Chapter 6 Background 19 Change
The prosperity of the Tang Dynasty is inseparable from its powerful military strength. The need for continuous foreign wars and the tradition inherited from the nomadic peoples of the Northern Dynasties, where civilians valued martial arts and chivalry was prevalent, are not unrelated to this phenomenon. Even scholars were expected to have a basic understanding of archery, horsemanship, and shooting skills, mainly due to the need to guard the borders.
Especially since Wu Zetian established the Wu Keju, the country has been known as the Tianchao Shangguo, with a million brave soldiers, which is not an exaggeration. (Even in the late Tang Dynasty, during the reign of Emperor Xianzong in the second year of Yuanhe, there were 830,000 registered military personnel, not including the privately recruited soldiers and local militias of the various regional governors and powerful families.)
The early Tang dynasty army continued to use the "Fubing system". Based on the farming households of the Bantian system, 634 military garrisons were set up in various strategic locations throughout the country, collectively known as the Fuzheng Garrison. The system of conscription and militia was implemented, where soldiers were drawn from self-cultivating farmers and wealthy households established under the Bantian system, with regular service replacing taxes. In peacetime, they would hide their weapons and armor at home, and when the country needed them, they could be mobilized in large numbers to take up arms immediately.
Divided into three categories: upper, middle and lower, the governor of the prefecture is the Zhēn Chōng Dūwèi ( fifth rank), the deputy governor is Zuǒ Yuè Wèi, under the prefecture there are Tuán (also known as Yíng), with an officer in charge, under the Tuán there are Duì, with a head of Duì, under the Duì there are Huǒ, with a head of Huǒ. Each Yíng has five Duì, each Duì has three Huǒ, each Huǒ has five Shí Cháng, each leading ten soldiers. The basic unit is the Yíng.
According to the function and equipment of the military, it can be divided into Zhonglei, Tunqi, SheSheng, Yueqi, Buwu, Changshui, etc. The subordinate officials are: Bie Jia, Zhang Shi, Liu Cao Wei, Can Jun. In charge of the local Wu army and military households, the military government is divided into three levels: upper, middle and lower, with a rotation of five rounds per year, with about 800-1500 people, and at most, there were more than 600 governments nationwide, with a total of over 700,000 soldiers.
Always keep one-third in service. In the central government, there are sixteen Wei Jiangjun Yamen specializing in military horses all over the world, which are: Left and Right Wei, Left and Right Xunwei, Left and Right Wuwei, Left and Right Weiyi, Left and Right Jinyuwei, Left and Right Lingjunwei, Left and Right Jianmenwei, Left and Right Qiuniuwei. Except for the Left and Right Jianmenwei and the Left and Right Qiuniuwei who supervised the soldiers and horses in the capital, other Wei also concurrently led more than 300 prefectures of troops in Guanzhong.
The highest commander-in-chief is basically not set, with the general leading all the guards, and each of the 16 guards has a long officer as a granted general. Under it are set up Zhonglang, Zhonglangjiang, Zuo You Langjiang, as well as Lushi Canjun, Cang Cao, Bing Cao, Qi Cao, and Zhuo Cao Canjun.
Each Wei maintained an army of 25,000-40,000 men, known as the Standing Army. The basic organization of the Wei army was slightly higher than that of the Fu Bing, and they were commonly referred to as the Ying Yang Wei. The officers were one level higher than those of the Fu Bing, with the highest officer being the Ying Yang Lang Jiang, who held a higher rank than the Guo Wei Du Yu of the Fu Bing. The main force was stationed in Chang'an, with approximately 200,000-300,000 soldiers and horses on standby at all times. (The predecessor was the Long Cong Su Wei, also known as the Ji Qi)
Inside the Imperial City of Chang'an, there were also the imperial guards of the Left and Right Feathered Forest Armies, the Left and Right Dragon Mighty Armies, and the Left and Right Divine Martial Armies as the emperor's personal guard units. They were collectively known as the Northern Court Six Armies or simply the Northern Army. The highest officials included the Commander-in-Chief, Grand General, (later added were the Palace Commandant, Front, Rear, Left, and Right Imperial Guards, Left and Right Central Majors, Same Rank, and Special Advance) Each army had a Leading General and subordinate setup similar to that of the Guard Armies.
In the local area, the central government governs 16 circuits under heaven (similar to the original provinces, but much larger in scale, without regular officials, and managed by special envoys from the central government) as well as several large metropolitan protectorates and over a dozen metropolitan governorates.
In the first rank of Dao, there were Jiedushi. There were three types of military district systems: Dudu, Duhu, and Jiedushi, with Jiedushi having the most comprehensive power, often concurrently holding the position of Yuanshuai, but governing a fixed number of states for military and political defense affairs. On the border, there were Da Dudu and Dudu, also in charge of the overall military and political power of several states, with varying sizes of jurisdiction.
The governor of the border areas, where various nationalities were mixed, also set up a large protectorate, and the protectorate, in addition to being in charge of border defense, was also responsible for handling ethnic affairs in the border areas. The same as the Wei Jun Da Jiangjun were all third-grade officials.
At that time, the main source of soldiers, the Fubing, was divided into two types: Zheng and Fang. Zheng referred to temporary dispatches, while Fang referred to fixed defense positions. Apart from personal service, it was also possible to pay for substitutes (pay someone to take one's place), depending on the military position and distance, a certain amount of silk or money had to be paid. Those who served were all households with permanent landholdings, serving five times a year, generally not exceeding three years, otherwise it would easily lead to soldiers fleeing.
The military headquarters are also divided into inner and outer headquarters. The inner headquarters refer to the five garrisons of the capital, Beijing, as well as the three guards of the imperial palace, and the three guards of the crown prince, collectively known as the Southern Army (also known as the Southern Imperial Guard or the Brocade-clad Cavalry). Corresponding to this is the Northern Imperial Guard, also known as the Northern Army, which is directly under the command of the Emperor. The former is mostly under the jurisdiction of the Golden Armor Guards, one of the sixteen guards led by the Prime Minister, and is stationed in front of the Taiji Palace's Zhuque Gate.
The latter is generally led by a prince or an official in the inner court, with military ranks belonging to the Sixteen Guards and residing in the Imperial Garden. The so-called Five Garrisons refer to the garrison troops from the five states of the capital, while the Three Guards refer to the Inner City Guards, including the Meritorious, Feathered, and Strategist Guards, which are divided into left and right divisions. Most of the officials in these guards are sons of high-ranking officials or aristocratic families, and it is a stepping stone for young men from general scholar-official families to advance their careers. Among them, the Strategist Guard is the most trusted by the imperial family and can serve as a night guard in the inner court, standing at attention during ceremonies, and participating in the changing of the guard with the Left and Right Guards, Left and Right Wuwei Guards, and Left and Right Xunwei Guards. They also take turns performing tasks such as "assisting in arrests" and "patrolling" at the gates of the capital city. All of these are collectively referred to as the Imperial Guard, which works together with the Northern Army to defend the capital. The Three Garrisons and Three Guards of the Crown Prince refer to the ceremonial guards of the crown prince, with similar military ranks but a smaller scale, generally led by the Three Solitary and Three Younger officials, including the Grand Preceptor, Grand Mentor, and Grand Guardian.
The Imperial Guards were originally known as the Feathered Forest Garrison, also referred to as the Northern Gate Garrison. They were stationed at the Xuanwu Gate and could be traced back to the time when Emperor Gaozu of Tang rose in rebellion from Taiyuan, with a group of loyal soldiers who voluntarily stayed behind to guard him. Each garrison had an estimated 20,000 troops, and over the years, they became hereditary, with sons succeeding their fathers, also known as hereditary father-son soldiers.
The Longwu Army originated in the Zhenyuan era of Emperor Taizong of Tang, selecting good horsemen to establish the Flying Cavalry's seven camps. Over successive generations, it was repeatedly expanded and reorganized until it reached a total strength of 10,000 cavalry. Later, due to their contributions in assisting the current Emperor Xuanzong, they were supplemented and expanded into the Left and Right Longwu Armies, each with 15,000 men, making them the only cavalry corps among the various armies stationed in the capital.
The Divine Martial Army originated from the elite selected during the rotation of the border army, with the smallest number (later changed to the Divine Strategy Army with the heaviest military strength). The emperor used different systems of troops to restrain each other, avoiding the situation where generals came from the same family, preventing personal dictatorship, and maintaining the combat effectiveness of the army.
At that time, the south and north imperial guards took turns to be on duty, not only did the garrison and guard duties overlap, but even the commanders also overlapped and interpenetrated each other's jurisdictions. The emperor used this method of "mutual inspection" to achieve mutual restraint and prevent any general from becoming too powerful. Due to the overlapping garrisons, in order to enter the opponent's camp, one had to hold a pardon letter, and after being introduced by the imperial charioteer and the gatekeeper, they could enter. (But later, the eunuchs' dictatorship broke this balance of power, monopolizing the authority of the imperial guards, arbitrarily deposing and replacing emperors, and even murdering them.)
The position of Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial Guards was often an honorary title held by powerful ministers or imperial princes, while the actual military affairs were handled by the General. The positions of Grand Marshal and Grand Protector were also largely ceremonial, held by members of the imperial family or tribal leaders from outside the capital. In peacetime, each guard unit had troops but no authority to deploy them, while the Ministry of War had the authority to mobilize troops but had no actual troops under its command. The two were mutually restrictive, and only an imperial edict could bring them together for a large-scale military operation.
The border military system adopted a hereditary military household system, some of which evolved from the Fubing system, similar to the father-son soldiers in the Imperial Guards, where the initial recruits were recruited by the court as the basis for the border military, and were settled locally to establish military households.
The Guards were the field troops selected from the Fubing, while the Border Troops were equivalent to modern hereditary border defense forces. The Fubing was a local garrison force and reserve for the Guards, all belonging to the regular army.
In addition, there were also troops from the local garrison systems of various towns and prefectures. For example, in the 19th year of the Zhenguan era (645 AD), when Emperor Taizong of Tang launched a military campaign against Gaoju, the troops that participated included not only the imperial guard, the five capital garrisons, the provincial troops from Jiang, Xie, Huai, and Ling prefectures, the border troops from Yingzhou and Songmo, the local militia from Pinglu and Lulong towns, as well as tribal soldiers from the Turks, Qiang, and Xianbei tribes, and soldiers from vassal states such as Khitan and Xi. There were also troops from subordinate countries like Silla and Baekje, as well as temporarily recruited mercenary forces known as "yì cóng". The total number of troops was in the hundreds of thousands.
Apart from their own garrison troops, each of the Sixteen Guards also commanded 40-50 military prefectures as garrison and reserve forces.
But the dozens of military prefectures under each Wei were scattered among the various circuits, both in local areas through non-affiliated relationships to restrain each other, and in the capital area through multiple sources of soldiers, to prevent certain factions from using names such as "xiangdang" to gang up and expand.
The army of this era, the infantry was mainly composed of halberdiers and shieldmen. The former were equipped with long-handled weapons such as spears, lances, pikes, guandao, and ji, while the latter were equipped with various sizes of shields and short-range weapons such as knives, axes, broadswords, maces, and hooks, wearing laminated armor made of metal and leather.
Cavalry wore mainly front and rear articulated cuirasses or leather soft armor. Equipped with a slightly shorter grip, the tail can be inserted upside down on the short spear of the horse (also known as the gun cavalry) has a strong impact force against the nomadic people's positive side, but the rotation and mobility are slightly inferior to the short-armed quick-shooting nomadic cavalry. Therefore, in the border army, there were also similar nomadic cavalry equipped with Hu Jiying composed of Fan Bing and Yi Cong, as well as Liu Ying composed of exiled criminals.
In the Tang Dynasty, there was no strict distinction between different types of soldiers, except for cavalry training. The combat capabilities were generally average. The difference lay only in the equipment of weapons, so there were no single-equipped troops. Even the shooting camp, which was mainly composed of archers and crossbowmen, would be equipped with 150 pikemen and swordsmen to form a combined battalion as close protection. In the combined forces of infantry and cavalry, a small number of mobile Hu cavalry would also be deployed as scouts and sentries.
Each equipped with first-class fire, each fire prepared six pack horses. With one black cloth tent, iron horse bucket, cloth slot, adze, chisel, mortar, basket, axe, pliers, saw; two armor beds, two sickles; team equipment: one fire shovel, one chest horse rope, three head reins, three foot shackles; personal equipment: one bow, thirty arrows, one Hu Lu (a type of knife), one horizontal knife, one whetstone, one large ladle, one felt hat, one felt suit, one bamboo walking stick; nine dou of wheat rice, two dou of millet, all self-prepared. Their armor and military equipment are stored in the warehouse. When they go on a campaign, they will be issued according to their needs.
Those who serve as guards above the rank of Shi are only given bows and arrows, and crossbows. All citizens at the age of twenty become soldiers, and are exempt at sixty. Those who can ride and shoot are called Yue Qi, the rest are infantry, Wu Qi (mounted infantry), Pai Shou (shield bearers) and Bu She (infantry archers).
