Ancient Chinese Warfare (61 page)

More or less to the right of the chariot group lie three groups of graves containing a total of 125 young, strong fighters, some complete
but others just skulls, variously distinguished by the presence of ritual objects, red pigment on their bones or skulls, and some sort of headband, all deemed indicative of rank. Without becoming entangled by the numerous details engendered by these finds and the several controversies prompted by their imaginative interpretation, it appears that these burials constitute a contingent assigned to the chariot company.

This force apparently was based on the squad of five, the standard number that would essentially underpin Chinese military structure for the next three millennia. Each squad had an officer, but rather than twenty-five squads there were only twenty, giving a base of 100, a number that well coheres with the Shang practices and penchant for units of 100 and 1,000. Because four higher-level commanders are distinguishable, the twenty squads were apparently grouped into units of five. With the addition of the contingent’s commander, the total reaches the subsequently sacrosanct number of 125 and would essentially cohere with the
Chou Li
articulation of 100 men to a
tsu
, but only on the assumption that the officers were not encompassed by the century.
³⁶
However, if the officers are excluded and the twenty-five men in the vanguard seen as an integral part of the infantry contingent, the number would again reach the magic 125.

A third aggregation of graves marked by a wide variety of utensils and weapons individually interred with single bodies has been interpreted as representative of the full range of support personnel required by the chariot company. Apart from two officials who seem to have had responsibility for overseeing the food and beverages, they appear to have been divided into groups of five and seven, with the former entrusted with responsibility for the weapons, the latter various other vessels, including the portable stoves and associated utensils. Further confirmation is seen in a grave that contains ten sheep, apparently the contingent’s mobile food supply.

It has been concluded that these graves show that Shang contingents were systematically organized around the chariots and that the additional ground forces were merely supplementary or auxiliary.
³⁷
However, even though the burials certainly seem to represent a deliberate array intended to honor the king, a few objections have been raised and a number of questions remain. Most prominent among the latter is
whether, as evidenced by a certain arbitrariness in selecting the graves for inclusion, the military organization discussed in Warring States writings is not being projected back onto the Shang.
³⁸
In addition, issues of chronology have apparently been ignored in several instances, because a couple of the graves overlap or intrude upon others, evidence of either sloppiness (which is unlikely given the precision of Shang palace and tomb construction) or ignorance of previous burials, synonymous with the absence of any intent to execute a grand design.

Somewhat broader questions might also be raised, including whether this array is merely an idealization, a deployment appropriate solely for the march rather than any operational utilization just as units paraded in review throughout history, or even a form of organization that only characterized the king’s personal force. This would explain the apparent overstaffing with support personnel, an extremely inefficient and unrealistic approach for a field army, even though later traditions suggest a small contingent entrusted with such responsibilities was attached to chariot squads.

How this contingent would operate on the battlefield also remains unknown. Presumably the vanguard of twenty-five protected the chariots during the archery exchange, but if they raced ahead on foot during the move to melee, the speed advantage of the chariots would be lost. If the chariots dispersed during the engagement, these elite ground fighters could have been assigned as accompanying infantry, one squad to a chariot, for protection. But similar questions also plague any understanding of the function of the 125 men deployed on the right, whether they operated in aggregate as close support, as dispersed units of 25, or shed any connection with the chariots in the chaos of battle, the most likely possibility.

Despite these significant issues, with allowance for possible chronological problems and considerable arbitrariness in selecting the graves, it appears that the aggregate preserves the elements of a late Shang military formation. Nevertheless, the foot soldiers constitute the true power, and as the era of chariot-to-chariot combat had not yet dawned, they no doubt bore the brunt of the fighting subsequent to the initial archery exchanges. Rather than being a key fighting element, the dagger-axe warrior on the chariot probably acted as a bodyguard for the archer,
while the driver merely controlled the chariot, presumably under the direction of the archer.

Formations for advancing, prebattle methods of deployment, and alignments for combat (such as seen in the
Liu-t’ao
) were eventually developed for the chariots, infantry, and chariots intermixed with infantry, possibly beginning in the early Chou. However, dismissing assertions that King T’ang employed nine chariots in a goose formation, the only pre-Warring States confirmation that chariot formations had begun to evolve is a debate found embedded in the
Tso Chuan
over whether it or the crane formation should be employed for the chariots.
³⁹
Moreover, assertions that the platoons were deployed to the left and right only increase the degree of puzzlement, because in the reality of fervent combat the chariots would have had to shed them to act as a
rapid
penetrating force, enjoy the requisite freedom of maneuver, and pursue fleeing enemies.
⁴⁰

Unless the chariots were broadly dispersed, conjoining more than a few men to them would simply have clogged the immediate area. Mobile combat becoming impossible, the chariot would have been reduced to functioning as an archery platform and localized command point. Presumably this is the reason the
Liu-t’ao’s
authors subsequently devised a rather dispersed deployment: “For battle on easy terrain five chariots comprise one line. The lines are forty paces apart and the chariots ten paces apart from left to right, with detachments being sixty paces apart. On difficult terrain the chariots must follow the roads, with ten comprising a company, and twenty a regiment. Front to rear spacing should be twenty paces, left to right six paces, with detachments being thirty-six paces apart.”
⁴¹
This dispersed formation would allow enemy chariots to pass through while providing the necessary operational space for maneuver.

All the military writers considered open terrain to be ideal ground for chariot operations. The great middle Warring States strategist Sun Pin therefore continued to advocate exploiting it with chariots (and cavalry) even when confronted by superior infantry strength:
⁴²

Tso Chuan
depictions of Spring and Autumn military clashes frequently reduce the chariot’s role to facilitating the exchange of provocative taunts and initiating individualized combat between chivalrous warriors—highly romanticized, unrealistic portraits of bravado that had little impact on the battle’s outcome—yet instances of massed chariot charges undertaken across relatively open terrain are also recorded. The ultimate chariot clash occurred in the spring of 632 BCE at the epochal Battle of Ch’eng-p’u, wherein a coalition of older, northern states vanquished imperious Ch’u’s initial thrust out of the south into the Chinese heartland. Although the rarity of Shang and steppe chariots precludes such clashes from having arisen in antiquity, it can still be pondered as an example of the potential effectiveness of employing chariot contingents en masse. Chin’s commanders secured victory through several unorthodox measures, including targeting the enemy’s weakest components:
⁴³

Two actions shaped the battle’s course and determined its outcome. First, Hsü Ch’en’s elite warriors initiated contact with an unexpected, concentrated thrust while the preliminary posturing was probably still under way. Its surprising fervency shattered Ch’u’s insecure allies deployed on the right wing, giving Chin’s forces unconstricted mobility and exposing the field to flanking attacks. Second, coordinated feigned retreats by Chin’s right wing and elements of the left wing that had not participated in the initial thrust, masked by clouds of dust that were deliberately created by the branches that had been cut down and attached to the rear of the chariots, easily drew the overconfident Ch’u armies forward in a disordered attack. Presumably Ch’u’s central forces, under Tzu Yü’s personal command, also moved forward to exploit Chin’s retreat and engage any remaining center forces; otherwise, the
Tso Chuan
account would not have noted that Tzu Yü “gathered his personal forces and desisted.”

In the swirl of battle all the actions were obviously performed by chariot forces exploiting their mobility, any infantry forces that were present having been left behind, perhaps as ensconced forces defending fallback positions. Therefore chariot clashes of the type envisioned by many traditional historians, reputedly common in the second millennium BCE in the West, not only could, but did, occur. The
Art of War
, which presumably reflects late Spring and Autumn and early Warring States warfare, specifically speaks of “chariot encounters,” implying that these were separate actions that didn’t entail infantry participation: “In chariot encounters, when ten or more chariots are captured, reward the first to get one. Change their flags and pennants to ours, intermix and employ them with our own chariots.”
⁴⁴

Somewhat later, while admonishing his 50,000 troops and 500 chariot commanders prior to engaging Ch’in in a major clash, Wu Ch’i
proclaimed:
⁴⁵
“All the officers must confront, follow, and capture the enemy’s chariots, cavalry, and infantry. If the chariots do not make prisoners of the enemy’s chariots, the cavalry not make prisoners of the enemy’s cavalry, and the infantry not take the enemy’s infantry, even if we forge an overwhelming victory no one will be credited with any achievements.” His pronouncement would seem to imply that the three component forces targeted their counterparts rather than engaging in a general melee or that the infantry was tied to the chariots.

As their numbers increased in later eras, rather than just being employed as a single mass, chariots were segmented into operational units ranging from a basic three—center, left, and right—to more tactically specific contingents
⁴⁶
controlled by drums.
⁴⁷
However, the low number of just 100 per army in the Shang probably precluded any subdividing, though some analysts have suggested groups of 30 may have been employed. The Shang and early Chou probably mark the transitional period when the chariot’s role had not yet been defined and individual chariots had not yet been integrated with accompanying infantry, a stage that would require rethinking, apportionment, and the development of training and operating procedures to avoid the battlefield chaos that would inevitably result if the chariots were merely added to the mix of combatants.

23.

ALTHOUGH CHARIOTS WERE extensively used by Egypt, Mesopotamia, and other states from about 1800 to at least 1200 BCE, then continued on in a more limited role, their combat effectiveness in China and the West has come into question.
¹
The chariot embodied power and mobility, but the limited numbers employed in the Shang probably served as command and archery platforms rather than assault vehicles or blocks deployed with overwhelming impact. Nevertheless, certain problems described in the historical and theoretical military writings must have negatively impacted every form of employment, limiting their possible utilization and modes of combat.

Apart from the control issues inherent in employing willful creatures in a synergistic mode, any exploitation of the chariot for martial purposes invariably entailed a number of maintenance, logistical, and environmental problems. Moreover, as chariot operations increased in importance, so did the army’s dependency and vulnerability. Horses might be struck by arrows, cut down with hooking and piercing weapons, disabled by pits and traps, enervated by thirst, or slain by poisoning their water supplies.
²
Even when not adversely affected by inclement weather, temperature, excessive humidity, overuse, poor food, bad water, or routine injuries, they required proper provisions, constant care, periodic rest, and especially the disposal of massive amounts of potentially dangerous waste when encamped. Being easily incapacitated both on the march and in battle, their losses could quickly become insurmountable.