The history of the transition of the Eastern Han Dynasty to the Three Kingdoms, I believe that many people can hear about it, not only in the textbooks, film and television dramas, this period of history has been interpreted many times, about the reasons for the division of the Three Kingdoms in the late Eastern Han Dynasty, in fact, most people also have a promise in their hearts, frankly speaking, it is a mutual stalemate, none of the three parties has the crushing strength, so it can only be temporarily divided. But what we are talking about today is not the integrity of the land area, the essence of unifying the world, is to establish a unified market, just like the first emperor promulgated in that year, the car coaxial book is the same text, the Three Kingdoms period wants to unify, to face the following difficulties, first to solve the Han Yuan Emperor, the formation of a powerful landlord class in society, there are several dynasties in history, have suffered losses in this class, the most serious, is the Establishment of The Great Ming, directly subjugated the country.
Only by solving this problem can we achieve true unification, since the beginning of the Warring States, the ancients have been trying to change, the main result of reform, is to combat feudal solidification of the nobility, bring benefits to the people at the bottom, and establish a flat society. There was a famous reformer Li Wu in the Warring States, who carried out a series of changes in the country, giving the people the ability to control the rules, as well as interpret and apply them, and at the same time wrote the "Book of Laws", which was implemented in the Wei state, and the Wei state was later able to enter the ranks of powerful countries, and Li Wu's merits can be said to be very high. The State of Wei produced several well-known reformers, in addition to Li Wu, there were books written by Wu Qi and Li Wu, which also affected the legal system of the Qin State, and the Qin Law was not so much the product of the Reform of the Warring States as it was the result of the reform of the Warring States. Later, this system was inherited by the Western Han Dynasty, and Xiao He modified it on the basis of the original Qin Law, adding three laws suitable for the country, thus forming the "Nine Chapters of the Law" of the Han Dynasty.
Speaking of the history of the Western Han Dynasty, we have to mention Liu Bang, Liu Bang was a very qualified Qin official before the rebellion, the Qin Dynasty ruled the country according to law, the law was particularly harsh, the Han Dynasty was different, they were more close to Huang Laozhi's saying, to rule the world with filial piety, Emperor Wen of Han advocated ruling without doing anything. The reason why the Qin and Han dynasties could shock the world was due to the advanced social system of the country at that time, but if you want to neutralize the country in the chaotic world, the social system is definitely an important part. However, once the change, it will give birth to a bad side, in the han wen emperor period, there has been chaos, in the han wen emperor rule, often people pretend to xiangrui, saying that there is panic, this incident also led to the loss of official positions by the chancellor Zhang Cang. After Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty seized power from the empress dowager, he continued to reuse Confucianism, and eventually adopted Dong Zhongshu's proposal that readers who wanted to enter the official arena should first examine Confucianism. Thus the era of Confucian rule began, until the empress of the Han Yuan Emperor handed over the jade seal to Wang Mang, and the Western Han Dynasty established by Liu Bang disappeared.
Liu Xiu, who established the Eastern Han Dynasty, although he was a son of a clan, but in essence a powerful landlord, throughout history, most of the fruits of victory harvested by the peasant uprising were enjoyed by the nobles, Liu Xiu was able to claim the title of emperor, partly because he restored the original system, after sitting on the throne, he managed to suppress the annexation of land by the powerful through the Law of Dutian, which touched the interests of the noble landlords, and his son Emperor Hanming was even bolder, so that he was attacked and slandered by the bureaucratic clique. Throughout China's three thousand years of feudal history, emperors from the grassroots are more likely to spread the words of killing heroes, Liu Bang is one, Zhu Yuanzhang is also one, of course, the truth or falsity in the history books, we have no way of knowing. From the Warring States to the Eastern Han Dynasty, the social system has been changing, and the disadvantages have also been born accordingly. The reason why no one has stood up for the unification of the three kingdoms is because there is no soft power, the Wei state, as the most powerful country in the three kingdoms, cannot crush the two countries with the strength of one country, and there are many short-lived empires in human history, such as the famous Alexander Empire, and the Yuan Dynasty that swept through Europe and Asia.
These two countries were based on the conquest of force, not so much a country as a combination of military and government, Cao Wei to some extent, the same is true, Cao Pi called the empress, so he sent Zang Ba to the south, the purpose of which is to consume Zang Ba's strength in Qingzhou, from here it can be seen that even after Cao Cao's death, Cao Wei did not have the strength to unify Jiangshan, and even some areas were not conquered, even by force. Cao Cao had a clear understanding of this before his death, lacked deep integration internally, and was reminded by strategists around him, but he was rejected by Cao Cao, Liu Xi once suggested that in the military aspect, he could temporarily guard the key places and concentrate on internal affairs, and Cao Cao responded that he was not a person who cultivated Wende, which meant that he did not take the world with literature. The reason why I think so is because Cao Cao is essentially a warlord, attaches great importance to military power, no one can touch it, and is very defensive about the people around him, whether it is a son or a general, in addition, Cao Cao likes to feel that he is in control of the war, and likes to leave tips for subordinates, famous zhang Liao, Li Dian, Le Jin and others.
At the same time, he also did not trust his generals, even if he knew who was not compatible with whom, he still had to arrange to fight together, even remote command, foreign troops also had to arrange family members as hostages, Cao Cao's behavior above was considered by many people to be too suspicious, in fact, personally believe that this is only a small part of the reason, the fundamental reason is that his internal affairs are a mess, Cao Cao is fighting outside, internal affairs are actually loyal to the Han Xiandi clique in governance, although they do things for Cao Cao, but in fact, for the Han Xiandi, before Lü Bu died, the Han Xiandi was still very peaceful Until Lü Bu's death, the civilian officials began to plot rebellions, and the civilian officials behind him were swords hanging over Cao Cao's head, but he had to use them, and the internal instability made Cao Cao unable to fight outside for a long time, and he was not at ease with the generals leading troops outside. Moreover, Eastern Wu and Shu Han were not cattle and sheep to be slaughtered, and if they wanted to completely defeat them, they had to send out elite troops, and they had to be paired with a powerful and famous general, otherwise it would be very difficult to succeed, which was simply impossible in view of Cao Cao's suspicions.
Cao Cao did not have the possibility of unification, he was the strongest warlord at the moment, and if he could not do it, it would be more difficult for others. Eastern Wu also had trouble, the first problem was that most of the generals of Eastern Wu had their own branches, they were still only small countries, warlordization was more serious than Cao Wei, and the military strength of Eastern Wu was extremely dependent on the private armies of major generals. Even the emperor could not command the whole army, which was equivalent to giving power to others, but if any general did not agree, then the Eastern Wu side could not send troops, at least not the army could not suppress the territory. The situation in Shu Han was even worse, before Liu Bei's death, the state power was divided into two parts, the internal affairs were handed over to Zhuge Liang, and the military was handed over to Wei Yan, Li Yan, etc. In terms of military power, Liu Bei did not completely hand over to someone, and at the same time could not achieve a clear distinction between reward and punishment, Wei Yan grasped dangerous places, and at the same time had rich combat experience, and was a rare veteran, but Liu Bei did not give him any rewards, but Li Yan, who had little military experience, was awarded the position of Zhongdu Protector and could control the internal and external military, but Li Yan was also strictly guarded. Staying in Chang'an forever, there was no chance to enter the central institution, and there was no chance to approach Liu Chan, losing the opportunity to climb up.
Liu Bei was cautious in politics and mainly divided military power, but what he did not expect was that after his death, the layout was actually broken, this person was Zhuge Liang, who was deeply trusted by him, and after Zhuge Liang took power, military and political power transitioned from the emperor's hands to the Cheng Xiang tree, and the power of the wen and wu courtiers was controlled by the Xiang Xiang alone, resulting in great changes in the entire political structure. In general, whether from a military or political point of view, Wei Shu Wu did not have the ability to unify, until the emergence of Sima Shi, because Sima Shi belonged to an aristocratic family, Sima Yi had a more hand in internal politics, after stabilizing the country, quelling the rebellion outside, and then deploying three large armies to pacify Eastern Wu, Sima Shi suppressed the warlords, ending the era of division of the Three Kingdoms.
reference:
Book of Han Bangu
Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Chen Shou