I saw the entire arguments in this thread are absolutely based on the presupposition of the posters. Even the title of this thread is already tagged a presumption of "Western neo-colonialism" , why? Because I haven't seen any thread titled "Qin Shi Huang vs Roman Empire", I didn't see "if Attila Hun lives longer and became the emperor of the Eurasia", there is no "if Batu khan didn't retreat from Vienna after Ogedei's death, can he eventually conquered whole Europe Continent?", which definitely has much higher percentage to success than Alex. But why there is no one interested in this topic? It's because inquiring into this topic would just hurt the self-ego of certain people. Therefore, this thread is entirely racial chauvinistic in their presumption.( By the way, there are already some forums other than this hotly discussing about the same issue)
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Let me tell you something about my role in this Cipher_101. I did not start this thread, which had a pretty ridiculous premise to begin with. I came in rather late; what sparked my interest in it was the speculation of what might have happened with one of history's more fascinating characters, because as we all know, Alexander died rather young. Plus, there are very few contacts between Mediterranean cultures and the Orient, and this makes an interesting alternate history scenario as well. So I decided to create a more believable scenario; not suddenly teleport him and his veteran army at the age of 30 with a supply dump in the middle of China. Maybe the original intent and title of this thread were inappropriate to this goal, but I am just piggy-backing on it.
It could just as easily have been Alexander vs. the Mauryan Empire, or Alexander vs. Rome-Italy (which is most relevant in my opinion). I admit it is far-fetched, but I tried to develop as believable a story as possible. It's inevitable, that some would find this kind of speculation offensive, but what exactly is it we do every time people play this game ? So if some want to shoot this down, or debate this presumption of "racial chauvinism", perhaps they need to examine their own motives, because to call this ancient collision of cultures that never happened an example of "Western neo-colonialism" is blatantly ridiculous. And by the way, there was a hot debate on Rome vs. the Han Empire, which was terminated abruptly, and the original premise was just as blatantly partisan in favor of Han China. Rome's disciplined army was not especially well-suited to warfare with armies accustomed to steppe warfare, but it was a unified empire vs. a unified empire. Many have also speculated on what would have happened if Ogedai had not died in 1240, and Subutai continued his incursions into Europe. There seemed to be widely varying opinions on this, but I do not want to open that debate up now.
......Iron weapons and armors: It is not impossible that Alex might plunder some of the iron weaponry from the Minor Asia (or use their army instead) and make use of them. But I doubt the ability of Alex and his army to produce this weapon in large scale due to the fact that iron smelting requires advanced stationary smelters which are lacked by this moving army (they couldn’t just produce iron weapon....with a poor smelter made by mud...).......
Long-range weapons:
There are no evidences that Alex had ever used crossbow in his battle, therefore bows and catapults might be the only long-ranged weapons in his arsenal. Alex might recruit some bowmen from Persia which employed composite bow as their main long-range weapons. But majority of his archers would still consist of more the mercenary bowmen from Crete Island which used slightly inferior bow.
Percentage 1: Alex was able to bring his formidable Greek Catapults to face the ancient Chinese fortress and city which is surrounded by walls.—0.1%(he even couldn’t bring them to India, it would take decades to reach China)
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I appreciate your sincere attempt to quantify the relative strengths and weaknesses of both sides. I may just point out a few things along the way that bear mentioning:
As far as I know, all of Alexander's weapons were iron, including the Kopis and Xiphos short swords and spear points. It was not inferior iron, but it was not steel. Only the armour, shields and helmets were maybe bronze, because of it's traditional virtues for that purpose.
This is not just Macedonia vs. China. I would propose that the following be considered, and it is open to others for debate;
The Celts on the lower Danube, in Iberia, and Gaul were already making raw steel weapons such as heavy broadswords that did not break. Around this time, even without Alexander, the first encounters with the Gauls were taking place. And the Romans/Samnites had steel or at least good wrought iron swords and armor. I'm not saying Alex would re-equip with those, but some elements of these would.
Regarding bows, there were specialized archers such as Cretan bowmen that were as famously skilled as the Balearic slingers. There were other specialized missile troops, horse archers, and slingers such as the Acarnanians within Greece, but javelin armed peltasts and Thessalian cavalry are perhaps their best known missile troops. The majority of Persian archers at this time, as someone pointed out, were not especially great, unless they were better trained Immortals or Kardaksha. Alexander also encountered a type of Indian longbowmen, and I believe some Nubian skirmishers were similarly equipped. So some small contingents of these may accompany his army.
The Scythian horse archers were good, but regarding other archers, the possession of composite bows does not itself guarantee superiority, since some were relatively small. Don't you think some of these missile troops would have been capable against the crossbowmen and heavy Chinese infantry ?
A long supply train would include some of the powerful ballistas on carts. These are no heavier than a loaded supply wagon, and maybe a few catapults, in the 60 lb. projectile range, could be towed by 4 oxen with a crew helping it over rough ground. The larger siege engines and towers would not be transported. Whenever the Greeks needed siege materials they built it on site. That should be relatively well known.
His is a multi-national army about 50% Macedonian-and it's immediate Greek allies. So there may be some challenges of command and control, but his legendary status is confirmed. I'm not willing to entertain that his volunteer army has divided loyalties so far from home.
1.2) Chinese
Iron Weapons and Armors:
Chinese must has already employed iron weapons and even steel weapons as their conventional weapons if they were to face the army of Alex. Iron had already been widely used in the agricultural sector and was produced industrially during the Spring and Autumn era. By the time of early Warring States Period, iron casting has been widely used according to the archeological discoveries at Jiang Su Liu He Province. The Chinese of the Warring States had also developed the quench-hardened steel.
.....There are varieties of types of crossbows used in Chinese army, differences exist between nations. Crossbow has a slower firing rate compared to ordinary bow, but in turn it has greater damage and range depends on size and weight of crossbow, a heavy-weight Chinese crossbow actually shoot out spears instead of bolts.
During Warring State Period, Most of the crossbows were made with bronze. ....Chinese crossbow has a greater accuracy compared to bow due to the specialized aimer Wang Shan 望山and the separated movement of string stretching and aiming. A even larger crossbow would require a basement frame(弩床
.
In general, there are three types of Crossbow during warring states according to their string stretching :
(a) Bi Zhang Nu(臂张弩
:literally arm-stretched crossbow. It was the earliest type of Chinese crossbow, shorter range but easier to maneuver. The earliest account of this type of crossbow mechanism was “Sun Bin’s Art of War”( Not Sun Tzu, it was written by a great Qi’s strategist named Sun Bin who lived at the midst of Warring State Period and died at 316 BC), with a shooting range of 100 “Bu”(步
or about 138.6 meter.
(b) Jue Zhang Nu(蹶张弩
: literally stamp-stretched crossbow. The crossbowmen employing this weapon use leg to stretch out the string instead of arm, in order to overcome the heavy resistance force of the bow. But once it shoots out the bolt, it has been proved to be a terrifying weapon. The Jue Zhang crossbow of Han faction has an effective range of 600 “Bu” or around 800 meter.
(c) Repeating Crossbow: Chinese had many inventions, and Chokonu is inevitably the most favorite Chinese military invention ..... However, I have to make it clear that Chokonu was just an alternative to Chinese arsenal, and it actually wasn’t mentioned much in most of the Chinese ancient text. .... Basically Chokonu is a Bi Zhang Nu, it has to sacrifice the accuracy( with the aimer or Wang Shan being replaced by the bolts box) and firepower in order to get a faster shooting rate. Therefore it is only suitable to counter a large mass of army in close-ranged battle.
Bow:
The first Chinese Composite Bow was the Qin Bow and Chu Bow dated from Spring and Autumn Period, they are built using bamboo and horn. Although it has a lower accuracy and damage than the mechanical crossbow, its flexibility and maneuverability grant it a greater strategic value than the cumbersome crossbow. Inevitably, composite bow was still the main long-ranged weapons of Chinese army due to its simplicity and mass production.
As early as the Spring and Autumn Period, Saltpeter and sulfur has been widely known by the Chinese, along with oil and rosin, they were used to make the flaming arrows or flaming ball which would be thrown by a catapult, causing devastating effect.
Poison:
Poison has been another strategic weapon to be used in Chinese army. They mostly used Aconitum as the source of their poison. The poison is then applied to the arrow head, even a single scratch from the arrow would cause the enemy to die within minutes.
I have to be perfectly clear about a few things.
1. The quote which mentioned "quench hardened steel", which I provided myself, is not referring to steel in any common sense of the word at this time. It may be referring to hardened pig-iron or wrought iron. Steel did not appear in China until the 1st Century AD.
2. I liked your basic description and assessments of the crossbows. I cannot accept that the
majority were made of bronze, maybe the larger ones in fixed mounts only, otherwise these capabilities look reasonable. This is my assessment of what proportion they were used:
a) arm-stretched crossbow - 138m, the most common crossbow of the trained 'heavy infantry'.
b) leg-stretched crossbow - 800m, almost non-existent at this time. From a few static positions maybe ? This is far too exotic, bulky, and difficult to load, to be operationally significant in the field, plus it came later with the Han dynasty.
c) the cho ko nu - from all I've read, the most common encountered Chinese crossbow, and missile weapon, among light troops and civilian levies, at this time.
3. bows - majority are self bows, but even composite bows come in all shapes and sizes. As others have pointed out, and as in Alexander's army, those trained with the bigger bows would not be the most common at this time.
I'm willing to concede that Chinese missile fire is potentially devastating in large enough numbers. The best weapon against it is to press the attack quickly as soon as you come within range - like the Greeks did at Marathon, Plataea, Arbela, and the Romans learned to against the Sassanians.
4. saltpeter and sulfur ? the only thing missing is fairly easy to come by charcoal. I will need some evidence that these chemicals were combined in some way that is operationally significant in 300 BC. Maybe Alexander would have mastered the early use of 'Greek Fire', which was devastating without requiring the formula for gunpowder.
5. poison - the mass handling of such a lethal substance that a scratch 'will kill within minutes' might be just as dangerous to the users as the victim, probably not very plentiful though. Maybe dung smeared on arrows and darts is believable. Apparently the Greeks knew something about biological warfare, releasing infected animals or leaving contaminated goods, but as with other things, this can be a two edged sword.
But as stated by other posters before, Greek Phalanx is vulnerable to flank attack, and Chinese strategy favored surprise strike, usually from a flank or rear direction. And even though Chinese didn’t apply iron weapons to whole army, the bronze weapons that Chinese was using still surpass the bronze weapons of Alex army due to a better bronze smelting and alloying technology.
Ranged Combat odd: Chinese-99%, Alex-1%
--Needless to say. Fire arrows and fire balls, poison, penetrating arrow barrage, and perhaps some catapulting, would tear whole Alex army apart, if not into pieces.
Whole Combat odd: Chinese-85%, Alex-15%
--Comparing the factors of what I have been discussing before, this is a battle odd of two great civilizations. I didn’t take other factors (tactics, geography, morale, number, supply, local resistance) into account, because taking these would just make China too overwhelmed to Alex.
Verdict: Final conclusion is made, sadly to say, Alexander was defeated. No imagination left.
Just a few points are:
1. Flank attack and surprise are not unique or new to Alexander, he used it many times himself, in very famous ways.
2. Why would China's bronze weapons be superior ? It is mostly a function of the tin content - I think the Greeks had that down, oh yeah and their weapons were iron.
On the subject of the Tao of warfare, you should also consider:
I think the resolve of Chinese resistance might be high initially, but compared to the cruel measures and massacres the Warring States practised on each other, and by their own generals on occasion, Alex may appear the lesser evil to some. That is a form of psychological warfare, and I think one or two minor victories might establish his reputation, so that some of Qin's less happy subject allies may be less than enthused about being used as cannon fodder against a liberator.
However, against such insurmountable odds as you have spelt out here. You are right, it is hopeless, I capitulate. Just one question though, with all this technological and organizational superiority, how is it that a similar sized army 1500 years later, (admittedly powerful - well-trained etc.) was able to take all of China in 2 generations, when there were only 3 warring states ? Oh yeah, the Huns ? Catalonian Fields my friend, the first time they were met on an equal footing.
I really don't want to go there again right now, but bows as well as crossbows come in many shapes and sizes. The more powerful crossbows don't fire at that rate, and sustaining that rate for any length of time would be a challenge, eh ?
