In the dispute of the Three Kingdoms in the late Han Dynasty for more than 60 years, although the alliance between Sun Liu and Cao Cao became the main line, this alliance was not stable. , Shu attack, Wu attack, you come and go between the three countries, and you have a very lively time.
In 22 1 year, Liu Bei made a massive expedition to the west on the grounds of "revenge for Guan Yu". This is the fourth direct conflict between the two countries after the capture of Mrs. Sun in 2 1 1 year, the demarcation of Xiangjiang River in 2 15 year and the sneak attack on Jingzhou in 2 19 year.
In order to win this battle, Liu Bei even put the political slogan of "restoring the Han Dynasty" behind him and sent someone to write a letter to Cao Pi, who usurped the Han Dynasty: "I am going to hear about the death of Cao Gong, and I will send Han Ran a letter of condolence and give it to him", and I took the initiative to show my kindness to Cao Wei.
The reflection of Moon Hee recorded Sun Quan's report when he asked Cao Wei for help. "Liu Bei has 40,000 troops and 23,000 horses, leaving Zigui." These 40 thousand people are the main force under Liu Bei's personal command. If you add the barbarian soldiers transferred by Ma Liang from Wuxi, the 10,000 water army that arrived in Yiling in advance, and more than 10,000 people defending Cao Wei in Jiangbei, Liu Bei's total strength is 60,000.
The purpose of Liu Bei's attack on Wu is not only to restore Jingzhou's territory, but to completely eat each other like Cao Cao before Battle of Red Cliffs. This is Liu Bei's public denial of Zhuge Liang's established strategy of attacking Wei with Wu, and he turned to destroy Wu first to realize the rule of crossing the river with Cao Wei, and then attack Wei. Therefore, in the face of Sun Quan's request, Liu Beiyan refused.
However, when he was in Battle of Red Cliffs 13 years ago, Cao Cao used as many as 200,000 troops, including Cao Cao's own troops15,000 and Liu Biao's troops of 70,000. Although Zhou Yu tried to belittle Cao Jun's fighting power in his exhortation to Sun Quan, he also had to admit that "today, with a solid school, his department has only 150,000 or 60,000 people in China, and the army has been exhausted for a long time and the income is extremely high."
As a result, as we all know, Battle of Red Cliffs and Cao Cao's 200,000 men were defeated by Zhou Yu's 30,000 men and Liu Bei's 20,000 men, and they fled north in haste. Of course, this is not the entire army of Wu Dong. As early as in Longzhong Dui, Zhuge Liang once said that "Sun Quan has been based in Jiangdong for three generations", and Sun Quan also mentioned to Zhuge Liang that "I can't raise the whole land of Wu, and hundreds of thousands of people are subject to people".
Before Liu Bei launched the Yiling War, the total strength of Wu Dong had reached 1000000, which experienced a great victory in Chibi and a prosperous period of more than ten years. This number will only be more than less.
Liu Bei is a witness of Battle of Red Cliffs, and he has a clear understanding of Wu Dong's strength. Since Cao Cao's 200,000 men couldn't win, why did Liu Bei dare to attack Wu with 60,000 men?
Of course, there are many wars in history in which the number of troops exceeds the number, and we can't simply judge the winning rate of the war by the number of troops, but the war in the era of cold weapons is consumption, and without certain strength support, it is tantamount to ants swallowing elephants.
1, bamboo slips of Zoumalou
During 1996, 65,438+10,000 bamboo slips of Wu Dong were unearthed in Zoumalou, Changsha, Hunan, covering many fields, such as military politics, judicature and nationality. In the bamboo slips numbered 6-2099, the following records were found: "In the 24th year of Jian 'an, a surname wrote a letter to General Lv Dai, and Li Yu's soldiers rebelled against Wuling and Changsha from beginning to end ... The old officer in the army was thirty-nine years old, and he rebelled on April 18th, four years in Jiahe ..."
As we all know, when the Xiangjiang River was demarcated in 2 15, Changsha County was assigned to Wu Dong, but it was not until the 24th year of Jian 'an (2 19) that Changsha under Wu Dong continued its rebellion, and the rebels publicly responded to Guan Yu. Even in the fourth year of Jiahe (235), there were still military attache defections.
If we combine with the record in the History of the Three Kingdoms that "Liu Bei led the army to attack until Wushan and Zigui ... all counties and people in Wuxi turned against Shu", we will come to a conclusion that Soochow's rule in Jingzhou is not stable and its influence always exists. This is one of Liu Bei's advantages in attacking Wu.
2, straight 105 baht
Zhi 105 baht is a large number of virtual coins cast by Liu Bei after he entered Shu, that is, the value of a five-baht is equal to the past 100 baht. This is a "loss trick" to grab wealth by issuing additional money to transfer inflation. However, more than 700 years after/kloc-0, archaeological experts found that among the 4,000 coins unearthed in Wu Dong during the Three Kingdoms period, 98% were Shu-Han copper coins such as 150 baht, and Wudong copper coins were only 50.
Even in Zhu Ran's tomb where Guan Yu was captured and killed by Lu Meng, there are a large number of Shu and Han coins of 150 baht. But strangely, Wu Dong coins were not found in the archaeological excavations of Shu Han tombs.
This means that the huge amount of Shu-Han coins discovered by Soochow is not the normal trade flow under the state of Wu-Shu alliance, but the erosion of the "finance" of Soochow by Shu-Han monetary system. It's a bit like Zimbabwe having to give up its currency and use the US dollar because of high inflation.
The direct consequence of this phenomenon is that the right to cast Wu Dong is in the hands of Shu Han. If Wu and Shu become enemies, they will stop exporting 150 baht, return to barter status, and the supply of military supplies will be seriously affected.
At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, because of the long-term war, the people did not trust the new currency. The 150 baht made by Liu Bei took the lead in seizing the market and became a "hard currency" because of its excellent technology and stable currency value. Sun Quan later published 500 complete works of Wu Dong, but the people didn't buy it, and later had to abolish it.
It can be seen that Liu Bei insisted on the western expedition to Wu despite the opposition of Zhao Yun and others, precisely because he had a clear understanding of the advantages and disadvantages, so he was confident that tens of thousands of people could realize the plan of swallowing Wu. As for the fiasco of Yiling, it was not a lack of troops, but improper tactical measures. Of course, this is another story.