SFS Chapter 699 The Western Migration of the Northern Xiongnu
Chapter 699 The Western Migration of the Northern Xiongnu
The pseudo-Han dynasty had no members surrendering to Wei, but Cao Wei had members surrendering to Han. This is the biggest dilemma currently facing Cao Wei.
Sima Yi saw this predicament and knew the reason for it: it boiled down to two words—confidence.
The reason why the pseudo-Han gentry did not surrender to Wei or collude with Cao Wei was because they believed that Liu Bei would succeed in his northern expedition. Similarly, the reason why the Cao Wei gentry secretly colluded with Liu Bei was also because they believed that Liu Bei would succeed in his northern expedition.
Because they trust Liu Bei, they actively gravitate towards him. This gravitate greatly increases the success rate of Liu Bei's Northern Expedition. The increased success rate of Liu Bei's Northern Expedition leads to even more gravitate towards him, creating a virtuous cycle.
But for Cao Wei, this created a vicious cycle. Because they didn't believe Cao Pi could defeat Liu Bei, they actively sought to ally with Liu Bei. This further fueled their disbelief that Cao Pi could defeat Liu Bei, and the consequences of this continued were predictable.
There was no solution to this problem. The only way was to defeat Liu Bei on the battlefield, even if it was just a small victory. This would give the gentry of the Central Plains hope of defeating Liu Bei, and only by seeing the hope of victory could they continue to support Cao Pi.
This was the only way Sima Yi could think of to break the deadlock, but to defeat Liu Bei, he had to act quickly and couldn't delay any longer.
Although we are still not confident about attacking Liu Bei now, it is still more certain than it would be several years later, right?
You must know that Liu Bei is actively reclaiming wasteland and storing grain, and his strength is increasing every day. If you really drag it out for three to five years, Liu Bei will bring tens of millions of bushels of grain and tens of thousands of junior officers who have been trained by Guan Xing to fight you head-on. What will you use to resist?
As for the Central Plains having more land and grain than Liu Bei, and a faster recovery speed, what's the use? Even if the population recovers quickly, it will still take decades. You can't send your newborn child to the battlefield, can you?
There's also grain. Liu Bei doesn't need to accumulate more grain than Cao Wei; just enough for the Northern Expeditions, so that he won't suddenly run out of food halfway through the campaign.
To put it simply, although Cao Wei could accumulate five million shi of grain at the same time, while the pseudo-Han could only accumulate one million shi, which was several times less than Cao Wei, one million shi was enough for Liu Bei's Northern Expedition. Any more grain would be meaningless to Liu Bei.
Therefore, we cannot delay any longer. We must take advantage of the fact that Jiangnan has just been unified, the people are suffering, and food supplies are running low, and start a war with Liu Bei as soon as possible. Even a draw would be good, otherwise the longer we delay, the less hope we have.
Sima Yi's thoughts became clearer with each thought, but he didn't rush to offer advice to Cao Pi. Cao Pi had just expanded his territory and was feeling quite pleased with himself, so Sima Yi didn't want to cause trouble for Cao Pi at such a time.
Besides, war isn't something that can be started in a day or two; it won't be until spring at the earliest, and it's not even the New Year yet.
Thinking this, Sima Yi raised his hand to clink glasses with Jiang Ji and took the opportunity to change the subject, continuing to ask about the interesting things that happened in the capital during his campaign.
Jiang Ji said, "In addition, during the time you were away, several more envoys came from the Western Regions, all of them accusing Ma Chao. I heard that Ma Chao has already broken through the Western Regions and entered Parthia. This Ma Chao only cares about attacking and not governing. He keeps plundering along the way, like locusts passing through, looting wherever he goes, driving all the countries in the Western Regions crazy."
Sima Yi was speechless. These warlords from the Central Plains really had no scruples after leaving the Han Dynasty. Mi Fang openly stole someone's wife in Linyi, Gongsun Yuan was driven out of Liaodong and easily destroyed the Three Hans, and Ma Chao was even more ruthless, simply inhuman.
On his way back to the capital, he received news that Gongsun Yuan was attacking the Three Hans, but he didn't pay much attention to it. The Three Hans were just a bunch of places that couldn't even be found on a map. It was nothing to brag about.
However, if Ma Chao could lead his army back to Liangzhou, it would definitely be a good thing for Cao Wei.
……
To march back to Liangzhou?
What a joke! Ma Chao finally got out, how could he possibly come back?
At the same time that Sima Yi was drinking with Jiang Ji, Ma Chao, who had already conquered the Western Regions, was leading his army to besiege a certain tribe.
Under Ma Chao's command, the Western Regions allied forces, which had been brought along, were rushing madly towards the enemy forces ahead. This enemy force was very tenacious and its fighting strength was even stronger than that of the Qiang and Hu tribes of Liangzhou. Its strength was far beyond that of the Western Regions allied forces, but they were simply too numerous to resist. They covered the mountains and plains and could not be seen in the end.
As Ma Chao rode on his horse, watching the Western Regions allied forces surge towards the enemy like a tidal wave, excitement filled every pore of his body.
Last winter, he braved ice and snow to invade the Western Regions. He hid in the Kingdom of Kucha for the winter, and after the spring, he launched another attack to conquer the Western Regions. He plundered all the people and resources that he could take from the Western Regions before leaving the Western Regions and entering the territory of Parthia. He wiped out countless tribes and finally arrived in Kangju, which is the western part of Kazakhstan in later generations. There he encountered a large tribe with nearly 100,000 people.
The mountains are now snowbound, so Ma Chao planned to wipe out this tribe and spend the winter there before continuing his westward advance in the spring. However, he didn't expect this tribe to be so powerful and difficult to conquer.
More importantly, this tribe looked different from the natives of the Parthian Empire. The natives of the Parthian Empire were mostly brown-skinned, but this tribe was all black-haired and yellow-skinned, looking exactly like people from the Central Plains. Their clothing and cavalry tactics were more like those of the steppe people, which made Ma Chao feel overwhelmed. At the same time, he regretted that he had been too reckless and had attacked without properly investigating the enemy's situation. He was too unprofessional.
Ma Chao keenly realized that his recent victories had made him a little complacent and arrogant, and he needed to be more careful in the future.
But that's a matter for later. Although the current situation is slightly unfavorable, the arrow is already on the bowstring and there's no way to stop now. Let's fight first and worry about the consequences later.
Ma Chao gripped his spear, ready to charge into battle himself, when his son Ma Cheng rushed over and said, "Father, something terrible has happened! The flood has washed away the Dragon King's temple! The tribe that went there is not the Parthian natives, but the Northern Xiongnu who migrated westward. They are the same Northern Xiongnu who were driven westward by Dou Xian's stone tablet at Yanran."
"What the hell?" Ma Chao was completely dumbfounded and exclaimed incredulously, "Northern Xiongnu? Are you sure you're not mistaken?"
As is well known, the Northern Xiongnu were defeated by Dou Xian and forced to migrate westward, eventually becoming the Scourge of God.
However, what they did not know was that after the Northern Xiongnu migrated westward, they did not go directly to the west. Instead, they wandered around on the road, found a place to rest and recuperate, lived there for a period of time, and were then driven away by other tribes and forced to migrate.
In other words, after the Northern Xiongnu were driven away by Dou Xian, they did not have a clear goal of wreaking havoc in the west. Instead, they wandered around like headless flies, stopping to rest and recuperate wherever they found a patch of grassland, then waging war with their neighbors. After being defeated, they would migrate west again and stop once more. This cycle of stopping and starting, going around in circles for hundreds of years, finally reached the west.
Historical records indicate that the westward migration of the Northern Xiongnu can be roughly divided into four stages: from 91 to 160 AD, they were in the Wusun region of the Ili River basin; from 160 to 260 AD, they were driven to Kangju by the Xianbei, which is the current location of Ma Chao; from 260 to 350 AD, they were in the Sogdian region, near the Aral Sea; and after 350 AD, they were driven to the Don River basin and entered Europe, becoming the Scourge of God.
But Ma Chao was different. Ma Chao had a clear objective: to escape Liu Bei and Cao Cao, to escape as far away as possible, and even to follow the path that Gan Ying had taken to visit the Qin Dynasty. So he caught up with the Northern Xiongnu, who had set off a hundred years earlier.
Upon learning that he had encountered the Northern Xiongnu who had been driven away by Dou Xian, Ma Chao felt a sense of temporal disorientation; this was too absurd.
Ma Chao asked in astonishment, "Are you sure?"
Ma Cheng nodded and said, "It's confirmed. I personally interrogated a few of them. They spoke the Xiongnu language, which I could understand, and they even knew a few broken Chinese phrases. They are definitely from the Northern Xiongnu."
Ma Chao spurred his horse and said, "We've really met a fellow countryman! Follow me and let's charge in and subdue him first."