The Warring States

I left off the last blog with an examination of the Art of War, and the ways in which it has influenced Chinese military history since its introduction in the Spring and Autumn/Warring States Periods. I'm going to give a brief overview of the Warring States, but will be focusing on two campaigns carried out by an alleged descendant of Sunzi (Sun Tzu), Sun Bin.

By the end of the Spring and Autumn Period, the various hundred odd states that existed in China had been whittled down to just seven: Qin in the west, the successor states of Jin (Zhao, Wei, Han) in the centre, Yan and Qi in the east and Chu in the south. The Zhou Dynasty kings were still technically in charge, and had their own little bit of territory near modern day Luoyang.

What's important to understand about the Warring States period is that, unlike the previous Spring and Autumn period, despite having more years of peace, the scale of war became increasingly larger, along with the casualties sustained by the various warring states. The exact date on which the Warring States period starts is a bit murky, as there lacks a clear event that marks the start time, unlike the fall of the Western Zhou Dynasty for the Spring and Autumn. Various dates have been suggested, from 481 BCE, which marked the end of the Spring and Autumn Annals, to 403 BCE, when the three states of Zhao, Wei and Han were recognised by the Zhou court. However, I personally prefer the date 453 BCE, which is the year in which Jin was partitioned into its three successor states. The period ends in 221 BCE, with the conquering of Qi by Qin armies, and the formation of the Qin Dynasty, the first dynasty that ruled over a unified China.

The Warring States Period is one of increasing bloodshed and destruction as the various states raise massive armies in their conquests of each other. Official numbers are generally thought to have been inflated, in order for the Han Dynasty to paint a picture of an extremely bloody period prior to unification. Remember that King Wu of Zhou had overthrown the Shang Dynasty with a force of 45,000 infantry and 300 chariots. Official figures for military might in the Warring States Period list the state of Qin as having an army of 1,000,000 infantry, 1,000 chariots and 10,000 horses. These numbers should be taken with a bucket load of salt, since they are likely inflated, but what can be inferred from this is that the scale of warfare increased at massively during the Warring States Period.

In terms of military technology, three things stand out. Firstly, the increased usage of iron in the process of forging weapons and armour, the invention of the crossbow, and the increased usage of cavalry to replace chariots. Although the primary metal used in the period was mainly bronze, at some point over the course of the 200 odd years of the Warring States Period, states shifted towards the usage of iron over bronze. The invention of the crossbow at some point during the 500s or 400s BCE enabled a shift away from aristocratic forms of chariot warfare, and towards the sorts of mass infantry armies that have become ubiquitous with perceptions of China. The decline of the aristocracy as a leader in terms of war making also enabled the development of dedicated cavalry forces, which were generally superior to chariots in that they were a more versatile fighting force.

The Warring States Period also saw a general spread in military philosophy, just as the Spring and Autumn had witnessed a plurality of moral and political philosophical thought. Of the Seven Military Classics of Ancient China, four are said to have been written during the Warring States Period. These are the Methods of the Sima, Wu Qi's Wuzi, Wei Liaozi, and the Three Strategies of Huang Shigong.

In terms of cultural development, the decreasing in stature of the aristocracy allowed for the development of a bureaucratic state, and the groundwork for the future Chinese bureaucracy were lain during the Warring States and Spring and Autumn periods.

Sun Bin

Said to have been a descendant of the famed Sunzi, Sun Bin (??? - 316 BCE) was a famed strategist of first the state of Wei, and then the state of Qin. Sun was tutored in military strategy by the hermit Guiguzi, and was considered to have been his best pupil. During his time with the hermit Guiguzi, he was good friends with another student named Pang Juan, and the two of them became sworn brothers.

Pang Juan soon left the tutelage of the hermit Guiguzi, and went off to the State of Wei, which he heard was recruiting talented men in order to conquer 'all under Heaven'. After a few years, with his star on the rise, he invited Sun Bin down to the State of Wei. But he was actually jealous of Sun Bin, who he knew to be the better general, and so he framed him for treason, and reported him to King Hui of Wei, who then ordered Sun Bin executed. Pang Juan pretended to be on Sun Bin's side, pleading for amnesty, and so the punishment was 'reduced' to face tattooing, and removal of Sun Bin's kneecaps.

Pang Juan then pretended to take pity on Sun, and treated him quite well, though he was in fact trying to trick Sun into writing a military book, after which he would have the man executed. Well, Sun figured this out, and decided to feign madness. Pang, not believing it, tried to test Sun's madness by locking him up in a pigsty, to which Sun pretended to be having fun and even ate pig feces. And so Pang stopped keeping an eye on him, allowing Sun to escape to Qi, where he eventually ended up as Chief Military Adviser.

In 354 BCE, Wei attacked Zhao, with Pang Juan at the head of the army, besieging the Zhao capital of Handan. Zhao asked Qi for help, and the King of Qi commissioned Sun Bin as military adviser, and Tian Ji as General to lead an army to assist Zhao. Knowing that a direct attack on Wei forces would be unwise, Sun proposed to attack Wei in order to relieve the pressure on Zhao.

In the Guiling Campaign, Sun first initiated a scattered series of attacks on Wei forts, all of them failing and luring Pang Juan into a sense of security, causing him to pool forces in the attack on the Zhao capital. Sun then had the Qi army attack the capital of Wei, Daliang. When word reached Pang at the Zhao Capital that Daliang was under attack, he marshaled a force to relieve the siege, and was decisively beaten at the battle of Guiling, where Sun Bin had prepared an ambush. From this campaign comes the 2nd of the thirty six stratagems - "Besiege Wei to Rescue Zhao". 

Pang managed to escape back to Wei, despite the destruction of his forces.

The second of Sun Bin's two famous campaigns, the Maling campaign took place in 342 BCE, when Wei attacked Han, and Han turned to Qi for assistance. Giving the impression that Han could depend on Qi's army for assistance, Han went all in against Wei, though the promised help never materialised. After a year of resistance, Han was no longer able to maintain its armies, and again asked for help from Qi. Again, instead of assisting Han directly, Sun advised to strike at the Wei capital of Daliang.

Having learnt from his mistake in the previous Battle of Guiling, Pang Juan (annoyed at having been recalled from the war in Han a few weeks away from taking the Han capital) ordered his 100,000 strong army to go around the Qi forces, to avoid ambushes, and also ordered his troops to return to the capital hastily, before Qi could set up any good ambushes.

Sun however, just sat and waited, rather than rushing around to attack the high morale Wei army. He then split his force, sending the majority of it back towards Qi to prepare the necessary materiel for ambushes, whilst he personally led a force to face Pang Juan. When the two armies came close to each other, Sun immediately ordered a retreat towards Qi.

Along the way, he ordered his army to reduce the number of stoves used for cooking day by day. Judging from the dwindling number of campfires, Pang Juan assumed that the Qi army was deserting, and so led a smaller, elite cavalry force to give chase. As the Qi army retreated back into their own territory, Sun then ordered the men to abandon some of their baggage. When Pang Juan's force happened upon this, they assumed that there existed a state of confusion in the enemy ranks. 

When the Qi army arrived at Maling, Sun Bin noticed a narrow path that could be used for an ambush, and so, judging that Pang Juan would arrive at nightfall, ordered his men to prepare for battle. Chinese folklore has it that he also ordered his men to inscribe on a tree "Pang Juan shall die in Malingdao, under this tree".

When Pang Juan arrived with his army, he was lured into the ambush, and, knowing that the battle was lost and escape impossible, took his own life.

Map of the campaign

The campaigns of Sun Bin reflect the trends of Chinese warfare found in the Art of War. Firstly, he focused mainly on the strategic aspects of the campaigns, willing to take defeats on a tactical level to shape his strategic goals. Secondly, he relied heavily on maneuvre to force Pang Juan to fight him on his own terms, attacking strategic ground and remaining agile in order to defeat a larger force. Third, as the retreat towards Maling shows, he made good use of 'shaping operations' in order to fight on the most favourable terms to him, engaging in ground of his choosing against an enemy tired out by pursuit. Finally, his heavy usage of deception in the Maling campaign reflects the famous Sunzi quote:

"All warfare is based on deception"

Next week I'll be taking a look at the Qin campaigns of unification, where we start to get into the proper, unified Chinese Dynastic history. Hope you enjoyed this blog post!

The Spring and Autumn Period

The Spring and Autumn period represents the zenith of Chinese philosophy and political thought. The decline in power of the Zhou Kings and the resultant rise of many disparate states formed an atmosphere where political and philosophical thought would be able to flourish in ways that would not be seen in China for centuries.

The Spring and Autumn is the period of Confucius, Laozi, Mozi and Sunzi. It saw the rise of the four main schools of philosophical thought that dominated the Spring and Autumn and the Warring States periods; Confucianism, Taoism, Mohism and Legalism. Of the two, only Confucianism and Taoism survive in recognisable form today.

Following the sacking of the Zhou capital at Zongzhou near modern day Xi'an by the Marquess of Shen and his Quanrong barbarian allies, the Zhou moved their capital eastwards, to Chengzhou in the Yellow River valley. This marked the ending of the Western Zhou Dynasty, and with it the ending of central Zhou authority. During the period in which the Zhou had consolidated their power upon ascending to primacy in China, states in the East had been carved up and given to members of the royal family. Though this had kept those potentially volatile states under Zhou control, by the fall of Zongzhou states that had once been ruled by royal brothers were now ruled by third and even fourth cousins.

Further complicating matters for the Zhou was the fact that their new capital was removed from their traditional power base in the Wei river valley. This double blow of a military defeat, combined with the removal of their power base meant that the Zhou were essentially reduced to a figurehead ruler of China.

The shifting of the capital occurred in 771BCE, and that is typically the date that historians associate with the beginning of the Spring and Autumn period. The name of the period comes from the Spring and Autumn Annals, a chronicle of the state of Lu between 772 and 479BCE. Traditionally, this piece of literature is ascribed to Confucius, but in reality was likely put together by chroniclers from the state of Lu.

Courtesy of Wikipedia

Over the course of the Spring and Autumn period, some 148 states rose, though were eventually unified by one of the seven major states that would arise by the Warring States period. The Spring and Autumn saw several important changes to the traditional Chinese methods of governing.

Firstly, the Feng Jian or Feudal system that had been in place during the Western Zhou dynasty was rendered obsolete. The rendering of the King of Zhou to a figurehead meant that real power lay in the rulers of the various states that were now vying for hegemony in China.

Secondly, the rise of these various states led to the development of a hierarchical alliance system. In it, the strongest state leader would be given the title of Hegemon or ba, who would be obliged to protect the weaker Zhou states and the Zhou royalty from intruding armies. Whilst this still had shades of the old Feng Jian system, in reality the Zhou royalty were not as important in the determination of the hegemon as might be implied.

Thirdly, the rise to power of the first hegemon, Duke Huan of Qi (Qi Huan Gong) was due largely to reforms passed by his adviser, Guan Zhong. Among these was the centralisation of power in the hands of the state, direct levies applied to the villages to bypass the reliance on the aristocracy for manpower, he devised a better method for choosing talent to be governors. During his tenure, Qi shifted from a traditional model whereby the aristocracy was responsible for governing to a system of professional bureaucrats. He also created sponsored government brothels to fund the government treasury. He also created a uniform tax code and used state power to encourage the production of salt and iron.

The success of Guan Zhong led to the emulation of his policies, which contributed further to the decline of the Feng Jian system.

Somewhat unique among the major states in the period was the state of Chu, which was not considered to be part of the Zhou cultural group, and as such were regarded as barbarians. Indeed, the state of Chu was not subservient to the Zhou at all, declaring that its king was equal, if not superior to, the King of Zhou. Many of the wars waged by the hegemons were against the state of Chu.

Following the death of the second hegemon, Duke Wen of Jin in 628BCE, tensions that had been simmering in the central plans area began to rise, and constant skirmishing erupted between Qi, Qin, Jin and Chu. By the time those four states sat down to discuss disarmament, it had become readily apparent that the traditional role of hegemon was outdated, as each state had acquired their own spheres of influence. The integration of non-Zhou peoples into various states, combined with the occupation by Chu of various areas recognised as Zhou blurred the line between Zhou and non-Zhou peoples.

When Jin and Chu backed off each other, Wu in modern Jiangsu and Yue in modern Zhejiang rose. In 583BCE Jin negotiated an alliance with Wu, which meant that even as Jin and Chu agreed to a truce in 546BCE, Jin was able to fight a proxy war via Wu, peaking in a full scale invasion of Chu by Wu in 506BCE.

Even as this was developing, the power of the Jin dukes was declining, resulting in a civil war in 497BCE, which lasted until 453BCE, the results of which were the elimination of most noble lines. The remaining families divided Jin into three states: Han Wei and Zhao.

This left seven major powers in the Zhou world: the three partitioned states of Jin, the three remaining powers of Qin, Chu and Qi, and the weaker state of Yan near Beijing. This set the stage for the Warring States period, which will not be covered next. Instead, I will be examining a few of the major characters of the Spring and Autumn period, namely Confucius, Laozi and Sunzi.