Genghis Khan's strong army formation contributed a lot to building his empire. He put men into arban, units of ten warriors that would be like brothers. He put ten units of arban into a zagun, a unit of 100. Then ten units of zagun made a mingan, a unit of 1,000 men. Lastly he organized ten units on mingan together to form a tumen, a unit of 10,000 men. Tumen were the groups that stayed together on travels to battles or war, and each of these units of men had a leader in charge (52). This army usually stayed tight across the front, but also extremely deep with many men. This was called the Chisel Formation (62). Also, to make his followers more loyal, Genghis slept with his soldiers outside and ate the same food as the soldiers. Genghis Khan's ability to relate to the Mongol citizens and warriors made them more loyal to him.
Genghis Khan's men staying in formation was greatly important in winning battles, but these men were also great in playing tricks and being deceitful. Mongols were taught that there were no rules in fighting and as long as you win, it doesn't matter how you get the results. In one scenario a Mongol warrior took an enemy convoy's clothes and dressed as the enemy to get into the city of Dading. The inside man convinced the city officials that the Mongols had been defeated and the city officials dismantled the cities defenses and called in troops protecting the outside city. Once word of this reached the Mongols, they easily took over the city (93). Also, when a Mongol soldier was in trouble and he was being pursued, the soldier usually carried something valuable to drop so that the enemy would stop chasing the Mongol to get the valuable object. Mongol soldiers were also taught to tie a branch to the tail of their horse to whip up dust in order to make them less visible or to make the enemy think that the Mongols numbers were larger than anticipated (96).
Propaganda played a huge part in Genghis Khan's expansionary of his empire.
