Zhao Gao is a bad guy, but his political skills are greatly underestimated.
In the process of summing up history, it is easy to make some characters facial, so when we mention Zhao Gao today, most people's impressions are nothing more than "traitors" and "usurpers." In fact, the strategy and means displayed by this person in the process of stealing power are the top in history. The author is not whitewashing Zhao Gao, but his mind is meticulous and his rhythm is so rigorous that even if you look at the whole of ancient China, it is difficult to have an opponent.
Let's start at the beginning.
After the change of the dunes, the power center of the Qin Dynasty once again entered a brief period of equilibrium. On the surface, the power of the state is firmly in the hands of the "three giants" composed of emperor Hu Hai, the powerful minister Zhao Gao, and the chancellor Li Si, in fact, in view of the fact that the first emperor of the first emperor, Ying Zheng, shot a crooked target, the tiger father gave birth to a dog, and Hu Hai's incompetence directly led to the fall of imperial power, so in the imperial court, it was actually the two major groups of Zhao Gao and Li Si that were directly confronting each other. At this time, the gap between the two is reflected.
First of all, as one of the most representative scholars in the pre-Qin era, Li Si himself was somewhat constrained by the idea of "kings and subjects". Moreover, he is the head of a hundred officials, under one person, and has the merit of standing, and the emperor is not the kind of master who has a lot of ideas, it can be said that as long as Li Si does not mess around, almost no one can overthrow him. In such a prominent position, Li Si was enjoying the joy of victory, but Zhao Gao was already preparing for a new round of "war".
Objectively speaking, at this time, Zhao Gao wanted to fight with the other party in the political arena, and there was almost no chance of winning. Li Si was full of talent, deeply relied on by the emperor, and this person had excellent eloquence, and even had the anti-heavenly eloquence to say that the dead were alive, and he rushed to provoke things, in case he could not do it and put the other party to death, it was undoubtedly moving a stone and dropping it on his own feet. Just as the so-called open gun is easy to dodge and dark arrows are difficult to defend, after careful analysis, Zhao Gao formulated a "three-step" excellent plan, the first step he had to do was to let Li Si "cool down" in the eyes of the emperor.
We need to make a digression here.
Zhao Gao is not a good character, but we cannot ignore this person's talent. First of all, Zhao Gao, as the commander of the Zhongche Government, the emperor's royal carriage and horse official, was himself extremely favored by the emperor. Although this official has little power and is definitely not prominent, not everyone can do it. In the pre-Qin dynasty classic "Taigong Liutao", there is a cloud: "Take the age of forty or less, be more than seven feet and five inches long, and be able to gallop horses and ride on them." "This was the criterion for selecting a coachman at that time, that is, under 40 years old, about 175 centimeters tall, able to chase a running horse, and even step on the back of a horse." You know, according to archaeologists, the average height of men at that time was less than one meter seven, and even the driver was selected by the standard of "great appearance", which shows that Zhao Gao's own hardware conditions will not be too bad.
In addition, when Qin Shi Huang wrote in the same world, he deliberately let Zhao Gao write the "Love Calendar" as a standard for showing the whole country, which shows that the latter's cultural skills should not be underestimated. All in all, even if it cannot be compared with those who were famous in the pre-Qin period, Zhao Gao can be called "both literary and martial". Usually such people often have shrewd minds.
Then again, although Hu Hai fainted, he was not a fool, and he knew that Li Si was an extremely capable talent. Zhao Gao wanted to provoke the relationship between the emperor and the chancellor and make the latter fall out of favor, but this must not be said explicitly. For this reason, for a long time, Zhao Gao did not move, until one day, Qin II euphemistically expressed to Zhao Gao that he had become emperor easily, and he wanted to enjoy such a sound dog and horse forever, and did not want to work hard anymore. Zhao Gao was silent on the surface, but in his heart he was very happy. The Biography of Li Silie records Zhao Gao's words to the emperor: "And His Majesty is deeply imprisoned, treating things with his subjects and attendants. In this way, the minister did not dare to play a suspicious thing, and the world called the Holy Lord. ”
Zhao Gao was very clever, and he did not directly persuade the emperor to lie flat, but instead "analyzed" the situation for the emperor in a similar way. He pointed out that Hu Hai was young and incompetent, and the change in the dunes left too much suspicion. Moreover, all the ministers of the DPRK and China are human spirits, and if Your Majesty's level of your half-hanging son is accidentally exposed, and the people below are not convinced, your throne may be impacted. You might as well go like this: Your Majesty, don't go up to the court at all, let's discuss the problem behind closed doors and then tell you to go out, so that the minister will not doubt your ability, but will call you wise!
It turned out that Lis did have ambitions, but he was not a real "gentleman". According to the literature, When Li Si was young, he went to the State of Qi to study, precisely for the sake of future glory and wealth. He is incomparably strong in business ability, but his personality has obvious weaknesses, that is, greed for power. At the beginning, Zhao Gaoce opposed Li Si to deal with the eldest prince Fu Su, and it was precisely to seize this point, and now, Zhao Gao also expected that Li Si could not accept being suddenly "left out", and would definitely seize the opportunity to show himself fiercely. Sure enough, Zhao Gao ate his opponent thoroughly.
One day, Hu Hai also implicitly expressed his desire to lie flat to Xiang Xiang, and soon Li Si deliberately wrote a long recital, which not only encouraged Hu Hai to do as he pleased, but also suggested that the little emperor use the cool rule of law to rule the country, kill anyone who dared to say "no", and consolidate centralized power. Li Si told Hu Hai: Whoever dares to resist will lose his head, and if he kills more, naturally no one will dare to squeak; when the imperial power is completely secured, won't you be able to enjoy it forever? Hu Hai was very satisfied with this and completely released himself. Li Si did not expect that he had painstakingly dedicated half a day of hospitality, but the benefits had all fallen to his opponent Zhao Gao. Sure enough, with the emperor's acquiescence, Zhao Gao launched a new round of purges of the ministers of the dprk, and by the way, a group of his own confidants were replaced, and his power was further expanded.
After successfully alienating the emperor from the chancellor, Zhao Gao began the second step of his plan. After all, Li Si is the head of the hundred officials, and his power is tilted toward the opposition, and if he wants to overthrow him, he must first stink him. Zhao Gao knew that Li Si was anxious to meet the emperor, so he deliberately picked the emperor to go to see him when he was having fun. He was playing until he was suddenly called to work, which no one could stand, not to mention that Hu Hai was still the emperor. It is said that once, Hu Hai was planning to play with the concubine for some excitement, but the clothes were only half off, and the minister ran out of nowhere. How come you knock on the door when you're having fun, deliberately looking for stubble, right? After three times and five times, Hu Hai lost his good feelings for Li Si.
Zhao Gao's method was very simple but very effective, and he quickly sacrificed the ultimate step of the plan. He still did not directly attack Li Si, but first targeted the latter's eldest son, Li You, who was fighting against the rebel army in Sanchuan County.
Historically, Li Yu is definitely a personal figure. This jun repeatedly defeated the main force of the rebel army, fought a big battle with Wu Guangda's army under the condition of absolute inferiority in strength, and killed corpses all over the field under Xingyang City, but the rebel army had no choice. Even when he was later killed in battle, Li Yu still stared angrily at the spear in his hand, looking like he would rather die than yield. However, as we said before, due to the emperor's indulgence in pleasure and Zhao Gao's dictatorship, the Qin army could not be mobilized in time, and Li You had to face an enemy army several times larger than his own in most cases, and the battle situation was naturally often passive. Instead, Zhao Gao spoke to the emperor, saying that Li You had secretly made peace with the rebel army, which was the main reason why the rebel army could not be eliminated for a long time.
Hu Hai was suspicious of this, and Zhao Gao again said, "Your Majesty, do you know why the Prime Minister always picks you to come and find things when you are happy?" That's because the Prime Minister has an opinion on His Majesty. You think, after the change of the dunes, you became the emperor, but the minister is still the minister. Now that the prime minister has been sealed, the next step can only be to split the earth and become the king.
Zhao Gao's point was over, but it made Hu Hai fall into a huge panic. Although from the literature, Hu Hai knew in his heart that Li Si was a capable person, and he was happy to worry about the important affairs of the DPRK and China to the latter; and Hu Hai was not sure whether Li Si really had antipathy, but this kind of thing was not a joke, and it was better to believe that it existed than to sit idly by. Hu Hai was extremely entangled in his heart, tentatively asking Zhao Gao how to deal with it, and Zhao Gao smiled slightly: Your Majesty will just hand it over to his subjects.
Everyone probably knows what happened next: Li Si was beaten up in prison, but he was still looking for an opportunity to personally appeal to Saint to wash away his grievances. Zhao Gao killed people and sent people to pretend to be Yushi many times, seeing that every hopeful appeal was finally sunk into the sea, and Li Si finally despaired, so that when the real emperor's envoys appeared in front of him, he also obediently confessed.
When we look at this process from God's perspective today, it doesn't seem very high-end. Zhao Gao's means are nothing more than provoking dissension and flattering power. However, from the perspective of the person in the game, especially in front of the direct opponent, Zhao Gao never showed his fangs. He knows what he wants, how to achieve it, no matter what the other party is doing, he brakes with static, taking one step and taking another step until his "three-step" plan is fully realized. It's almost like a boiled frog in warm water, which can't be guarded against at all. Until he was suddenly thrown into prison, Lisi was barely aware of it. It wasn't until the moment he went to jail that he realized he was done playing. In fact, as early as the time when he first wrote to advise the emperor to rule the country and indulge in pleasures, Li Si had already fallen into this insidious but hidden trap.
Also through this process, we can see that Zhao Gao is not the dry "traitor" that many people think, this person's mind and means are the top in history, even when confronting a powerful opponent like Li Si, he can easily play the situation in his hands. In other words, this person himself is a person with extremely good abilities, but unfortunately his heart is not right. If he was willing to be a loyal vassal and loyal to the country and the emperor, then there was no possibility that the Qin Dynasty would die and China's feudal history would be completely rewritten. Lis's loss to such an opponent is actually not unjust.