As we all know, four great inventions were born in ancient Chinese history. Among them, compass, papermaking, printing and gunpowder are important tools to promote the development of world civilization. These inventions directly promoted the development of the industrial revolution after they were introduced to Europe. Many people It is said that the ancient dynasties did not know how to develop gunpowder. In fact, this sentence is wrong. As early as the Ming Dynasty in China, the development of firearms did not fall to Western countries. Among them, the most famous are the gods of fire flying crow, the sky-shaking thunder cannon, and the fire dragon. Out of water, ten thousand enemies, flying sand drums, etc.
The first controlled firearm in Chinese history was issued in the Song Dynasty. It was called assault rifle at the time. The barrel was made of bamboo, which was easy to explode. The bullets were also iron bullets and did not have much lethality. By the end of the Yuan Dynasty, China had been able to Fighting with iron muskets, Zhu Yuanzhang and Chen Youliang competed for the world. In the battle of Hongdu, the Ming army used a large number of firearms to defend the city, relying only on 40,000 people, against Chen Youliang’s 600,000 army’s 85-day attack. Zhu Wenzheng It became famous in the first battle.
After the death of Zhu Yuanzhang, the King of Yan Zhu Di launched the Battle of Jingnan. When he fought with Emperor Jianwen’s troops in Hebei, he was hit by a swarm of rocket vehicles of the Ming army. This weapon is to tie the arrow to gunpowder and then directly fire it through the fuse. A salvo reached 100. In the second year of Jianwen, that is, in 1400 AD, Zhu Di’s troops were beaten by rocket vehicles in Baigou River. After winning the country, Zhu Di ordered the Shenji Camp to equip rocket vehicles on a large scale, except for a swarm of bees. In addition to rocket vehicles, the Ming Dynasty also developed multi-stage rockets, winged rockets.
By the middle and late Ming dynasty, the development of rockets has become more and more advanced. At that time, of the Qi’s navy, 10 warships were equipped with more than 2,000 rockets. On average, each soldier had 4 rockets, which was unprecedented. The Qi’s army was also called the title of the strongest force in Asia in the 16th and 17th centuries. It was not until 240 years later that Europe knew about the weapons of jet rockets. Then the Ming Dynasty’s weapons were so developed, why couldn’t they beat the Eight Banners soldiers?
In fact, there are two main reasons for this. The first reason is political corruption in the Ming Dynasty, rampant corruption, deduction of military payments in the army, and fraudulent things abound, leading to the worsening quality of firearms. The second reason is eight. Cavalry combat uses roundabout tactics and will not confront head-on. Even if the Ming Dynasty uses large-scale firearms, it cannot gain an advantage on the battlefield. In addition, the arrival of the Little Ice Age and the rebellion of Li Zicheng, Zhang Xianzhong and others made the Ming Dynasty worse. Only then did the Qing Dynasty pick up the bargain, otherwise the Jurchen tribe could be crushed by the military power of Ming.
