troung

So why did you comment?

__________________
To sit down with these men and deal with them as the representatives of an enlightened and civilized people is to deride ones own dignity and to invite the disaster of their treachery - General Matthew Ridgway

cdude

When the Mongols rose in the north, the Song (Soong) Dynasty was already defeated by the Jin from Manchuria, and the Song only controlled the southern part of China, we call it the South Song, in contrast to the North Song before the Jin invasion.

So, the Song is not quite just the Cantonese ( people from Canton province which is the south most province in China proper), but also other southerners.

I don;t know what would happen if the Mongols didn't conquer the Song. We northerners always like to go south and beat up the southerners. Sooner or later, if it's not the Mongols, the Manchus would do it anyways. Weather north of the Great Wall is just too rough!

__________________
Tibet might be faraway, but it's ours

Officer of Engineers

It might have been the other way around with the Soong marching north though I doubt it. The Soong were on the edge of another technological leap. They were perfecting the canon to the point that it could be mass produced. There were advances in personal firearms though I doubt those would have the same impact since archers on horseback were far more lethal and the firearms of the period were notoriously inaccurate.

__________________
Chimo

cdude

I, too, doubt the Soong would march north even if they had the best canon around the time. This is maybe a little bit regionalism, but Northerners are bigger, stronger, more violent, we might not have the brain power to write classical poems, but we sure know how to fight, even to this day. People in China Proper were totally spoiled by the good weather, they could not handle the hash climate out of the Great Wall.

Historically, no southern Chinese dynasty won a single "unification" war against the northerners. It's always the northerners going down and conquer the China Proper. I was once sitting in a talk by a history professor. He told us the phenomenon is so true that even the communists, they first occupied Manchuria, then going from there and won the Civil War.

Officer of Engineers

Or you could be under the Russian boot. Do recall the only way the Qin took the Ming was through treachery and then went on to use Chinese firepower to stop the Russians.

No, my point about the Soong canon was that they would've become the dominant military power in the region. Whether that translate into marching north is another question but it does mean that they would've been invulnerable against northern aggression, at least until the military technology balanced out and I'm not sure how that would be achieved. From Europe perhaps?

But then, that would be the Russians.

troung

Trade (legal or otherwise) or capturing weapons or smiths. The Qing captured Chinese cannon makers to create their own artillery park.

But they used steppe style mobility to take East Turkestan and Mongolia.

Officer of Engineers

Didn't think of that.

Would they have done so without taking the Ming? That was a lot of money to raise their armies.

troung

They got most of the Mongols without having Ming resources. They marched in with eight Mongol banners and with all but one of the Manchu eight banners having a couple of Mongol companies attached. So they would have had a lot of Mongols regardless, keeping them would have been an issue.

The Zunghar campaign would have had to have been done with or without those resources as the Zunghars threatened Qing held Mongolia. The campaigns were heavily aided by Chinese resources so they would have been fought different - but still they had to be fought. The Qing fought in the steppe style (modified with matchlocks and cannons on both sides but both sides still used horse archers) with settled resources behind them against steppe people, like Kubalia vs. Qaidu/Duwa or Arik Boke.

One thing I will speculate is that while the Qing made use of Chinese resources to march west, the Soong/Ming weren't going to march west.

A hypothetical nomadic state facing a cannon armed Soong would end up getting them somehow, and then using them which might just make things worse as it would make taking cities easier then throwing rocks at the walls. They could just end up making their doom easier by having cannons around.

Could have a 1453 Byzantine thing where a gunsmith sets up shop with the enemy who will pay him on time. You could be one of many poorly paid Soong gunsmiths or the very well paid Mongol gunsmith. Or just get forced into the trade.

========================

troung

Speculating... having a little fun with a further what if

A non-Qing conquest of Southern China - say a southern Ming or a Wu state or what ever - gives the bizarre parallel during the Zunghar conflict, of Manchus ruling northern China, Han ruling the south and Mongols (Zunghars) outside coming southish. Factor in Russia to the equation playing off everyone. So bizarre alliances, arms deals to destabilize, raids and all types of fun.

I have read some sources which put a sort of tension during the Zunghar conflicts as the Manchus (Jurchens) remembered the fate of the Jin.

Gettoit

Im done here ... this isnt fun anymore..