Nevertheless, the movement for a military ideology was at times the prevailing mode of thought among the men who held power in China. They were able to gain perspective on their own behavior by reference to the old traditions, regarding themselves as upright magistrates in a time of chaos. For working purposes they could claim from their subordinates and superiors a vague constitutionalism limited to army circles. Amid the cowardice, betrayal, and corruption in the military dictatorships, tendencies occasionally appeared leading toward an effective military spirit. Certain kinds of betrayal or cruelty were beyond the limits of good soldiering, but not many. A more effective explanation for the condition of the armies in China from 1916 to about 1931 may be found in _tuchünism_. A _tuchün_ was a military commandant ruling an area ranging from a few districts to a number of provinces.[7] The imperial regime maintained a military counterpart to the provincial governor. After the Republican Revolution provinces tended to become separate and autonomous under military leaders. The military man, who was prone to apologize for his position by admitting that he was not developing a permanent establishment, who held his troops together by a modern feudalism, could also rationalize his role by presenting himself to his province as a good son, by stressing the wickedness and strangeness of the soldiers in other provinces, and by suggesting the thought of federalism. The scheme was not convincing or edifying, but it could become temporarily popular. A great part of the news from China is still written in terms of _tuchünism_--since it is a simple pattern and requires no explanation involving Chinese peculiarities. Satrapies have become tyrannies in all ages. At the very best the _tuchünist_ movement could not have served well as the constituent force of a new China. It would necessarily have ended in one-man government, almost unthinkable with modern Chinese conditions; or it would have implied a military federalism which is scarcely a solution to the problem of unity. Military cliques at times had China-wide proportions, but despite the proclamations which were occasionally issued, there was no effective single movement for a general military regime. Such movements as there were developed within the framework of the shadow Republic. Moreover, the shifting alignments of Chinese wars within the nominal organization of the Republic were so confused as to make almost anything but order seem possible. Yet many Chinese thought in terms of a "realism" compounded of slogans and military exigencies.