A Smart Wolf Living with Well-Armed Enemies
productive, I have been reading a Chinese book on the lives of
Mongolian herders on the vast steppes of the Inner Mongolian
Grasslands. Written as a personal narrative of a Han Chinese
youngster escaping the violence of Cultural Revolution, it explores,
from the perspective of the Han Chinese, the lifestyles, values, and
beliefs of the "untamed" (i.e. not converted into permanent settled
communities) Mongolians in an effort to understand the ethnic
differences and the spectacular military history of Mongols and their
ancestors.
From the very beginning, the author establishes the bipolarity of
"nomadic-herding civilization" (such as that of the Mongolians) vs.
"agriculture-based civilization" (such as that of the Han Chinese).
As a visitor from the agriculture-based civilization, the author
immediately notices the respect the herders hold for the the wolf, a
creature so hated and widely killed by farmers. In fact, the book's
title roughly translates to "Symbolized by the Wolves" (狼圖騰),
signifying that the Mongolians and other herding peoples of the
steppes respect the creature to such a degree that they are willing to
choose the creature as their ethnic symbols.
At first, the author is highly puzzled. The Chinese civilization is
one symbolized by the Dragon (or, with the same format as before,
"龍圖騰"), a mythical creature that represents both a sense of stability
and unpredictability in the seemingly endless continuation of human
society in China. The Dragon brings fortune and misfortune to China
with powers that for centuries defied human explanations, yet
protected the Chinese race through natural disasters and wars,
allowing it to outlast countless others who came into existence around
the same time or even after it.
To the Han author, the wolf, on the other hand, cannot bring fortune.
It kills innocent herbivores (many of which are valuable assets for
the herders themselves) and even humans. Yet, through multiple
observations of wolves hunting, the author began to change his views.
The genius wolf-packs display in hunting down prey both faster and
larger than themselves and their sense of individual sacrifice from
the good of the group is something that herders, for centuries,
strives to emulate. Of all creatures on the steppes, only the wolves
can compete on an equal level with the humans, surviving harsh natural
conditions to battle humans, often for the exact same prey.
For the herders, competing with the wolves have also developed their,
physical strength, sense of military thinking, and group mentality
perfect for warfare. Without having to learn in military schools, all
Mongolians become natural fighters unrivaled by any elite troops
produced by agriculture-based civilizations. Such explains the
successful exploits of the Khitans, Jurchens, Mongols, and Manchus.
In fact, as the author comes to the conclusion, such masterpieces of
military art as "the Art of War" are just reflections of the
strategies invented by the wolves and adopted by nomadic herders. It
can be said that without wolves, the entire military history of the
world may be different.
However, the author does seem to forget the elements of time and
cultural longevity in his newly found respect for wolves. The wolves,
just as the nomadic herders, are masters of military battles, but in
the ultimate battles of civilizations, the nomadic-herders have not
become major players in modern societies (in fact, many have
disappeared) despite having won most wars against agriculture-based
civilizations. Why? It is power of cultural and economic
assimilation. Even as the Mongols and Manchus conquer China and
become its masters, they have found themselves becoming more and more
Chinese, heading on to the path of eventual disappearance as
independent ethnic entity.
It is the intense competition with wolves for limited resources of the
steppes that destines the herders for disappearance through cultural
assimilation. Because herders lose assets and suffer physical damages
in their ever-inconclusive fight with wolves that they are forced to
repeat basic production and asset accumulation. Without extra
population that can be extracted from this basic cycle for more
high-level activities, i.e. research into culture, literature,
technology, and industry, neither the sophistication nor the overall
population of the civilization can grow.
Thus, especially when the herders conquer large tracts of land from
their weak agricultural counterparts, they are still at the end,
forced to use the superior social institutions and cultures of their
conquered subjects to rule the new territories, eventually changing
the ruling class of herders from wolf-like strategists to sheepish
agriculturalists just like their defeated subjects. When this group
of herders are "tamed" (as happened to the Mongolians in China), the
next group of "untamed" herders will successfully invade and become
new rulers (such as the Manchus), allowing the process of "taming" to
repeat itself.
Comments
Post a Comment