Faced with such utter military and cultural humiliation, the Chinese reaction was first one of disbelief, anger and indignation. However, after the initial shock of defeat and humiliation, some of the progressive officials and intellectuals began to realize the need to strengthen China‟s military defense. Under the careful and effective leadership of Li Hong Zhang and Zeng Guo Fan, they began to advocate in the 1860‟s the adoption of Western scientific and military technology to make China strong and wealthy. Such wealth and power were the underlying concept of the Self-Strengthening Movement, China‟s first attempt at modernization by adopting Western techniques and technology.123
The very early programme was launched by regional leaders. Zeng Guo Fan established the Shanghai arsenal; Li Hong Zhang built the Nanjing and Tianjin arsenals, Zuo Zong Tang constructed the Fuzhou Dockyard. These were the first and most important military units in late Qing China. The arsenals were established with the help of foreign advisors and administrators, such as Léonce Verny who helped
122 For a reference book please see: Sterling Seagrave, Dragon Lady: The Life and Legend of the Last Empress of China, New York: Vintage Books, 1992.
123 In this part the author has quoted very valuable source that was written by Francis Soo. For more information please refer to China & Modernization - Past & Present, Studies in East European Thought, Springer Netherlands, Volume 38, Number 1, July 1989, p. 6.
Mr. Soo is a professor at Boston College in Department of Philosophy. Mr. Soo is a professor at Boston College in Department of Philosophy.
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build the Ningbo Arsenal in 1862-64, or the French officer Prosper Giquel who directed the construction of the Fuzhou Arsenal in 1867-74. Zeng Guo Fan and Li Hong Zhang worked together to construct the Jiangnan Arsenal. The first modern schools for the study of mechanical skills and navigation under the direction of foreign advisers were established at these arsenals and dockyards. Students were studying here and also learning the new military techniques. These there powerful regional strongmen were able to act rather independently of the central government.
Thus, there was little coordination between the provinces and the government. The author thinks that the reasons of their good relations with government were their ability and dealing skills with Qing rulers. 124
The most important was the funds of modernization and it was sponsored by the government. They suffered from the usual bureaucratic inefficiency and nepotism.
Many of the Chinese administrative personnel were sinecure holders who got on the payroll through influence.
During the late 19th century, many plans and programs, whose main purpose was to improve China‟s outmoded military defenses, especially her naval forces, were proposed and implemented. Chief among them were125:
(a) Establishing factories and dockyards for shipbuilding;
124 A reference book about China‟s military modernization History, please see: Elleman, Bruce A., Modern Chinese Warfare, 1795-1989, London: Routledge Press, 2001.
125 In this part the author has used and quoted a very valuable source that was written by Francis Soo.
For more information please refer to China & Modernization - Past & Present, Studies in East European Thought, Springer Netherlands, Volume 38, Number 1, July 1989, pp. 1-52. Francis Soo used in his study Immanuel Hsu‟s book, The rise of Modern China, London Oxford, 1970, pp. 45-375.
Mr. Soo is a professor at Boston College in Department of Philosophy. Mr. Soo is a professor at Boston College in Department of Philosophy.
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(b) Creating factories for making guns and machines;
(c) Establishing arsenals in various locations of east part of China;
(d) Establishing the board of Admiralty and the Beiyang Fleet;
(e) Establishing a military academy at Tianjin;
(f) Promoting and launching modern industries and enterprises;
Such as textiles, shipping, mining, telegraph and communication Systems;
(g) Sending officials and students to Western countries (especially to Germany, France, and Britain) and the United States to learn Western
Military technology.
Regional leaders needed money to keep the foreigners in their works. However, huge growth in the number of foreign employees had made increased costs so much.
It was hard to cover all the expenses of them. Furthermore, officials were not even aware when the foreigners were not capable to perform the tasks that they had been hired to do. The soft behaviors and laxity in procurement practices also caused more money to China. Costs were getting more and more. Many opportunities for corruption problem still existed in construction contracts and in the distribution of workers payments. Problems were sure inevitable because China was doing totally new kind of development in her military and society. The economical problems of Qing government could not afford all the things that regional leaders demanded.
74 3.2.1 First Military Establishments
As the author has already mentioned in his study of modernization in Chinese military, the most important goal of the Self-Strengthening Movement was the development of military industries. These plans were; construction of military arsenals and of shipbuilding dockyards to strengthen Chinese navy. The programme was handicapped by several problems. In this period it was not so easy to handle the new establishments because the Qing government and especially the Empress Dowager Cixi were observing the steps of regional governors.
The military modernization programme was spearheaded by regional leader.
These leaders have led the establishments throughout their regions. These most important military establishments and the regional leaders were:
a) Zeng Guo Fan who established the Shanghai Jiangnan Arsenal.
b) Li Hong Zhang who built the Nanjing and Tianjin Arsenal.
c) Zuo Zong Tang who constructed the Fuzhou Dockyard.
However, except these establishments Chinese regional leaders have also built the others military units in other regions. These were126:
· Guangzhou Arsenal (1874).
· Hangzhou Arsenal (1885).
126 Ting-yee Kuo and Kwang-Ching Liu, The Self-Strengthening: The Pursuit of Western Technology, The Cambridge History of China, 1978, pp. 491–517. For online book please refer to: Chapter 10:
http://histories.cambridge.org/extract?id=chol9780521214476_CHOL9780521214476A011
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· Hanyang Ironworks, in Hubei (1890), established by Zhang Zhi Dong (張之 洞).
· Hanyang Arsenal (1892).
· Hunan Arsenal (1875).
· Anqing Arsenal (1861), set up by Zeng Guo Fan.
· Beijing Field Force Arsenal (1883).
· Daye Iron Mine (1890), in Hubei.
· Jilin Arsenal (1881).
· Jinling Arsenal (1867) in Nanjing used for making breech rifles and steel.
· Lanzhou Arsenal (1871).
· Mawei Arsenal established near Fuzhou (1866).127
· Shandong Arsenal (1875), used for gun purchase, making acid and gun powder.
· Sichuan Arsenal (1877).
· Tianjin Arsenal (1867), under Li Hong Zhang used as gunpowder factory and to manufacture acid.
· Taiwan Arsenal (1885).
· Weihaiwei Shipyard (1882), the base for the Beiyang Fleet in "Port Arthur."
· Yunnan Arsenal (1884)
· Xian Arsenal (1869).
Schools128 for the study of mechanical skills and navigation under the direction of foreign advisors were established at these arsenals and dockyards. The author
127For more information please visit Christopher Wren Association, The College of William and Mary:
http://web.wm.edu/cwa/A04PDFs/02.pdf?svr=www
128 Schools after 1865 contributed to the spread of Western social and political ideas among Chinese intellectuals.
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wants to add that having the western technology in China has brought many books in to country. These books were translated in Chinese and read by many intellectuals in China.
These military industries were largely sponsored by the government. As such, they suffered from the usual bureaucratic inefficiency and nepotism. Many of the Chinese administrative personnel were sinecure holders who got on the payroll through influence. Foreigners have got their role and started to build military units for China.
The first one was established in 1845 by the British at Whampoa, downstream from Canton. It hired about 1,000 workers. In the next fifty years (down to 1894), foreigners, mostly British, built more than twenty ship-repair facilities, employing a total of some 9,000 men. After the Second Opium War (1856-60), taking advantage of China‟s cheap labour, Westerners branched out into light industries. They ranged from tea processing plants, tanneries, silk filatures and the like, to match and cigarette factories. By the time of the Sino-Japanese War (1894-95), they accounted for some 10,600 workers. The shipping industry employed an unknown number of Chinese, probably in the thousands. In addition, utilities in the treaty ports (gas, water, and electricity) accounted for some 1,400 people, and the telegraph and illicit postal service, also a fair number.129 All told, foreign-owned enterprises in China probably employed some 39,000 Chinese, about half of them in mechanized manufactories, in the period up to 1894130. After the Second Opium War British invasion and effect had
129 David Pong, Government Enterprises & Industrial Relations in Late Qing China, History, University of Delaware, Australian Journal of Politics and History: Volume 47, Number 1, 2001, pp.
4–23.
130 Pong, David, Government Enterprises & Industrial Relations in Late Qing China, USA: University of Delaware, Australian Journal of Politics and History: Volume 47, Number 1, 2001, pp. 4–23.
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more space in China. Besides, Second Opium War brought more missionary movements in China.
Second Opium War in 1860 that private missionary education in English started to expand elsewhere in China owing to the establishment of more treaty ports and the persistent efforts of missionaries to convert the Chinese. The rapid expansion of such missionary education can be seen from the following figures: by the 1870s there were only 20 mission schools with around 230 students across the country, but by 1925, there were over 250,000 children in 7,000 Christian elementary schools, and about 26,000 in Christian middle schools131.
After the end of the Second Opium War in 1860 some Qing government officials were aware of the urgent need for China to learn modern military and technical knowledge from the West in order to resist further foreign intrusion and to better cope with the Western powers in national and international affairs.
To achieve this, the teaching and learning of European languages, English in particular, was regarded as crucial; accordingly, the first foreign language school sponsored by the government in China, the Tongwen Guan (同文館) was founded in Beijing in 1862, which witnessed the inception of official English teaching in China.
Subsequently similar schools were set up in other areas of the nation such as Shanghai and Guangzhou. Over the period, the Western missionary schools together with these government sponsored language schools formed the main source of English language teaching132.
131 Zhang Ming Jian, US-China Education Review, Impact of English on Chinese mainland: From historical, educational and political dimensions, Volume 4, No.5, Serial No.30, May 2007, p. 61.
Zhang Ming Jian, male, PhD, associate professor of College of Foreign Languages, Qingdao University;
research fields: linguistics, applied linguistics.
132 Zhang Ming Jian, US-China Education Review, Impact of English on Chinese mainland: From historical, educational and political dimensions, Volume 4, No.5, Serial No.30, May 2007, pp. 61-62.
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After the Second Opium War,many Qing government officials began to distinguish betweenEnglish and French intentions. This newfound understanding had significant impact on the “Policy of Engagement” and “Policy of hiring for suppression” later adoptedby the government.133
3.2.2 Some Important Military Units, Arsenals and Dockyards during the Movement
The defeats both in the Opium Wars brought change and afterwards regional leaders have started their modernization plans. In December 1861, Zeng Guo Fan established the Anqing Arsenal, where, depending on traditional handicraft techniques, Chinese experts built a working steamship. In 1864, Li Hong Zhang purchased his Suzhou Arsenal machines, which had previously equipped the British fleet.
In Nov. 1863, Rong Hong, returning from the US, advised Zeng Guo Fan to set up a “Parent factory” and then sub-plants producing basic machinery. Soon, Zeng sent Rong abroad to buy equipment. He and Li also established the South China Arsenal in 1865. Later, the Qing Dynasty imported machines and set up more than 20 factories engaged mostly in military production. One of them, the Fuzhou Shipyard began producing military ships and steam engines from 1869. In 1883, Chinese engineers assembled China‟s first cruiser there. One another factory was South China Arsenal, built a Yangtze passenger steamship with 3000 horsepower, the best of that period. To
133 Zhang Xiao Min and Xu Chun Feng, The Late Qing Dynasty Diplomatic Transformation: Analysis from an Ideational Perspective, Oxford: Chinese Journal of International Politics, Vol. 1, 2007, p.409.
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train more people in Western technology, two factories opened schools. South China Arsenal also opened a translation institute.134
The pro-Western faction focused their attention only on weaponry production, and didn‟t establish any basic industries or manufacture machines on a massive scale, so that the military industry continued depend upon imports and landed itself in a passive position. Of course, a small number of people stressed the importance of machines in civilian production. In 1873, Chen Qi Yuan reeled silk on modem machines. A year later, Li Hong Zhang first proposed using machines to tap iron ore.
In 1878, Zuo Zong Tang has imported machines from Germany to build a woolen cloth factory in Lanzhou. However, society at large was reluctant to accept new things. Most of people were accustomed to outmoded customs, and traditional forms of production and old technology, and chaos of the times made development impossible.135
From the 1860s, small privately-run machine factories had emerged in cities like Guangzhou and Shanghai. When they repaired machines, they gradually learned how to reproduce some of them, following models to produce lathes and steamships.
In the early 20th Century, they copied internal combustion engines. However, because China had lost sovereignty over its tariffs, domestic mechanical products were not protected, and private businesses could not compete with foreign manufacturers.
In this study the author believes that giving some more detailed information about arsenals and dockyards will lead the readers much more into this period. As the
134 Cited from Baichun Chang, The Modernization of China‟s Mechanical Engineering Under the Influence of the West (1581–1985), The 20th International Congress of History of Science (Liège, 20–26 July 1997), Volume 17. ENGINEERING AND ENGINEERS, Edited by Michael Ciaran Duff, Belgium: Brepols Publishers, 2002, pp. 133–142.
135 Baichun Zhang, The Modernization Of China‟s Mechanical Engineering Under the Influence of the West (1581–1985), please see his study: http://mech-history.ihns.ac.cn/papers/zhang11-e/zhang11.htm
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author has already mentioned the military modernization has started with building the first western style military buildings. Sure this would not be a clear definition, thus, we need to look more in to this military buildings and how they were built. In such a complicated period unfortunately the author can not mention all of these military establishments and their role in the movement. But some of the most important ones will bring the military modernization period much above to the surface.136