Talk:Battle of Changping

Absurd Figures--Modern Estimates?

The figures for armies and casaulties given here are clearly absurd. Could modern estimates of army size be given alongside exaggerated ancient claims, as per western battles of the same period? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.56.112.231 (talk) 15:09, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

§§These figures are not absurd; While major western battles of the same period often envolves only thousands to tens of thousands of soldiers, major campaigns in China in warring states and afterwards routinely see Generals commanding 10 times the western size, up to hundreds of thousands of men, with many branches. The details are well documented in Confucious history sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by HuhuFufu (talk • contribs) 19:38, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. These were hardly medieval armies fighting with gathered feudal levies. Qin was a ruthlessly centralized state, with a massive and organized population resulting from decades of public works projects dedicated to irrigation projects to increase agricultural productivity. The high degree of government control and administrative efficiency also allowed the government to effectively organize such a large mass of labor, and to efficiently collect grain taxes as to be able to stockpile them for massive armies. Not coincidentally, the administrative structure dedicated to organizing such masses of men to labor also prove to be effective in organizing these same masses into regiments for war.

As for the casualties involved, Zhao's losses were such that the country was permanently crippled, having lost the fruit of an entire generation of young men in the war against Qin. The victory also allowed Qin to conquer all the other states in less than a generation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.101.223.152 (talk) 14:26, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Its not about wht size of armies chines use to concentrate in those times (as mentioned in historical sources, they are all exaggerated arent they ?) and wht the size of western armies use to be in those days (again as per primary sources), its about a scientific fact that logistically gathering such a large concentration of fighting men, moving them, maneuvering them, feeding them, paying them etc was an impossible task. try calculating how much state had to spend on paying, feeding and maintaining this 500,000-600,000 troops on battle field, and then compair it with annual income and expenditure of the state. You will definitely declared that state/empire/kingdom to be bankrupt.

Citation needed. Sounds like original research.

until medieval era concentrating an army larger then 100,000 men is considered an extreme case by modern military historians, armies became larger once technology improved that eased the logistic problems Railways for instance.

الله أكبرMohammad Adil 23:35, 30 December 2009 (UTC)