Beiyang Army

Beiyang Army
北洋軍
Symbol of the Beiyang Army during the Republic
Active	1895–1928
Country	Qing Empire (1895–1911) Republic of China (1912–15; 1916–28) Empire of China (1915–16)
Type	Infantry, artillery, cavalry
Role	Land warfare
Size	20,000 (1902) 60,000 (1907) 536,000 (1919) 700,000 (1926)
Garrison/HQ	Tianjin Beijing (from 1907)
Engagements	See list Boxer Rebellion 1911 Revolution Second Revolution National Protection War Constitutional Protection Movement Occupation of Mongolia Northern Expedition
Commanders
Notable commanders	Yuan Shikai Fengshan Yinchang Duan Qirui Feng Guozhang Cao Kun

The Beiyang Army (Chinese: 北洋軍; pinyin: Běi Yáng Jūn; lit. 'Northern Ocean Army'), named after the Beiyang region, was a Western-style Imperial Chinese Army established by the Qing dynasty in the early 20th century. It was the centerpiece of a general reconstruction of the Qing military system in the wake of the Boxer Rebellion and the First Sino-Japanese War, becoming the dynasty's first regular army in terms of its training, equipment, and structure. The Beiyang Army played a major role in Chinese politics for at least three decades and arguably right up to 1949. It played an instrumental role in the 1911 Revolution against the Qing dynasty, and, by dividing into warlord factions known as the Beiyang clique (Chinese: 北洋軍閥; pinyin: Běiyáng Jūnfá), ushered in a period of regional division.

The Beiyang Army had its origins in the Newly Created Army established in late 1895 under Yuan Shikai's command, after China was defeated in the First Sino-Japanese War. Unlike its predecessors, it had a formal structure with infantry, cavalry, artillery, and logistical branches, and maintained strict training and discipline. The brigade-sized force was expanded over the years with new recruits and by incorporating other units, before serving as the core of a larger army after Yuan was appointed the Viceroy of Zhili and Northern Ocean (Beiyang) Minister in 1901. The tensions between Russia and Japan in Manchuria in early 1904 caused Empress Dowager Cixi to accept Yuan's request to raise more divisions, and he also used his senior position in the Army Reorganization Bureau to prioritize its funding. By 1907 the Beiyang Army had 60,000 men organized in six divisions, some of whom served in the Inner City of Beijing as the emperor's palace guard, and on the eve of the 1911 Revolution it was the strongest military force of the Qing dynasty.

Yuan Shikai used his position as the commander of the Beiyang Army as leverage to negotiate the abdication of the Qing emperor during the Revolution in exchange for himself to be the first president of the Republic of China. He used the army to maintain his control, but his decision to stop rotating officers during that time led to them turning their divisions into their own power base. This made them influential leaders in their own right after Yuan's death in 1916. A series of political crises ended with the general Duan Qirui taking control of the Beiyang clique until disputes over strategy and a power struggle split the army between his Anhui clique and the Zhili clique of Feng Guozhang and Cao Kun. Military commanders had expanded their armies in response to the Second Revolution, the National Protection War, and the Constitutional Protection Movement, so as the Warlord Era began there were an estimated 536,000 men under arms in northern China as of 1919.

Duan Qirui was able to maintain control over the government in Beijing through figureheads from 1917 to 1920, but that year saw the outbreak of the Zhili–Anhui War, causing the split of the Beiyang Army between several factions. The next four years resulted in several wars between the Anhui, Zhili, and Fengtian cliques, the latter representing the holdings of Zhang Zuolin in Manchuria. The warlord conflicts of the early 1920s led to Zhang Zuolin emerging as the strongest of the northern warlords by 1926, when the Kuomintang's National Revolutionary Army began its Northern Expedition to reunite China. Zhang put together the National Pacification Army from his and other Beiyang warlord forces, which had a total strength of around 700,000. After they were defeated in 1928, the Kuomintang capture of northern China marked the formal end of the Warlord Era and the Beiyang government, though some parts of China continued to be led by warlords until the Communist takeover in 1949.