page_title: Military of the Qing dynasty
section_title: Eighteenth century
hierarchical_section_title: Military of the Qing dynasty / Eighteenth century
caption_attribution_description: Русский: Это сражение с цинских войск с уйгурами у озера Ешилькуль в 1759 г.
context_page_description: The Qing dynasty was established by conquest and maintained by armed force. The founding emperors personally organized and led the armies, and the continued cultural and political legitimacy of the dynasty depended on the ability to defend the country from invasion and expand its territory. Therefore, military institutions, leadership, and finance were fundamental to the dynasty's initial success and ultimate decay. The early military system centered on the Eight Banners, a hybrid institution that also played social, economic, and political roles. The Banner system was developed on an informal basis as early as 1601, and formally established in 1615 by Jurchen leader Nurhaci, the retrospectively recognized founder of the Qing. His son Hong Taiji, who renamed the Jurchens "Manchus," created eight Mongol banners to mirror the Manchu ones and eight "Han-martial" banners manned by Chinese who surrendered to the Qing before the full-fledged conquest of China proper began in 1644. After 1644, the Ming Chinese troops that surrendered to the Qing were integrated into the Green Standard Army, a corps that eventually outnumbered the Banners by three to one.
context_section_description: The policy of posting Banner troops as territorial garrison was not to protect but to inspire awe in the subjugated populace at the expense of their expertise as cavalry. As a result, after a century of peace and lack of field training the Manchu Banner troops had deteriorated greatly in their combat worthiness. Secondly, before the conquest, the Manchu banner was a "citizen" army, and its members were Manchu farmers and herders obligated to provide military service to the state at times of war. The Qing government's decision to turn the banner troops into a professional force whose every welfare and need was met by state coffers brought wealth, and with it corruption, to the rank and file of the Manchu Banners and hastened its decline as a fighting force. Bannermen frequently went into debt as a result of drinking, gambling, and spending time at theaters and brothels, leading to a general ban on theater-going within the Eight Banners.
  At the same time, a similar decline was occurring in the Green Standard Army. During peacetime, soldiering became merely a source of supplementary income. Soldiers and commanders alike neglected training in pursuit of their own economic gains. Corruption was rampant as regional unit commanders submitted pay and supply requisitions based on exaggerated head counts to the quartermaster department and pocketed the difference. When Green Standard troops proved unable to fire their guns accurately while suppressing a rebellion of White Lotus followers under Wang Lun in 1774, the governor-general blamed the failure on enemy magic, prompting a furious reply from the Qianlong Emperor in which he described incompetence with firearms as a "common and pervasive disease" of the Green Standard Army, whose gunners were full of excuses.
  Qing emperors attempted to reverse the decline of the military through a variety of means. Although it was under the Qianlong Emperor that the empire expanded to its greatest extent, the emperor and his officers frequently made note of the decline of martial discipline among the troops. Qianlong reinstituted the annual hunt at Mulan as a form of military training. Thousands of troops participated in these massive exercises, selected from among Eight Banners troops of both the capital and the garrisons. Qianlong also promoted military culture, directing his court painters to produce a large number of works on military themes, including victories in battle, the grand inspections of the army, and the imperial hunt at Mulan.
caption: A battle between Qing troops and the Uyghur Khojas near Lake Eshilkul in 1759.
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