Lost Colony tells a fascinating story, engages the Grand Debate, and draws a nuanced conclusion. The “story” focuses on the victory of Koxinga (Zheng Chenggong, 1624–62) over the Dutch, resulting in his conquest of Taiwan, which had been occupied by the Dutch since 1624. Andrade calls this 1661–68 conflict the Sino-Dutch War. A “preamble” introduces the story and its place in the Grand Debate (see below), then three roughly equal main parts are devoted to the narration of the story, and finally a “closing” section extends the events to 1668 and serves as a conclusion. The story has been treated in both Western and Chinese literature. Andrade's contribution, with his admirable mastery of rich Dutch and Chinese sources and meticulous attention to them, lies in dramatizing it (but without reducing its historical authenticity) and presenting it in a monograph. It is a huge success. Lost Colony reads like a historical novel or a screenplay, full of exciting details and colorful figures.
The other significant contribution of Lost Colony is that it integrates military history into the long-standing Grand Debate between the orthodox (some would say “Eurocentric”) and revisionist models of world history. The former stresses European superiority and uniqueness; the latter argues that Asian societies were not unlike European ones and experienced equal dynamism. To revisionists, the Great Divergence (in the words of Kenneth Pomeranz) between Europe and Asia did not take place until 1800.
To incorporate the Sino-Dutch War into this Grand Debate, Andrade introduces two sub-schools, variants of the above-mentioned models. The influential Military Revolution School (represented by Geoffrey Parker) maintains that superior European military technology allowed Europeans to occupy 35 percent of the world's surface prior to 1800. The nascent, Andrade-labeled “Chinese Military Revolution School” argues that a “military revolution” first took place in China and that Ming China was the first “gunpowder empire” in world history; subsequent advanced European gunpowder technology merely expanded options for the Chinese. Andrade emphasizes the Military Revolution as a Eurasia-wide phenomenon and concludes that “developed parts of Asia were progressing along lines quite similar to those in Europe” (pp. 7–12).
Andrade writes that he once believed Europeans possessed no technological edge over Asians, but now views the renaissance fortress and broadside sailing ship as two unique European advantages, as evidenced by 1,200 Dutch soldiers holding Zeelandia castle against a tenfold larger Zheng army for nine months and the Chinese dread of Dutch broadside ships. On the other hand, Andrade challenges (but does not destroy) the idea of the uniqueness of Europe's “way of war”—European troops were better drilled and disciplined—by showing that Koxinga's troops were much better drilled, disciplined, and led and eventually defeated the Dutch (see especially part three).
Weaving the Sino-Dutch War into the Grand Debate, Andrade adopts a nuanced, middle-ground approach between the two models of world history: Asian societies were more similar to than different from European societies or, in other words, Eurasian societies were developing along similar lines; but “European societies were developing more quickly.” The Great Divergence between East and West from 1800 on, in Andrade's opinion, was not a sudden one, but a small, accelerating divergence starting in the 1500s (pp. 14–15).
This approach is stimulating, as it may urge both sides to consider a middle way. It remains to be seen how Grand Debaters will react, but surely Lost Colony will push “Clio in arms” (John A. Lynn's term for military history) to a more central place in the Grand Debate. Economic historians probably will challenge Lost Colony as too tiny an example for too big an issue. The Sino-Dutch War is military history, while the Grand Debate involves mostly social, economic, and technological (other than military) aspects. Social and economic historians, especially on the Asian side, will ask how a case derived from military history applies to other aspects of early modern Asian societies. Indeed, Lost Colony stops at military matters. Advances in military technology may or may not go hand-in-hand with socioeconomic development, and sometimes the two diverge (China between the 1680s and 1839 is a telling example).
While Lost Colony commendably adopts a global approach, more attention to the goings-on in neighboring regions would have made its argument even stronger. Andrade claims “very little” has been done on wars between Europe and Asia (p. 12; cf. p. 154). As a matter of fact, some interesting and important studies have been done, at least on Southeast Asia, by Charles Boxer in 1964, Denys Lombard in 1967, Anthony Reid in 1982 (entitled Europe and Southeast Asia: The Military Balance!), and Pierre-Yves Manguin in 1988. Islamic states such as Johor, Jepara, and especially Aceh in maritime Southeast Asia launched twelve assaults on Portuguese Malacca between 1513 and 1629. All failed, with Aceh losing 19,000 of 20,000 troops in 1629 (basically, a century-long attack failed to dislodge the Portuguese, whom Andrade terms the “Sick Man of Maritime Asia” in a separate article); in both 1628 and 1629, Java-based Mataram launched attacks (the siege in 1629 lasted more than one month) on Dutch Batavia (modern Jakarta) but failed twice. Why? Superior European broadside ships and, especially, renaissance fortresses (and native alliances)! These invaluable comparative cases offer better examples of European military superiority. Unfortunately, they were not consulted.
Lost Colony is not meant as a history of (gunpowder) technology, but more engagement with technological aspects would have enhanced it. For example, weapons and warships such as “deer gun” (luchong 鹿銃), “cannon boat” (gongchuan 熕船), etc. are simply not mentioned; terms such as “bassen,” “doppelhaggen,” “huang 癀,” and “bird gun” (pp. 131, 133, 244–45, 308, 382 n.27) are not explained; novices in gunpowder technology would not know that “muskets” during this time referred to matchlock guns; and the term “rifle” (p. 275) is an anachronism. Though the book is relatively richly illustrated, ample archaeological finds of Zheng and Dutch gunpowder weapons (cannon particularly) are not pictured. Other deficiencies include typos and a sparse index.
Overall, Lost Colony is ambitiously theorized, well researched, stimulatingly argued, and beautifully written. Those interested in Chinese, Asian, military, and global history will find it fruitful, stimulating reading. In terms of Asian military history, Lost Colony is another excellent addition to accomplishments over the last decade by scholars on South, Southeast, and East Asia, but military history of Asia still lags behind that of Europe. A genuine global (non-Eurocentric and non-Asiacentric) military history is one step closer due to Lost Colony.
