Chapter 452: Today’s trouble, killing the chicken to scare the monkeys
Cao Shuang said helplessly: "The Emperor Wu's victory over Liangzhou was not complete. If we could have done it once and for all and used a better strategy, why would we have trouble today?"
Bai Lingjun smiled and said: "The Emperor Wu probably wanted to do this at the beginning, but due to the great loss of strength in the Battle of Chibi, there was no more troops to control more of Liangzhou.
We can only eliminate the forces like Song Jian who ceded territory and proclaimed themselves emperor first, kill the chickens to scare the monkeys, deter the Hu people, and make Liangzhou more stable."
At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Han Dynasty was weakened, and princes from all over the country took advantage of the situation to compete in the Central Plains.
In this troubled world where princes are fighting each other, all are respected by strength and the big fish eats the small fish, but a very magical separatist force still appears.
This prince only occupied the territory of a county town, and he dared to call himself the king. During this period, he was not annexed by other princes. He used the territory of a county town to divide the territory in troubled times for more than 30 years. This prince is the one who calls himself the King of Han Dynasty at Heshou.
Song Jian.
Song Jian and Dong Zhuo, the later Han thief, were from the same hometown and were both from Liangzhou. However, unlike Dong Zhuo, Song Jian was not a Han, but a Hu. He was the leader of a righteous Hu tribe in Longxi County.
In the first year of Zhongping, Beigong Boyu, the leader of the Qiang and Hu, and Li Wenhou, the leader of the Yihu in Huangzhong, responded to Zhang Jiao's Yellow Turban Uprising and raised troops in Liangzhou to rebel against the Han Dynasty. They also invited Song Jian to join the coalition army.
Facing the invitations from Beigong Boyu and Li Wenhou, Song Jian decided to respond with troops and took advantage of the situation to occupy a county town named Paohan in Longxi County.
What is unexpected is that after occupying Paohan County, the first thing Song Jian did was not continue the campaign to expand his territory, but chose to start the kingship establishment with the territory of a mere county seat.
Song Jian gave himself the title of King of Han Dynasty at Heshou Ping, and also changed the title of the year and appointed hundreds of officials.
With this move, Song Jian broke the Han Dynasty's system of not granting kings with different surnames and became the first king with a different surname in the Eastern Han Dynasty. This seems to mean that Song Jian has great ambitions and leaves no way out for himself.
After all, the kingship system has crossed the bottom line that the Eastern Han Dynasty court can tolerate. Unless Song Jian can expand his power to the point where the court has to compromise, the court will never accept Song Jian's surrender.
However, the fact is exactly the opposite. Compared with other rebels who were fighting for territory at the same time, Song Jian stopped the pace of expansion after occupying Baohan County and acted in a low-key manner.
He closed the door and became a local emperor. Until his power was destroyed later, the only territory Song Jian occupied was the county of Baohan.
At that time, there were countless warlords in Liangzhou, and there were many cases of big warlords annexing small warlords. Under such an environment, how did Song Jian, using the territory of this county, maintain its own forces in these troubled times for more than thirty years?
What about?
In fact, although the territory occupied by Song Jian was small, only one county, his strength was not bad. He had tens of thousands of elite soldiers, and he had defeated the imperial troops who came to conquer on several occasions.
In addition, the land in Liangzhou is barren and sparsely populated, so the warlords in Liangzhou yearn for the rich Guanzhong area.
However, among the Liangzhou warlords, none had the strength to march alone to seize the Guanzhong area.
Faced with this situation, the Liangzhou warlords had no choice but to form a military alliance and unite to advance into the Guanzhong area. They successively confronted the Eastern Han Dynasty court, Li Cui, Guo Si, Cao Cao and other forces. The two sides fought intermittent wars in the Guanzhong area for thirty years.
for many years.
Under such circumstances, although there was acrimony among the coalition forces and they did not trust each other, and there were many wars within the coalition forces, they were able to survive because the Baohan County occupied by Song Jian was on the edge of Liangzhou.
Come down.
However, the good times did not last long. In 214 AD, Cao Cao defeated the Liangzhou coalition led by Han Sui and Ma Chao in the Battle of Weinan, thus advancing into the Liangzhou area.
At this time, Song Jian, who was separatist, also became the target of Cao Cao's elimination, so he ordered Xiahou Yuan to lead an army to attack Song Jian.
Xiahou Yuan was a famous general in the Cao State and was good at running thousands of miles. Before Song Jian could react, Xiahou Yuan led his troops to the city and surrounded Paohan County.
In just over a month, they defeated Song Jian's army, captured Baohan, and beheaded Song Jian and all the civil and military officials he appointed.
A force that had been separatist for more than 30 years in troubled times was wiped out so easily. From this, it seems that they just didn't have the energy and opportunity to deal with Song Jian.
Liangzhou is a place worth mentioning. The "Book of the Later Han" says: "Liangzhou is the most important place in the world and the country's vassal guard." These short ten words can be said to be a better reflection of the importance of Liangzhou.
But in fact, the role of Liangzhou is not only reflected in its geographical location, but also the influence it can have in the context of the time cannot be underestimated.
In today's troubled times, what is the most important thing?
The most critical thing is naturally the population and horses. At that time, Liangzhou was mainly a gathering place for the Qiang people. Thanks to the Xiongnu's westward migration, the Qiang people's survival pressure gradually decreased. In this context, they took advantage of the cold
The state's rich material resources are multiplying faster and faster. While the population base is skyrocketing, the number of high-quality horses is also increasing.
As we all know, the Qiang people can be regarded as a kind of fighting nation. When a nation itself is strong, has a large number of people, and has high-quality horses, in this era, it is a type of resource that can help warlords transform into siege cities and land.
The advantages.
Therefore, Cao Cao has long been eyeing the land of Liangzhou, but he has never taken action.
As for the reason why he didn't take action, it was because there was a faster way to unify the world at that time. Cao Cao was very confident in himself, and he was even more conceited about his luck. At that time, he was sure to win the battle, so he thought he didn't need to
Take Liangzhou’s steady and steady approach.
After the defeat at Chibi, Cao Cao's strategy of unifying the world at a rapid pace had failed. He knew full well that the three kingdoms were already established, so he turned back to deal with Liangzhou, and officially obtained the treasure land of Liangzhou around the 19th year of Jian'an.
Cao Cao conquered Liangzhou so early. It stands to reason that after long-term control, after the establishment of Cao Wei, his rule here should have become more and more stable.
But what is surprising is that Cao Wei has never been able to stabilize in Liangzhou.
When Emperor Wen of the Wei Dynasty Cao Pi first came to the throne, there was "Hu Yijian's prostitutes and concubines in Lushui, Liangzhou, many people in the Yuan Dynasty rebelled, and there was great disturbance in Hexi."
Let’s look at the performance of Liangzhou during Zhuge Liang’s Northern Expedition. It can be said that the instability of Cao Wei’s rule in Liangzhou was fully demonstrated during Zhuge Liang’s Northern Expedition.
Around the second year of Taihe, there is this: "The kingdoms of Liangzhou each sent the Yuezhi, Kangju Huhou was rich, Kangzhi and other more than 20 people came to accept the festival, and the army marched northward.
He wanted to lead his troops and spearhead the attack," and then the three counties of Nan'an, Tianshui, and Anding rebelled and surrendered one after another (what is incredible is that they encountered almost no resistance)...