In the twelfth year of Jianxing (234), Zhuge Liang officially launched the sixth Northern Expedition of Shu Han, and he led his troops to the north for the fifth time, which was also Zhuge Liang's last Northern Expedition. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

Historically, Zhuge Liang was fully prepared for this Northern Expedition, but unfortunately the other party was also fully prepared, and the two sides launched a preliminary confrontation in the Northern Plains, and Zhuge Liang failed to gain the upper hand.

【The South is Gradually Stabilizing】

In the eleventh year of Jianxing (233), due to the strict legislation of Zhang Yi, the governor of Shu Han, the leader of the Yi tribe, Liu Zhou rebelled. Zhang Yi sent troops to fight, and before he broke through Liu Zhou, the Shu Han court recruited Zhang Yi to return to the court, and all the generals thought that they should quickly return to the court to ask for guilt, Zhang Yi said: "It can't be like this, I was called back to the court because of the barbarian rebellion and incompetence." But my replacement has not yet arrived, and I am on the battlefield, and I should organize the transportation and storage of grain and grass as supplies for the destruction of the traitors, so how can the affairs of the state be wasted because I have been removed from office? ”

So Zhang Yi continued to lead the affairs without slackening, and did not set off to return to the court until Ma Zhong, the successor governor of the Imperial Prefecture, arrived at the front line. Ma Zhong relied on the foundation laid by Zhang Yi to kill Liu Zhou and quell the rebellion, and Zhuge Liang, the prime minister of Shu Han, praised Zhang Yi very much after learning about this incident, and also brought him with him during the Northern Expedition.

After Ma Zhong became the governor of the city, he moved the administrative office to Wei County, Jianning County, which was between the Han and Yi peoples, and strengthened the local management of the Yi people. After quelling the rebellion, the Shu Han court crowned Ma Zhong as the general of the supervising army and the Marquis of Boyang Pavilion. And soon after, Ma Zhong sent Zhang Wei to pacify the rebellion of the fangs in Qiqi County and Xinggu County.

Since the third year of Jianxing (225) Zhuge Liang quelled the Gaoding rebellion, the Suyi tribe rebelled several times, and successively killed Gong Lu and Jiao Huang, and since then the Yueshan Taishou did not dare to go to the county to take office, but only dared to be stationed in Anshang County, which is 800 miles away from the capital of Yueshan County, so Yueshan County has its name. Ma Zhong, with the assistance of Zhang Wei, the Taishou of Yueshan, combined his grace and power to quell the chaos, moved back to the county, repaired the city, controlled the salt and iron resources, and reopened the road from Yueshan County to Chengdu, restored the communication of the pavilion and post, and restored the old order of Yueshan County. Therefore, the meritorious Ma Zhong was crowned as the general of Annan and was given the title of Marquis of Pengxiang.

Because of the outstanding performance of Shu Han generals Ma Zhong, Zhang Wei and others, the situation in several counties in the south of Yizhou has also become more stable, which also allows Zhuge Liang to concentrate more on dealing with the Cao Wei forces of the Northern Expedition.

【Preparation before the Northern Expedition】

Zhuge Liang's previous three Northern Expeditions (the first, the second, and the fourth) were all forced to withdraw because of the lack of military food, so Zhuge Liang persuaded the peasants to speak martial arts in the three years after the Fifth Northern Expedition of Shu Han (his own fourth), made wooden cattle and flowing horses, transported rice and grain to the mouth of the valley to collect, and lived in the pavilion of the valley, rested with the people, and prepared for another northern expedition.

In order to ensure the supply of military food in future battles, Zhuge Liang established a mansion in the valley and invented the flowing horse. In this way, on the one hand, Zhuge Liang could reserve a considerable amount of grain on the predetermined battlefield, and he also had advanced means of transportation such as "wooden ox" and "flowing horse", which provided a relatively reliable supply guarantee for his subsequent operations.

In the three years that Zhuge Liang was recuperating, it was not completely nothing, and there was Liu Zhou in the south, but it was quickly pacified by Ma Zhong. Soon after the pacification of Liu Guan, the fangs of Qiqi County and Xinggu County rebelled again, and Ma Zhong ordered Zhang Wei to go to the crusade, recruiting more than 2,000 of his people, and sending them to Hanzhong to enrich the Northern Expeditionary army of Shu Han.

There was no war in the north of Shu Han for three years, Zhuge Liang prepared for war after three years of training as a soldier, and the conditions for the Northern Expedition to Cao Wei were becoming more and more mature, so he sent an envoy to Wu and agreed with Eastern Wu to jointly attack Wei.

However, General Cao Wei and the commander of the Western Front, Sima Yi, had also expected this, and he carried out large-scale tuntian in the Guanzhong area, and he also gained a lot in the past few years.

Sima Yi's younger brother Duzhi Shangshu Sima Fu believes that in order to capture the enemy and win, there should be preparations first, every time Zhuge Liang invades the Guanzhong region, the soldiers on the border can not resist, and the central army needs to be mobilized to rush to the battlefield. He also suggested that 5,000 peasants should be mobilized from Jizhou to camp in Shangtai for training in autumn and winter, and to camp in spring and summer because of the fighting in Guanzhong and the shortage of grain and material reserves. These suggestions were adopted, so Guanzhong was enriched with supplies and dealt with the attack of Shu.

Another large-scale confrontation between Shu Han and Cao Wei was on the verge of breaking out.

【Battle of Yangsui】

In the spring of the twelfth year of Jianxing (234), Zhuge Liang personally led his troops to the north to attack Cao Wei for the fifth time. According to the Book of Jin, this time Zhuge Liang led more than 100,000 troops (Note 1) out of the Xiegu Valley and built a fortress in the southern plains of Weishui in Yixian County. The Son of Heaven was worried about this, and sent Qin Lang, the protector of Shu, to supervise the infantry of 20,000 cavalry, and was subject to Sima Yi's temperance. At the beginning, the generals planned to garrison Weibei to wait for the enemy, Sima Yi said: "The grain and property accumulated by the people are all in Weinan, and this is a place to fight. That is, to lead the army to cross the river, and build a fortress with the water on its back. Later, he said to the generals: "If Zhuge Liang is a brave man, he should use his martial arts and march east along the mountain." If we go west to Wujoyuan, then our army will be fine (Note 2). "Zhuge Liang really went up to Wuzhang Plain, and will cross Weishui north from there.

Sima Yi sent the general Zhou Dangtun to Yang Sui to lure the Shu army. After a few days, Zhuge Liang did not move. Sima Yi said: "Zhuge Liang wants to fight for the high ground and not to the sun, I know his intentions." "Send the general Hu Zun and Yongzhou Assassin Guo Huai to garrison in Yangsui and meet Zhuge Liang in Jishi. Engaged in the battle in front of the high ground, Zhuge Liang was not allowed to advance and returned to Wuzhang Plain. At that time, a long star fell in Zhuge Liang's camp, and Sima Yi knew that Zhuge Liang would be defeated, so he sent strange soldiers to copy the Shu army from behind, beheading more than 500 people, capturing more than 1,000 people, and surrendering more than 600 people.

According to the "Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms: The Biography of Guo Huai", in the second year of Qinglong (234), Zhuge Liang came out of the sloping valley and tuntian at Lankeng (Note 3). At that time, Sima Yi was stationed in Weinan. Guo Huai estimated that Zhuge Liang would definitely fight for the Northern Plains and advocated occupying it first, but many people disagreed. Guo Huai said: "If Zhuge Liang crosses the Weishui River and ascends the Beiyuan, he can join the troops in the North Mountain, cut off the Longdao, and frighten the subjects and the Hu people, which is a great danger to the safety of the country." Sima Yi agreed with this point of view, so he asked Guo Huai to join the northern plains.

The trenches have not been repaired, the Shu army is pressing, and Guo Huai is fighting back. A few days later, Zhuge Liang led his army westward. The generals all thought that Zhuge Liang wanted to attack the Western Siege. Only Guo Huai believed that this was Zhuge Liang's bluff to make the Wei army respond in a big way, and he would definitely attack Yangsui. That night, the Shu army really attacked Yangsui. Because there were defenses in the city, Zhuge Liang's plan did not succeed.

According to the "Book of Jin", "Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms" and other materials, we can see that after Zhuge Liang's fifth Northern Expedition, the initial plan was seen through and failed to get cheap, and Cao Wei successfully resisted the onslaught of Shu Han, but the specific situation is still very different in the records of the two materials. Specifically, the Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms states that Guo Huai made many correct suggestions and was adopted by Sima Yi, while all the credit in the Book of Jin is attributed to Sima Yi, and Zhuge Liang attacked to no avail.

For example, there is no record in the Book of Jin about the Northern Plains, and the battle of Yangsui was expected by Sima Yi in advance, but the contradiction is that Sima Yi just said that Zhuge Liang wanted to fight for the high ground and not to Yangsui, and later sent the general Hu Zun and Yongzhou Assassin Guo Huai to jointly garrison Yangsui, and the two sides finally engaged in the highland.

The record in the "Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms" is very clear and clear, indicating that Zhuge Liang attacked the west in the east, and besieged Yangsui in the west, Guo Huai saw through it, and what was recorded here was that "Huai Du thought that this was in the west, and if he wanted to make the officers and soldiers respond to it, he would attack Yangsuier", and in the end, Yang Sui was prepared, and Zhuge Liang failed to succeed.

Relatively speaking, the record in the "Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms" is more objective and clear, while the record in the "Book of Jin" is very vague, and the position and writing style are obviously the same as the previous text.

Note 1: Zhuge Liang's specific number of troops is in the first-hand materials, I have not found the specific figures, "Book of Jin" as a second-hand material, the numbers can be used as a reference, but not necessarily accurate.

Note 2: I personally do not know the specific geographical situation at that time, so I cannot interpret this paragraph.

Note 3: The specific location of Lan Keng has not been ascertained for the time being.