When everyone talks about Zhao Kuo in the Warring States period, the first thing that comes to mind is the allusion of talking about soldiers on paper. For two thousand years, people have believed that Zhao Kuo is a mediocre talent who only knows how to talk about soldiers and has a very low actual military command ability, because we have always been a hero who talks about success or failure, and Zhao Kuo has lost the Battle of Changping and defeated the national fortunes of the Zhao State, and has always been nailed to the pillar of shame by everyone.
Is the historical Zhao Kuo really a mediocre talent who talks on paper? During the Battle of Changping, Bai Qi, the god of war of the Qin state, saw the death raid launched by Zhao Kuo's army led by the Zhao army when the grain was cut off, and said a sentence to expose the truth, Bai Qi sighed after seeing Zhao Kuo's battlefield command: If this son does not die, he will become a great trouble for the Qin state; the person who can be so valued and jealous by the god of war who has not tasted defeat in forty years is not a mediocre talent. In fact, this can also be seen from some of the things Zhao Kuo has done.
Zhao Kuo was the son of the famous general Ma Fujun Zhao Of the Warring States period, and was a typical high-ranking aristocratic disciple, who was familiar with military books from an early age, and often debated with his father about the soldiers, so he was very proud, in fact, this is also a common disease of many high-ranking cadres. Because Zhao Kuo had no battlefield experience and always said that the war was very simple, Zhao Hao thought that his son was good at talking emptyly, divorced from reality, and did not really understand the art of war. Later, Zhao Kuo Changping was defeated and died, which became the stained evidence that he would only talk about on paper. Let's put aside stereotypes, most young people are not like this, more or less have some good and lofty ambitions, not to mention the sons of nobles like Zhao Kuo, these do not mean that he is a mediocre talent.
After the Outbreak of the Battle of Changping, King Zhao sent troops to confront the Qin army at Shangdang, because almost all the troops were withdrawn, and King Zhao was worried that the Hu people at that time would take the opportunity to invade the borders of the Zhao state. Because Zhao Kuo had a good relationship with King Zhao since he was a child, he recommended to King Zhao a person to garrison biansai, who later broke the Xiongnu and became the pillar of the Zhao state after the Changping War, repeatedly defeating the Qin army that attacked Zhao, this person was the famous Li Mu, one of the four famous generals of the Zhao state. From this recommendation, we can see Zhao Kuo's military vision, if Zhao Kuo is really a mediocre talent who only knows the art of war, he will definitely not find Li Mu's excellence, let alone recommend Li Mu.
Qin and Zhao confronted each other on the Changping Battlefield for more than three years before a great decisive battle occurred, and in the previous three years of confrontation, the Zhao army had always been commanded by the veteran general Lian Po, and the reason why the veteran general Lian Po adopted a defensive position was because he could not defeat the Qin army. King Zhao decided to change the commander temporarily, also because the national strength of the Zhao State could no longer support it. As we all know, the national strength of the Qin state has become stronger and stronger after the Shang martingale transformation method, and the comprehensive national strength of the Qin state at the time of the Battle of Changping far exceeds that of the Zhao state, at least in terms of grain and grass, the Qin state is far more than the Zhao state. Three years of confrontation with the enemy with the soldiers of the whole country thousands of miles away from the capital is also a great burden in modern society, and even the Qin state appeared at that time: men were in battle, women were lucky, and the granaries in Guanzhong were empty. Moreover, the national strength was far inferior to that of the Zhao state of Qin, and even if the king of Zhao did not change his command and let Lian Po continue to confront, it would definitely be the Zhao army that collapsed first.
After Zhao Kuo arrived at the Changping battlefield and became the commander of the Zhao Army, the 500,000 generals of the Zhao Army cheered loudly, which showed that Zhao Kuo was extremely popular with the army, and such a person was definitely not a brother who could only talk about it. Changping was besieged for forty-six days, and the Zhao army's food was only fed by war horses and wild vegetables, but half a million Zhao troops could still maintain high morale, and wave after wave of rushing to kill the Qin army, Zhao Kuo's commanding ability was by no means comparable to that of ordinary famous generals. The Qin army surrounded the Zhao army with 600,000 troops, which had cut off the grain route, and when Zhao Kuo broke through and was killed, the Qin army lost more than half, and the Zhao army finally surrendered 200,000. It can be seen from this that the loss of the qin and Zhao armies at that time was comparable, and under this predicament, Zhao Kuo was able to achieve a comparable exchange ratio with the Qin army, no wonder Bai Qi would say that Zhao Kuo would not die, and it would become a major disaster for the Qin state in the future.
Zhao Kuo was young, and how unfortunate was it that he encountered an opponent like Bai Qi when he first went to war? At that time, Bai Qi was already over sixty years old, and he had been traversing the battlefield for more than forty years without losing a defeat, how powerful, Bai Qi's commanding ability was one of the best in China at any time. Zhao Kuo's defeat at the hands of Bai Qi was not shameful, let alone that he was a mediocre talent, and at that time, any famous general in the Warring States was placed in Zhao Kuo's position, and he did not dare to say that he could defeat the Qin army commanded by Bai Qi.
The most fundamental reason for Zhao Kuo's defeat is that the national strength of the Zhao state is not as good as that of the Qin state, the two countries are in contention between life and death, and the real decision to win the final victory is the national strength, which is by no means something that one or two famous generals can change. Zhao Kuo's sadness lies in the fact that he encountered such a powerful opponent in his first battle, Changping lost his national division in the First World War, a hero on success or failure, and a reputation passed down for thousands of years