Conscription was based on the ahmudan system, which required local chiefs to supply their predetermined quota of men from their jurisdiction on the basis of population in times of war.

The third, the field levies or conscripts, were usually raised just prior to or during wartime, and provided manpower to resist attacks and project power beyond the boundaries of the empire.

[4] Most of the field levy served in the infantry but the men for the elephantry, cavalry, artillery and naval corps were drawn from specific hereditary villages that specialized in respective military skills.

Gentry youths in Upper Burma were required to serve in the military or non-military service of the king either in the corps of royal pages or in the capital defence regiments.

At a lower social level, tens of thousands of military and non-military were required to serve capital service rotas lasting from several months to three years.

(King Bayinnaung's best and most relied upon general Binnya Dala was an ethnic Mon while many Shan sawbwas led multi-regiment armies throughout Toungoo and Konbaung eras.)

Two long spears were hung on the side of the Howdah to be used in melee [10] While not as pronounced as in Europe and other similar cultures, mounted warriors hold an elite position in Burmese society, "because horses and elephants are worthy of kings; they are excellent things, of power.

But by the mid-17th century, mercenaries, who had proven politically dangerous as well as expensive, virtually had disappeared in favour of cannoneers and matchlockmen in the Burmese military ahmudan system.

Battery subdivisions were commanded by Thwethaukgyis[16] Regular artillerymen seem to have mostly accompanied standing armies; it is likely most men manning defensive positions were recruited locally.

[15] By the mid-18th century, the navy had acquired a few seafaring ships, manned by European and foreign sailors, that were used to transport the troops in Siamese and Arakanese campaigns.

This unit had a thousand men and was commanded by the Hpaungwun whose his second commando was the Hlethin Bo[17] Fireships were used against the British between 1824 and 1825; those were bamboo rafts carrying clay jars filled with cotton and petroleum.

[18] In 1800, Symes noted that Burmese troops wore loose scarlet frocks with conical caps with a plume and drawers reaching below the knees.

In the First Anglo-Burmese War, a Western observer at the Burmese capital noted of the army leaving for the front: "each man was attired in a comfortable campaign jacket of black cloth, thickly wadded and quilted with cotton".

[3] The general strength of the wartime army varied greatly depending on a number of factors: the authority of the king, the population of the territories he controlled, and the season of year.

King Bodawpaya (r. 1782–1819) obliged Burmese merchants plying the Irrawaddy to supply specified quantities of foreign guns and powder in lieu of cash taxes.

[15] The quality gap between locally manufactured guns and European arms continued to widen as new rapid advances in technology and mass production in Europe quickly outstripped the pace of developments in Asia.

[30] By the late 17th century, gunmaking was no longer a relatively simple affair as had been the case with the matchlock but had become an increasingly sophisticated process that required highly skilled individuals and complex machinery.

Bodawpaya had to rely on domestic musket production, which could produce only low-tech matchlocks while the rival Siamese were transitioning to more advanced European and American supplied flintlocks.

In response, the Burmese, led by Crown Prince Kanaung instituted a modernisation drive that saw the foundation of a gun and munitions foundry and a small artillery factory.

The pwe-kyaungs which, in addition to a religious curriculum, taught secular subjects such as astrology, divination, medicine (including surgery and massage), horse and elephant riding, boxing (lethwei) and self defence (thaing).

In contrast to European-style drill and tactical co-ordination, Burmese field forces generally fought in small groups under individual leaders.

They found that the Burmese kings distrusted the vassal states, and instead preferred to rely on the country's numerous toll stations and watchtowers from where messengers could be rushed to the capital.

Two hundred years later, the army's brutal sack of Pegu in 1757 secured the subsequent tribute missions of Chiang Mai, Martaban and Tavoy to Alaungpaya's court.

Alongside Portuguese mercenaries, who formed the army's elite musketeer and artillery corps, indigenous infantry and elephant units also began using guns.

[25] In the 18th and early 19th centuries, the army had helped build the largest empire in mainland Southeast Asia on the back of a series of impressive military victories in the previous 70 years.

The long running wars of the 16th and 18th centuries greatly depopulated the Irrawaddy valley, and correspondingly reduced their later kings' ability to project power in lands most conscripts had never even heard of.

[47] In the flintlock era, mid-18th century, a small French contingent helped the Hanthawaddy garrison at Syriam hold out for 14 months before finally captured by Alaungpaya's forces in 1756.

As a result of their distrust towards the Burmese, the British enforced their rule in the province of Burma mainly with Indian troops later joined by indigenous military units of three select ethnic minorities: the Karen, the Kachin and the Chin.

The Burmans, "the people who had actually conquered by fire and sword half the Southeast Asian mainland", were not allowed to enter the colonial military service.

The recruitment policies are also said to have rankled deeply in the Burman imagination, "eating away at their sense of pride, and turning the idea of a Burmese army into a central element of the nationalist dream".