The Silk Road from Chang'an to Constantinople was opened as early as the Eastern Han Dynasty. However, during the Wei and Jin dynasties, the southern and northern dynasties were chasing deer, and the exchanges between the Central Plains and the Western Regions were blocked. In the Sui Dynasty, emperor Jue toured the west and re-outlined it, and the Silk Road was once again smooth, opening a new chapter in east-west exchanges in the Middle Ages.
War is not easy
At the beginning of the Sui Dynasty, the protagonists active on the Silk Road were the Turks, who first united with Persia to overthrow the White Huns, and then allied with Eastern Rome, defeated Persia, and then shocked the countries in the western region, controlled the trade routes, and gained momentum.
After the Sui Dynasty Emperor ascended the throne, he showed his ambition of "mixing one RongXia", but did not want to rush to raise troops, but adopted the strategy of "attacking from afar and attacking closely, separating the strong from the strong and combining the weak", and sent a powerful minister Pei Zhi, who was in charge of the Zhangye border trade, but in fact probed the western region.
Pei Zhi had always been familiar with border affairs and had planned divisive strategies to eliminate hidden dangers that threatened the relations between the Sui Dynasty and the Turks. After taking office this time, he paid close attention to the movements of various countries, accumulated a large amount of information, and wrote three volumes of the "Atlas of the Western Regions". The book contains an overview of forty-four countries, with a map of the dangerous places. Pei Zhi pointed out that there are many treasures in the Western Regions and trade is very profitable, and the countries are only forced by the armed forces of the Turks and Tuguhun to dare to send tributes, so they advise: "With the national weide, the general Xiaoxiong, and the pan and cross Kunlun, it is as easy as a palm, why not go!" ”
However, the Sui Emperor, who was criticized by later generations for being poor in military force, still did not easily launch a war, but chose the route of Huairou Yuanren. In the third year of Daye, in the Turkic civil strife, the Qimin Khan was defeated and the pilgrimage attached to the interior, the emperor ordered people to build huge tents that could accommodate thousands of people, and entertained visitors with a hundred plays. Foreign leaders such as Qimin Khan offered hundreds of thousands of cattle, sheep, camels and other livestock, and the Sui Dynasty rewarded 200,000 pieces of silk. The exchange of gifts mentioned in the history books is actually a large trade. The Sui Emperor relied on tributes and rewards to envelop the Eastern Turks in order to suppress the powerful Western Turks.
At the same time, he also sent a number of envoys to test the position of the countries on the Silk Road and use diplomacy to encroach on the Western Turkic forces. Li Yu, a lieutenant of the Yun Cavalry, was ordered to send an envoy to Persia, and during the reign of the "victorious king" Kuth Lao II, Persia immediately sent an envoy to "pay tribute". Shi Weijie and Si Li engaged Du Xingman on an envoy to the nine kingdoms of Zhaowu in Central Asia, and along the way, he harvested a lot, bringing back the agate cup of The Emperor, the Buddhist scriptures of Wang Shecheng, the lion skin of Shi Guo, and the fire rat hair.
During the Daye period, three-quarters of the forty-four kingdoms in the Western Regions included by Pei Zhi came to the dynasty one after another, and the Sui Emperor sent a strategic means of trade to the initial success.
Taste the sweetness of military conquest
However, the persistent diseases that plagued the Silk Road have yet to be solved, and the first to bear the brunt of it is Tuguhun. Tuguhun was originally a branch of the Xianbei Murong clan and was a destabilizing factor on the Silk Road. Emperor Wen of Sui adopted a policy of gentleness toward him, but Tuguhun oscillated between the Turks and the Sui Dynasty, eventually causing Emperor Jue to kill him. In the fourth year of Daye, Tuguhun was defeated in the Western Regions and asked the Sui Dynasty to surrender. The Sui Emperor sent Yuwen Shu to lead an army to meet the surrender, taking advantage of the situation to raid the remnants of it, and the leader Fuyun Khan escaped, and Tugu hun was seriously injured.
With this battle paving the way, the Sui Emperor decided that the time was ripe and made the decision to make a five-year tour of the west. Emperor Jue was quite self-conscious about this:
Since ancient times, tianzi had the ritual of hunting, and the emperors of Jiangdong had many fat powders, sat in the deep palace, and did not meet the people, so why should this be?
The Western Tour is not simply a royal conquest, but a collection of many intentions such as conquest of strong enemies, deterrence of foreign nationalities, observation of folk customs, and sightseeing in the mountains and rivers. One of the great hobbies of the Sui Emperor was to let the monarchs of various countries personally enter the dynasty to show their majesty as the Son of Heaven. Hearing that the emperor was traveling west, Gaochang, Yiwu and other twenty-seven kingdoms in the western region came to pay tribute, and many monarchs embarked on a journey to the east, and various envoys "Pei Jinyu, who were golden and jade, burned incense and played music", which made the Sui Emperor highly interested. Passing through the Yellow River, in order to show off his might to the Qiang people, he also ordered "Chen Bing to talk about martial arts", and held a large-scale hunt on the north bank, involving hundreds of thousands of people, and the spectators were all amazed.
After arriving in Xining, the encirclement and suppression of Tuguhun was imminent. The Sui Emperor personally dispatched a large army and laid out a huge encirclement. Fu Yun heard the wind and fled, but the remnants of Tuguhun had no way out. The emperor ordered a general attack, the Sui army defeated the opponent with a single blow, and more than 100,000 people from Tuguhun surrendered. After years of using troops, Tuguhun's "four thousand miles from east to west, and two thousand miles from north to south" was all occupied by the Sui Dynasty, and "the prosperity of the Sui clan is extremely important."
After tasting the sweetness of military conquest, the Sui Emperor revived the Huairou policy and lured luo khan to the mud with the Han mother Xiang Clan, further ensuring the smoothness of the Silk Road.
The hidden dangers of good luck
But just when he was satisfied, the Sui Emperor was immersed in good fortune and extravagance. On the way back to the east, he chose to cross the rainy and snowy Qilian Mountains. For him personally, this may be a feat, but the mountain road is narrow, the army can only line up in a long snake array to move forward, the soldiers freeze to death, the horses lose nine times out of ten, and even the harem concubines are lost a lot, all of which are senseless sacrifices.
Back in Luoyang, in order to show off his national strength to the envoys and merchants of the Western Regions who had entered the dynasty, the Sui Emperor gathered tens of thousands of people, played music and acted all night, entertained the Hu people in shops, and ate and drank drunk. There is a more amazing scene, in order to boast of prosperity, the trees of Luoyang Market are decorated with ribbons, and the confused Hu Shang asked:
There are also poor people in China, whose clothes are not covered, why should they be with this object, and what is the entanglement of trees?
Receiving emissaries and merchant groups from the Western Regions many times has increased the burden on the people, and the hidden dangers of the country's prosperity and poverty have also surfaced. There is no shortage of great talents, but it is a failure to do good and great achievements, and the strategy of the Silk Road can be described as a microcosm of the political career of the Sui Dynasty Emperor.
Excerpt from | "Leadership Wencui" january 2022, original titled "Sui Emperor's Silk Road Strategy"
Source of the manuscript | China Reading News
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