In 383 BC, a battle broke out between Former Qin and Eastern Jin, known in history as the Battle of Shuishui.
Xie An defeated Former Qin's million-strong army with 80,000 men, and Former Qin, which had absolute superiority, was thus defeated by the Eastern Jin Dynasty. The subsequent influence on Former Qin and Eastern Jin was very large, and Former Qin perished and the Eastern Jin Dynasty was partial. And this war also left a lot of questions for everyone, why did the Former Qin million army collapse in an instant? Why didn't the Northern Expedition follow the victory of the Eastern Jin Dynasty? Why can the Eastern Jin Dynasty only be partial to an even? Next, let's look at the beginning and end of the Battle of Shuishui.
Comparison of Former Qin and Eastern Jin Dynasties
Former Qin
In the last years of the Western Jin Dynasty, social turmoil caused ethnic minorities in the north to go south, and the north became a battlefield for ethnic minorities to play games. The advantage of ethnic minorities is military, and the disadvantage is not to learn, so the minority regime in the north is not long-lasting. Until one day, Jian Jianping Yan Ding Shu, the world's nine prefectures of one hundred counties of ten to seven. Under the administration of Jian Jian and Wang Meng, "Guan Long Qingyan, the people are prosperous", which is obviously a well-off scene. However, Former Qin still had drawbacks that could not be bypassed, which is mentioned in Wang Meng's suicide note (note 1). Before Wang Meng's death, he directly pointed out the shortcomings of Former Qin, which were as follows:
1: The good starter may not end well: The speed at which Jian Jian unified the north was very fast, and it was also very smooth, so it was easy to breed the idea of a light enemy. It is easy to start a business and difficult to keep one's business, so Wang Meng advised Jian Jian to tremble and tremble like an abyss. But in fact, Wang Meng's advice was useless, and Jian Jian still bred the idea of a light enemy, so that eight years after Wang Meng's death, he began to conquer the Eastern Jin Dynasty in the south.
2: Not recognized: Although the Eastern Jin Dynasty is in a quiet corner, the people still regard the Eastern Jin Dynasty as the Orthodox Chinese, and the upper and lower levels are peaceful. Former Qin, on the other hand, was different, and he didn't know what to do internally, so wouldn't it be self-inflicted to rush south? Therefore, Wang Meng insisted on dissuading Jian Jian from going south, but unfortunately Jian Jian did not take Wang Meng's suggestion to heart.
3: The degree of internal centralization is not high: Xianbei and Xiqiang, the nobles who surrendered, were only forced by the power of Former Qin, and did not really belong to it. Once Former Qin suffered defeat, then these ambitionists would become Former Qin's enemies. Therefore, Wang Meng advised Jian Jian to kill these magnates, but Jian Jian was too benevolent and did not take Wang Meng's advice. Later generations analyzed the reasons for the failure of Former Qin, one of which was because of Jian Jian's benevolence, and also said: Yin Qin died in violence and Qin Died in Ren.
Summary: After a long period of conquest in Former Qin, the domestic military and civilians were tired of war (Note 2), and there were too many factors of instability in the country (magnates). Moreover, Jian Jian only nominally unified the north, and his mastery was completely inferior to that of the Eastern Jin Dynasty. In addition, Jian Jian's personal success is quick and profitable, which is also one of the reasons for failure.
Eastern jin
After Emperor Huai of Jin ascended the throne, Sima Rui crossed south to Jiankang at the suggestion of Wang Dao, and sima Rui and Wang Dao after that had been co-opting the Jiangzuo clan, and they adopted a negative psychology of watching things in the north. Although some of the scholars at that time did not recognize the Wang and Sima clans, both the Sima clan and the Wang clan advocated partial security, so there were also a number of supporters in Jiangzuo. Later, Sima Rui was proclaimed emperor in Jiankang, and Wang Dao was in charge of the imperial government, which was called "the king and the horse, the world together". Later, in order to prevent Former Qin from going south, the Eastern Jin Dynasty made the following countermeasures:
1: Enveloping the Southern Shi Clan: Wang Dao persuaded the Jin Yuan Emperor to recruit Gu Rong and He Xun, who were representatives of the Southern Shi Clan, and under the temptation of high-ranking officials, the two of them came to take office, and then the Southern Shi Clan also submitted to the Eastern Jin Dynasty. Having a stable internal environment is stronger than that of Former Qin.
2: Resettlement of displaced people: After the Yongjia Rebellion, the people in the north followed the family to the south, known in history as the southern crossing of the Yiguan. Wang Dao established Qiao Prefecture, Qiao County, and Qiao County in the south to resettle the scholars and displaced people from the north. These people have fled from the north, and they have witnessed the misery of the north with their own eyes, so they cherish the peace that preceded it even more.
3: Formation of the Beifu Army: In order to better resist Former Qin, Xie Xuan recruited displaced people in Guangling and trained them strictly to form a combat effective army (Note 3).
Summary: The internal environment of the Eastern Jin Dynasty is better than that of former Qin, and there is a Yangtze River graben, as long as there is no major problem, it is more than enough to be safe. Moreover, the Eastern Jin Dynasty had been training its army in order to avoid Former Qin from suddenly moving south.
The Battle of Shuishui broke out, and Xie Xuan became famous in the Battle of Yi
There was a small episode before the Battle of Shuishui broke out, that is, the Battle of Huainan. At that time, Jian Jian sent 70,000 troops and cavalry to lead 70,000 troops and cavalry to take Xiangyang; Yang Yang and Shi Yue led 10,000 cavalry out of Luyang Pass, and Murong Chui and Yao Cang led 50,000 troops out of Nanxiang; Gou Chi, Mao Dang, and Wang Xian led 40,000 troops out of Wudang, and the three-way army surrounded Xiangyang, and the Xiangyang defender Zhu Xu was captured after a year of death. Zhu Xu was actually a pawn of Xie Xuan, because Jian Jian was very benevolent at that time, so Xie Xuan wanted to let people break into the enemy army.
In August 383, Gong Rong led 250,000 vanguard troops, And Jian Led 600,000 infantry and 270,000 cavalry, a total of 1.12 million troops to the south.
The Eastern Jin Dynasty, with Xie Xuan as the vanguard, led 80,000 Northern Fu soldiers north to meet the main force of the Qin army.
In order to relieve Xie Xuan's pressure, Huan Chong led 100,000 Jingzhou troops to cut down Qin in order to contain the Former Qin army.
Before the war, Jian Jian still wanted to avoid soldiers, so he sent Zhu Xu to persuade him to surrender. This was obviously a trick, because Zhu Xu revealed the foundation of Former Qin to the Eastern Jin Dynasty. Zhu Xu said that the Former Qin army had not yet arrived, so he persuaded the Eastern Jin Dynasty to quickly defeat the Former Qin vanguard force, and then break the Former Qin million army.
In November, Xie Xuan sent Liu Gaozhi to Luojian and won a great victory in Luojian. This battle opened the prelude to the Battle of Shuishui and greatly boosted the morale of the Eastern Jin Dynasty. Some people inside Former Qin advised Jian Jian to retreat, and then blocked the enemy on the banks of the Shuishui River, which was safer. Jian Jian also thought that half a crossing and hitting was half the work, so he thought of retreating one after another. Unfortunately, the Qin army had just retreated, and the Eastern Jin soldiers began to cross the water to attack, Zhu Xu spread rumors in the rear of the Qin army that the Qin army on the front line was defeated and retreated, the Qin army was in chaos, and Xie Xuan also took the opportunity to defeat the Qin army. (Note 5)
Why did Former Qin's million-strong army fail? Later generations summarized the reasons for the failure of Former Qin as follows:
1: Jian Jian lacked experience in commanding large corps operations: Throughout the history of the Qin and Han Dynasties, the only people who really commanded large corps to fight were Wang Qi and Han Xin. Because of the inconvenience of communication in ancient times, the command of the army relied entirely on the banner, and it was very difficult to command a large army to fight. Jian Jian lacked the experience of commanding large armies to fight, so much so that he even let the army retreat before the battle, and then the rear army thought that the front line was defeated and retreated, resulting in a big chaos.
2: Military and civilian war weariness: Engels once said: Years of war will exhaust even the most powerful countries. Former Qin itself was only militaryly unified, not internally monolithic, and still caused the people to complain and complain, and the mass base was extremely low. Even the crown prince advised Jian Jian to recuperate, but Jian Jian insisted on exhausting his troops, so that the army collapsed at a touch.
3: Rewards and punishments are not clear: Although Jian Jian was known for his benevolence, he was resistant to Han officials, especially after Wang Meng's death, Jian Jian favored the ethnic minority officials of Former Qin even more. Northern Wei was able to develop because of the reuse of the Cui clan, and Former Qin was also developed because of the reuse of Wang Meng, but both made a mistake that they could not reuse Hanchen for a long time. Jian Jian did not form a leadership group with the same intention before the war began, and the failure of Shuishui was inevitable.
4: Personal problems: The partnership between Jian Jian and Wang Meng is still very tacit, but since Wang Meng's death, Jian Jian has become a good and happy achievement, perhaps Jian Jian is worried that he has not completed the great cause of reunification before he dies, so he wants to unify the country and mountains as soon as possible. However, because he was too eager to make quick gains, he led to a serious strategic light enemy, so that he was defeated by Xie Xuan.
Why can Xie Xuan win more with less? Later generations summarized the reasons for Xie Xuan's victory as follows:
1: The place of the Shuishui operation is Yuzhou, and Yuzhou is the territory where the Xie family settled down, if Yuzhou is lost, then the Xie family will be forced to relocate. Both the Sima clan and the Wang clan were eyeing the Xie clan, and once the Xie clan was severely damaged, it was very likely that other clans would use it to annex or weaken the influence of the Xie clan. Therefore, out of self-interest, Xie Shi must win this battle, and if he does not succeed, he will become a ren. Firm conviction in combat is also one of the advantages. 2: Beifu soldiers trained for seven years: Beifu soldiers are private soldiers trained by the Xie family, elites selected by Xie Xuan among many displaced people, and then carefully trained for seven years, and their combat effectiveness far exceeds that of Jian Jian's army.
3: Huan and Xie abandon their opposition, and the two families jointly resist the enemy. Moreover, Huan Chong led 100,000 Jingzhou soldiers to attack Former Qin, helping Xie Xuan relieve some of the pressure.
4: Proper tactics: Zhu Xu rumored that the front-line army was defeated, so that the Qin army was in chaos, and Xie Xuan took advantage of Former Qin's internal instability to vigorously provoke internal contradictions in Former Qin and scatter the heart of Former Qin's army.
Subsequent effects
The battle of Shuishui was defeated miserably, and the troops of the Jianjian clan were drastically reduced, not only the dream of unifying the world was shattered, but the original peaceful situation in the north was also disintegrated. Murong Chui of the Xianbei clan re-emerged and established his own state, and Jian Jian himself was killed by Yao Cang (Qiang) two years later, and Former Qin perished. The north was again in strife, and unfortunately the Eastern Jin Dynasty also had some problems. Xie An, Xie Xuan, Xie Shi, Huan Yi, Huan Shi Qian, Huan Shimin and other ruling elites fell one after another, and the Eastern Jin Dynasty was unable to launch a large-scale Northern Expedition, so it could only be partial to peace. Although the Eastern Jin Dynasty was unable to carry out the Northern Expedition, the ethnic minorities in the north could not conquer the south, so they gained a relatively peaceful external environment. The large number of northern elites moving south has also given the core part of Chinese culture a chance to breathe, so that it will rise again in the future.
After the Battle of Shuishui, the Beifu Army also became an army with powerful power, unparalleled prestige, and meritorious efforts to turn the tide, and Xie An, Xie Xuan and other core figures of the Xie clan died, and the Eastern Jin Dynasty began to compete for the leadership of the Beifu Army. Because of internal political struggles, the Xie family, who founded the Northern Province Army, came to the peak, and Huan Xuan also successfully usurped the throne with the Help of the Western Province Army. The sandpipers competed for fishing and profit, and eventually Liu Yu overwhelmed the Eastern Jin Dynasty with the Northern Province Army and opened the Southern Dynasty. Liu Yu ended the door valve politics, but replaced it with a new political model in which the military leader used military power to control the warrior clan.
exegesis
1: Book of Jin, Vol. 114, Zaiji No. 14: Meng Yue: "Although the Jin Dynasty is secluded and ugly, Wu and Yue are inherited by Zheng Shuo. Kindness and good neighborliness, the treasure of the country also. After the subject is gone, he is willing not to take jin as a picture. Humble and humble, my vendetta, will eventually be afflicted, and it is advisable to gradually get rid of it so that it can be community-oriented.
2: Murong Shao commented on Former Qin: He was strong, he was victorious, he was in the clouds in the north, Shu Han in the south, he was transported for thousands of miles, the roads were facing each other, the soldiers were tired outside, and the people were trapped inside
3: The Biography of Liu Prison of the Book of Jin: "The Beginning of the Taiyuan Dynasty... Xuan (Xie Xuan) raises more energy and courage... Xuan joined the army with Jiaozhi (Liu Jiaozhi) as his leader, led the elite as the forward, won every battle, and was called the Beifu Soldier. The enemy is afraid."
4: Zhu Xu: If Qin's millions are exhausted, it will be difficult to be an enemy. If they defeat their forwards, they will already lose their strength and can be broken.
5: "Zizhi Tongjian Volume 15" Qin soldiers retreated and could not be stopped, xie xuan, Xie Yan, Huan Yi and other troops crossed the water to attack it. Rong Chi rode a little Chen, wanted to retreat as a marshal, the horse fell, and was killed by the Jin soldiers, and the Qin soldiers collapsed. Genji took advantage of the victory to pursue, as for Aoka. The Qin soldiers were defeated, and they died in the same way, hiding the wild Saichuan. His those who walked heard the wind and cranes, and they all thought that the soldiers had arrived, and they did not dare to rest day and night, and they slept in the grass, and they were hungry and frozen, and the dead were seven or eight. At the beginning, Qin Bing was small, and Zhu Xu shouted after Chen: "Qin Bing is defeated!" "The crowd rushed.