Royal Guards (Themiclesia)
The Royal Guards (衛士, gwrjaih-sdrje) are military units of Themiclesia stationed in palaces and charged with their defence. Historically, the Royal Guards were selected from regional militias in one or more regiments in each palace, though the only surviving units today are the Left Guards and Right Guards. Since most active palaces today are in Kien-k'ang, the capital city, the Royal Guards are often confused with the Capital Defence Force. While they are now integrated with the Themiclesian Army, their ceremonial commander is the Marshal of the Guards, usually a retired minister.
Name
The name kuninkaanvartija was first used by Hallian visitors to the Themiclesian court, who noted that the palaces were defended by troops apart from the normal militia musters present in the capital city. When Anglians followed, they translated the Hallian term into Anglian directly to give the modern name Royal Guards. This, however, is not a literal translation and introduces some nuances that are not present in the Shinasthana term. The word "Royal" implies a connection to the monarchy, but the institution of the Royal Guards is not exclusive to the monarch himself; there are guards, under the same category, protecting his consort, his mother and grandmother, and his heir. Secondly, in the Themiclesian view, the guards defend the palaces and not the monarch (or any of his relatives) directly. Given that palaces were very heavily fortified (the Hian-lang Palace had walls in excess of 12 meters thick) and possessed numerous military installations, the Royal Guards were expected in the first place to man the fortifications, rather than to protect the monarch's person, which was the proper jurisdiction of the Gentlemen-at-Arms. The pictosemantic word gwrjaih (衛), though coined millennia before Royal Guards were active, depicts four feet surrounding a circle, interpreted to mean pacing around a settlement in its defence.
This distinction, though trivial, can be enlightening when analyzing its place and behaviour. The Royal Guards regiments typically never leave the palace in which they were stationed, even if its occupant left it; when the emperor left Hian-lang Palace, the regional militias along the pre-arranged route would marshal in his defence when passing through their jurisdictions, and when he arrived at a different palace, it would already be defended by the Royal Guards there. As a result, some scholars suggest replacing its title with the more literal and descriptive "Palace Guards", though Themiclesian policy has been to retain foreign translations whenever possible, even if inaccurate, to reduce the likelihood of confusion between old and new translations of the same name.
History
Origins
In the military policy of the early Meng dynasty, after which a large part of the Themiclesian establishment appeared to have been derived, each prefecture was responsible for keeping its own militia, which possessed specializations such as infantry, crossbowmen, cavalry, and chariotry. These militias were locally stationed unless summoned away for duties on the border or abroad. The palaces were, however, not defended through the local militia; rather, they possessed their own defence forces, which answered to a specific minister in the central government. Further, royal tumuli and mausolea were also protected by special units raised much as with the palace guards, since these edifices were considered akin to palaces, except for deceased emperors. This system, mausolea excepting, was inherited by early Themiclesian governments, which actively borrowed and emulated the Meng state's organizations. The Sje-mra Clan (司馬氏), which nominally unified Themiclesia in 265 under the Tsjins dynasty, maintained the separate defence structure for palaces, and subsequent Themiclesian dynasties have generally upheld the same. After the arrival of the Meng monarchy in 542, the Royal Guards were viewed as part of the heritage and legitimacy derived from the Meng dynasty and therefore exempt from intensive reforms.
Pre-modern history
The Royal Guards have been viewed by historians as an institution that has very little character or history. Their placement as defensive troops in palaces have very effectively shielded them from conflicts, which generally occurred abroad or in border regions. Since Kien-k'ang, Rak-lang, and Drjang-'an, where most palaces were located, were a considerable distance away from hostility, the Royal Guards as an institution, for the most part, have been inactive in Themiclesia's wars. However, during crises, exceptions have occurred. When Maverican nomads incurred in the 6th century with cavalry, regional militias could not be summoned in time to marshal at the capital city, and thus the Royal Guards were ordered to defend the city. In the Siege of Kien-k'ang in 1385, the Royal Guards also took to battlements, against Menghean forces laying siege to the city. During the Pan-Septentrion War, they were deployed to the front, in a time when general strikes and politial uncertainty undermined the Army's recruitment campaigns. Despite these facts, the Royal Guards were absent from pivotal conflicts such as the Battle of Sgrjem-tju (1198), which heralded the recession of Themiclesian power in Columbia, and the Maverican Wars (1765–67; 91–96). These facts "support its characterization as a purely defensive institution", in the words of B. Larter (1904).
In view of its absence from major conflicts, historians have tended to take the "institution chronology" approach, studying its relationship with the broader Themiclesian government and military, its expected role, and external commentators' views of it. Continuing the Meng dynasty's tradition, each Themiclesian palace possessed one or more regiments (校, krawh) of guards. During the earlier dynasties, when palaces were few, this was tenable; however, their number swelled to over 20 in the restored Meng dynasty, which created an unprecedented pressure on local militias to remit troops for guard duty, their strength regularly about 20,000. This was not a problem for the Meng government, as it imposed conscription, but in the following Dziai dynasty, when militia service was voluntary, the govenrment resorted to moving regiments periodically between palaces. Eventually, several palaces were abandoned to fund military activity in Columbia, and the discharge of the guards at those palaces appeared to be an economy. This seemed sensible as each palace was stationed with guards regardless whether in use or not, though by custom the emperor, empress, crown prince, and empress dowager(s) each occupied one palace. After the Dziai ended, the Meng-era practice of having guards at every palace temporarily resumed.
Modern era
In the 17th century and onwards, the Royal Guards have experienced a considerable recession in prominence, as resources were progressively diverted to the navy. While regional militias, with annual marshals, did not cost the government much to maintain, the Royal Guards, standing at palaces for terms of one or two years, had to be compensated in grain or money. During the Ngwjeih dynasty, the number of staffed palaces further dropped from about fifteen to six or seven. During the Maverican Wars, the Privy Council stubbornly refused to release four regiments of marshaled and armed troops to the front, even though the four were stationed in vacant palaces. This reservation of troops resulted in delays (it took three months for militiamen in the distant north to be assembled and marched to the battlefield) that the enfranchised public believed was partly responsible for losses in Themiclesia-proper. As a result, vacant palaces lost their guard regiments under the Conservative governments of the early 1800s, aiming to reduce burdens on the public, whether in the form of taxation or military or labour service. Under the commerce-focused Liberal government since the 1840s, the policy was continued; since only the palaces in Kien-k'ang were regularly occupied, the Royal Guards' presence was thereby limited to it.
Since the 1800s, the Hian-lang Palace and Middle Palace had two regiments of Royal Guards each, while the East Palace, Gweng-hljuns Palace, and Gwreng-ngjars Palace, one each. It was suggested in the 1830s to place them under some sort of unified command, or even to professionalize them, but the Conservative policy of reducing military expenditure prevented their further exploration. An alternate interpretation for this rejection is that the government found it a security risk. Situated in Hian-lang Palace, the government placed its two regiments under the supervision of the Cabinet Office, which did not have power to send instructions to the regiments without government permission, suggesting it was quite conscious of the matter of security. Furthermore, the two regiments were forbidden from communicating with each other and had emphatic limits in their respective geographic jurisdictions. Their commanders were also, without exception, drawn from civil servants with experience in military administration; Tribunes supervised the activity of officers and intercepted their commands in paper form, and collective punishment was imposed to deter collusion. After the establishment of the Army Academy, civil servants were gradually replaced with trained military officers, though the manner of their operation did not break from earlier traditions of the Royal Guards.
In the late 1800s, Crown Prince Djeng (成太子, djeng-t'ais-tsje, 1857–1885), who was entitled to his own guard regiment at his seat, the East Palace (東宮, tong-kjung), took a rather unusual interest in military affairs. In his youth, he compelled the Director of the East Guards to have regular reviews of the guards. Not satisfied with this, he took to speaking with his guards and designing exercises for them in the premises of the East Palace. While his father, Emperor Mjuk, was not suspicious, like some courtiers, of Djeng's motives, he did not approve of his close contact with soldiers. Nevertheless, with parliamentary backing (arguing the capital city lacked a cavalry contingent), he was granted a regiment of horse guards in 1878. This is unconventional, as palace guards were traditionally infantry and chariotry, not cavalry. Despite slowly-changing attitudes, his courtiers found his interest in soldiers intolerable. In 1879, a picture of him holding a rifle, with his guards in the background, was published on a tabloid, greatly infuriating the empror and Conservatives in parliament. The editor of the tabloid was arrested and sentenced to a €1,000 fine for lèse-majesté. The Liberals, though more tolerant of his eccentricity, did not defend him. The emperor met Djeng unannounced and severely castigated him, requiring him to censor his activities. He also suggested that a "truly sympathetic crown prince" should "ensure their funding was not abused, rather than associating with them". Djeng continued his infantry and cavalry exercises regularly after this but died suddenly in 1885. His cavalry regiment was immediately disbanded to put to rest the controversy, while the infantry regiment continued to defend the East Palace and its new occupant, the future Emperor Gar.
1932 Nationalist revolt
During the Nationalist Revolt of 1932, the Royal Guards were instrumental in its suppression. On the day of the incident, the Hian-lang Left Guards were stationed in the palace, east of the Constellation Gate (閶闔門, t'jang-gap-men), and the Hian-lang Right Guards south of the West Side Gate (西掖門, ser-ljak-men), against the palace's outermost walls. The palace's gates were opened, as customary, after the assent of the Under-Secretary of State of the Hall (殿中郎, dens-trjung-rang) and the Secretary of Protonotaries (the clerk of the house) was obtained as usual, around 3 o'clock in the morning, well before the demonstrators arrived. As usual, a detachment of 200 guardsmen were sent to line each passage in the Constellation Gate, and the courtyard the gatehouse formed with the nearby walls. As the demonstrators arrived at about 6 o' clock, they started to unravel their banners and signs and congregate in the courtyard; this was normally not allowed, since the courtyard regularly saw ceremonies. However, the Royal Guards did not prevent them from occupying it, since it was not a day on which ceremonies were expected. While the rallying began with megaphones, it was soon apparent that the messages delivered through megaphones that day were appealing for revolution, since the Nationalists have already staged demonstrations there for four consecutive days. The Gate Captain (門司馬, men-sje-mra) took note of this matter and relayed it to the Cabinet Office, whereupon the Secretary of the Right, with the assent of the Under-Secretary of State of the Hall, ordered the Gate Captain to monitor the demonstration closely.
About an hour later, the assembly burst forwards into the gatehouse, which alarmed the Royal Guards, who were commanded to form a tight line, a dozen men deep, in each of the three passages to bar the demonstrator's entry. The development was dispatched to the Cabinet Office again, which was thrown into confusion. Themclesian ministers lived within the palace, in the quarters for the Council of Correspondence. This section was less than a kilometer away from the commotion, and ministers were notified of the disorder and advised to assemble at the Court Hall, over the breezeway connecting their quarters to their offices. However, before all Cabinet ministers arrived, push gave way to shove and punches in the passageway, with apparently several members of the Royal Guards unconscious and crushed by the demonstrators. The Gate Captain was hesitant to order them to open fire and instead asked for instructions from the Cabinet Office again; in the meantime, he ordered the guardsmen to leave their rifles inside the gate and push outwards, confident that he had more manpower than did the demonstrators. In later recount, he also said this would prevent the demonstrators from taking hold of the guardsmen's arms while they were pushing against each other. However, that the guardsmen were disarmed may, according to some, have encouraged the demonstrators to push even harder, resulting in a stalemate. The Secretary of the Right reported the latest and advised that only two fortified gates stood between them and "the rioters". At 7:45, reports from the Royal Guards asserted that the rioters demanded the dissolution of the government. Then, another message was sent stating that the demonstrators intended to rescue the emperor from his "corrupt, traitorous ministers" and join the "Hemithean cause".
At 7:59, the Gate Captain reported that forty of his men were dead or unconscious and asked for further instructions. The Home Secretary noted that the Royal Guards' casualties were mounting, but he was heckled for mentioning "irrelevant facts". He would later recount that he meant to suggest the police be sent for, but the minister (whose identity he could not recall) who heckled at him silenced his suggestion. The Prime Minister opined that Foreign Secretary, whose portfolio included the palace, must "either advise the Cabinet to some course of action or consider his position [i.e. resign]". The Foreign Secretary, initially reluctant, was compelled by "hear, hear" from other ministers to state that he believed the demonstrators should be "effectually removed". Hearing this, the other ministers vocally supported the resolution, and the Gate Captain was informed that he was to use any means to remove the demonstrators immediately. However, the Secretary of the Right interpreted this resolution to mean that all the Royal Guards were instructed to remove the demonstrators and passed the message to the Hian-lang Right Guards as well, which was on stand-by but not actively invovled at the Constellation Gate. The Gate Captain (with units of the Hian-lang Left Guards) ordered the rifles to be passed back to the troops who were bearing the brunt in the passage and begin firing into the crowd. This stunned the rioters at the front, who began to push backwards; however, those behind continued to push forwards at the behest of their leader. Soon, the Hian-lang Right Guards rushed from the West Side Gate out of the palace and to the outside of the Constellation Gate and began firing on the protesters from behind. The Left Guards fired to expel the intruders, without advancing through the passage, but the Right Guard surrounded and compressed the intruders towards the gatehouse with gunfire.
Faced with gunfire from both directions, panic ensued amongst the demonstrators, but the Left Guards and Right Guards were unable to see each other and continued to fire in each others' direction. According to most sources, the leaders of both regiments were unaware of each others' presence. Several minutes later, a stray bullet from the Left Guard killed a member of the Right Guard, which mistook this as a sign the demonstrators were armed. Alarmed, the Right Guard dropped their rifles and switched to machine guns. This accelerated the injuries sustained by the demonstrators immensely. Detecting automatic fire, the Left Guards also became concerned that the protestors may have heavy weapons, and they temporarily retreated from the line of fire but mounted the gatehouse's superstructure. From inside, the fired downwards through peepholes onto the demonstrators. Only the presence of guardsmen on the gatehouse itself informed the Right Guard that the Left Guard was responsible for the gunfire in their direction. Soon, the understanding spread, and gunfire ceased. By this point over 500 had died in the crossfire. That the two regiments had forced the demonstrators into an enclosed space without cover and continued to fire from both exits massively exaggerated the casualties in a group of protesters who were, by all accounts, unarmed.
Pan-Septentrion War
Menghe entered the Prairie War against Themiclesia in 1933, as a consequence of the Hian-lang Guards' massacre of Nationalist demonstrators. This turn of events transformed a relatively minor war into a national emergency. While the Ministry of War submitted a proposal to impose nation-wide conscription in 1934, after it became apparent that militia units maintained by the prefectures were insufficient to halt the Menghean advance, the Foreign Office believed a peaceful resolution was still possible and blocked the conscription proposal, fearing it would provoke Menghe into increasing commitments as well. As the government discussed conscription internally, suffrage protests combined with general strikes against the Liberal government's alliance with Conservatives to reduce union rights threatened to make conscription a fatal policy for the government. Thus, it conscripted organized men in other departments to supplement the regiments at the front via the Special Conscription Act, 1934.
During the passage of the Act, the Privy Council, the board of neutral advisors to the emperor, was not consulted at length. This led to some Privy Councillors expressing concerns for the security of the palace, deprived of its troops, but the government proceeded contrary to the Council's monitions. The Prime Minister personally met the Privy Council (consisting mostly of his predecessors) and persuaded them that the "mistake of the Maverican Wars" must not repeat, meaning that ready troops should be used, lest the emperor be seen as protecting himself and his palaces before his country. In the Privy Council's duty to uphold the emperor's public image, dissenting voices were quieted. The Hian-lang Left Guards and Right Guards, who were virulently attacked in press for its absurd shooting of protesters who already surrendered, were sent in Mar. 1934 to the front, along with the other guard regiments, the Middle Left Guards, Middle Right Guards, and the South Guards. The Progressive press, the Weekly Telegraph, considered this an atonement for its wrongs, but other newspapers decried the Telegraph's characterization as political. Two months later, they were joined by the Royal, Inner, Middle, and Gweng-hljuns Engineers, reserve Metropolitan policemen, and the Navy's marines.
During the early stages of the war, the Royal Guards were known for their ineffectiveness, and some field commanders believed their privileged and sheltered position robbed them of proper discipline and courage. However, into 1936, the five guard regiments had become roughly on par with regional militia units and were, by their experience, "a cut above" some of the less motivated and newer conscript units. Regardless of their performance, the front crawled towards the Themiclesian heartland and came to Kien-k'ang in 1940. At this point, the Hian-lang Guards were placed under the 142th Infantry Division and the Middle Guards and the South Guards the 82nd. They participated in several battles close to the capital city but never directly in the Battle of Kien-k'ang. In 1936, the emperor evacuated his court to Blem-hme' Palace. The Privy Council privately suggested that a regiment be raised from nearby militias as the Blem-hme Guards. While the government refused, citing the emperor's desire "not to be especially defended", about a company's worth of conscripts exempted from direct engagement for various causes were assigned to the defence of the Blem-hme' Palace. They were not officially given the title of "Blem-hme' Guards", but historians have usually identified them as such. The extensive premises of the palace overwhelmed the company, and their lack of training invulnerated the palace to invasion, such as by Yamabe Oshimaro and Anabe Matakoshi.
The Themiclesian retreat was reversed in 1941, and the Royal Guards continued to press with the Army westwards, until the end of 1943, when the Menghean and Dayashinese forces were cleared from Themiclesian territory. As the 1936 conscription law covered only territorial defence, not permitting conscripts be deployed abroad, the Themiclesian Army began in 1943 to persuade some conscripts to become professional soldiers. This is largely because of Hallian and Tyrannian pressure for Themiclesia to join the invasion of Menghe itself, expected for their assistance in the defence of Themiclesia. The Royal Guards, which did not consist of conscripts but continued to induct volunteers throughout the war, were thus earmarked for the East Expedition Force. However, breaches at the palace have caused the emperor to be hidden in alcoves for prolonged periods of time, which the Privy Council was desperate to rectify; as a result, the Middle Left Guards and Hian-lang Right Guards were ordered to return to Blim-tsi, where the emperor resided. Their return effectively countered any further attempt at infiltration, as D/ISOG assassins were unable to sneak pass the Royal Guards on duty and at full strength.
Recruitment
In the standard template of the Themiclesian prefectural militia, members after some basic conditioning, in the form of local garrison duty, are returned to normal lives and are called up anywhere from ten days to one month per annum for various forms of service. Along with border postings, local garrison duty, and conveyance duty, service in the Royal Guards is one such possibility. In most dynasties, militiamen had no choice over where their postings were, and their journey to and from their posting was financed by themselves; the state, during particularly generous periods, may issue compensation for their voyage, but this was exceptional. In some forms of service, the units formed during the militiamen's training period may not apply, as the specific duties required. This is the case in the Royal Guards, where militiamen are summoned to the capital city individually, rather than as a unit. Traditionally, the term of service as a guardsman is the most labourious, lasting a whole year, rather than three months at the border or a month at the local garrison. While Themiclesia had palaces distributed across its territory, there was a marked preference for guardsmen to be posted to distant palaces, rather than proximal ones.
There has been considerable research and debate as to the unusual marshalling practices of the Royal Guards. While the traditional militia-levy system has been abandoned since the Pan-Septentrion War, its anachronism was already a subject of comment amongst diplomats and visitors to Themiclesia in the 18th and 19th centuries. Tyrannian diplomat S. G. Bursar writes:
In selecting the palace's troops, the Themiclesians repose confidence in no man. They are chosen by lot from the militiamen of the prefectures, so that nothing—not politics, not wealth, not belief, not origin—may corrupt the choosing. They meticulous seek to banish any trace of affinity, by the same means Solon sought to bar demagogues and prevent bribes from government.
Surviving records corroborate Bursar's observations, and in the 18th century it appears there was a 1/15 chance that a trained militiaman would be randomly chosen to serve in the Royal Guards each year. Authors, particularly those of a military background, have questioned the effects of such a form of recruitment, asserting that units formed this way would have little cohesion. They also note that, after a Royal Guard unit was assembled, it was immediately assigned to duty, without further training. In the traditional characterization of the Royal Guards, they were troops meant to "defend above [i.e. the emperor] and prevent mischief" (謹上防非), which has been interpreted to place relative emphasis on political reliability rather than combat effectiveness. Though no primary literature explicitly supports their position, some scholars believe the Royal Guards were thus more reliable to central government because it had no regional affiliation. Additionally, the government may have been aware of their shortcomings in combat, which, if true, would explain their absence from battles. However, for the suppression of disorder and guarding palace gates, it appears their performance has been adequate.
Rank structure
The Royal Guards possessed idiosyncratic rank structures throughout their history, because of their proximity to the royal palace. While this was substantially harmonized with the remainder of the Army during the Pan-Septentrion War, their rank titles continues to be particular in name.
Enlisted
| OR-1 | OR-2 | OR-3 | OR-4 | OR-5 | OR-6 | OR-7 | OR-8 | OR-9 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rank name | Private | Private | Private | Corporal | Sergeant | Staff Sergenat | Sergeant 1st Class | 1st Sergeant | Sergenat-major |
| Shinasthana | 衛士 | 衛士 | 衛公士 | 衛長士 | 司直 | 執事 | 衛士正 | 廷小史 | 廷史 |
Officers
| OF-1 | OF-1 | OF-2 | OF-3 | OF-4 | OF-5 | (OF-6)[1] | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rank name | 2nd lieutenant | Lieutenant | Captain | Major | Lieutenant-colonel | Colonel | (?) |
| Shinasthana | 衛士假吏 | 衛士吏 | 衛士將 | 衛侯 | 衛司馬 | 衛尉長史 | (衛將軍長史) |
List of former and current units
This list covers the fate of units active in 1800.
- Hian-lang Left Guards
- Hian-lang Right Guards
- East Foot Guards (renamed South Guards 1916)
- East Horse Guards (disbanded 1881)
- Middle Left Guards (now the 134th Middle Brigade)
- Middle Right Guards (now the
- Gweng-hljuns Left Guards
- Gweng-hljuns Right Guards (merged with Gweng-hljuns Left Guards in 1872)
- Gwreng-ngjars Left Guards (disbanded 1904, refounded 1916)
- Gwreng-ngjars Right Guards (disbanded 1881)
- Dzrjung-tek Guards (disbanded 1854)
- Dais-'an Guards (disbanded 1912)
- Gwrjiang-gar Guards (disbanded 1804, refounded 1936, disbanded 1942)
- Blem-hme' Guards (disbanded 1821, refounded 1936, disbanded 1945)
- Mjeis-lang Guards (disbanded 1803)
- Drjang-nglakw Guards (disbanded 1814)
- Drjang-snjings Guards (disbanded 1855)
- Brjiang-'an Guards (disbanded 1807)
Notes
- ↑ History provides that OF-6 should exist, but since it is unlikely that more than two regiments of Royal Guards would be placed under the same commander, this rank is speculative.