In the battles of the Three Kingdoms period at the end of the Han Dynasty, the impact of the Battle of Chibi was undoubtedly the most far-reaching. For the Battle of Chibi, it refers to the battle of Sun Quan and Liu Bei in the thirteenth year of Jian'an (208) in the thirteenth year of Jian'an (208) to break Cao Cao's army in the area of Chibi on the Yangtze River (northwest of present-day Chibi City, Hubei Province). This is one of the famous battles in ancient history in which the less wins more and the weak win the strong, and it is the most famous of the "three major battles" in the Three Kingdoms period, the other two are the Battle of Guandu and the Battle of Yiling. In the Battle of Chibi, Cao Cao led 200,000 people down the river. Eastern Wu's left and right governors Zhou Yu and Cheng Pu each led 15,000 elite soldiers, and together with Liu Beijun, they went up the river and met Cao Jun at Chibi.
Huang Gai proposed a plan to attack the enemy ships by fire, so Sun Liu's coalition forces broke the Cao army and burned a large number of Cao Jun's boats. The Cao army burned the remaining Cao jun boats and ships, and then retreated, resulting in heavy losses of hundreds of thousands of its troops. It was precisely because after this battle that Cao Cao suffered heavy losses, prompting Sun Quan and Liu Bei to each seize part of Jingzhou, laying the foundation for the establishment of the Three Kingdoms. After the Battle of Chibi, Liu Bei not only gained a foothold in Jingzhou, but also sent troops to capture four counties in southern Jingzhou, that is, the four counties of Jingnan. So, the question is, after the Battle of Chibi, Liu Bei had already occupied the four counties of Jingnan, so why did he borrow Jingzhou from Sun Quan?
One
First, in December of the thirteenth year of Jian'an (208), Liu Bei joined forces with Sun Quan and defeated Cao Cao at Chibi with a coalition led by Zhou Yu and Cheng Pu. Liu Bei and wu jun marched by land and water and pursued them to Nan Commandery. In the fourteenth year of Jian'an (209), Liu Bei and Zhou Yu jointly attacked Cao Ren at Nan Commandery, forcing Cao Ren to retreat at Jiangling City. Because Jiangling City was strong and difficult to overcome for a while, Liu Bei led the people to conquer the four southern counties of Jingzhou, Wuling Taishou Jinxuan, Changsha Taishou Hanxuan, Guiyang Taishou Zhao Fan, and Lingling Taishou Liu Du all surrendered. Lei Xu of Lujiang County led tens of thousands of people to submit. In the same year, Liu Qi died of illness, and his subordinates elected Liu Bei as the pastor of Jingzhou.
Therefore, at this time, Liu Bei should have come to the most favorable stage of his life, not only seizing the four counties of Jingnan, that is, Wuling County, Changsha County, Guiyang County, and Lingling County, but also obtaining the title of Jingzhou Mu. However, Liu Bei was not satisfied, but repeatedly borrowed the land of Nan County from Sun Quan, which is a historical allusion that everyone is more familiar with - "Liu Bei borrowed Jingzhou". There is a folk saying after the break: "Liu Bei borrowed Jingzhou - there is no repayment of the loan", giving the impression to the world that Liu Bei is playing with lai, borrowing things and not repaying. People mistakenly believe that he borrowed the whole of Jingzhou, but this is not the case. In 210 CE, Zhou Yu died, and Lu Su of Eastern Wu, based on strategic considerations, persuaded Sun Quan to "lend" Liu Bei some of the Jingzhou occupied by Eastern Wu, so that Liu Bei could gain a firm foothold and join Eastern Wu in defending against Cao Cao.
Two
After Liu Bei repeatedly begged for Nan Commandery and Lu Su's advice, Sun Quan thought that it was right, so he "lent" the Southern County of Jingzhou to Liu Bei, first, forced by Cao Cao's situation that the center of gravity of the Southern Expedition was biased towards Huainan, second, in order to let Liu Bei replace Eastern Wu in facing cao's army in Jingzhou, and third, half of Eastern Wu's Southern County, surrounded by Liu Bei and Cao Cao Xiangyang, went deep alone. In this regard, in the author's opinion, after the Battle of Chibi, although Liu Bei owned the four counties of Jingnan, he still borrowed Jingzhou (南郡) from Sun Quan, mainly because the location of Nan County was too important. Nan County is a county in ancient history, which was first placed in the Qin Dynasty and was located on the south bank of the Han River. The seat of government was in Jiangling County (江陵县, in modern Jingzhou, Hubei).
By the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the location of Nan Commandery included the Yangtze River coast of present-day Hubei Province from Jingzhou to Yichang, which was the most important strategic place in Jingzhou, guarding the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, while the location of the four counties of Jingnan encompassed the southern part of today's Hubei Province, all of Hunan Province, and the northern part of Liangguang. From this, it is very obvious that if Liu Bei wanted to capture Yizhou, he must base itself on Nan Commandery and thus enter Yizhou along the Yangtze River. In addition to the convenience of capturing Yizhou, Nan County, because it was guarding the middle reaches of the Yangtze River, was the land of Xiangfan to the north, which was also an important platform for the Northern Expedition to the Central Plains. For example, in 219 AD, Guan Yu used Nan Commandery as the basis to launch the Battle of Xiangfan. In the Battle of Xiangfan, Guan Yu besieged Xiangfan, posing a more immediate threat to cao wei's hinterland.
Three
In this regard, Zhuge Liang said in the "Longzhong Pair": "If there is Jing and Yi, Baoqi Rock Obstruction, West and Zhu rong, Southern FuYiyue, external alliance Sun Quan, internal repair of political reasoning; if there is a change in the world, then order a general to take the army of Jingzhou to Xiangwan and Luo, and the general to lead the people of Yizhou out of Qinchuan, who dares not eat pot pulp to meet the general?" If so, then hegemony can be achieved, and the Han room can be prosperous. In Zhuge Liang's view, Liu Bei wanted to support the Han Dynasty, and there were two key points, one was to seize Yizhou and occupy the Chengdu Plain, which has the reputation of the country of Tianfu, and the other was to occupy Jingzhou, and to simultaneously attack the Central Plains from the two directions of Jingzhou and Yizhou.
On this basis, after the Battle of Chibi, although Liu Bei owned the four counties of Jingnan, the four counties of Jingnan could not only serve as a platform for the Northern Expedition to the Central Plains, but also could not facilitate Liu Beixi to take the land of Bashu. Therefore, Liu Bei needed to borrow Jingzhou (南郡) from Sun Quan. In other words, as long as it occupied the land of Nan County, it was possible to control the core of Jingzhou and have greater achievements. In addition, for Sun Quan, although there was also an ambition to seize Yizhou, but because of Zhou Yu's illness and death, there was a lack of suitable executive candidates, which prompted Sun Quan to lend Nan County to Liu Bei. If Zhou Yu had not died, it would not have been so easy for Liu Bei to successfully borrow Nan County.
Four
Finally, during the Three Kingdoms period at the end of the Han Dynasty, the location of the four counties of Jingnan encompassed the southern part of present-day Hubei Province, all of Hunan Province, and the northern part of Liangguang. For example, among the four counties of Jingnan, Lingling County, and Lingling County, many of which are in the area of present-day Guangxi. Therefore, for the four counties of Jingnan, it was relatively far from the Central Plains, that is, a remote place at that time. If Liu Bei just wanted to divide one side, then the four counties of Jingnan were indeed a good choice. However, for Liu Bei, who is committed to the Kuangfu Han Room, he will naturally not be satisfied with the four counties of Jingnan.
In other words, during the Three Kingdoms period at the end of the Han Dynasty, the value of the four counties of Jingnan was difficult to compare with that of several counties in the north of Jingzhou. For example, Nanyang County in the north of Jingzhou was a large county with a large population, and Zhang Xiu was able to become a prince of the party and compete with Cao Cao just by relying on Nanyang County. Further, looking at the strategic location of the four counties of Jingnan, we will understand the reason why Liu Bei borrowed Nan County from Sun Quan. For the four counties of Jingnan, the north is the southern county occupied by Zhou Yu, Liu Bei can not expand to the north, expanding to the north is to clash with Zhou Yu, that is, to be an enemy of Sun Quan, to the east is also Sun Quan's territory, can not expand, the west is the lofty mountains, the south is the more remote Jiaozhou, which was not a more important territory at that time.
Therefore, only by borrowing Nan County from Sun Quan could Liu Bei's forces have the possibility of further expansion, and if he stayed in the four counties of Jingnan, he was doomed to be unable to stand with Cao Cao and Sun Quan. In general, the so-called Liu Bei "borrowed Jingzhou" is actually borrowed from The South County of Jingzhou. Later, liu bei won Yizhou, and Sun Quan sent someone to return Jingzhou, and the two sides were tense and tense. So the two families redivided Jingzhou, with Xiangshui as the boundary: the three counties of Changsha, Jiangxia, and Guiyang belonged to Sun Quan; the west of Nan County, Lingling, and Wuling belonged to Liu Bei, and Liu Bei and Sun Quan each occupied the three counties. In this way, Liu Bei not only "also" lost a county, but also gave up a county, but in fact still did not return the original Nan County, which also laid the groundwork for Sun Quan to sneak into Jingzhou and kill Guan Yu.