Speaking of outstanding figures in ancient Chinese military affairs, Zhuge Liang, the Shu Han chancellor in the Three Kingdoms period, and Han Xin, a famous general in the early years of the Western Han Dynasty, these two are well-known military talents. Their achievements in military theory and practice have been passed down through the ages.
According to historical records, in the early years of the Shu Han Dynasty, Zhuge Liang led the Northern Expedition many times, but these wars ended in failure. Some people are curious: if Han Xin traveled through the Three Kingdoms period and replaced Zhuge Kongming to command the Shu army to conquer the State of Wei in the north, then would Shu Han be able to achieve victory?
In fact, if Han Xin himself personally commanded the Northern Expedition of the Shu Army, the chances of Shu Han winning the victory could be said to be very large. As for the reasons, there are mainly the following three points:
There are specializations in the art industry
Although Zhuge Kongming and Han Xin are both talents with superior intelligence, but just as the so-called "hearing the Tao has a priority, the art has a specialty", a person cannot do everything, there are always places where his ability is outstanding, and there are also aspects of his relative weakness.
In the military field, Han Xin's talent was far higher than Zhuge Liang's. Compared with the military, Zhuge Kongming is actually best at political planning. The highlight of his life was to assist Liu Bei and Liu Chan in handling political affairs and stabilizing and strengthening the Shu Han regime.
As a courtier, although Zhuge Liang had certain military talents, he was indeed slightly inferior to someone like Han Xin who specialized in the military field. He was responsible for both military and political work in the Shu Han clique, not only to do Xiao He's things, but also to carry out Han Xin's tasks.
No one is perfect, and no matter how clever and resourceful Zhuge Liang is, he cannot become a top figure in both fields at the same time. A courtier who should have been in the imperial court was used as a general, which can be said to be an important reason why Zhuge Kongming repeatedly went on the Northern Expedition and repeatedly lost battles.
Compared with Zhuge Liang, who was more skilled in civil rule, Han Xin was born in the ranks of the army in a serious manner, and he had extremely rich combat experience, once secretly attacking Zhang Handan by Chen Cang, and defeating Chen Yu in a battle against the water, all of which fully demonstrated his actual war achievements.
Han Xin's love of the military is unparalleled. When he was a fallen nobleman and too poor to eat, he was reluctant to exchange the broken sword on his body for food.
Later, he became a nameless pawn who could not be reused under Xiang Yu's account, and he was fortunate to be recommended by Xiao He to occupy a high position, thinking only in his heart, "I serve the king as a national soldier, and the monarch treats me as a national soldier", and what he wants to do is that the contemporary national soldier is unmatched.
Han Xin specialized in military studies and was praised by later generations as a "soldier immortal". He compiled his own program for governing the army, which could quickly recruit new soldiers, reorganize the army and put them on the battlefield, and form a command system of its own.
The tactics of war are different
In addition to their military capabilities, the two men's completely different military strategies were also an important factor affecting whether they could win the Battle of wei in the Northern Expedition. In terms of war strategy, Zhuge Liang was an outstanding representative of the conservatives, while Han Xin belonged to the more daring radicals.
Zhuge Liang himself was a very cautious and cautious person, so his military strategy was also to adopt a conservative approach step by step. Zhuge Liang followed the steps every time he fought a battle, and was unsurprisingly defeated by the more powerful Wei army.
As a good soldier, Sima Yi judged the battle situation very accurately. Therefore, it seems to be suppressed by Zhuge Liang on the battlefield, but in fact, he knows that the combat endurance of the Shu army is not strong, so he relies on the strength of most of the Wei state as a backing, thus consuming the combat ability of the other side for a long time.
It can be said that Zhuge Liang's old opponent Sima Yi was well versed in Zhuge Liang's character characteristics, accurately grasped this weakness of Zhuge Liang and chose the strategy of only defending and not attacking, and finally defeated Zhuge Liang's troops.
Han Xin was a very bold military, and if he went to the Three Kingdoms to lead the Shu army to attack the State of Wei without scruples, it would not be a way to win.
However, Shu Han's own strength was already very weak, and in order to meet its ambition to dominate the world, a conservative style of combat was completely insufficient.
Only by adopting the method of surprise attack to win a surprise victory can we turn the passive situation into the initiative on the battlefield and thus win the victory of the weak over the strong.
Han Xin's unique combat style
Compared with other military experts, Han Xin's fighting style can be said to be unscrupulous, there is no rule, and he does not play cards according to the routine at all. Such a style is often very advantageous on the battlefield, after all, "know each other, win every battle", if the other party does not know their next strategy, it is very conducive to hitting him unexpectedly.
Of course, Han Xinbing seems to be chaotic but in fact has its own wonderful points, he is not acting arbitrarily, but according to the conditions of the times and local conditions, he has done a good job of improvisation.
Don't underestimate this kind of martial art, in terms of leading soldiers to fight, being able to achieve this level is actually the level of the pyramid. One of the keys to the military aspect is "first to be invincible", that is to say, to minimize their own flaws and maintain sufficient resilience in order to grasp the initiative well.
For the general, the most valuable thing is judgment. Han Xin was always able to find the right information and give instructions from the mess, which was very valuable under the extremely backward information and communication conditions of ancient times.
In contrast, Mr. Zhuge Liang was too concerned about his own merits when fighting. His forward-looking, backward-looking, dragging mud and water personality always implicated the Shu Han army to follow, and it was inevitable that he would lose the battle.
In addition, Han Xin likes to fight fast battles, fully mobilize all the energy of his opponents and then devote themselves to one battle. If he was leading the Northern Expedition, he would definitely be suspicious of the army, using the trail to move Cao Zhen and Zhang Gao to a position favorable to himself, and then cut the opponent's key point with a large force.
This style of play was more suitable for the national strength and military strength of the Shu Han Dynasty than Zhuge Liang's war of attrition. Compared with the strength of the two armies at that time, the method of fast warfare and mobile warfare was far better than slow warfare, and it was more certain to win a victory.
All in all, as one of the three masters of the original Han Dynasty, Han Xin can be regarded as an unmatched height in terms of military merit. I think that in that year, he had defeated Chen Yu's hundreds of thousands of elite soldiers and horses with an army of 30,000 old and weak, which can be said to be a model and a good achievement in the history of war.
Zhuge Liang attacked Chen Cang extremely conservatively, and in the end gave up the siege just because of the lack of grain and grass, which showed his own character trait of not daring to take risks.
Han Xin was on the contrary, although he also attached great importance to grain and grass, but he was not as persistent as Zhuge Liang, even if there was no grain and grass, he still held the determination to overcome difficulties in battle. When attacking the Zhao state, the Han army only prepared half a day's worth of military food.
From this point of view, not only in terms of tactics, but also in terms of combat style, Han Xin was better than Zhuge Liang. If the Shu Han army had the command of Han Xin, then victory could be said to be natural.