When the Chinese Almost Disappeared

The Mongols had a technique they used whenever they wanted to invade a country. The year before they would send small, mobile units to raid the targeted territory over a wide area to "terraform" it for their particular type of warfare. 

This terraforming would include killing any farmers they could find in order to drive all farmers off the land, and burning and destroying any farm buildings and equipment. The effect of this was to convert farm land back to pasture, so that the next year, when the full Mongol battle army appeared on horseback, there would be enough pasturage in enough places so that the Mongol horde could move rapidly where it wanted, and draw the opposing army into a battle on its own devastating terms.

When the Mongols invaded China, they found the going very difficult, as the heavily populated landscape threw up many obstacles—cities, towns, irrigation canals, etc.—while the pasturage was poor. This was why the conquest of China took so long, from 1205 to 1279.

Also, as the Mongols moved deeper into China, conquering state after state (Western Xia 1227, Jin Empire 1234, and Song Empire 1279), the large conquered population presented a constant danger of rebellion.

In the midst of this lengthy and laborious process, the second of the Great Khans, Ogedei thought seriously about simply exterminating the vast population of Northern China in order to turn the land back into depopulated pasturage that would allow his horse-borne horde to move and strike further South with greater ease.

The Mongols valued wide, open spaces more than people.

The exact date of this fateful decision is not known, but it seems to have been made shortly after the collapse of the Jin Empire (1234), which occupied the Northern half of modern-day China. The Song Empire, which occupied the Southern half of modern-day China, had actually been allied with the Mongols against their traditional enemies the Jin, but now, with the Jin defeated, they became the next target of Mongol expansion. In order to facilitate this next push to the South, some of Ogedai's advisers suggested the genocide of all Chinese in the conquered territory.

Yelu Chucai

The person who managed to dissuade Ogedai from this decision was Yelu Chucai, a man of Khitan ancestry—the Khitan's were another steppe people who infringed on Chinese civilisation's Northern border—and by all accounts an extremely impressive individual. 

Born near Beijing in the Jin Empire, he was reported to be of giant stature—one account gives his height as 6'8"—and to have had a beard that reached all the way down to his waist, as well as a deep, resonant voice. He was also a respected Confucian scholar.

In 1218, when Genghis Khan was attacking the Jin Empire, Yelu Chucai, who was then 28, defected to the Mongol side, serving Genghis and his successor Ogedai Khan as a trusted adviser. When the plan for exterminating the population of Northern China was discussed, Yelu advised against it, pointing out that by keeping the territory populated they could tax it and fund the war.

The prolific historical writer Arthur Cotterell describes this moment in his book Asia: A Concise History:

"...it has to be said that the sheer size of the Chinese peasantry had always baffled the Mongols. Considered unfit as soldiers and possessing no craft skills, it was proposed to Ogedai Khan that these useless people be exterminated and their land allowed to revert to pasture. Yelu Chucai argued strongly against this drastic proposal, explaining that if he was permitted to introduce a proper system of taxation and let the peasant farmers work in peace, he could collect enough revenue to pay for all future Mongol campaigns. As the promised tax flowed to Karakorum talk or genocide ceased."

This financial concern may reflect the fact that, by this period, the Mongol army had increasingly become a multinational mercenary army, drawing troops and military experts from a wide range of countries, including many Chinese despite their supposed military unworthiness described above.

In particular the Mongols used Persian and Arab engineers to build siege weapons, such as trebuchets, while Mongol leaders often favoured foreigners as bodyguards in order to defend themselves against plots by other elite families.

After Yelu Chucai died in 1244, he was buried in Beijing, and a shrine or temple was constructed to honour his memory. In a typical display of Leftist historical amnesia, this was later destroyed in 1966 by the Red Guards in the so-called “Cultural Revolution.”

Instead of the Chinese disappearing, only the temple of the man who prevented their disappearance disappeared.