Study On The Mutiny In The Middle And Late Ming Dynasty

In the early days of founding of the Ming Dynasty,given the experience and lessons of the demise of the previous dynastyand the importance attached to the army by Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang himself,the Ming Dynasty designed a strict military system.In terms of local garrisons,Emperor Ming Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang created the system of guards,which cooperated with the tuntian system,which not only ensured the orderly progress of social production,but also maintained the combat capability of the army.However,with the development of society,state corruption breeds,infiltrates the army,the system of guards and tuntian is destroyed,army production is unsustainable,food shortages and pay occur repeatedly,the military system carefully established in the early Ming Dynasty gradually deteriorates,the soldiers at the bottom live in hardship,and in the case of desperation,mutiny finally breaks out and intensifies.The mutiny in the middle and late Ming Dynasty occurred under the influence of many factors,and it was an unavoidable problem for the feudal dynasty army.The first is economic.The long-term lack of pay in the army,the deprivation of soldiers’ treatment,and the corruption of officials,of which the long-term lack of pay in the army is a direct and important cause of the mutiny,and there are many historical records in this part of the historical materials.The benefits that soldiers originally had had were canceled because of the changes,and there was dissatisfaction,some officials embezzled and accepted bribes,withheld military salaries,and corruption was rampant.The second is political reasons.The middle and upper generals of the army were discordant,and mutinies were launched because of disagreements,and some low-level soldiers were used by upper officers as pawns against the imperial court,and at the same time there were problems within the army,and the upper officers were corrupt,ignored the military,and delayed in fun.Again the source of troops.The development of the conscription system has led to the recruitment of many idle people in the city,and the quality of military resources has greatly declined,and they are slightly unsatisfactory,and they are often making noise.There are also higher-ranking officers who have served and occupied soldiers for a long time,because they have abolished public affairs for private gain,regard the national army as their own domestic slaves,and oppress and exploit soldiers as generals,and the low-level soldiers are oppressed and have no choice but to resist.When dealing with mutinies,the Ming Dynasty treated soldiers,Jiajing in the early stage was mainly suppression,especially the two Datong soldiers became representatives,in the later period from suppression to appeasement,only the first few evil people were dealt with,the rest of the party was no longer pursued,the treatment of officials involved in the mutiny,generally based on seizure,demotion,and removal of officials,if there was a large-scale turmoil and the killing of important members of the imperial court,the mutiny chief general and others would be sentenced to death such as beheading.The mutiny in the middle and late Ming Dynasty brought many negative effects,the worst of which was that the army was arrogant and difficult to control,and military discipline was lax,and many soldiers participated in many mutinies,and they figured out the imperial court’s policy of focusing on appeasement and distributing according to trouble,and often mutinied to profit from it.The mutiny process was mixed with desertion,and after entering society,it became a disaster and became a harmful factor that undermined social stability.Military discipline was undermined and government restraint declined.The mutiny led to the gradual abandonment of army training,the decline of combat effectiveness,the victory of both foreign wars and internal counterinsurgency,and the weakening of the border defense capability of the Ming Dynasty.The quelling of the mutiny led to an increase in the financial burden of the state,because quelling the mutiny required appointing generals and local officials,mobilizing the army,and pacifying the soldiers with money and food,each of which was a huge financial expenditure,and the high military expenditure put great pressure on the finances of the Ming Dynasty.At the same time,military salaries were increased year after year,and in the late Ming Dynasty,there were first Liao salaries,then there were salaries,and then training salaries,and the "three salaries" were added to further intensify social contradictions,so mutinies indirectly or directly became one of the important reasons for the demise of the Ming Dynasty.