CHINA'S AWAKENING.
Prestige gained, 1880-90--Yields to Japan in Korea while
reasserting full suzerainty--The lessons of adversity--Schemes for
naval and military reforms--Purchase and manufacture--Provincial
system antagonistic to reform--Li Hung-Chang's efforts--Faithful
service of foreign experts--Drill-instructors--Creation of a
navy--Coast fortification--Superior efficiency of navy compared
with army--Corruption and nepotism--Awakening of China apparent,
not real.
The service of the navy in the conveyance of troops and of a special
envoy to Korea in 1882 was the first which that luckless force was able
to render to China. The service was repeated on two other occasions:
when a High Commissioner was sent on a mission of imperial condolence
in 1890, and again when an assassin was rescued from the revenge of
counter-assassins and conveyed safely from China to Korea in 1894. The
little kingdom thus played a considerable part in the awakening scenes of
the suzerain empire.
On a retrospective view, indeed, it would appear that during the period
in question China passed the culminating-point in her efforts to regain
national prestige. She had just asserted herself in an unexpected manner
in her dealings with Russia, playing a very different part in regard to
her distant and worthless possessions in the north-west from what she
had done twenty years before in regard to the integral part of her proper
territories in the north-east, which she had surrendered with scarcely a
protest. The world began to respect China as a power. Her decisive action
in Korea showed that she was no longer disposed to permit her neighbours
to trifle with the question of her suzerainty in that kingdom, and for
ten years she was pre-eminent there in fact as well as of right. Yet
with a significant qualification. For, being challenged by Japan while at
war with France in 1885, she was unable to vindicate her sole supremacy
in Korea, and was constrained to admit her rival into partnership. Thus
was the first irrevocable step taken towards the future realisation
of the Japanese designs on the peninsula. A _condominium_ must ever be
destructive to the policy of the less energetic member, and the treaty
concluded between Li Hung-chang and Count Ito in 1885 was the fatal
prelude to the events of ten years later. As the treaties granting to
Russia a coequal right of navigating the Amur and a joint ownership of
the Usuri province constituted the virtual surrender of Chinese rights,
so any treaty with Japan, no matter on what conditions, respecting Korea,
was a virtual abdication of the Chinese suzerainty. The right in common
to send troops into Korea on notice given could have no other effect than
to deliver up the kingdom to the Power which was the most alert in taking
advantage of the agreement. In giving up half her rights China retreated
from an inexpugnable position, and left herself no footing for defending
the remaining half, when its turn came to be assailed.
But with the irony which is the very pathos of human and national decline,
the outward pretence to authority became more demonstrative as the
substance of the claim slipped away. Not for two hundred and fifty years
had China asserted her prerogative with such uncompromising arrogance
as when she sent an imperial mission of condolence to the royal Court in
1890, years after the keystone of her Korean arch had been pulled away. It
was also about this period that the Chinese Minister to England lent his
name to a manifesto warning the world of the coming resurrection of China.
"The sleep and the awakening" strictly followed the law above alluded to,
that hollowness, not solidity, makes the loudest sound.
But so many interests are now inextricably interwoven with the destinies
of China that her effort at reform and its failure compel us to give
attention to the opening of a new chapter in the world's history. The
humiliating foreign invasions, the three rebellions that shook the
empire, and the numerous minor risings, had all left their impression.
The lessons taught by these adversities had been taken to heart, and
the rulers of the empire were called upon to devise a remedy. The first
and most obvious desideratum was, of course, naval and military reform,
or rather regeneration, whereby they might be strengthened to speak
with their enemies in the gates. On this subject Chinese statesmen were
absolutely at one with their officious foreign advisers: it was a subject
which inspired many of the early homilies of the British Minister, if no
others. There was, however, this essential difference in the conception of
the means of carrying out the reform, that the foreign advisers of China
were completely prepossessed by the notion that an imperial executive,
if it did not exist, must be promptly created, while nothing was further
from the imagination of the Chinese. They were entirely prepossessed
by their tradition and the state of things actually existing, which
they did not dream of changing. That was the provincial system on which
the administration of the empire rested. The fiasco of the Lay-Osborn
flotilla, which was the first crude attempt to mix the oil and vinegar
of the two conflicting systems, revealed the fundamental, irreconcilable
divergence between the two sets of ideas, which rendered all advice
from the one side to the other futile, and co-operation impossible. That
palpable failure of the Central Government was calculated to discourage
fresh innovations from the same quarter, and the incident was constantly
referred to by diplomatists as having blighted the promising career of
Wênsiang as a reformer, he being the minister personally responsible for
the scheme.
The Chinese, nevertheless, proceeded according to their own lights to set
their house in order in so far as its defensive services were concerned.
The successful employment of foreign arms and foreign auxiliaries in the
suppression of the Taiping rebellion showed them the way. It was a natural
but a fatal error, which the Chinese have not to this day abjured, to
attach too much importance to the arms, and too little to the man using
them. They accordingly commenced in a rather wild and wayward manner to
buy weapons and munitions, and then to set up in their own country the
means of manufacturing the simpler kinds. The chief promoter, if not the
originator, of these novelties was Li Hung-chang, who continued to be the
presiding genius of military and naval reform, no matter in what province
his official duties happened to lie. The personal authority wielded by
the Grand Secretary in provinces beyond his own government was really
a step towards centralisation of the executive, and with time and an
adequate succession of followers in the same path there is no telling what
changes in the Government system might not have been evolved from such a
nucleus. But the one-man power was unequal to any great result; it also
weakened with age, opposition, and discouragement. The actual reforms
inaugurated remained strictly provincial, and even local. There was no
evidence of initiative or supervision from the Central Government. The
nearest approach to it was the establishment of an arsenal at Tientsin by
Chunghou, the first superintendent of trade for the northern ports, and a
member of the imperial clan. It would almost appear as if the Government
had no concern with the more distant parts of the country, and the strange
anomaly presented itself to the onlookers of large sums being expended on
the most modern artillery and in the manufacture of thousands of arms of
precision while the Peking field force was equipped with bows and arrows.
There came a time at last when the necessity of some kind of
centralisation was forced on the Government. It was after Prince Kung had
been sent into retirement in 1884, when his younger brother, the father of
the emperor, had decided to "come out" and take a part in the executive
government, and especially after Prince Ch'un had made a short cruise in
salt water in 1886, that a Naval Board was established in Peking itself
with the prince at its head. The institution was of course laughed at,
as the beginnings of things usually are, and its inefficiency was indeed
glaring enough. It would have taken a generation in slow-moving China for
such a board to have learned the rudiments of its duties.
What we are at the moment concerned with is the naval and military reform
of the twenty-five years preceding the advent of Prince Ch'un to power. In
the purchase of war material no single system was followed. The provincial
rulers at Canton, Foochow, Nanking, and Tientsin no doubt had to sanction
what was done within their respective provinces--a check which might be
perfunctory or conscientious--but practically the management was in the
hands of subordinate officials without knowledge or training or visible
responsibility. As in war each Chinese regiment fights for its own hand,
or runs away as the case may be, so in the supply of arms each local
official did pretty much what seemed right in his own eyes. Hence the
heterogeneous composition of _matériel_, one small body of troops carrying
in a campaign thirteen different patterns of rifle, with ammunition still
more curiously diversified.
Concerning the arsenals established under the auspices of the various
governors-general from Canton even to Kirin in Manchuria, and under
the technical management of foreigners, the most remarkable point to
be noted--and it applies generally to the employment of foreigners in
China--is the faithful service the Chinese have been able to command in
circumstances where it was hardly to be expected. An ignorant employer and
an expert employee is a combination apt to engender the worst abuses, and
the way the Chinese selected their foreign executive--a marine engineer
here, a surgeon of a marching regiment there, a naval lieutenant somewhere
else--was not the way, one would have thought, to obtain either honesty
or efficiency. Yet the foreigners selected either possessed or acquired
adequate qualifications, and one and all rendered devoted service to
their employers. The position of these foreigners, however, never was or
could be one of authority: whatever they did was under the orders of their
Chinese superior, who was often too ignorant to weigh the reasons for what
was done. In course of time the natives themselves became more instructed,
but whether their half-knowledge was a help or a hindrance to the work of
their foreign experts is problematical. Of the quality or quantity of the
_matériel_ turned out in the various Chinese arsenals it were useless to
speak. It produced an illusory sense of security, and for a time imposed
equally on native and foreigner.
Nor was training entirely neglected. Drill-masters were engaged. Schools
were established in connection with the arsenals, where naval instruction
especially was carried to a high standard. Students sent to Europe
proved themselves most apt to assimilate the instruction given to them.
Of those who distinguished themselves at Greenwich may be mentioned the
present Minister to the Court of St James's. Cadets were also received
into the British navy, and some very expert officers were turned out by
these means. A large number of youths were at one time selected to be
educated in the United States, remaining there long enough to learn to
read and write English, and to become enamoured of Western life. This
educational experiment was interesting in many ways. The youths who were
sent to America under the care and at the instigation of the Cantonese,
Yung Wing, who had himself been educated in the United States, were
domiciled for the most part with private families there; and they so
imbibed the influence of their surroundings that a high sense of honour
was developed in them. The writer can speak from personal experience of
the fidelity and efficiency of some of these students. Captain Clayson,
who had several serving under him in the "Peiyang Squadron," has said that
although on their return to China the authorities had distributed them in
services other than those for which they had been trained, yet because
of the school discipline they had been subjected to, and the sense of
honour developed by their contact with Western people, he found them far
more useful and trustworthy than the men who had been trained in Chinese
naval schools. This experience seems to suggest that there are good moral
qualities of the Chinese waiting, like the mineral ores in their country,
for an awakening influence. In all these progressive efforts Li Hung-chang
retained the lead, and his own province was well in advance in educational
enterprises. Besides a military school with German, and a naval school
with English, instructors, he set up within a mile of his Yamên a fairly
furnished medical school with a hospital attached. His special corps of
foreign-drilled troops was the best equipped and best disciplined force
in the empire.
While all this progress was being made in the direction of military
efficiency, the naval requirements of the country were not neglected. The
failure of the undigested Lay-Osborn scheme showed the Chinese that the
naval problem must be attacked in a different fashion. It was a false
start, and they must begin again. Accordingly, profiting by what they
had heard and seen of the efficient service rendered in their narrow
waters by foreign gunboats, the Chinese Government contracted with the
Armstrong firm for a small flotilla carrying one heavy gun with a wide
range of fire. These craft were little more than floating gun-carriages;
but notwithstanding broad beam and flat bottoms, they were moderately
sea-worthy. They were known as the Alphabeticals, from being named after
the Greek letters. This modest flotilla was the nucleus of the Chinese
navy.
Attempts at naval construction were made at Shanghai, Foochow, and Canton;
but beyond providing work and training for native artificers, and acting
occasionally as transports on a small scale, despatch-carriers, and
official yachts, the vessels turned out from native yards rendered no
service to the country. The Chinese navy as a potential military arm only
took shape when Li Hung-chang was able to carry the Government with him so
far as to purchase effective war-ships in Europe, to institute a system of
training under competent foreign officers, and to establish naval harbours
with docks and workshops. Two iron-clad battleships, a respectable
squadron of cruisers, and some smaller craft, manned by trained crews and
officered by men who had received a regular naval education and perfectly
understood their duties, constituted the fighting navy of China. The two
English officers who supervised the training, Captain Tracy at Foochow
and Captain Lang in the Gulf of Pechili, were thoroughly satisfied with
the capacity of both officers and men, and what was distinguished as the
Peiyang or Northern Squadron was brought up by the latter officer to such
a state of efficiency that he reckoned that a further two years' drill
would enable the Chinese to take its place, on a small scale, among the
best equipped fleets in the world.
And while the navy was developing so satisfactorily, coast fortifications
also made great progress. The mouths of rivers were all defended by
the best modern guns; three naval ports in the Gulf of Pechili--Port
Arthur, Weihai-wei, and Talien-wan--were fortified at great expense,
and everything externally evinced a determination on the part of China
to place herself in a position of independence, delivered from the fear
of foreign attack, except of course by land, and even that had been
partially provided for, as we have seen, by the military establishments
in Manchuria.
Between the naval and the military preparations, however, there was an
immense disparity. The force for which Li Hung-chang was personally
responsible was carefully drilled, armed, fed, and paid, and, given
competent leading, would no doubt have rendered a good account of
itself; but the army as a whole was never brought to a state approaching
efficiency. The navy, on the other hand, possessed the best ships and the
best armament that money could buy, with the most modern appliances for
war, and its _personnel_ was subjected to the most careful discipline.
The fortress guns were also of the newest and best pattern, and nothing
was spared, apparently, to fit them for the purpose for which they were
intended. It was generally conceded that the fortresses so armed were safe
from attack by sea.
The explanation of the great difference between the organisation of
the sea and the land forces seems to be that the former, being a new
creation, was beyond the range of criticism and was unhampered by any
traditions, while the reform of the army was merely patching a worn-out
garment. The immemorial conditions of military service were unchanged.
No army was formed, but a series of local levies raised without cohesion
or central control. The foreign instructors were kept strictly to their
class-work, were subordinated to the people whom they had to instruct,
and possessed no kind of authority. They were allowed to drill the men,
while the officers for the most part held themselves above the drudgery
of the parade-ground. The few who had acquired a smattering of military
education in Europe were as helpless as the foreign drill-masters to move
their wholly ignorant superiors. Hence abuses of the most grotesque kind
did not creep but rushed into every camp and every school, reducing the
scientific teaching to a hollow farce.
The familiar factors of peculation and nepotism had an important influence
on these naval and military developments in China. Such things are no
monopoly of the Chinese. If corruption could ruin a State, it would not
be necessary to look so far afield as China for national disasters. But
the form which the vice takes in China has a determining effect on the
administration quite irrespective of the waste of resources and diminution
of efficiency which are common to corruption in all its forms. Thus if we
have to reconcile the lavish purchases of material with the attenuation of
_personnel_, we need only reflect that the former bring large emoluments
with little labour to the official employed, while the training of men
involves much work and little profit. Further, if we want an explanation
of the infinite diversity of the arms which are furnished to the troops,
we may find it in the excessive competition among officials for a share of
the traffic, and the interest which the higher authorities have in passing
without inspection what is purveyed by their subordinates.
Nepotism in China is part and parcel of the family system, which is the
palladium of the nation. Every military corps raised is essentially
territorial; and if ever it is moved from one province to another,
it looks to a territorial chief, and no stranger can command it. Li
Hung-chang's disciplined troops, if not all of his own clan, were at
least the natives of his province and spoke his dialect. His subordinate
officials were blood relations and family adherents. It needs no argument
to show how such a survival of feudalism militates against national
organisation. Pure feudalism, indeed, would be less detrimental; for under
it territorial exclusiveness would at least be balanced by territorial
responsibility, but under the short-service system of China a governor
or governor-general may during his three years' term throw everything
into confusion and half ruin the finances of a province with which he is
precluded from having any territorial tie, and then proceed to another and
repeat the performance. The navy, though, as we have said, exempt from the
incubus of tradition, was nevertheless unable to withstand the pressure of
immemorial heredity. As the first and principal naval school happened to
be at Foochow, it was natural that new battleships and cruisers should be
officered and manned in the first instance by natives of Fukien province.
The admiral, however, hailed from another province--that of Li Hung-chang.
Though brave and capable, Admiral Ting was uneducated, and found it
hard to hold his own among the captains and lieutenants who had been to
Greenwich and could speak and write English, and some of them French.
Neither the Chinese admiral nor the English co-admiral--who was led to
believe he possessed authority, but was deceived--were able to repress
the intrigues which ran riot among the Foochow officers,--intrigues having
for their object the complete control of the fleet, the power of keeping
out and admitting whom they chose without reference to qualifications,
and the general determination to subordinate the naval service to
their personal and family advantage. The presence of Captain Lang was a
hindrance to their schemes, and they intrigued him out. But as the fleet
belonged to the north, they were unable to exclude northern seamen from
the country round Weihai-wei, who proved when the day of trial came the
most intelligent and the staunchest force that China possessed.
The Peiyang Squadron was the nearest approach to an imperial navy that
China ever possessed, and yet it was so far provincial that it could not
be sent into the central or southern waters without creating jealousy
on the part of the local authorities, just as if it had been a foreign
force. In 1891, when anti-foreign riots in various places on the Yangtze
threatened to endanger the peace of the empire, the Imperial Government
allowed foreign ships of war to proceed up the river for the purpose
of preventing outbreaks rather than offend the susceptibilities of the
provincial authorities by employing their own naval forces on that duty.
During that critical period the Peiyang Squadron was cruising in Japanese
waters while the Great River was being patrolled by foreign gunboats.
These various evidences of martial energy procured for China the credit
of a real awakening, and ensured her the respect due to a serious Power.
Yet the unsoundness of the foundation on which her new prestige rested was
no secret to any one who took the trouble to consider the facts, for all
the weaknesses we have mentioned, with many more, were notorious to every
foreign resident in China; nor was there a naval officer of any nation
who did not regard the fighting value of the Chinese fleet as nothing.
Ships were good, officers and men in themselves were passable, but without
organisation, while the whole force was governed by other than militant
principles. The attempted military reorganisation could, in fact, have no
vitality except as a branch of a general reform of the administration,
the keystone of which was fiscal. Of this, however, the Chinese rulers
seemed to take no heed, contenting themselves with snatching at what
was superficial and conspicuous to the eye. The Chinese florists in the
spring-time supply to hawkers shrubs covered with blossom which is so
cleverly attached by fine wire to the twigs as almost to deceive the
elect. This is practically what the Chinese Government bad been doing with
their national defences, so that on the first trial they collapsed like a
sapless flower. These experiences have an important bearing on the large
problem of Chinese reform and reorganisation, and indeed on the continued
existence of the empire.
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