freenovelworld Chapter 191 The Warring States Era
Chapter 191 The Warring States Era
In order to maintain his power, Han Tuozhou decided to launch a northern expedition to recover the lost territory. The great poets Xin Qiji and Lu You strongly supported this northern expedition, but the final result was disappointing.
In 1206 AD, Han Tuozhou launched the Kaixi Northern Expedition, divided his troops into three routes, and was completely defeated. Sichuan and Wuxi rebelled, and the situation became increasingly unfavorable to Han Tuozhou.
Soon, Shi Miyuan and Empress Yang colluded with the imperial guards and kidnapped Han Tuozhou on the way to court and killed him. Empress Yang cried and made a scene, which made Ningzong no longer pursue the matter of beheading the ministers without permission and instead let Shi Miyuan take over Han Tuozhou's position. Thus, the third powerful prime minister of the Southern Song Dynasty came on the stage.
The third one: Shi Miyuan. Shi Miyuan also came from a prominent family. He was the son of Shi Hao, a famous prime minister of the Southern Song Dynasty. He gained the trust of Emperor Ningzong and his wife by maintaining a good relationship with Empress Yang's brother.
After Shi Miyuan came to power, he sent Han Tuozhou's mobile phone to the Jin Kingdom and reached a new agreement with the Jin Kingdom. He tried to win over the people by rehabilitating the Qingyuan Party members, but Shi Miyuan's ambition was greater than Han Tuozhou's.
After Shi Miyuan came to power, he controlled the appointment and dismissal of important officials. People in the court and the public had to curry favor with Shi Miyuan to get a good job. Ningzong's adopted son Zhao Yun was indignant about this and pointed to the map and said, "I will exile Shi Miyuan to Qiongzhou in the future."
After hearing about this, Shi Miyuan found Zhao Yun from the royal family as a backup and secretly planned a coup. Soon, Ningzong suddenly became seriously ill. Shi Miyuan was relieved, and Empress Yang forged an imperial edict to make Zhao Yun the emperor, who was Song Lizong. In October, he continued to rule with absolute power. In 1233 AD, Shi Miyuan died at the age of 69. He was posthumously named King of Wei and given the posthumous title of Zhongxian.
Fourth: Jia Sidao Jia Sidao is also known as the Cricket Prime Minister. Jia Sidao also relied on nepotism to rise to power. He was the younger brother of Consort Jia of Emperor Lizong of Song Dynasty, and relied on his sister's relationship to rise to prominence.
In 1259, Jia Sidao made great contributions in the Battle of Ezhou and was granted the title of Duke and Prime Minister. However, after Jia Sidao came to power, he implemented the Planning Law and the Public Land Law. His original intention was to reform the internal affairs, but it was undoubtedly a disaster for the Southern Song Dynasty, which was on the verge of bankruptcy.
The plan was to audit the army, but Jia Sidao took the opportunity to exclude dissidents and expel a large number of capable generals. He forced Liu Zheng to rebel, adding fuel to the demise of the Southern Song Dynasty, and the public land law made people angry.
The original intention of the public land law was to buy the land of the landlords and then rent it to the poor farmers. However, due to severe inflation, the paper money used by the court to buy land was almost equivalent to waste paper. In addition, the large landlords concealed their land, the small landlords had no land to sell, and the tenants were exploited by corrupt officials, making the crisis of the already precarious Southern Song Dynasty even more serious.
Jia Sidao had lost all support for his actions. In 1275, he was killed at the age of 63. The following year, the Yuan army invaded Lin'an and the Southern Song Dynasty fell.
[Understand the history of the Warring States Period in one breath: famous generals and emperors of the Warring States Period]
This was an era of heroes, countless classic battles, more than 140 countries, more than 1000 wars, and various princes vying for the top spot.
With the strategic maneuvers of Zhang Yi and Su Qin, and the mutual conquests of Sun Bin and Bai Qi, the military thought and strategy and tactics during this period were hundreds of years ahead of the world. This video will help you understand the Warring States Period in one go.
After Han, Zhao and Wei divided Jin, China entered the Warring States Period. Wei Wenhou, the founding monarch of Wei, appointed Li Kui as prime minister and first implemented reforms.
He reformed politics, rewarded farming and warfare, and built water conservancy projects, which enabled the Wei economy to develop rapidly. He also appointed Wu Qi to carry out military reforms and created a highly professional military force during the Warring States Period - the Wei Wuzu.
In 389 BC, the Qin State raised an army of 50 to attack the Wei State, but Xihe County was defeated by 5 Wei Wuzu led by Wu Qi. Since then, the Wei State has dominated the Central Plains.
In 386 BC, Tian He, the powerful prime minister of Qi, exiled Duke Kang of Qi to the sea and established himself as the king. He then imitated the Three Families Dividing Jin and made the Zhou emperor confer him the title of Marquis of Qi. Qi history records that Tian replaced Qi. After Duke Kang of Qi died, Tian replaced Jiang Taigong and the worship of him ceased.
Soon after Wei Wenhou died, two things happened in Wei State that changed the course of history: first, his son Wei Wuhou, who succeeded him, forced Wu Qi, who was more accomplished than him, to leave; second, his grandson Wei Huiwang appointed Pang Juan as a general.
After Wu Qi fled to Wei, he went to Chu. King Dao of Chu placed him in a high position and started a drastic reform in Chu. In seven years, Chu's national power increased dramatically, but Wu Qi's reforms caused resentment among the nobles of Chu.
With the death of King Dao of Chu, Wu Qi was also killed by the nobles of Chu, and the reform came to an end. Although Chu lost the opportunity to dominate the Central Plains, it also established its status as a powerful country.
Pang Juan and Sun Bin were originally brothers who studied under Guiguzi at the same time. Later, Pang Juan became a general of the Wei State. Out of jealousy towards Sun Bin, he fabricated a crime and cut off his feet.
Later, Sun Bin fled to Qi State, where he was appreciated by Qi General Tian Ji, who accepted him as his retainer. In 354 BC, Wei State attacked Zhao State, but Sun Bin's strategy of "wei wei jiu zhao" easily resolved the situation and defeated the Wei army.
Soon, Wei attacked Han again. Sun Bin used the same trick again and led his army to attack Wei's capital Daliang. On the way back, the Wei army was ambushed by Sun Bin at Ma Ling Road. 10 elite soldiers were wiped out, and Pang Juan committed suicide to apologize. Wei lost its hegemony from then on.
In 359 BC, Gongsun Yang began to implement reforms with the support of Duke Xiao of Qin. He issued the Order of Moving Trees and Establishing Trust, and it took him 19 years to make Qin another superpower after Wei.
Because it laid a solid foundation for the Qin Dynasty to unify the world, and later Qin Xiaogong granted the Shang land to Gongsun Yang, later generations also called him Shang Yang.
After the Battle of Maling Road, Wei was defeated and Qin and Chu continued to attack Wei. So King Hui of Wei appointed Zhang Yi, who had been the prime minister of Qin, to preside over state affairs and planned to implement a plan to unite Qin and Han to attack Qi and Chu, which was known in history as Lianheng.
But Zhang Yi's strategy of "lianheng" was actually to make Wei submit to Qin first and let other vassal states follow suit.
King Hui of Wei refused, so he drove Zhang Yi back to Qin and appointed Zhang Yi's political enemy Gongsun Yan. After Gongsun Yan came to power, he immediately began to unite the seven states of Chu, Qi, Zhao, Han, Yan in the east and Yiqu in the west to attack Qin, and nominated King Huai of Chu as the leader, which was known as the Hezong. However, due to the different intentions of the states, the coalition was defeated and the Hezong soon failed.
In 313 BC, the State of Qin planned to attack the State of Qi, but was worried that Qi and Chu had already formed a coalition alliance, so it sent Zhang Yi to the State of Chu to lobby King Huai of Chu, using the lie that Qin was willing to offer 600 li of land in the Shangyu area to alienate the alliance between Qi and Chu. However, the 600 li was later changed to 6 li. King Huai of Chu was furious and sent troops to attack Qin, but the Chu army was defeated in Danyang.
Later, Zhang Yi persuaded Zhao, Yan and Qin to form an alliance and directly swallow up the Fangcheng area of Chu. King Huai of Chu announced that Qu Yuan had been deceived by his advice, detained, and finally died in Qin. From then on, the state of Chu declined.
In 293 BC, in order to open a passage to the Central Plains to the east, the State of Qin sent General Bai Qi to lead the Qin army to attack Yique. In this battle, the 24-strong coalition army of Han and Wei was completely wiped out. The elite troops of the two countries of Han were almost completely lost and they were no longer able to resist the eastward advance of Qin.
But at this time, the originally weak Zhao State began to rise again, and the newly enthroned King Wuling of Zhao began to implement the Hu clothing and horse riding reform across the country.
In order to adapt to the needs of cavalry warfare, he changed the wide-sleeved long robes of the Central Plains into short, tight-sleeved Hu clothing, changed the traditional chariot soldiers into cavalry, and changed chariot warfare into mobile warfare, which greatly enhanced the military strength of Zhao and became a new obstacle to Qin's eastward development.
In order to attack Zhao, King Zhao of Qin sent people to Qi to make an agreement with King Min of Qi, with him as the Western Emperor and him as the Eastern Emperor, preparing to unite the five countries to attack Zhao. However, Qin's wishful thinking was discovered by Su Qin, the prime minister of Yan.
He first persuaded King Min of Qi to give up the idea of becoming emperor and to send troops to weaken his power. He also persuaded the five states of Yan, Han, Wei, and Zhao. In the end, Su Qin was given the seals of the six states and attacked Qin together. Qin was defeated and was forced to cede land to Wei and Zhao in exchange for peace. After that, Zhao's famous generals Zhao She and Lian Po and famous prime minister Lin Xiangru appeared one after another, and Qin was unable to set foot in Zhao for more than 10 years.
While Qin and the Central Plains countries were fighting fiercely, Yan, far to the north, rose quietly. Because it was located at the northernmost tip, it was threatened by nomadic tribes such as Linhu and Donghu in the north, and it bordered Qi, so it had been bullied by Qi for many years.
When King Zhao of Yan came to the throne, he began to work hard to revive the State of Yan and recruited talented people from all over the world. He ordered people to build a high platform on the bank of the Yi River and placed a thousand taels of gold as a gift to the talented people who came to join him. This high platform was the famous Golden Platform.
The result was that wise men from various countries rushed to Yan State, and Yan State quickly gathered a large number of talents in various fields. The most famous among them was Le Yi from Wei State. He was appointed as the second prime minister by King Zhao of Yan and began to carry out a series of reforms in the political, economic, and military fields of Yan State. Le Yi's reforms gradually enabled Yan State to embark on the path of enriching the country and strengthening the military.
In 283 BC, King Zhao of Yan sent General Qin Kai to lead an army to conquer the Donghu. Qin Kai's army advanced from the Guishui River Basin to the Chaobai River Basin in Miyun from west to east, breaking through the barriers and conquering the plains along the way, and drove the Donghu to the upper reaches of the present-day Xiliao River.
Qin Kai then mobilized residents to repair the Great Wall, and built the more than 2000-kilometer-long Northern Great Wall of Yan State. Yan State's land area also jumped to become the third largest country after Qin and Chu.
In 286 BC, the Song State, which was surrounded by enemies, was in civil strife. King Min of Qi took the opportunity to raise troops to destroy Song State and attempted to expand into the Central Plains. Although this move brought Qi State to its peak, it also intensified its conflicts with Qin and Zhao, and posed a serious threat to Han, Wei, and Chu.
As a result, the conflicts among the countries in the region became extremely acute. King Zhao of Yan took the opportunity to send people everywhere and finally reached an alliance with other countries to attack Qi. The coalition forces of Yan, Zhao, Qin, Wei and Chu, led by Le Yi, defeated the Qi army in Jixi. Then he led the Yan army all the way to capture 72 cities of Qi, until he captured Linzi, the capital of Qi, and collected the treasures looted from the palaces, temples and royal family of Qi and returned them to Yan. This was called the "Le Yi Attack on Qi". Qi never recovered from this.
At this time, the Qin State had developed into the most powerful country in the world since the reforms of Shang Yang during the reign of King Xiaogong of Qin. After more than 100 years of efforts by four generations of monarchs, King Huiwen, King Wu and King Zhaoxiang of Qin, the Qin State had become the most powerful country in the world at that time.
In 279 BC, the killer Bai Qi led the Qin army eastward along the Han River and headed straight for the Chu capital Yingcheng, opening the prelude to the Qin's war of unification. The Qin army marched straight in, quickly captured various important towns along the Han River, and reached the Chu capital Yancheng.
The Chu State gathered a large force in Yancheng in an attempt to stop the Qin army from advancing southward. After Bai Qi failed to capture Yancheng after a long siege, he built a dike a hundred miles west of Yancheng to store water and built a long canal directly to Yancheng, diverting the Han River to flood the city, drowning hundreds of thousands of residents.
The next year, Bai Qi led his army to capture the Chu capital Yingcheng. The frightened King Qingxiang of Chu was forced to move the capital to Chen. In this battle, Qin gained a large amount of territory from Chu. The patriotic poet Qu Yuan, who witnessed the country's gradual demise, committed suicide by jumping into the Miluo River. Chu also declined due to the loss of a large amount of territory and population. From then on, both sides declined, and the world became a situation of competition between Qin and Chu.
In 271 BC, King Zhao of Qin established the national policy of making friends with distant countries and attacking nearby countries as proposed by his guest minister Fan Ju. He began to send people to make peace with Qi and Chu, and then aimed his attack at neighboring countries such as Zhao and Wei.
Two years later, King Zhaoxiang of Qin wanted to send troops to attack Zhao, but Bai Qi was ill at that time, so he sent General Hu Yang, who had the same fighting characteristics as Bai Qi, to lead the troops.
Hu Yang led the Qin army from west to east across Shangdang County of Han State, and directly penetrated Yanyu, which was less than 300 miles away from Handan, the capital of Zhao State. However, Hu Yang only surrounded Yanyu and did not attack the city immediately, but divided his troops to attack Wu'an, which was less than miles away from Handan. This move was deeply influenced by Bai Qi, and the intention was not to capture the city, but to annihilate the enemy's living forces.
King Huiwen of Zhao was caught off guard and urgently summoned his generals Lian Po and Le Cheng to ask if they could rescue the city. Both of them believed that Yanyu was too far from Handan and the road was rugged and dangerous, making it difficult to rescue the city.
Only the great general Zhao She believed that “the road is long, dangerous and narrow, only the brave general will win”, so Zhao She led his army to Yanyu in a hurry, kept his troops in place for 28 days to encourage Yanyu to become arrogant and underestimate the enemy, and then launched a sudden attack when the enemy was surprised.
Zhao She first occupied the strategic Beishan Mountain, waiting for the Qin army to attack. As a result, the Qin army was defeated. The main general Hu Yang was beheaded, and the myth of the Qin army's invincibility was broken. Zhao She became famous in this battle and became one of the eight famous generals of the six eastern countries. This is the allusion of "the brave wins when two meet on a narrow road".
Eight years later, the Qin army returned and the Battle of Changping broke out. After Zhao general Lian Po was defeated by Qin general Wang He, he began to build fortresses, clear the fields and confront the Qin army.
King Xiaocheng of Zhao believed that Lian Po's morale was low and he would not go to war. The Prime Minister of Qin, Fan Ju, took the opportunity to send people to Zhao to spread rumors that Lian Po was easy to deal with and that the person Qin was most afraid of was Zhao Kuo, the son of the general Zhao She. King Xiaocheng of Zhao believed it and sent Zhao Kuo to replace Lian Po as the main general. After Qin learned the news, it also quietly replaced the main general with Bai Qi.
Bai Qi took advantage of Zhao Kuo's weakness of youth and adopted a strategy of feigning defeat and retreating, luring the enemy out of their positions, and then dividing and encircling them, cutting off the Zhao army's food supply. As a result, a large number of Zhao soldiers either starved to death or died due to failure to break out, and the soldiers even began to kill each other for food. Zhao Kuo was also shot dead by the Qin army during his breakout. The Zhao army, which had lost its leader and suffered heavy casualties, was unable to fight again and could only surrender to Bai Qi.
As a result, Bai Qi ordered all the Zhao soldiers who surrendered to be buried alive, leaving only 240 young soldiers to be sent back to Zhao. In this battle, about 45 Zhao soldiers were beheaded and buried alive. Zhao was seriously injured and could no longer fight against the Qin army. The Battle of Changping was the last turning point in the history of the Warring States Period. From then on, the unification of Qin was only a matter of time.