The military song of China is a Chinese patriotic song that dates back to the formation of the New Armies of the late Qing Dynasty. The succeeding Chinese regimes recycled the music and changed the lyrics.
In urban legend, the music was taken from the Prussian March of the Emperor Wilhelm II which can' be found in Armeemarschsammlung. The original Qing lyrics were commissioned by Zeng Guofan for the Xiang Army. The same lyrics were used during the Yuan Shikai regime and known as the Soldier's Training Song.
After the Xinhai Revolution, the lyrics were changed again and continued to be used by the Chinese military. A well known variant was the National Revolution Army Song.
The Communists reworded the song into the Land Revolution Is Successful. A further modification transformed the song into Three Rules and Eight Notices, which is the best known form today. The latest lyrics is an extension of Zeng Guofan's version, adding additional rules to further inspire soldiers' discipline.
At the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, the music was used in the presence of representatives of the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China.
Famous quotes containing the words military and/or china:
“In all sincerity, we offer to the loved ones of all innocent victims over the past 25 years, abject and true remorse. No words of ours will compensate for the intolerable suffering they have undergone during the conflict.”
—Combined Loyalist Military Command. New York Times, p. A12 (October 14, l994)
“In a country where misery and want were the foundation of the social structure, famine was periodic, death from starvation common, disease pervasive, thievery normal, and graft and corruption taken for granted, the elimination of these conditions in Communist China is so striking that negative aspects of the new rule fade in relative importance.”
—Barbara Tuchman (1912–1989)