Talk:Sino-French War

message: Where is this "Spanish and Filipino volunteers" business coming from?--143.213.132.69 07:05, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  

message: This page is certainly more accurate about the winners and losers of this war:
"While neither side could be considered to have a military victory in the Sino-French War, China was considered the actual loser. China had entered the war to prevent France from destroying the relationship of a protectorate that existed between China and Annam. The Chinese were also eager to avoid having France as a neighbor. China obviously failed in both of these goals. The relationship between China and Annam was severed as the treaties establishing Annam as a French colonial possession were recognized by China. France became China's newest neighbor."
:What is the difference between a "de facto victory" and a "victory"? You might say that the first is assumed to be a victory while the second is declared to be a victory (or something else), but that is irrelevant and smacks of semantics. Even this article you gave basically says the French won, though I'm not sure about the part of military victory. After Foochow, French victory in the war was certain. The Chinese had success on the ground, but it was not decisive at all. The fact that they could not fully defeat the French on land, and Foochow of course, brought them to the table.UberCryxic 23:35, 21 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Based on the current disputes and discussion, I have for now changed the wording to: "negotiated cease-fire; French victory considered by some people" for NPOV reasons. If everyone agrees French was indeed victorious in the war after the discussion, the phrase "considered by .." will be dropped.--64.231.79.66 22:32, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I would like to weigh in and say that is far closer to the truth. From a strict military standpoint, the French won the war for Indochina militarily and politically. To call this a Chinese military victory involves full disregard of what military science defines as a victory, and previous Qing Imperial history. There have been several events where the Qing Empire faced the invasion of a traditional tributary ally to the Chinese Dynastic system, including both where they won like Hideyoshi's Invasions of Korea and the Russo-Manchu border conflicts., and ones where they lost. Simply put, the French invaded a traditional tributary ally of the Chinese Empire, and the Chinese-led alliance failed to drive them from the territory (like they helped do with the Japanese invasions of Korea in the 16th century), or where they inflicted enough losses to force the French to withdraw due to pressure at home (like the Viet Minh would do close to a century later). Indeed, in failing to do so they sustained heavy losses (about a sixth of the total forces mustered by the alliance) and faced being driven into the Northern border territories or Southern China. That is essentially all that matters, and none of it can be constituted as a Chinese military victory, even localized French defeats near the Northern border and forced withdrawals South into territory they had all but securely taken. Whatever we wish to discuss about the Chinese doing well against Western arms or training, or the French failing in allegedly more ambitious aims (like possible seizures of Taiwan or more of South China) are another matter, but they do not change the bare military facts. 75.37.2.123 (talk) 03:34, 22 June 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Whilst the French did not win every single battle during the war, I must say that this War was a French victory because the French destroyed the Chinese navy in Foochow. Without that navy, the Qing government realized that if they did not cease the fighting, then the island of Taiwan would become a French colony (the French had already controlled the Pescadores Islands and successfully Occupied Keelung during the war) and there was no evidence to suggest that the Qing forces would be able to win against the French in Vietnam. The French would simply ask Russia and Japan to start invading Manchuria, Korea and Northern China which would ultimately bring an end to the Qing dynasty itself. --A-eng (talk) 04:20, 5 February 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Winner and Loser 

message: Rex, the phrasing you want makes the sentence read awkwardly. What's wrong with the way I rephrased it?UberCryxic 17:37, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: French took control of Tonkin from China,   which China always claimed was theirs.   Is Tonkin not an inch ?   The French achieved their aim of taking over Vietnam,  and they succeeded in their war aim.   The Chinese tried to stop them,  and failed.   The French clearly won this war.122.106.205.74 (talk) 03:20, 14 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text:  What anybody believes is immaterial from the view of military science. For the same reason it matters not a whit that Americans, Canadians, and Britishmen still argue over who "won" the War of 1812 without looking at the overall picture. You allege that the casualty counts are from a "French source" that is supposedly biased and supposedly minimizes the losses they suffered while exaggerating those of the enemies beyond them, but you provide not a whit of evidence to justify this statement and yet expect us to take it uncritically. That is simply not how it works, and given that it is- to the best of our knowledge- the most accurate count means that it will be kept. Furthermore, the idea that the French retreat from the North (in relatively good order, all things considered) brought about by genuine but not crippling defeats constitutes a "Chinese victory" ignores that in order to get that far, the Chinese had to abandon their entire protectorate in Annam to effective French control. Considering that the stated reason for the Chinese involvement was to secure a traditional tributary ally/colony against foreign invasion, this can only be taken as a failure of their stated intent, meaning that not only did the French "take an inch" from China, they took all of French Indochina from China! As for the statement regarding the blockade, it espouses such a considerable naivety or willful ignorance of Chinese maritime trade in the South China Sea (including to territories like Taiwan) and at the river mouths that were (and are) an essential part of Chinese infrastructure in the region. *That* is precisely what the French blockaded (as can be proven by accounts from both sides at the time), and the idea that the Chinese had no fleet requires you ignore events like the Battle of Fuzhou. And finally, the idea that the French withdrawal represents a concrete Chinese ability to repulse the French rather than local French forces simply being repelled and there being no stomach for trying to advance further can be bellied by the Second Opium War and the Boxer Rebellion coming two decades before and after the war, when the French military showed itself capable of cutting into the Chinese heartland with ease when it chose and political factors favored it. So in summary, it is not even remotely fair or reasonable to call this "indecisive." This represented a Qing defeat and retreat from Southeastern Asia, fair and simple. 75.37.2.123 (talk) 03:34, 22 June 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Phrasing

message: I have recently completely overhauled the article on the Sino-French War.  I will shortly be publishing a full-length book on this subject, which has drawn on a substantial number of original sources in both French and Chinese, and I have worked on the (perhaps mistaken) assumption that I am one of the few people in the world who either knows (or cares) enough about the Sino-French War to be able to write authoritatively on it.  If there are other enthusiasts out there, please get in touch.  I would be delighted to hear from you.
Apologies to previous contributors whose work was overwritten.  My only excuse is that I had a complete text ready to paste in, and it would have been an extremely time-consuming task to try to integrate it with existing material, much of which was inaccurate.  Since contributing my text several days ago I have noticed that it has attracted a number of amendments, which I welcome wholeheartedly.  I have occasionally made minor stylistic changes to these amendments (I am a professional historian and academic editor by trade), but I have kept their substance.  Recent amendments that have improved my own text include background comments on Lieutenant-Colonel Paul-Gustave Herbinger and Jules Ferry.
I am hoping in the next few months to contribute substantial articles on the senior French military and naval commanders in the Sino-French War, and also pieces on the Beiyang and Nanyang fleets.  Eventually, I intend to contribute articles on each of the battles highlighted in bold type in my main article.  This labour of love, however, might take some time.  I will, of course, link all these articles to the main article.
In the meantime, I wonder if anybody could help me with a piece of information.  Despite researching the Sino-French War for six years and establishing the French and Chinese orders of battle in exhaustive detail, I have been completely unable to find out the Christian name and date of death of General Bouët, who briefly commanded the Tonkin expeditionary corps in the summer and autumn of 1883.  Does anybody know?  If it helps, he was born in 1833.
Djwilms (talk) 04:09, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Work in Progress 

message: I've temporarily added a Jolly Roger flag for the Black Flag Army in the infobox of this and related articles, having seen a French illustration of a Black Flag soldier carrying just that flag (the only difference being that the skull and crossbones was on a triangular, rather than a rectangular, flag.  I would love to replace it with a more authentic flag.  The Wikipedia article Black Flag Army states that the Black Flags displayed the seven stars of the Great Bear on a black flag.  I'm not sure where that comes from, as I've never come across any reference to such a flag in the French sources I have read, but if anyone could verify it and do a neat little image, it would be great.
My own feeling is that the Black Flag Army used a variety of standards of all colours.  I'll try to collect the evidence from various French accounts of battles against the Black Flags and contribute a paragraph on the subject to the article Black Flag Army. 
Djwilms (talk) 07:37, 21 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi Djwilms. I've been puzzled by this issue myself, especially since a "Black Fag army" banner I photographed at the Musée de l'Armée is not black at all... It does seem however that the kind of black flag you are alluding to exists: please check the following link: . This would indeed be "the seven stars of the Great Bear on a black flag". Best regards PHG (talk) 09:44, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

text: Hi Djwilms. I went to the Musée de l'Armée again to double-check what the notice about the above flag says. It says that the flag was captured in 1885 from the Blag Flags during the Tonkin campaign, and that it is the flag of the commanders of the Black Flag. They also describe the character ling  'Obey!'. For what it's worth... Cheers PHG (talk) 19:09, 23 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Black Flag Army Flags 

message: Dear User:Alex Needham
Do you have any reason to dispute that the Sino-French War ended in a French victory, or are you just being difficult?  France ousted China as the suzerain power in Vietnam, repeatedly defeated the Chinese armies, and inflicted serious damage on China's navy.  That counts as a victory as far as I, and most serious scholars of this period in Chinese history, are concerned.  The Cambridge History of China declares baldly, 'France won the Sino-French War'.  
I appreciate that not all Chinese scholars would agree, which is why I have generously given space to Lung Chang's views in the lead paragraph.  But I do not agree with his claim that China won. 
This issue has been thrashed out over and over again.  Please provide evidence for your claim that the war did not result in a French victory. 
Djwilms (talk) 01:19, 4 March 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Number one amounts to nationalist chest thumping, and is unworthy of consideration. Not only would it in and of itself not matter even if it were, true, it verfiably is not. 
Number Two: There are actually a VERY great number of them, as you would know if you bothered to check the citations. Your "guess" has no evidenciary or proof value, and should not be adhered to. As for their sources, primarily the Western records (which are acknowledged by just about everybody to be the most accurate) and the Chinese and Indochinese sources that are available. We do not give a flying farq what you argue unless you have actual evidence or logic to argue with, which you have shown you do not. Even if there were exaggerations and underplays, the broad contours of the French sources are agreed to be accurate, and in many cases the French actually exaggerated the risks, as shown by the much-vaunted and mythologized decision to retreat because of a telegram made in the heat of the moment and using exaggerated estimates of enemy numbers, resources, and ability. You're trying an Ad Hominem against an entire body of evidence for what amounts to nationalist fetishizing when even the aforementioned "Chinese Scholars" do largely base their research off of that same corpus. 
Number Three: The French did indeed occupy Chinese land multiple times by any definition. Not only was Indochina- like other tributary states- viewed at *best* as an autonomous part of the Emperor of All Under Heaven's patrimony according to the traditional Imperial reckoning (and thus making the distinction between "Chinese" land and "Tonkinese" land more of a modern invention), but the French did succeed in launching several raids and minor occupations along the Chinese coast. Furthermore, the French were hardly repelled from Taiwan; they retreated in good order. The bottom line is that the French primarily cared about severing Indochina from Chinese control, and they accomplished that goal; the  armaments of the two sides do not wave away that key result. The War of 1900 (which included the French, which you omit) was designed not to conquer China, but to liberate the Concessions that were under siege and crush the Boxers and their Imperial allies, which was likewise the result. The French did not invade China primarily because they were not interested in doing so, and secondarily because it was not what the French people signed up for in a relatively unpopular colonial war. Finally, the idea that France was the only country the Chinese fought to a stalemate in this period ignores the far more successful resistance they mounted against the Russians along the Northeastern border in Manchuria throughout the later 19th century. In short: this is a monumentally uninformed opinion with little value, and so should be discarded. 75.37.2.123 (talk) 21:02, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Result of Sino-French War 

message: Hi PHG,
Thanks for that interesting stuff you have dug out on French attempts to cosy up to Japan against China before and during the Sino-French War.  I'm going to search Albert Billot's L'affaire du Tonkin, the standard French diplomatic history of the Sino-French War, to see if he can add anything to your research.
What I would like to do eventually is merge your new section into the existing section 'China's fear of Japan', and probably cut it down a bit.  At the end of the day, France and Japan did not become allies, and I think it unbalances the main article to devote so much space to something that never happened.  On the other hand, I've long been wanting to create a new article, Diplomacy of the Sino-French War, and that would be the natural home for a discussion of French overtures to Japan.  I'll try to get round to it before long.
I'll get back to you after I've seen what Billot has to say on the subject.
Djwilms (talk) 07:27, 8 October 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  French overtures to Japan, 1883-5 

message: The territorial changes state that: French protectorate over Tonkin and Annam within French Indochina. This's not ok, because French Indochina didn't exist until 1887. 207.233.70.197 (talk) 18:59, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: French Indochina

message: I read the discussion above regarding win or lose, but clearly it is a tie. One more thing to mention is please do not speak most of westerns etc....you Chinese etc.... You are yourself and you can not not stand for westerns, nor Chinese! The judgment is yours. And do not apprear to be superior like westerns believe what....So what! 
OK, so if that's the case as you identified, Chinese believe Chinese victory while French and most of westerns believe it is a French one, then why not put indecisive. 
The truth is China, precisely Qing Dynasty, had a huge army equiped with limited bows, spear and sword. Please note that was limited spear and sword, and basically they were short of supply all the time. You cited the French source which of course minimized the loss and exaggerated the kills. Many people can give you some number 10 times more loss than the one you raised. Clearly in land China was the winner, as French retreated which is a fact and there is nothing you can argue about. The retreat is not a tactical maneuver, not a trap, not under the political pressure. I have no idea how you judge the result of the war, but a retreat under military offense will by no means called a tie.
In sea, you do not need to address that as virtually Chinese has no navy (or ships just shipped from Europe), no marines and no training on modern warfare. So what French blocked the sea? China then was a agriculture country and did not rely on any other import. 
By comparison, you can do some research on sino-Japan war in 1890, or 1900 war, or 1840/1856 war UK/France vs. Qing. That's the "victory" by UK/JP/France, not this one, with modern army, riffles, cannons and battleships, France did not take an inch from China. That is clearly a failure.
The purpose of France, at the beginning, was not to invade China of course. But if France winned in Zhen Nan gate, they would have simply moved forward. The fact that UK took away Hong Kong, JP occupied Taiwan, Russia took a fraction of northwest and northeast territory of China is the fact that they won the war. 
However, I partially agree with you regarding the end of the war, politically China is a loser, militarily, China can not win over long term if France send more troops. A indecisive is a fair answer for this question. Not sure if you agree to save more arguments?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.245.59.15 (talk) 19:03, 22 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Indecisive indeed - Win or Lose 

message: Go read wikipedia policy. Stating things like the french "amply avenge", and "if general negrier was there the french would have won", are extreme violations of wikipedia policy on neutral language and original research. secondly, all of the sources that mentions these "spectacular" french victories with thousands of chinese dead, are french sources (i'm taling about the tonkin campaign), appear to be nationalistic and aiming to be revisionist, to brush over France's extremely poor performance in the war for a supposedly first rate western power. The fact that an author needs to include words like "avenge", and speculate (fantasize) about the french holding on to lang son and the war not ending in their retreat probably shows that the sources in this article need seriously cleaning up. Since the French were forced to retreat, its impossible that they managed to count the exact number of "1,500" corpses on the battlefield. No one is showing where these numbers are coming from
France also succeeded in the naval war, because the northern Chinese Beiyan fleet had zero participation in the conflict, and they only faced a fraction of the hundreds of thousands of soldiers in all the chinese regional armies which were not even sent in the war. The article is trying to portray this as a case where the western power overran the primitive natives with their spear chuckers, swords, and sailboats.Meamdul (talk) 20:13, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: warnings needed over non neutral language and French sources

message: http://books.google.com/books?id=ezZKAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA441#v=onepage&q&f=false
Rajmaan (talk) 04:34, 27 December 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Encyclopaedia Britannica: a dictionary of arts, sciences, and ..., Volume 23  edited by Thomas Spencer Baynes  

message: http://books.google.com/books?id=gHUsAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
Title	越南地輿圖說: 5卷
越南地輿圖說: 5卷, 盛慶紱
Author	盛慶紱
Published	1883
Original from	Harvard University
Digitized	Sep 9, 2008
Rajmaan (talk) 18:22, 2 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chinese cartography of vietnam, pre war (1883) 

message: A western eyewitness saw French heads exhibited at a market in Taiwan, after being cut from the corpses. Westerners in Taiwan contacted the Chinese officers to remind them of conduct regarding war dead after the incident. The paragraph may be quoted verbatim as an introduction to a section on Taiwan, but not used as an independent source.
Page 229
http://books.google.com/books?id=jAMxFLcYU4sC&pg=RA229#v=onepage&q&f=false
http://books.google.com/books?id=KZZDAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA229#v=onepage&q&f=false
Rajmaan (talk) 06:05, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  War dead 

message: 马维琪 Ma Weiqi
马廷秀 Ma Tingxiu
李辉山 Li Huishan
白金柱 Bai Jinzhu
Rajmaan (talk) 00:08, 1 April 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hui Commanders in the Qing army who fought against France 

message: Not all french goal were achieved: no indemnity paid to France, french army evacuate Pescadores + fall of french governement + military defeat on land (bang bo, dong dang...)
Also it is considered that Qing empire achieved a limited regional tactical victory  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.9.173.250 (talk) 04:44, 2 April 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: The protection of the article will expire tomorrow. I had expected to see some discussion on this talk page, but apparently I have to remind the two combatants that further edit warring will in all likelihood lead to temporary blocks. Favonian (talk) 20:50, 16 March 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Not all french goal were achieved 

message: The dispute referred to above has been the center of a ludicrously protracted edit war. I have protected the article for two weeks, and both parties are "encouraged" to discuss the issue on this talk page. Blocks will be forthcoming in case of renewed fighting after the protection expires! Favonian (talk) 13:52, 10 March 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: The protection of the article will expire tomorrow. I had expected to see some discussion on this talk page, but apparently I have to remind the two combatants that further edit warring will in all likelihood lead to temporary blocks. Favonian (talk) 20:50, 16 March 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article protected 

message: The article provide information about affirms Chinese rule over Spratly and Paracel islands, which is a serious affirm while dispute is happening in South China Sea right now, but the references are not reliable. In this study of US Government , the appendixes show all convention between French and Qing Chinese Government. They mentioned nothing about "Spratly and Paracel islands". Another source also show the CONVENTION CONCERNING THE DELIMITATION OF THE BORDER BETWEEN CHINA AND TONKIN, 1887 and again there is not anything about "Spratly and Paracel islands".
While the references  for above affirm only state that: China' claims to the islands are based on historic usage by China fishermen as early as 200 B.C.E and on the 1887 Chinese- Vietnamese Boundary Convention. As we can see in the full text of the Convention, there isn't a piece of information related to "Spratly and Paracel islands". I hope that "affirms Chinese rule over Spratly and Paracel islands" should be removed from the article as proved it is wrong.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hoangkid (talk • contribs) 15:34, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chinese rule over Spratly and Paracel islands??? 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: I think it's time to end this utter non-sense. There's the same thing on the Sino-Vietnamese War article.
The only times I ever see this line is on articles about wars China lost
Why does wikipedia indulge in blatant Chinese jingoistic revisionism? France achieved its war goals, French victory period. Just because the Chinese performed less terribly than usual in a few ambushes doesn't mean that can claim victory in the war.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.241.174.178 (talk) 21:31, 2 April 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: In every chinese related article about war, they will always "claim victory". Complete delusion and are attempts made by ultranationalistic chinese (50 cent, wumao) trying to change and distort history because they still feel humiliated and insecure, so they have to reinvent and fake history to feel less shameful about their defeats. This is despite on record that the chinese have always outnumbered their opponents and still lost terribly countless times. And here on wikipedia, quora, and various wIki forums; their descendants have continued their legacy of shameful lying and unfaithful editing. Let's not forget that some chinese got to wikipedia admin level and were banned for CCP propaganda. 49.190.240.37 (talk) 14:19, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Both sides claim victory" 

message: The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:
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Participate in the deletion discussion at the . —Community Tech bot (talk) 05:09, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion 

message: Instead of just having a few confirmed users blindly cancelling and banning anyone who changes the result under "sockpuppet" accustions even though no consensus has been reached in the talk page yet? Can we discuss why we should take in consideration the Chinese claim of "victory" in this war they obviously lost, just because they had some success in one non-"game-changing" battle right before suing for peace?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.150.152.202 (talk) 23:04, 21 January 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: The only people that get called sockpuppets are sockpuppets, you were called plain old disruptive. And no, we're not having a debate about what text should say based on the opinions of editors about the result. FDW777 (talk) 08:05, 22 January 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Can we have an actual discussion on the Result section? 

message: This article's body depends overwhelmingly on French primary sources authored by living persons during the war. Maurice Loir was working in the French navy at the time of the war. Lecomte was also a captain in the French forces. Marolles was a vice-admiral. Auguste Bonifacy was a lieutenant-colonel. Huard, Armengaud, Garnot, Harmant, and Thomazi were all French people living at the time of the war. One source, La Dernière Campagne du Commandant Rivière by Marolles, was originally published before the war had even ended. The only Chinese source cited is Lung Chang and secondary sources are mostly relegated to the beginning and ending of the article. Qiushufang (talk) 23:46, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: Primary sources

message: While the French appeared to be the overall winner of the war, there is no need for "French victory" and "French naval victory" to both appear as result(s) in the infobox. Instead, "French victory (especially in the naval campaign)" should state it all. --Wengier (talk) 21:50, 8 September 2023 (UTC)
thread_title: Result