Why can Shu Han, who has the weakest national strength, be able to share the world with Cao Wei and Sun Wu?
The Shu Road is difficult, and the difficulty lies in crossing the Qinling Mountains and Bashan; Zhuge Liang made good use of his geographical advantages and adopted a strategy of attacking and defending to continue the life of the Shu Han regime.
Looking back on the 5,000 years of China, I am afraid that there is no more attention than the history of the Three Kingdoms, and there is no more respected than the figure of Zhuge Liang. A history of the Three Kingdoms, people have been talking about it for more than a thousand years, and a "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", people have read it for hundreds of years. The stories in Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition have been circulated several times, and the people and events in them have not only repeatedly appeared on the stage of dramas, but also on the screen. However, it is not only people and things that have made history, but also the land under our feet, the mountains and rivers on the land, these geographical factors cannot be ignored, because Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition route is the geography of military operations.
Mountains and rivers can only be integrated into the military when people use them. Among the three kingdoms of Wei, Shu and Wu, Shu Han was the weakest, but it was able to coexist with Cao Wei and Sun Wu, forming a strong trend of the Three Kingdoms, which was inseparable from the Northern Expedition led by Zhuge Liang to the Han army. Later generations commented that the reason why Zhuge Liang's military action was able to successfully preserve the Shu Han regime was that the purpose of the Northern Expedition was to attack and defend, and the final purpose of the military action fell on "defending", which was directly related to the choice of the road of the Shu Han Northern Expedition.
Shu Han and Cao Wei two regimes confronted each other in the north and south, Shu Han is located in the land of Bashu, the road of the Han army's northern expedition must cross the Qinling Mountains, and the Qinling Mountains, which extend east-west mountains, not only constitute a natural barrier between Shu Han and Cao Wei, but also is the most difficult section of the Shu Road. Tang Dynasty poet Li Bai's poem "Shu Road Difficulty", with its bold chapter recited for thousands of years, let future generations appreciate the hardships of ancient Sichuan-Shaanxi transportation. The difficulty of Shu Road, the difficulty lies in crossing the Qinling Mountains, Bashan two mountain ranges, taking the road in the mountains, as the so-called "even the peak to the sky is not full of feet, and the dry pine hangs upside down against the cliff." Flying turbulent waterfalls and waterfalls compete for hustle and bustle, and the cliffs turn to rocks and thunder", the hardships of the road have hindered the communication between Sichuan and Shaanxi for a long time.
The Sichuan-Shaanxi passage runs through the Qinling Mountains, and the road is mainly selected in the mountains and valleys. River valleys are often formed by river erosion where the rocks break in the mountains, and roads are formed in the wide areas, and homes are turned into farmland. There is no road to be found on the steep cliff, and the plank road must be dug out. The standard plank road is generally on the steep wall with turbulent water, using the stone cracking method to dig out the stone hole, penetrate the crossbar as a beam, and then lay a wooden plank on the beam, and erect standing timber on the bottom of the river body stone as the support of the beam.
In ancient times, there was no explosives, and it was very difficult to dig the plank road by the method of cracking stones, Li Bai's poem "The earth collapsed and the mountain destroyed the strong man to die, and then the ladder stone stack hooked together", with exaggerated brushwork, described the price paid for the construction of the plank road. Not only that, after the plank road is paved, the flying stack is cloudy, winding on the steep cliff, narrow and fragile, and it is not easy to walk or maintain. Therefore, "Shu Road is difficult, it is difficult to go to the blue sky" is not only written in literary dictionaries, but also exists in reality.
On the Shu Road, Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition started from Hanzhong, crossed the Qinling Mountains and arrived in Guanzhong, and it was precisely like this that all the battles of the Northern Expedition took place on the roads that crossed the Qinling Mountains. There are four main roads that cross the Qinling Mountains, all of which start from Guanzhong and end in Hanzhong, from east to west, respectively:
- Meridian Road: Meridian Town→ Meridian Valley→ Qinling → Shiquan→ Raofengguan→ South Meridian Town→ Chenggu → Hanzhong.
- Fu Luo Road: Zhou Zhi → Luoguguan → Yangxian County→ Fushui → Chenggu → Hanzhong.
- Baochuan Road: Liuba→ →Baocheng Baocheng →Road: Hanzhong.
- Ancient Road (also known as Chencang Road): Yimen Town, Baoji → Qingjiang River→ Luoyang → Mian County→ Hanzhong.
These four roads were opened at different times and with varying degrees of difficulty, and all this became the basis for determining the path of the Northern Expedition.
The opening time of the "Meridian Road" was about in the Qin and Han dynasties, and it entered the Meridian Valley from the Meridian Town, which is more than ten miles northwest of Xi'an City. In ancient times, the north was called "Zi", and the south was "Wu", and the Meridian Valley was named because it was located in the south of Chang'an City in the Han Dynasty. The meridian road is more than 1,000 miles long, long and dangerous, there are few residents along the way, there is no administrative construction in the whole process in the Han Dynasty, it is generally not used by people, but the road is the closest to Chang'an City, and it takes about half an hour to reach Chang'an by riding a fast horse from Meridian Town.
The opening time of "Fu Luo Road" is about between the two Han Dynasty, initially starting from the martial arts today, walking around the valley into the ridge, called Tangguang Road, and then changing from Zhou to enter the Luoshui Valley on the north side of the Qinling Mountains, and the Fu Shui Valley on the south side of the mountain is connected from north to south, constituting a cross-ridge passage. Although Fu Luo Road is the shortest of the four roads that cross the Qinling Mountains, there are many slopes along the road, and the distance between Luo Shui and Fu Shui is long, so it is not easy to walk, so the passage time of this road is the latest.
"Bao Slope Road" is composed of the inclined water valley on the north side of the Qinling Mountains and the Baoshui Valley on the south side, the Bao Shui is clear, the inclined water is through Wei, the whole road is more valley and less slope, and the mileage is less than 800 miles, it is precisely because of this that the Bao Slope Road has been opened as early as the Western Zhou Dynasty. "Huayang National Chronicles" contains: "King Wu of Zhou cut down the Zhou, and he was the master of Bashu. "Assisting the Bashu division of King Wu of Zhou, the road to march should be the praise slope. During the Western Zhou Dynasty, the ancient Baoguo Kingdom was in the area of Baocheng in the south of the Qinling Mountains. Chinese. Jin Yu recorded: "The king of Zhou You has praise, and there are praise people to praise the daughter." In the Western Zhou Dynasty, the protagonist of the "Beacon Opera Princes" Zhou Youwang's favorite concubine Bao Xi came from the Bao Kingdom, but it is thought that this road had already existed at that time, and in the Qin and Han dynasties, the Bao Slope Road has become the main traffic road between Chang'an and Hanzhong.
The name "Old Road" is due to the fact that the road runs along the old road river in the east source of the Jialing River. This road starts from Baoji City in the north, and was called Chencang in ancient times, so this road is also called "Chencang Road". In addition, there is a loose pass at the place where the road enters the Qinling Pass, so it is also called the "scattered pass road". The history of the opening of the old road is also very long, the inscription of the bronze Sanshi plate of the Western Zhou Dynasty has the words "Zhou Dao", the ancient scattered country is located in the area of Fengxiang in Baoji, Shaanxi Province, just where the old road enters the mountain, according to the research of Wang Guowei, the Zhou Road is the old road, and the opening of the old road is on the occasion of the Shang and Zhou Dynasty.
Hanshu. It is recorded in the Gou Xun Chronicles: "The old road is more than saka, and it is far away." "The old road is more than 1,200 miles long, but there are many mountains and valleys along the way, not only easy to walk, but also suitable for living, and the villages are connected, so in the Qin and Han dynasties, there are three county-level institutions along the road, Hechi, and Fuxian, and the Tang Dynasty has two state-level institutions of Fengzhou and Xingzhou, and the three counties are increased to six counties. In the Tang Dynasty, the old road formed a fork, and it was changed from Liangdang (now Fengxian County, Shaanxi Province) to Liuba, that is, it turned to the Baochuan Road for traffic.
Among the four roads that cross the Qinling Mountains, the old road and the Bao ramp road are less difficult to pass, and they are the two roads that the ancients used the most.
In addition to the above four roads, the "Qishan Road" should also be counted as one of the passages over the Qinling Mountains. The place where the Qishan Road passes is the remaining vein at the west end of the Qinling Mountains. The starting point of Qishan Road is in Lixian County, along the west of the Jialing River, along the west of the Jialing River, through Xihe, Hui (now Hui County, Gansu Province) Cheng (now Cheng County, Gansu Province) basin and the old road converges into Hanzhong, although the Qishan Road is very long and separated from Guanzhong by Longshan, but the flat place along the way is longer, which is convenient for the troops to march and transport baggage.
The Qinling Mountains not only form the boundary between the subtropical and temperate zones in terms of physical geography, but also affect the political, economic, and military forces on both sides of the mountains by virtue of their topography. From the perspective of historical military geography, the story of Zhuge Liang leading the Northern Expedition during the Three Kingdoms period and taking place in the Qinling Passage is particularly unforgettable.
During the Three Kingdoms period, Shu and Han were the weakest among the three regimes of Wei, Shu and Wu, but Zhuge Liang's strategy of attacking and defending enabled this weak country to stand side by side with the Cao Wei and Sun Wu regimes for a long time. Later generations praised Zhuge Liang's life's achievements, often used to summarize the unfledgling three parts of the world, six out of Qishan, and seven captures of Meng Shu, which has folk interpretation of the story, but also the real history, of which "three points of the world" from "Longzhong pair".
According to the policy of "Longzhong Pair", Zhuge Liang's goal of obtaining Yizhou and Jingzhou for Liu Bei had been achieved, but later due to Guan Yu's "careless loss of Jingzhou", Jingzhou was lost again, and Zhuge Liang's prediction at that time that Cao Wei might have internal strife due to the princes' struggle for power, but it never appeared. In such a situation, attacking as defense is the best choice to preserve the Shu Han regime. However, Zhuge Liang led the Northern Expedition of the Han Army, not the six out of Qishan as the folk legend, but five times, and the five Northern Expeditions were not all out of Qishan.
Zhuge Liang presided over the five Northern Expeditions, three out of Qishan, one out of the old road, and one out of the slope road. Zhuge Liang has always been cautious in the use of troops, and he does not send troops unless he is "absolutely sure to overcome and be safe", so he chooses these roads to seek stability, and the more important reason is that there are fewer slopes, which is conducive to the passage of grain and grass. As the saying goes, "the army has not moved, the grain and grass go first", any period of war, logistics supply is the key link that determines the outcome of the war, Zhuge Liang's five northern expeditions to Qishan Road as the mainstay, the reason is that this road not only has the advantage of transporting grain and grass, the Tianshui Basin can also be planted in the field to plant wheat to solve the long-term fierce war of food needs. At that time, fighting a war was different from that of modern times, and it was common to hold on for one or two years, so raising grain and tuntian fields was a guarantee to support the war.
The roads through which Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition passed, whether it was Qishan Road or the Old Road and the Baochuan Road, the northern exits of these roads were in Longyou and Chencang respectively, which were not only far away from Luoyang, the capital of Cao Wei, but also had a considerable distance from Chang'an, the political center of Guanzhong, especially the Qishan Road, which was blocked by Longshan, not only could not pose a threat to the Cao Wei regime, but even the Cao army in Guanzhong was difficult to achieve a substantial blow. The story related to Qishan Road in the Northern Expedition "Lost Street Pavilion" is almost well-known, and the "Lost Space Chop" in the later drama shows the scene of Zhuge Liang slashing Ma Jian with tears, and this is a real event that occurred in the sixth year of Jianxing (228) when the Han army went out of the Northern Expedition of Qishan Road. The drama highlights Zhuge Liang's sage style of taking the overall situation into account and not favoritism, while geography focuses on the military geographical value of the street pavilion.
Street Pavilion is also known as Street Spring Pavilion, so the site is in the southeast of Zhuanglang in Gansu Province today, the place of Longshan Pass. Longshan is Liupan Mountain, a north-south mountain range that divides the Guanzhong Plain and the Tianshui Basin on the east and west sides. The street pavilion is the only place to enter Guanzhong from Longyou, and the loss of the street pavilion means that the road to Guanzhong is blocked. This military operation was not carried out substantively, and it was cut off due to the loss of the street pavilion, so Zhuge Liang's killing of the horse was by no means due to the victory or loss of the First World War, but a mistake that ruined the Northern Expedition.
As we can see, the path chosen by Zhuge Liang during several Northern Expeditions almost did not pose a real military threat to the Cao Wei regime, and some only used it to divert the system, so as to achieve the effect of attacking and defending. In the face of Zhuge Liang's choice of the Northern Expedition path, the Shu Han general Wei Yan was very incomprehensible, and once proposed to lead 5,000 elite soldiers to attack Chang'an on the Meridian Road. The so-called elite soldiers refer to the troops who do not carry baggage, only carry dry food for a few days, and ride fast horses, and the meridian road comes down from the northern slope of the Qinling Mountains, and the fast horses only need half an hour, if they are surprised by sneak attack, they should be able to deal a substantial blow to Cao's army. But Zhuge Liang was cautious all his life and did not agree to this proposal.
In his later years, Zhuge Liang tried to give a real military blow to the Cao army in Guanzhong, and from the ninth year of Jianxing (231), he began to train troops and prepare for war, while repairing the plank road on the Bao ramp, and making wooden oxen and flowing horses, that is, wheelbarrows, to transport materials. Three years later, Zhuge Liang led an army of 100,000 troops to the north along the Bao Slope, and Wei Ting was shaken. Wei general Sima Yi to avoid its edge, to take the policy of sticking to the non-fighting, the two sides held each other on the shore of the Wei River for more than 100 days, unfortunately, Zhuge Liang was not in good health, died of illness in Wuzhang Plain, fifty miles away from the mountain pass, the Han army sent troops this time in vain. Later generations commented on this Northern Expedition with infinite emotion, and the Tang Dynasty poet Du Fu left a poem: "Die before leaving the school, and the hero will be full of tears." ”
Military operations in the era of cold weapons, whether offensive or defensive, have never left geography. Recalling that the ancients talked about Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition, "attacking for defending" became a common conclusion, and the reason for this conclusion lies in geography. The Qinling Mountains divide the north and the south, and there are too many stories that happened on the Shu Road, and Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition is the most unforgettable scene. "How many things in ancient and modern times are laughing and talking." A song "Linjiang Immortal" by Yang Shen of the Ming Dynasty left infinite emotion for future generations, history has gone away, only the ancient road of the year, still under the feet of today's people to communicate the north and south, and deduce a new story.