The Early Tang:
Challenges and Successes
Seizing on the Sui disasters, Li Yüan, a high-ranking Sui
general, rose against the emperor and went on to establish the Tang dynasty.
The men under his command on the day of his revolt totaled roughly 30,000, both
infantry and cavalry. Like many of the generals who hoped to replace the Sui,
he was able to enlist the aid of several thousand Turkish cavalrymen. By the
time Li Yüan had captured the city of Changan, which was proclaimed the Tang
capital, he had picked up an additional 200,000 men. Many of these were men who
had deserted the Sui army during and after the disastrous Korean campaigns. Li
Yüan divided this force into twelve divisions, each led by a trusted general,
for there was still much fighting to come before China was securely in Tang
hands.
These were true divisions, expected to be able to operate on
their own with a full complement of various types of weapons and soldiers, both
infantry and cavalry. In addition, the soldiers were allotted lands on which
their families were to be settled. The production of these lands was to make
the divisions self-sufficient in supplies, an institutional continuation of the
Northern Wei and Sui military systems. Like the Sui founder, Li Yüan and his
son and successor, Li Shimin, understood the importance of pacifying both China
and the lands to the north. This was why Li Yüan took such care to settle large
numbers of his soldiers on lands near to the steppes. Li Shimin, better known
by his reign title of Tang Taizong, was particularly successful at this, using
both military and diplomatic strategies to become not only emperor of the
Chinese but Qaghan (essentially, “Emperor”) of the Turks as well.
Unlike members of the traditional ruling classes of southern
China, but like Tang Taizong, many of the leading figures of the early decades
of the Tang were very comfortable with steppe traditions such as hunting and
the relative freedom of women-a result of the intermingling of Chinese and
nomadic peoples during the period of disunion. Applying this knowledge, Taizong
took advantage of disunion among the various steppe tribes to insinuate himself
into their politics and feuds. The result was that many of the nomadic tribes
became an arm of the Tang military system. Taizong thus solved-at least for a
time-the main problem plaguing Chinese armies since the Zhou period: the lack
of horses, needed to create a credible cavalry arm. The nomads made up the bulk
of the Tang cavalry during the reign of Taizong, and they were called on at
times to assist in his campaigns for the consolidation of Tang rule within
China proper. Those few times steppe tribes refused to heed his orders, he sent
Tang armies, aided by other steppe cavalry, to bring them to heel.
Taizong was accepted due to his adaptation to steppe
traditions, especially his knowledge of steppe politics and military tactics.
Frequently, he led his soldiers in person, often when outnumbered by enemy
forces, reportedly having four horses shot out from under him during the course
of his campaigns. He was also acquainted with the steppe military tactic of the
feigned retreat, adapting this tactic successfully from its use with cavalry
forces to use with primarily infantry forces.
Later Tang emperors were unable to maintain the sort of
personal authority that was necessary to control the steppe nomads. But nomadic
internal rivalries allowed the Tang dynasty to keep its northern frontier
fairly secure for a few decades after Taizong’s death. Even after Tang control
on the frontiers weakened later in the eighth century, the dynasty could often
call on nomadic armies for assistance. But Tibetan invasions and the An Lushan
Rebellion in the mid-eighth century, coupled with ongoing transformations of
the Chinese economy and society, would finally destroy the almost symbiotic
system of nomadic cavalry alongside settled Chinese infantry.
The Tang Army
The Fubing System The Tang dynasty, especially from the time of
Tang Taizong, consciously worked to create a system whereby the dynasty was
primarily defended by citizen-soldiers. Like the Han dynasty, the Tang was
suspicious of large professional armies, believing that skilled professionals
were much harder to control or to keep loyal than an army composed of free
citizens. The Tang also believed that some skilled professionals were
necessary, especially for the expeditions the dynasty planned in both the north
and south and as a mobile strike force. As we have seen, the cavalry arm was
primarily made up of nomadic horsemen who could be both used as a buffer and
called on to assist in military expeditions. In the next section, we will
discuss the skilled professional force that was kept near the capital. In this
section, we will focus on the large forces of citizen-soldiers called the
Fubing Army.
The term Fubing has been translated in various ways, the
most common being “militia.” This is not satisfactory. Militia
usually refers to men who are soldiers only part-time or part of the year; the
rest of the time, they engage in their primary occupation. The members of the
Fubing, however, were primarily professional soldiers, members of a standing
army who spent all or nearly all of the year in military units, training or
engaging in security duties.
The confusion in meaning comes from how the Fubing were
recruited, and, sometimes, the Chinese sources from the Tang period are
themselves unclear as to what the functions of the Fubing were. Nonetheless, in
tracing the evolution of the Fubing, we learn that in the early Tang, at least
up until the end of the eighth century, it was the most effective part of the
Tang military, maintaining the security of the Tang frontier and assisting in
several of the early Tang military expeditions. The Fubing commanders were some
of the best in the whole Tang military.
Li Yüan established the capital of Tang China at Changan,
located in the Guanzhong Province. As we saw earlier, by this time, he had over
200,000 men in his command. Although more fi ghting would be necessary to
establish control over the rest of China, Li Yüan needed to ensure that the
northern frontier was secure. To that end, many of these soldiers and their
families were settled in agricultural communities. When additional soldiers were
needed for his armies, Li Yüan had these families furnish them, along with
their equipment and weapons. As these communities were expected to be
self-supporting, the Tang court was spared a large expense. When this
system-obviously extensively copied from the Sui military system-was expanded
to include all ten of the provinces under Tang Taizong, the Tang had seemingly
solved all three of the main Chinese military concerns. That is, there were
military forces on the northern frontier to protect against nomadic threats;
scattered military units were available for internal uses; and, because all
these forces were self-supporting, there was little drain on imperial finances.
When the Fubing system was established, there were 623
communities, each with 800-1200 soldiers plus their families, making a total
military force of well over 600,000. While the soldiers trained, their families
were required to work their assigned lands, much as in the Sui and the Northern
Wei earlier. But a key difference was that during the Tang dynasty, little
private landownership was allowed in China, and all land was divided up
according to a very complicated formula. This Equitable-Field system was
implemented throughout the early Tang and was the basis for the Fubing military
system. Those communities classifi ed as military were allotted a certain
amount of land, which in the early decades of the Fubing system was quite
large. In return for providing soldiers and supplying military needs, these
communities were exempted from many taxes. Officers from the Imperial Guards in
the capital were dispatched to the Fubing communities to oversee the
administration of the lands and to lead the soldiers when necessary. This was
to prevent local commanders from bonding too tightly with their men and gaining
too much independent power, though lower-ranking officers usually came from
within the ranks.
Recruitment was not by universal conscription, nor was it a
strictly hereditary duty as under previous systems such as the Sui. Instead,
roughly once every three years, officers of the Imperial Guards would circuit
the Fubing communities and recruit, choosing on the basis of wealth, physical
fitness, and number of adult males in a military household. Though the age of
recruitment varied over time, generally a man was enlisted from age 20, and he
would serve until age 60, when he could retire. Membership in the early decades
was considered an honor, and those families with wealth and influence were able
to get a higher proportion of their sons accepted. It is not clear how rigidly
the physical requirements were enforced, but recruits were supposed to be in
good health and were tested on physical strength. Those from frontier
communities were also tested on their horsemanship.
After being accepted as a Fubing soldier, the new recruit
and his family were expected to provide all of his rations, armor, and weapons.
Groups of families were required to provide horses, mules, or oxen for use by
the Fubing. This was a relatively cost-free way for the Tang to maintain a
standing army, its only expense being the allocated land.
The three main duties of the Fubing were, in order of
importance, garrison troops on the frontier, guardsmen in the capital area of
Changan, and combat troops on expeditions. Local commanders of the Fubing were
expressly forbidden to move their troops out of their camps without
authorization from the court. There were exceptions in emergencies, but a
commander who did move his men without prior approval had to notify the court
immediately. Punishment for failing to follow these rules was exile or even
death for the offending commander. Throughout the seventh century, the Fubing
acquitted itself well along the frontiers and also maintained the Tang hold
over the newly unified southern territories.
Guard duty in the capital area was considered a particularly
important function of the Fubing by the Tang court. A complicated rotation
system was devised to determine which Fubing units had guard duty and when. At
any given time, there were tens of thousands of Fubing soldiers in various
defensive positions in Changan and the immediate area. They were not the only
military forces in the capital, but they were considered a check on the Palace
Army that was supposedly the personal military force of the emperor.
Taking part in Tang military campaigns was the third duty of
the Fubing. Rarely did the Fubing campaign on their own. Most often, they went
into combat with large numbers of other Tang military units. The Korean
campaigns, for example, were manned primarily by troops recruited from regions
near Korea, but the Fubing were often the backbone of the expeditionary force.
Also, an expeditionary force sent to subdue the kingdom of Nanchao (the
present-day Chinese province of Yunnan) contained a large number of Fubing
soldiers.
There is general agreement that through the 600s the Fubing
were a competent, efficient military force that remained loyal to the Tang
court. However, changes in Tang China’s economy and society in the early- to
mid-eighth century led to the decline of the Fubing. The Equitable-Field system
was without doubt the foundation of the Fubing military system, but in the
early 700s, aristocratic families, government officials, religious orders, and
others with influence were gaining effective private ownership of land. Many of
the Fubing lands passed into private hands, and many military households saw
their share of land reduced drastically. Service in the Fubing became less
prestigious, and families increasingly saw classification as a military
household as a burden and attempted various means to have their status changed
to civilian. Many families attached themselves to Buddhist temples or religious
orders as a quick way to relieve themselves of the burden of supplying the Fubing.
Many others fled to newly reclaimed lands, becoming tenant-farmers or laborers
on the lands of the wealthy in preference to service as a Fubing household,
testament to how burdensome that service had become. Reports in the 740s told
of massive desertions from the Fubing armies, at the same time that fierce
Tibetan armies were raiding the northern and northwestern frontiers. The Fubing
system was formally abolished in favor of a system of voluntary, recruited
soldiers in 749.
The Palace Army In addition to the Fubing units that were
expected to be composed of citizensoldiers, the Tang maintained a professional
force at the capital of Changan, designed as the personal army of the emperor.
This was the Palace Army, composed originally of those units used by Li Yüan in
his revolt against the Sui dynasty. Often, this army is called the
“Northern Army” because it was originally posted in a defensive
position just north of Changan, as well as in the northern sector of the city.
By Tang Taizong’s time, nearly all of the soldiers in this army were from noble
or wealthy families located in the capital region.
At its height of effectiveness in the late seventh century,
there were probably no more than 60,000 men in the Palace Army. In this early
period, it was the core of Tang military strength and even included a cavalry
element. Members of this army trained constantly together, and those who were
tall and strong and showed ability at horse-archery were admitted to the
cavalry, commanded mostly by specially recruited Turkish officers.
Other than some of the cavalry officers, most officers in
the Palace Army came from the Imperial Guards. Indeed, most of the top Fubing
officers were also Imperial Guardsmen. The Imperial Guards were recruited
exclusively from the families of nobles and former high-ranking officials, and
some have seen this as a modified version of the “hostage system”
that had been used by the Han dynasty to maintain some measure of control over
powerful families. As long as membership in the Imperial Guards was esteemed,
there was a constant flow of competent, energetic officers for both the Palace
Army and the Fubing. But by the late seventh century, the Imperial Guards- and
therefore the Palace Army-had become involved in imperial succession struggles,
and their effectiveness had diminished considerably.
The empress Wu (690-705) greatly expanded the Palace Army,
enlisting men from outside the traditional recruiting grounds. This could have
been an invigorating move that revitalized the military efficiency of the
Palace Army; but, instead, a major unit of the Palace Army was used in 705 to
depose the empress, and various other units later were frequently called on to
assist in court intrigues. During the outbreak of the An Lushan Rebellion in
755, the Palace Army simply melted away as the rebel forces approached. Only
1000 of the supposedly elite force were left to accompany the emperor as he
fled the capital.
The Decline of Tang
Military Efficiency
New Frontier Armies Constant and growing threats from a newly
unified Tibetan kingdom in the late seventh century demonstrated the increasing
feebleness of the Fubing military system. The Tang relied to a large degree on
their Uighur and Turkish nomadic allies, who by this time could no longer be
considered even remotely under the control of Tang China. The Uighurs had been
especially effective in assisting the Tang, but they did not come cheap. By the
670s, vast amounts of silk and other goods were necessary to buy Uighur
assistance. When the payments slacked, the Uighurs would strike within China to
exact payment and, since the Fubing garrisons were significantly weakened,
their raids were often successful. To lessen reliance on the hired Uighur
cavalry and protect the frontier, the Tang replaced the Fubing system with one
of long-serving volunteer frontier armies, led by imperially appointed military
governors possessing a good deal of civil as well as military authority.
For military encampments for these new troops, the Tang
constructed massive fortresses across the three provinces that bordered the
steppe frontier. The frontier fortresses were connected to and communicated
with each other and the capital by post roads and beacon towers. In some cases,
the fortresses were constructed on former Turkish territory. While the Turks
were away in battle with tribes further west, the Tang army moved in swiftly to
secure the area, constructing fortresses and denying the Turks some of their
prime pasturelands. By the 720s, there were well over 65,000 soldiers with 15,000
horses stationed in Guanzhong alone, with comparable numbers in the adjoining
two provinces.
This entailed an enormous expense, and, though the Tang was
a fairly prosperous time in China’s history, this level of outlay proved difficult
to maintain. Unlike the Fubing forces, these frontier armies were not
self-supporting, nor could they be, with many of the soldiers posted relatively
far north in lands less suited to settled agriculture. The difficulty of paying
these forces prompted dangerous political arrangements. Taxing authority was
given over to the military governors, who increasingly ruled independently of
the court.
Until 750, the system appeared to be working. Tang China
faced a series of ups and downs in terms of security along their frontiers, but
none of the problems they encountered was very serious. Trade through the Tang
possessions in Central Asia continued fairly smoothly, and the nomadic peoples
on all fronts were, if not fully pacifi ed, at least not of serious concern.
But the year 751 saw three major military disasters for the Tang. The first
occurred at the Talas River on the western frontier, where a major Chinese
force under the veteran Korean general Gao Xianzhi was decisively defeated by a
combined Arab-Turkish force. Another Chinese army, on the northeastern
frontier, led by the Turkish-Soghdian general An Lushan, was decisively
defeated by a predominantly Khitan nomadic force. Then, a major Chinese army
was defeated and wiped out in an invasion of the Nanchao kingdom in the
southwest, leaving the Sichuan area of China vulnerable to renewed Tibetan
attacks. The combination of defeats seriously destabilized the dynasty.
Transformation and Decline The Tang dynasty faced two big problems
in trying to rebuild its military forces after the disasters of the mid-700s.
First, although the large frontier armies did not fare well in combat against
foreign forces, internally, their commanders continued to accrue tremendous
independent power. The threat to central authority posed by military commanders
and the great warrior aristocracy became acute in the 800s as commanders gained
control of the civil government in their provinces and won the right to
hereditary succession to their commands. In the end, independent warlords
brought down the dynasty-a development that would significantly influence the
military policy of the succeeding Song dynasty.
Second, the increasing demographic and economic influence of
southern China in the empire as a whole had significant ramifications for the
social and military structure. The south was even more unsuitable terrain for
raising horses and maintaining cavalry traditions than the north of China. As a
result, Chinese reliance on nomadic tribes for cavalry became even greater at
the same time as the rulers of China became even more distanced from the
culturally syncretic milieu that had produced the leaders of the early Tang.
Thus, Chinese control over their nomadic allies waned, and cavalry warfare became
more and more divergent from native Chinese military traditions. This, too,
would fuel the Song reaction against great warrior aristocratic families, who
most strongly embraced those traditions.
Events reached crisis proportions because of the independent
power of military commanders. An Lushan, the most powerful Tang general and a
court favorite, rebelled in 755. After seven years of chaotic fighting, the
various rebel forces were finally defeated, but only with significant aid from
nomadic Uighur horsemen, who became a problem in turn. A succession of emperors
rebuilt a central army around the core of a loyal frontier army; this Shence
Army was led by eunuchs, reflecting an effort to solve the problem of commander
loyalty. Though temporarily successful-the Shence Army was instrumental in
putting down another rebellion by military governors in 781-the institution had
little success controlling the nomadic frontier because of its central location
in the capital. Further, its power was steadily diluted by aristocratic infl
uence, money shortages caused by the independence of the military governors,
and involvement in court politics. Increasingly enfeebled, the Tang dynasty finally
fell in 907, ushering in several decades of warfare that would accelerate the underlying
changes in China’s political, social, and military structure.
