In 223 BC, after Guan Yu was killed by Sun Quan, Liu Bei decided to go on a crusade against Eastern Wu in order to avenge Guan Yu. As a result, It is conceivable that Eastern Wu sent the governor Lu Xun to hold firm, and Lu Xun took advantage of Liu Bei's eagerness to win and dominated the entire occupation, and finally Liu Bei was defeated in the Battle of Yiling, and he himself died of illness in the White Emperor City. Before Liu Bei died, he entrusted his own son Liu Chan to Zhuge Liang.
Liu Chan was incompetent and incompetent, and had no talent for governing the country, so the burden of the Shu state was all on Zhuge Liang's body at once.
Take the initiative to go north
Zhuge Liang took the initiative to carry out the Northern Expedition, not only for Liu Bei's last wishes, but more importantly, at that time, Cao Wei was vigorously restoring his national strength, if he did not attack at this time, when Cao Wei's strength grew to immeasurable, Shu Han could only let people flesh. Therefore, Zhuge Liang could only send Chen Zhen and Deng Zhi to Eastern Wu to persuade Sun Quan.
In this way, he had the strength to fight against Cao Wei, and after Zhuge Liang led a large army to quell the rebellion in the south, he began to formally prepare for the Northern Expedition.
Two errors
However, during the First Northern Expedition, Zhuge Liang made two mistakes. In 228 BC, Liu Bei's subordinate Wei Yan offered Zhuge Liang a plan to emulate the famous Han Dynasty general Han Xin, and he himself led five thousand soldiers and horses directly along the Qin Mountains to capture Chang'an, which only took about ten days, but this plan was directly rejected by Zhuge Liang.
Some people here will put forward the idea, if it is Han Xin who is leading at this time, will the Northern Expedition still win? This is indeed an interesting idea!
Turn things around
I believe that everyone understands the strength of Han Xin's war, and he wins by surprise, often catching the enemy by surprise. Coincidentally, Han Xin also once went north, and he would never stay for a long time every time he captured a city, but continued to fight along the next until the enemy all surrendered.
If this kind of courageous and resourceful spirit of adventure is placed here in Shu Han, perhaps it can really reverse the situation of Shu Han's defeat.
The idea put forward by Wei Yan was a good opportunity, but unfortunately there was no chance to implement it.
The street kiosk is lost
The second mistake Zhuge Liang made was to hand over the street kiosk to Ma Mo. At that time, the Shu army suggested that Zhuge Liang send veteran generals to garrison, but Zhuge Liang did not adopt it, and even if Wang Ping was sent to assist Ma Mo, he could not resist the fiasco of the Shu army. In the end, the street kiosk was lost, and Ma Mo was also killed. It is because of these two points that many people have questioned Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition and have the idea of placing Han Xin in it.
To sum up, if the general was replaced by Han Xin, the Northern Expedition still had a certain chance of success, after all, the Shu army at that time just lacked Han Xin's courageous spirit of adventure!
bibliography:
Romance of the Three Kingdoms