well every traitor had an excuse. but wu sangui was not necessarily "mad" at li zicheng for letting his general take chen yuanyuan, he just thought that if li would treat him this way now then he would not be very secure later on. so he went with the manchu's, however duo ergun didnt treat him very well either...i mean they sent him to kill the south ming regime first then to yunnan, who wants to preside over that place anyways.
Do you think Wu Sangui is a traitor for Han Chinese?
- Thread starter Lion
- Start date
From your rationing, almost all of the emperor who actually started a new dynasty is a traitor. Even the first emperor of Tang dynasty, Zhou Dynasty, etc. All of them are subjects to the previous dynasty, but they overthrow their previous dynasty to become the emperor themselves (all except for the Yuan Emperor).
Plus when Li Zhicheng took over the capital, Ming Dynasty had failed to exist. it is officially gone. So Wu Sangui was no longer a Ming General.
solarz
Brigadier
It would be far-fetched to argue that emperors such as Li Shiming or Zhu Yuanzhang are traitors. Even Zhao Kuanying only staged a military coup to gain power for himself. That is far different from selling out your own nation to a foreign power, which was what Wu Sangui did.
The Ming dynasty did not end with Li Zicheng's conquest of Beijing. There were in fact several heirs to the throne who could have rallied support. After all, the Taiping Rebellion also took over Beijing and forced the Qing imperial court to flee.
However, even if we did concede that the Ming dynasty ended when Li Zicheng took over Beijing, the Qing at the time were still a foreign power, and Wu still held an important military post under the authority of the Ming Empire. That makes his action an act of treason, pure and simple.
Okay. You might be right in saying Wu Sangui is a traitor... but definitely not to the Han Chinese, rather he is a traitor to the Ming Dynasty, although the question still remains that the Ming Dynasty had already fallen to Li Zhicheng and so Ming is actually not existing. Although one may argue that there are still a number of would be king for the Ming, but are they real princes?
If you look at late Ming era, you would see that the corruption and decays are so great that actually it is better for the dynasty to just fade off. Early Qing and their rulers are more benevolent and the people are better off. So in this sense you couldn't say that Wu Sangui is a traitor to the Han-chinese.
Please also note that even Sun Zhongshan also engaged foreign help in some point of his life to battle and overthrow the Qing Dynasty in the early 19th centuries.
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When did Taiping rebel reach Beijing? From what I know, the furthest it goes was Nanjing..
Only the eight nation coalition forces managed to do that in 1900.. Forcing CiXi to flee from the capital.
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vesicles
Colonel
Like I said before, normal rebellion is a domestic issue, Chinese vs. Chinese. So there should not be a talk of traitors in this case. However, in Wu's case, he defected to a foreign power and helped the foreign power kill his own countrymen. THAT is treason. No doubt about that!
If it was a civilian who did this, well, we have to be careful about how to define this person because civilians never formally swear loyalty to the nation, at least not in ancient times. So if civilians do this, we usually cut them some slack. But Wu was a general, which means he swore that he would defend his country against its enemy at all cost. Many have indeed paid the price and died while defending their country. Why in the world should Wu be excused for surrendering to his enemy for fear of death? A soldier is prepared to die for his country. This is a common knowledge. Of course, many do surrender in difficult situations, and we can't blame them. However, joining your enemy and helping the foreign power kill his own countrymen for his own ambition and glory? This is NOT acceptable in any country, at any time, under any circumstances. This, for a military personnel, is treason at the highest order.
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vesicles
Colonel
Huh? I think you got it backward. He's not a traitor to the Ming dynasty since Ming was gone at the time. But he's a traitor to China since Manchu at the time was considered a foreign country. Manchurian also considered themselves as an independent entity. They officially declared the formation of Late Jin empire. before invading China. That made them a foreign country. So it was Manchu vs. China. He defected to Manchu and helped them attack China. That made him a traitor to China and Chinese people, plain and simple.
Just because he defected to a good foreign power, it does not mean he did not defect! He still betrayed China and allowed China to fall into foreign hand, albeit a better hand than Ming. That does not change the fact that Wu defected to a foreign country and helped them kill his own countrymen.
Also, Let's not forget the ten days of massacre in Yangzhou and the 3 slaughtering in Jiading.
Also because Manchurian feared Chinese rebellion so much that theyd ecied to bann all forms of manufacturing and invention that was military and weapon related. That was one of the main causes for China's set-back in technological advancement.
Sun might've got help from other countries, but he never allowed any foreign troops to enter Chinese territory. There is a BIG difference between the two cases. Also, the help from foreign power that Sun got was minimal. He mainly depended on Yuan Shikai who kicked Sun out once Qing was destroyed and declared to become an emperor.
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FriedRiceNSpice
Captain
Wasn't Beijing sacked during the 2nd Opium War (Arrow War) in 1860 by a French-British force as well?