Chapter 28: When the Stars Shine in the Late Han Dynasty
Sun Quan held a meeting in the rear and completely exposed his purpose to the Jiangdong nobles. Of course, he did not want to rely on his own strength.
He wanted to unite the entire Jiangdong family and send troops to conquer Jingzhou together.
Liu Bei suppressed the aristocratic families in Jingyi, which seriously damaged the interests of the aristocratic families. The aristocratic families in Jiangdong did not dare to seek refuge with Liu Bei, and were also afraid that Liu Bei would annex Jiangdong.
Sun Quan took advantage of this to induce the Jiangdong nobles to contribute money, people, effort and food, forming an interest group to fight against Liu Bei's army.
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So after deciding to send troops, Jiangdong quickly began to make active preparations. The troops and horses were not moved, but food and grass were sent first.
As a result, the major families in Jiangdong committed bloodshed and sent out their private armed forces, led by their generals, to transport grain, grass and supplies and march towards Ruxukou.
Historically, Sun Quan and Guan Yu divided the river to rule, and the main strategic location was Lukou, that is, the area around Chibi.
But now he stretched out his claws several times to plot Jingzhou, but Shen Chen cut off his claws. He even lost the strategically important Lujiang County in Jiangbei, so he now only has two defense points.
One is at Ruxukou, mainly to guard against Cao's army in Huainan.
The other place is in Chaisang, guarding against the Jiangxia Navy and the Xiling Zhao Yun Army located in the north of the Yangtze River.
After Lu Su's death, Yan Yan refused to take over as the governor, so Sun Quan took Lü Meng as the governor and stationed himself in Chaisang, across the river from Zhao Yun's army stationed in Xunyang.
After Lu Meng took office, he immediately sent letters to Huang She and Zhao Yun in a humble manner to express his willingness to make friends. From time to time, he also mentioned Liu Bei and Sun Quan as his relatives, and often went to Xunyang and Xia on the grounds that the two families had a good relationship.
Visit Zhao Yun and Huang She.
His apparent purpose was to pay a visit and establish lasting friendship, but his actual purpose was to personally investigate the deployment of Huang She and Zhao Yunjun.
So now he has figured out the true layout of the Jiangxia navy and the Xiling garrison.
In addition to Ruxukou and Chaisang, Sun Quan also sent Bu Zhi as the governor of Jiaozhou and Sun Jiao as the governor of Guiyang. They were nominally stationed in Guiyang, Jiaozhou to ensure his rule in Jiaozhou, but in reality they were spying on Jingnan.
To take Jingzhou.
After Sun Quan arrived at Ruxukou, he took up command in the rear and constantly dispatched troops and generals. With Pan Zhang, Jiang Qin, Zhou Tai, Ding Feng, Zhu Ran and others as generals, he crossed the southeastern hills by land to increase the number of troops at Chaisang.
At the same time, Xu Sheng and Yu Fan were ordered to lead 8,000 troops from Yuzhang south to reinforce Guiyang, bringing the total military strength of Guiyang to 20,000, so that they could take advantage of the situation and annex Jingnan.
All his plans did not dare to be carried out on the Yangtze River.
Because the Xiling County occupied by Liu Bei is just north of the Yangtze River, all their actions on the Yangtze River will be noticed by Liu Bei's army on the north bank, so he can only transport troops and food from the southeastern hills and mountains. For example, when Shen Chen flooded the east army of Yi,
county.
This is all done in secret.
However, due to the inability to use the Yangtze River to transport grain, his dispatch of grain, grass, troops and horses was relatively slow. It took several months before he could barely stock up on some grain and grass, and there was still a large amount of ordnance materials that needed to be deployed.
Of course, ancient wars did not happen overnight. In order to defeat the Xiongnu, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty relied on the forty years of Wenjing's rule and the accumulation of his previous twenty years.
In order to defeat Cao Cao in the Battle of Guandu, Yuan Shao relied on Wang Fen and Han Fu and later Yuan Shao's hard work for more than ten years.
In addition to accumulating their own resources, they spent a year or even several years just mobilizing troops and horses, transporting grain and grass, raising supplies, etc.
Now it is also a battle for national destiny for Jiangdong.
If he wins, he can annex Jingzhou and establish his own kingdom like Cao Cao's King of Wei and Liu Bei's King of Hanzhong.
If you lose, send it.
Therefore, Sun Quan had to be extremely careful, and the preliminary preparations alone took a long time.
And during the preparation stage, he was not idle and had been doing intelligence work.
Now Sun Quan has placed a large number of spies inside Jingyi. There are countless spies at the bottom who pretend to be ordinary people. At the top there is Sun Shangxiang, the Princess of Han who is forced to obey Liu Bei in everything and pretends to be a virtuous and virtuous person.
The queens of the princes and kings of the Eastern Han Dynasty were princesses, but Liu Bei was crowned king according to the Western Han Dynasty. The ancients paid attention to well-matched families. Mrs. Gan and Mrs. Mi could not be queens due to status issues, so Liu Bei married the daughter of the Wu family of the Yizhou family as his queen. The princess was Sun Shangxiang.
, whose status is second only to the queen.
This also means that in terms of identity and status, Sun Shangxiang is the number three figure in the entire Liu Bei Group, only lower than Liu Bei and Queen Wu. You can imagine how important the information he can steal is.
For example, the true situation of Liu Bei's several troop deployments was the news delivered by her, although it was false news Liu Bei "accidentally" gave her...
However, Liu Bei's several deployments of troops in Jingzhou were all secretive and covert. From the outside, it looked like there were at least 10,000 or 20,000 people guarding Nanjun and Jingnan, but in fact they were all transferred away. Therefore, this tactic was dismissed by Sun Quan.
Seen as an illusion, what Sun Shangxiang detected is the truth.
It was not until October of the 23rd year of Jian'an that after the Huangmen soldiers and Xiliang cavalry returned, Shen Chen slowly withdrew his troops to Ye County and set up camp outside Ye County, forming a confrontation with Cao Hong's army on the opposite side of the city.
momentum.
Cao Hong did not dare to pursue him, so he could only choose to continue camping in Taiting. Moreover, after Shen Chen withdrew his troops, he breathed a sigh of relief and hurriedly prepared food and grass to send to the front line again.
In November of the 23rd year of Jian'an, Cao Cao took the initiative to launch an attack on Guanzhong and personally led the army to Yi County.
Guan Yu withdrew his troops and returned to Baoxie Road.
In December, Cao Cao ordered Xiahou Dun and Yu Jin to continue to be stationed in Wuzhangyuan, leaving Dong Zhao as his military advisor, while he led the main force to attack Xiliang with Zhang He as the vanguard.
Liu Bei moved the people of Xiliang to Hanzhong. In fact, he only moved Han people. A large number of Qiang people still live in Liangzhou.
This was too fatal for Cao Cao.
Because of Ma Chao's relationship, the Qiang people in Liangzhou basically supported Liu Bei, and it was easy for Liu Bei to obtain war horses from them.
Once Liu Bei is allowed to train a large number of cavalry who can come and go freely, the Guanzhong Basin will be greatly threatened.
Although the main force of Cao Cao's army is still infantry, there are also a lot of cavalry.
For example, his son Huang Xuer Cao Zhang, who is thirty years old this year, is now a heroic cavalry general with tens of thousands of elite cavalry under his command. He has also conquered the rebel Wuhuan and Xianbei.
The Guanzhong Plain has an unobstructed view, and the mobility of the cavalry is particularly important. Cao Cao now regards Zuo Fengyi and Hedong County as his rear grain and grass base.
If Liu Bei is equipped with cavalry, attack Zuo Fengyi from Xiaoguandao and harass the rear.
Then Cao Cao will lose his important source of food and grass and be forced to transport food from Guandong. This is obviously a fatal thing. If he is not careful, he may lose Guanzhong.
Therefore, Cao Cao must recapture Xiliang and completely cut off Liu Bei's source of horses.
At the beginning of the 24th year of Jian'an, Cao Cao, who was already sixty-five years old, marched to Jieting. From Jieting to Longxian, Lueyang, Xianqin, Jixian, Wangyuan and other places along the Tianshui, Wu Lan, Yang Huai, Gao and other places
Liu Bei's generals such as Pei, Deng Xian, Leng Bao, Zhang Ren, Liu Quan, Fu Jin, Xiang Cun, etc. will be stationed there.
Cao Cao sent Zhang He as the vanguard, defeated all generals and tribes, killed several Liu Bei generals, shocked Xiliang, and marched to Tianshui City.
Liu Bei was still in Hanzhong at the time. When he heard the news, he immediately came in person.
Under the siege of Cao's army, the Tianshui defenders had no choice but to retreat to Lucheng and formed a stronghold in Lucheng and the surrounding mountains and forests to defend themselves.
Liu Bei led three generals: Zhang Fei, Ma Chao, and Wei Yan, and the rest were Pang De, Zhang Ren, Yan Yan, Huang Quan, Lei Tong, Yang Ren, Kou Feng, Meng Da, Dong Jue, Feng Xi, Zhang Nan, Gao Xiang, and Yang Bai
, Yang Ang and other dozens of generals and an army of 50,000 went to Lucheng to confront Cao's army.
At this time, the lineups of both sides can be said to be very luxurious, with famous players gathered together.
Among the five tiger generals on Liu Bei's side, except Zhao Yun in Xiling and Huang Zhong in Bodao, Guan Yu, Zhang Fei and Ma Chao all participated in the war caused by Cao Cao to seize Xiliang.
In terms of counselors, in addition to the Prime Minister Zhuge Liang who was in charge of Jiangzhou and transported grain and grass to the front line, there were the Prime Minister Pang Tong in the middle, Prime Minister Fazheng on the right, Prime Minister Xu Shu on the left, Jia Xu, the imperial censor, Yang Yi and Deng Zhi, the minister, Ma Liang, the general in charge of industry, and Li Yan, the general in charge of industry.
All are already in the military.
For example, Zuo Prime Minister Xu Shu is currently following Guan Yu in a stalemate with Xiahou Dun and Yu Jin at Xieyuguan, Pang Tong and Li Yan are in charge of grain and grass in Hanzhong, and Liu Bei has gathered Fazheng Jia Xu and others as frontline military staff.
In terms of the number of soldiers and horses, plus the soldiers and horses who retreated from the front line and Guan Yu's army, Liu Bei's army has a total strength of about 120,000.
Cao Cao was no less generous.
The eight tiger riders of the clan, the one-eyed general Xiahou Dun, the tiger-stepping pass right Xiahouyuan, the famous anti-Shu general Cao Zhen, the thousand-mile horse Cao Xiu, and Xiahou Shang, who are both confidants and minions, are here.
Among the five good generals, Yu Jin, Zhang He and Xu Huang all participated in this battle.
Others include Cao Zhang, the Huang Xuer, Xu Chu, the tiger fool, Guo Huai, the governor of the late Cao Wei Dynasty, Zhao Yong, the governor of Yizhou, Huchuquan, the Shanyu of the Southern Huns, and so on.
As for civil servants, there were Zhong Yao, Dong Zhao, Sima Yi, Jiang Ji, Liu Ye, Du Xi, Yang Fu and others.
The main force of Cao Cao's army is about 100,000. There are tens of thousands of soldiers and horses from Xiliang who have returned to Xiliang led by Yan Xing and Yang Fu. Some Wuwan Xianbei Hu cavalry brought from the north, as well as the Guanzhong generals who have defected to Cao Cao, the total army is 170,000.
So many.
Cao Cao actually had an advantage when it came to food and grass.
Because since he moved a large number of people from Liangzhou to Guanzhong, Zuo Fengyi and Hedong County have become his rear granary, where he can farm and grow food.
The harvested grain and grass were sent to Chang'an, and Zhong Yao, the Sili captain who was in charge of Chang'an, sent people to transport the grain and grass to the front line.
On the other hand, Liu Bei could not afford to feed so many people in the Hanzhong Basin, so he could only transport food from the rear.
However, the grain and grass transportation lines in the rear were in long and poor condition. They had to be transported from Jiangzhou, Chengdu and other places from Jinniu Road and Micang Road to Hanzhong, and then from Hanzhong to the front line in Wudu County. The losses were much greater than Cao Cao's.
Therefore, in the battle between Guanzhong and Xiliang, Cao Cao was far more advantageous than Liu Bei.
Soon Cao Jun attacked Lu City.
The northwest wind blows fiercely, and the mountains on both sides are densely forested. It is early spring, and the mountains are full of green.
Liangzhou in the Han Dynasty was not as yellow as the Loess Plateau of Gansu in later generations. The miracle of life bloomed here. It had undulating hills and vast grasslands, which raised countless Han and Qiang people.
In the afternoon of January 16, the 24th year of Jian'an, Cao Cao was riding on horseback, looking at the endless hills in the distance.
What he saw were mountains and ridges that seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see. The grass and trees all over the mountains and plains were swaying in the wind, and the mountains and forests were carved with knives and axes, just like the uncanny workmanship of nature, revealing a kind of rough beauty everywhere.
This is a natural miracle that is not found in Mimi Jiangnan.
Cao Cao looked around, looking at the vast mountains and forests in the distance, and asked to his left and right: "Where is this place?"
Yang Fu, who joined the army as a guide, said: "King Wei, this is Rongqiu Mountain."
Rongqiu Mountain is just south of Lucheng.
After all, Lu City is just a small city and cannot accommodate tens of thousands of troops. Therefore, Liu Bei only deployed a few thousand troops in the city. The main force was deployed in the mountains behind, and the camps stretched for more than ten miles.
And Cao Jun occupied the entire Qishan Road north of Lu City, and a large number of Cao Wei soldiers were looking for a place to camp in the rear.
Zhang He, as the vanguard general, had already reached the outside of Lucheng City and was stationed in a plain open space in the north of the city.
At this time, seeing Cao Cao arriving in person, he hurriedly came to see him.
"King Wei."
Zhang He galloped over and knelt down on one knee in front of Cao Cao.
The army behind Cao Cao was still walking on the road, and the densely packed army began to seize the mountains and plains on his side according to the deployment.
And Zhang He's contribution to their ability to arrive here so smoothly can be said to be very great.
Cao Cao smiled and said: "Come on, Junyi, is there any height here?"
Zhang He stood up, pointed to a hilltop to the east and said, "That mountain is quite high. You can see some of Liu Bei's army's deployment on the mountain behind."
"Introduce the crowd to take a look."
Cao Cao reined in his horse.
At that moment, a group of people went up the mountain.
When we reached the mountain, we were at a high altitude and our view suddenly became clear.
In the distance to the south, I saw mountains lined with trees and a large number of camps built. Banners covered the sky and sun. Flags of Liu, Zhang, Ma and Wei were flying. Soldiers in orange-red Han uniforms were all over the mountains and fields, and their momentum was overwhelming.
Farther away, Cao Cao also saw someone on the cliff above the mountain, looking from a distance, surrounded by countless people and horses behind them, holding umbrellas, and their status seemed to be extremely noble.
"That must be a shoemaker!"
Cao Cao said to the people around him: "This guy is from a humble background, but he dares to claim his fortune!"
Zhang He pointed to the distance and said: "King Wei, that is Qishan Mountain."
Qishan Mountain is a mountain range and a high mountain.
It is located to the north of Qishan Road, geographically closer to Tianshui County.
So every time Zhuge Liang went out of Qishan, he would pass by here and attack Tianshui, Xiliang, Cao Wei.
Cao Cao looked around and saw that the mountain was towering, much higher than the mountain he occupied, but Liu Bei seemed to be overlooking him from the mountain, which made him very unhappy.
However, standing on the top of the mountain and looking at the situation below the mountain, it is indeed very clear.
At this time, Zhang He's vanguard army was stationed outside Lucheng City, and Cao Cao's main army had also arrived, with Xu Chu and Cao Zhang behind him.
Below, Xia Houyuan, Cao Zhen, Cao Xiu, and Xia Houshang arrived with their soldiers and set up several camps.
As a result, the entire mountains and strategic roads around Lucheng, including the city of Lucheng, were divided up by the armies of Liu Bei and Cao Cao.
Various famous generals were like clouds, occupying some hilltops respectively, forming a confrontation between the north and the south.
If you add to this the Guan Yu, Xu Shu, Guan Ping, Xiahou Dun, Yu Jin and others who were confronting each other at the exit of Baoxie Road in the Wuzhangyuan area.
Most of the first-rate generals from Cao Wei and Shu Han gathered here.
For a time, the stars in the late Han Dynasty were shining brightly.