Talk:Eight Banners

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The table indicate Left Right, Upper Lower for each banner. What significance do those labels have? If significant, a paragraph should be added to explain what they are. If not, the two columns should be removed from the table. Kowloonese 22:17, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"Although the banners were instrumental in the Qing Empire takeover of China proper in the 17th century from the Ming Empire, they began to atrophy in the 18th century, and were shown to be ineffective for modern warfare by the second half of the 19th century." I'd love to know exactly how the system was used to the advantage of the Machu. A citation to allow follow-up reading would also be nice.

The bottom paragraph of text is partially obscured by a picture when using firefox, can someone sort this out?

There's a lot of useful information in this article that can be cited and used in the Wikipedia article. ====> http://bic.cass.cn/english/infoShow/Arcitle_Show_Forum2_Show.asp?ID=242&Title=The%20Humanities%20Study&strNavigation=Home-%3EForum-%3EEthnography&BigClassID=4&SmallClassID=8 Abstrakt

[edit] Resources Please

Where are the sources? This article needs more sources, also, please check the work "The Art of War." There is a chapter that talks about banners which would seem applicable to this article. Also, please note that Europeans also used banners in the middle ages.

With an army lacking modern communication, banners were necessary for generals so that they could formulate battle strategies. In the 19th century, innovations in communication gave western powers the edge because they rendered banners obsolete. To say that the banner system was defeated is the same thing as saying a .44 magnum is more effective than a bare fist I mean, unless you're Neo from the Matrix, its an unfair comparison. There is also the fact that numerical designations are a bit more efficient, thing is, number designations can only work if there is modern communication. Without modern communication, number designations would be all but useless and cause confusion.

Meaning, anyone wanting to defeat a modern army would do well to target its communications. Destroy an army's communications, and you cripple it. The best tanks, jet fighters and ships in the world are worthless if they can't talk to each other. Indeed, regarding an attack on a 21st century army, destroying their means of communication is akin to severing the spinal nerve; do that, and the body is crippled, paralyzed. So it is with a modern army; the real danger exists, that if technology could be developed which would cripple communications, that army would be all but paralyzed. Therein lies the principle of banners; the fact that military squads have to have constant communication with one another.

The western powers did not win because banners were useless; they won because, well, a telegraphed message is much faster and efficient than banners. Nevertheless, even modern armies operate on the very principle that made banners necessary to ancient armies in the first place. Please be careful to not jump to conclusions and please analyze the facts more carefully. Thanks.

---stardingo747 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.63.78.91 (talk) 23:06, 29 November 2007 (UTC)