Ming Dynasty Nine Side Defense Of Military Punishment

Military punishment of the Nine Frontier fortification system of the Ming Dynasty refers to measures taken by the Ming government to crack down on the garrison personnel in the Nine Frontier fortifications for their various types of prohibited behaviors through the promulgation of laws, edict and Imperial Rescripts and the establishment of the military system led by civil officials, military officers and eunuchs for the purpose of controlling the garrison personnel in the Nine Frontier fortifications, straightening the military discipline and improving military effectiveness. This paper deals with the ways and types of the military punishment in the Nine Frontier fortifications respectively from the provisions and implementation perspectives.In the introduction part, the author gives a brief introduction to the cause, significance, status-quo, content and methods of the research as well as relevant concepts. Based on the above study, this topic is proved to be worthy of research, which shall supplement the weak link of related researches.In Chapter One, the author introduces the basic scope and military organization systems of the "Nine Frontier fortifications", clarifies the formulation of principal laws, types of penalties, applicable principles, executor of military punishment, power wielding, objects under control and the military punishment system of the Ming Dynasty and reveals that the design of this system is also the embodiment of the military commanding concepts, namely, pattern of literati controlling military officers and the system of mutual restraint of internal and external forces.In Chapter Two and Chapter Three, according to the distinction between public crime and private crime and based on law and decrees of the Ming Dynasty such as Statutes of the Great Ming, HUIDIAN, The Criminal Ordinance of Ming Dynasty and Huang ming tiao fa shi lei zuan as well as historic data such as Ming shilu, Ming Shi and Ming-Qing Dynasty Notes, the author preliminarily sorts out principal military bans of the frontier fortification system in the Ming Dynasty and clarifies the actual execution of these military bans in the Nine Frontier fortifications. Principal military bans in the Nine Frontier fortifications in the Ming Dynasty include military malfeasance and general dereliction of duty, specifically, military malfeasance which is also called public crime such as lost of battle, fall of city, death of horses due to inappropriate daily drill and poor management of military camps and general dereliction of duty that is also called private crime such as private business management, embezzlement of public properties and the blackmail, illegal shortening or even exemption of soldiers’enlistment by civil officials, military officers, eunuchs and low&medium-rank military officers. The punishment of these prohibited conducts includes legal punishment such as punishment of whipping, punishment of flogging, service punishment, banishment, Five Penalties and Ransom System, political punishment such as exemption of titles, demotion, deposal and deduction of salary and extrajudicial torture such as beheading and exposure of the cut-off head to the public, all of which are the punishment of certain coercive force. In addition, there are also flexible punishment such as warning and penalty according to the imperial command.In Chapter Four, the above research results indicate that various types of wrongdoing of garrison personnel in the Nine Frontier fortifications in the Ming Dynasty incur corresponding punitive measures. However, due to the excessive number of punishment means, the phenomenon of the same crime incurring different and random punishment is rather prominent. No rules can be followed in this regard. Especially for the punishment of civil and military officials such as Troop Commanders and Governors, the emperor could kill or pardon them out of his own will. The arbitrariness resulted from imperial power, political struggle, court politics and Chinese traditional etiquette has somewhat interfered in the final execution of the military punishment system of the Ming Dynasty. Seen from the military punishment of the Nine Frontier fortifications in the Ming Dynasty and performance of the frontier defense, the military punishment is advantageous to preserve military orders, but also exerts negative influence on the specific implementation of the punishment system. Meanwhile, the degraded military system in the Ming Dynasty is also revealed in the weak punitive measures.