The Mohist M-ilitary Doctrine And Its Influence On The Development Of Chinese Military History

This dissertation research aims to comprehensively reveal the forming process and main contents of the Mohist military doctrine and the historical function of that in the developing process of Chinese military history. The basis of the dissertation research is literature, and the main research method is to follow up the extraction of the contents of thinking from literature with vertical organization, analytical research and systematic commentary.The dissertation research shows that, the Mohist military doctrine is a theoretical system of war and laws for directing war, preparation for war and conducting war recorded in Mozi, under the guidance of the Mohist war outlook, including military art and military technology, whose development had bore an interactive relation to that of Chinese military history in the Warring States Period, whilst a hidden relation as one between the influencing and the influenced to it after then, since the Mohist School in the sense of a powerful and dynamic organization disappeared, and the Mohist military doctrine was rendered intrinsic as an element in the Chinese theory of war and laws for directing war, preparation for war and conducting war in the Qin Dynasty.The dissertation research shows that, in the aspect of military art, the Mohist thinking of military diplomacy, theory of war conduct and armed forces building all stemmed from contemporary military practice in the Warring States Period, whereas promoted the advancement of the practice. The Mohist thinking of military diplomacy, a product of the Mohists' endeavour to carry out the doctrine of the opposition to aggressive war (fei gong非攻), with historical lessons from the Jinyang Campaign. Mo Di's art of diplomatic struggles used to be held in high esteem by the Diplomatic Strategists (Zonghengjia纵横家), such as Zhang Yi, Lord Mengchang, and Su Qin, whose diplomatic actions showed the inheritance from the Mohist thinking of military diplomacy in some ways. The Mohist theory of war conduct is closely related to the situation with struggles for cities and land in the background. The Jinyang Campaign, the Puyang Campaign and the Guiling, Maling Campaign, etc. all provided valuable lessons of actual combat for the Mohist tactics, and the State of Wei's transformation after the Maling Campaign from prosperity to decline impelled the Mohist School to lay more stress on the significance of external environment for state security. Dur- ing the reign of the King Huiwen of Qin, his troops defeated the allied forces of the states of Han and Wei in Yique, which initiated an example of the annihila- tion of the group army of numerous enemy troops under siege by means of stra- tegic counteroffensive, i.e. strategy of defensive attack equaled to the Mohist principal of active defence. The successive outbreaks of the Jixi Campaign and the Jimo Campaign between the states of Qi and Yan showed the important sig- nificance of popular support and high morale for the win of war, which commu- nicated with the fourteen elements of 'the method for garrisoning besieged city (shou weicheng zhi fa守围城之法)' expounded in the article named 'The Guard over City Gate (Bei Chengmen备城门)' in Mozi. When the Changping Campaign between the states of Qin and Zhao broke out more than twenty years later, both states entered the all-round strategy and power contest, which showed the influ- ence of the Mohist theory of war conduct to some extent. The Mohist theory of armed forces building showed the policy of conscription, the structure of troops, and the staffing of officers against the background of the prefecture and county system, as a result of the historical transformation of military system in the War- ring States Period. As all states conferred the titles of nobility according to mili- tary exploits, the Mohist military management showed the idea of the strictness in punishments. Moreover, the Mohist School also advocated achieving a better balance between severe punishment and lenient or cautious sentence, which in the military penal system inherited the law structure in the Warring States Period, especially the guiding ideology of severe punishment in combination with leni- ent sentence in the laws of the States of Qin. In fact, the Mohist military penal system put the spirit of the ratio juris in the laws of the States of Qin into practice, and played an active role in promoting its completeness and perfection in the form of specialized law.The dissertation research shows that, in the aspect of military technology, the Mohist School not only greatly advanced the enrichment and development of city defence technology, which reached a completely new level on the foundation of predecessors' achievements of military theory and experience of military practice reviewed, but also established a complete Four-in-One system of city defence weaponry composed of attack, shelter, defence and shock on the foundation of the improvement, readjustment and realignment of obsolescent weapons, which greatly advanced the perfection of the system of weaponry in the Warring States Period. The Mohists' historical contribution to the city defence constructions can be divided up into three aspects. The first one is that they completely summed up the essential structure of the main part of contemporary city defence constructions, i.e. the city walls that is the backbone of constructions referable to the problems about the scale of city walls, about the steps to get onto the top of walls, and about the surrounding roads outside city walls, and the city gates that is the key part of constructions including all kinds of mechanisms and facilities on the gates; the second one is that they put forward, on the foundation of the technology of military projects in former time and directed against different types of city attack, a programme of the allocation of the city defence outbuildings on city walls, including the facilities for reliance in battle, represented by the screens designed to give greater height to the city walls (taicheng台城, xing- cheng行城, or lilou立楼) and buildings on the horse face embattlement (mulou木楼or shilou士楼on the mamian马面), and for reconnaissance and early warning, represented by watchtower (zuohoulou坐候楼), turret (gaolixi高磨(礻斯)) and pavilions (ting亭); the last one is that they creatively put forward an organic effective outer defence system of city, according to the record in the article named 'Flags (Qizhi旗帜)' in Mozi, composed of 6 defence works in descending order of the distance from far side to city wall, i.e. 'the outer bank of moat (qianchi wailian前池外廉)', 'the islet in moat (shut zhong zhou水中周)', 'the fence (fan藩)', 'the outer low wall (pingyuan冯垣)', 'the enceinte of city gate (nuyuan女垣)' and 'the city wall (dacheng大城)', and divided into 3 defence lines except the city wall, i.e. the defence lines of moat, obstacles and outbuild- ings. The Mohists established a complete set of system of city defence weaponry: firstly, they inherited, improved and developed a group of obsolescent weapons of the Spring and Autumn Period; secondly, they creatively made and applied a group of sheltering and obstructive weapons; thirdly, they made a concentrated effort, taking active defence as the guiding ideology, to develop and expand the application of a group of defensive attack weapons; lastly, they improved and in- vented a group of heavy weapons, with colossal power and high lethality, typical of the highest level of contemporary frontier military technology.The dissertation research shows that, the First Emperor of the Qin Dynasty united all states of China, which marked the beginning of a new era in the process of the development of Chinese history as well as Chinese military history. Firstly, in the historical environment of the great unification, the Mohist military doctrine got its new development, which established, in the contemporary and later strategy of frontier defence, the Mohist defence concept of military preparation in organic combination with armed struggle, i.e. to render the combat strength of armed forces increasing based on lasting consistent military preparation, on the purpose of the realization of the long-term stability of central dynasties, around the reduction of the gap in military might, seeing from angle of the rational mobilization of man power and material resources and the development of armaments, and with the unity of reconciliation and battle, attack and defence. Secondly, the Mohist military theory also exerted an important influence on the later small producers who took advantage of folk religion to engage in armed struggles against rulers. From Chen Sheng Wu Guang Uprising in the last years of the Qin Dynasty to the White Lotus Rebellion in the mid-Ming, the armed forces of peasants constantly explored the new ways of military struggle, based on the inheritance from the Mohist military theory. Moreover, with the development of folk religion and the variety of social contradiction, Chinese peasant war constantly injected the living ideal with the new real social contradiction in the background into the increasingly rich religious doctrine. Lastly, the application of Mohist military technology to the military engineering and weaponry after the Qin Dynasty remained very wide. In the Qin and Han dynasty, the Ten-thousand-li里Great Wall built on the northern frontier for the purpose of guarding the Xiongnu inherited and developed the city defence technology recorded in 'The Guard over City Gate' or the articles following it in Mozi, and all kinds of weapons and their related tactics that Mohists had studied, created, reviewed and improved was widely applied as well. These weapons numbered among the sophisticated then, but became increasingly conventional in the last years of the Eastern Han Dynasty. In the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the obsolescent Mohist weaponry got improved and readjusted, and their tactics got reformed as well. Many military projects in the period from the Sui Dynasty to the Five Dynasties, when the development of cold steel peaked, and the Mohist technology of weaponry realized its full potential, which set the stage for the birth of the technology of firearm, rarely seen in the period from Western Han Dynasty to the Southern and Northern Dynasties actually continued the Mohist system of weaponry.. When the dynasties of Liao, Song, Western Xia, Jin and Mongolian Yuan alternated or coexisted with one another, the Mohist siege technology, owing to the need of military struggles, got further development, to which Chen Gui made outstanding contribution. In the contemporary battle of siege, the conventional cold steel remained dominant, and the Mohist technology of weaponry with creative application continued with development, whose influ- ence never waned until the dynasties of Ming and Qing, and finally came to an end.The dissertation research shows that, with Chinese conventional guidance of strategy and tactics modernized as from the Opium War, the Mohist military technology had gone through the dynasties of Ming and Qing, and stepped down from military realm. However the Mohist conduct of war and campaign had been rendered intrinsic as an element in the Chinese ancient laws for directing war and the theory and method for directing operations, applied spontaneously in the period. The Movement of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom inherited the Mohist conduct of war and campaign from peasant wars of past dynasties, which revealed itself in the tactics of religious mobilization, the expression of peasants' interests and aspiration, the transformation of guerrilla tactics into the establishment of base area and the strategic tendency of siege to strong city defence. In the last years of the Qing Dynasty, with the development of modernization of Chinese military theory and practice, the hidden element of the Mohist conduct of strategy revealed itself in the course of the resisting foreign aggression and learning foreign skills. During the reign of the Northern Warlord (Beiyang北洋Army), the concentrated reflection of the further blend of the element of the conventional Mohist conduct of strategy and the modern theory of the development of war preparedness for national defence, when the modern military art progressively formed, was the high unity of the factors of people and things. Even in the 20th century, the Mohist military doctrine still played the guiding role of strategy in a string of struggles to resist aggression such as the Yihetuan Movement, the War of Resistance Against Japan, the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea and the counterattacks in self-defence of the People's Repub- lic of China. In short, the influence of the Mohist military doctrine on the devel- opment of Chinese military history is important as well as far-reaching, and both the Mohist military theory and the technology are once or always continuously inherited and developed. Since the advent of the 21st century, with the situation of the world undergoing new complicated changes and the arduous domestic tasks of reform, development and stability, the building of national defence and the armed forces have entered a new period. The new situation and task presents the higher demand for the building of the armed forces and military prepared- ness. The Mohist military doctrine still has the inspiring value for the People's Liberation Army, to hold high the great banner of socialism with Chinese char- acteristics, follow the guidance of Deng Xiaoping Theory and the important thought of Three Represents, thoroughly apply the Scientific Outlook on Development, strengthen the ideological and political building with earnest ef- fort, continue to ensure military preparedness, make an effort to deepen the re- form of national defence and the armed forces, work hard to open up new pro- spects for modernization of national defense and the armed forces, and fully carry out their historical missions at this new stage in the new century.The dissertation research produces three points of findings with creative significance: the first one is that, the research systematically organizes the main contents of the Mohist military doctrine, and especially ascertains the structure, origin and development of the Mohist main military facilities and equipment; the second one is that, the research intensively studies the historical background against which the Mohist military doctrine formed, the interactive relation between the Mohist military doctrine and the development of Chinese military history in the Pre-Qin Period, the influence of the Mohist military art on the realms of frontier defence wars and peasant wars and the development and changes of the Mohist military technology in the Chinese cold weapon age after the Qin Dynasty; the third one is that, the research reveals the role of the Mohist military doctrine in the course of the modernization of Chinese military history, and the inspiring value of that for Chinese armed forces in applying the Scientific Out- look on Development, and opening up new prospects for modernization of na- tional defense and the armed forces.