi Huangdi, shortly before 200 BC. (There had been fortifications there already; Shi extended and unified them.) Thus, it served as a northern bulwark for some two thousand years. During that span of time, barbarians from the north occupied substantial parts of China on three occasions. After the breakdown of the Han dynasty in 220 AD, a string of barbarian-ruled kingdoms sprang up in the north; most of them, however, were not invaders, but non-Chinese who had been incorporated into the empire. In the early thirteenth century, Genghis Khan's Mongols overran all of China. Finally, in the seventeenth century, the Manchus conquered the empire. Three conquests (and it's stretching things to apply that word to the first instance) in some two thousand years: that's pretty respectable, it seems to me.
The point that both Pratchett and Wimberley miss (and, oddly, the producers of the film Mulan do get) is that the Great Wall was not merely a static barrier; it was the front line of a flexible defense in depth. Signal towers were placed at intervals along the wall, whereby a string of garrisons set well back from the wall could be warned of incursions; armies issuing from those garrisons could reinforce threatened points as needed. The garrisons themselves had signal towers of their own, and warnings of danger could be relayed to yet another layer of defenders, and another, all the way back to the capital. As long as those garrisons could be maintained, the system was quite capable of repulsing invasions.
At the time of the Mongol invasion, China had fissioned into three kingdoms, the Hsia, the Chin, and the Song, and the Song actually assisted the Mongols in their attack on the Chin; none of the three kingdoms was capable of maintaining the northern defences properly. Likewise, when the Manchu attacked, the Ming dynasty was in political and financial crisis - and, in any case, the Manchu attack came from the northeast, not the north or northwest where the Great Wall lay. Defenses had been built in the northeast, but they were much smaller-scale and thoroughly inadequate.
Not an adequate defense? On the contrary, so long as they were properly maintained, the Great Wall and the supporting garrisons were quite capable of protecting China, and it is simply silly of Wimberley to denigrate it as he does.
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Date: 2007-05-25 02:39 am (UTC)In fairness to the French--not my usual mode--the Maginot Line was not defeated but by-passed. I've seen persuasive arguments that the French Army could have held the Germans if they'd had better generals and politicians behind them.
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Date: 2007-05-25 04:43 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-05-25 09:36 am (UTC)