In the history of the past five thousand years, countless people have emerged who have thrown their heads and spilled their blood for the country. Correspondingly, there are also many "traitors". However, it is still rare for the emperor, as the ruler of the feudal dynasty, to become a "traitor".
In the five generations and ten kingdoms, there was a founding emperor, and his traitorous behavior made the Central Plains invincible for four hundred years. This person was Shi Jingyao, the founding emperor of the Later Jin Dynasty.
Shi Jingyao is a member of the Shatuo clan, he liked military books since childhood, and he was also good at riding and shooting. Therefore, Li Siyuan, who was also a Member of the Shatuo clan, attached great importance to him. By following Li Siyuan in his southern expedition to the north and establishing his outstanding military achievements, Shi Jingyao became Li Siyuan's confidant general.
Li Siyuan also married his daughter to Shi Jingyao in order to show his respect for Shi Jingyao. Shi Jingyao did not live up to Li Siyuan's trust. Once, when Li Siyuan was in danger, he tried to save Li Siyuan from the heavy siege of the enemy. Since then, he has repeatedly guided Li Siyuan. Later, with his help, Li Siyuan successfully ascended to the throne. In order to repay Shi Jingyao's exploits, Li Siyuan was appointed as the emissary of Heyang Jiedushi and began to control the military power independently.
After Li Siyuan's death, Shi Jingyao served as an envoy to Taiyuan and controlled the situation in Hedong. It was also at this time that Shi Jingyao had the ambition to become emperor. He repeatedly asked the emperor for a large amount of military food in the name of the Khitans to expand his strength. Afterwards, fearing that the matter would be revealed, he killed thirty-six of his generals.
After the expansion of strength, Shi Jingyao's ambitions became more and more ambitious. Later, the Tang Emperor Li Congke also sensed Shi Jingyao's antipathy, and he decided to strike first. He ordered Shi Jingyao to be made the envoy of Yun Prefecture, in an attempt to transfer Shi Jingyao away from his core area and clean him up. At this time, Shi Jingyao already knew that his ambitions had been exposed.
In order to become emperor, he was already desperate. He appealed to the Khitans, a nomadic people in the north, for help. Using the Sixteen Prefectures of Youyun as a bargaining chip, and claiming to have borrowed troops from the Khitan at the time Shi Jingyao made this decision, the conditions for his subordinates to borrow troops from the Khitan were too humiliating, and there was no need to promise so much to the Khitans. However, at this time, Shi Jingyao only had the imperial throne in his eyes, and as long as he could become emperor, he was willing to accept even the greatest humiliation. The Khitans had long coveted the Sixteen States of Youyun. As soon as they saw that Shi Jingyao was so obedient and sensible, they resolutely sent troops to help Shi Jingyao.
With the help of the Khitans, Shi Jingyao successfully led troops into luoyang to destroy Li Congke's Later Tang and establish the Later Jin. After becoming the founding emperor, Shi Jingyao did not have the backbone of the emperor of the Central Plains Dynasty. He was condescending to the Khitans to the extreme. Even to the point of being obedient. Every time he wrote a letter to the Khitan Emperor, he called the Khitan Emperor "Father Emperor". From time to time, he also offered curiosities to the Khitan Emperor.
Shi Jingyao's act of ceding Youyun Sixteen Prefectures made the Central Plains Dynasty no longer safe to defend the area north of the Yellow River. After the Great Song unified the Central Plains, it launched several wars to retake Youyun Sixteen Prefectures, but all of them ended in failure. Because the Sixteen Prefectures of Youyun were controlled by the Khitans. The Central Plains Dynasty could only be in a strategic passivity. For the next four hundred years, the Central Plains Dynasty was beaten everywhere for the lack of Youyun Sixteen Prefectures, whether khitans, Jurchens, or Mongols, because the occupation of Youyun Sixteen Prefectures made it extremely easy for them to invade the Central Plains. It can be said that the demise of the Song Dynasty had a lot to do with Shi Jingyao's traitorous behavior.