In the autumn of 209 BC, in Puxian County, heavy rain fell from the sky
On the muddy official road, a group of ragged people are still struggling to move forward in the torrential rain
Suddenly, someone shouted loudly to the drunken county lieutenant to escape
He provoked again and again, successfully provoking the county lieutenant, first drinking and cursing, and finally drawing his sword
How could the county lieutenant know that all this was his calculation, using his good popularity to arouse the sympathy of everyone
When the county lieutenant raised the sword in his hand, before he could cut it down, he quickly took it down and killed him
Then, with the cooperation of his accomplices, another county lieutenant in charge of escorting them was killed
Finally ascend to the top and exhale:
Cut down no way, curse Qin! Princely general, Ning has a kind of hu?
”
Yes, his name is Wu Guang, and his accomplice is Chen Sheng.
The Dazexiang Uprising launched by Chen Sheng and Wu Guang sounded the clarion call of the world against Qin, and the Qin Dynasty began to enter the countdown stage.
But we all know that not long after, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang died.
Their rebel army became cannon fodder for the nobles of the nations, and the fruits of the final victory were picked by the Liu Bang clique.
This was the first large-scale peasant uprising in China's history, and it was of great significance.
"The prince will be phased, Ning has a kind of hu"
The cry has been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people since then, and has influenced generations of people for thousands of years.
The Tang Dynasty poet Du Mu once lamented in "A Fang Gong Fu":
“
The Qin people do not have time to mourn for themselves, and the posterity mourns; the posterity mourns and does not learn from it, and also makes the posterity mourn the future generations.
It can also be used here to lament Chen Sheng, Wu Guang, and the peasant uprising.
Many peasant uprisings in later generations took Chen Sheng and Wu Guang as an example, but they did not escape the fate of Chen Sheng and Wu Guang, and always made wedding dresses for others.
It is better to sort out the large peasant uprisings in the past 2,000 years of feudal history.
Green Forest Red Brow Uprising
From 1 AD to 9 AD, for more than 8 years, Wang Mang completed the An Han Gong - Zai Heng
——
False Emperor
- The perfect excesses of the True Emperor successfully replaced Liu Hanjiangshan.
Wang Mang was very much in favor of Confucianism, saying that after the emperor implemented a series of new policies, modeled on the western Zhou system, and wanted to return to the era of lizhi before the collapse of the Li Dynasty.
History calls Wang Mang's reform.
At the same time as the new policy was issued, Wang Mang also continued to launch wars, causing hundreds of thousands of troops to be trapped in the frontier for a long time, consuming countless manpower, material resources, and financial resources.
According to historical records, just to get together the name of the "Four Seas", Wang Mang made a big move to send troops to occupy the land around Qinghai Lake and set it up
West Sea County
。
In order to make this a veritable county, the population must be enriched.
Wang Mang's solution is: forced immigration!
In what name do you immigrate?
Send a charge army!
In order to meet the needs of immigrants, Wang Mang temporarily added dozens of harsh decrees and added thousands of criminals out of thin air.
Whatever Wang Mang's original intentions were, the result of the New Deal was:
The people are not happy, and the world is in turmoil.
In 17 AD, there was a famine in Jingzhou in the south.
A large number of hungry people are there
Under the leadership of Wang Kuang and Wang Feng, they began to gather continuously, and occupied the Green Forest Mountain as a base area.
That's it
Green Forest Army
The prototype
In the game with the officers and soldiers sent by Wang Mang, the strength of the Green Forest Army not only did not weaken, but grew stronger and stronger, gradually developing to the scale of tens of thousands of people.
While Wang Mang's new dynasty was busy suppressing the Green Forest Army but failing again and again, a new peasant uprising occurred in the northern Shandong region, the largest of which was called
"Red Brow Army".
In the process of the continuous growth of the Green Forest Army and the Red Brow Army, the powerful landlords and the Liu Clan also began to secretly store up their strength.
Wang Mang's new policy not only hurt the common people, but also harmed the interests of powerful landlords, especially the previous Liu royal clan.
Before officially claiming the title of emperor, Wang Mang deposed 32 princes and 181 princes of the Liu clan, and the two sides were already inseparable.
Before and after Wang Mang's usurpation of the throne, the princes of the Liu clan had launched armed resistance, all of which were quickly suppressed and then stopped.
It was not until the huge Green Forest Chimei Uprising stirred up the four directions and made Wang Mang tired of coping, that those Liu clan relatives who had been dormant became active again, joined the rebel army, and gradually occupied a dominant position.
In the end, Liu Xiu, the "son of the plane", completed the miracle of Guangwu Zhongxing.
Yellow Turban Uprising
Later, it was the zhangjiao yellow turban uprising at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty that changed the wind and clouds.
The Yellow Turban Rebellion shook the foundation of eastern Han rule, but it still failed to overthrow Liu's Jiangshan, but it created an excellent opportunity for all the princes to compete for the Central Plains, opening the curtain of cruel and wonderful wars in the Three Kingdoms era.
The Yellow Turban Army was once again reduced to cannon fodder, and the whetstones or stepping stones of the various princes.
In the end, the Sima clan of the Shi clan completed the unification of the world.
There are many more, many such stories.
For example, the peasant revolt at the end of the Sui Dynasty, the uprising of Wang Xianzhi and Huangchao at the end of the Tang Dynasty, the uprising of the Red Turban Army at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the peasant revolt of the late Ming Dynasty, and so on.
Why did it become cannon fodder?
Why is it always the peasant revolt that blows the clarion call for the fall of the dynasty, and then becomes cannon fodder and is picked by peaches?
I think we can talk about it from the following four aspects, and the importance is decreasing in turn.
1. Resistance encountered
When the peasant revolt broke out, the original social order of the feudal dynasty was not destroyed, and the various state apparatus could still function normally.
The so-called skinny camel was bigger than The horse, and compared with the early peasant rebel army, the various war resources held by the imperial court were much more powerful.
In order to "kill the chicken and scare the monkey" and prevent such things from happening again, the imperial court will launch at this time, and it has the ability to launch a large-scale encirclement and suppression operation.
In the process of suppressing the uprising, the imperial court inevitably consumed a lot of military and financial resources.
The economy at the end of the dynasty was usually on the verge of bankruptcy, and as the war progressed, the financial pressures continued to increase, and could only be solved by constantly raising taxes. The greater the financial pressure, the more taxes are collected, the more taxes are collected, the more people who cannot survive, and the more people who rebel, the more people will become more and more.
The more difficult it is for the government to carry out effective encirclement and suppression.
2, their own strength
Peasant rebel armies are often initiated first by a group of people who can't survive, and the first people who join are the same bitter haha.
Often at this time, the deterrent effect of the government and the imperial court on ordinary people is still there, except for people in areas directly affected by the war, as well as people who really cannot survive, it is difficult to let more people join in. In particular, elite talents with certain strength include local tyrants, squires, middle- and lower-level officials, and readers.
This leads to a very serious and widespread problem: the rebel army is ill-prepared, undertrained, has low combat effectiveness, is short of money and food, and lacks the talent of strategic vision.
When the smoke was everywhere, the government was exhausted and was dragged down, and
In the test of blood and fire, the peasant rebel army trained a number of backbone cadres, and the combat effectiveness was continuously strengthened, which really shook the ruling foundation of the feudal dynasty and won victory
The balance gradually tilts.
At this time, the speculators who have been holding back the big trick jump out to harvest, pick peaches, divide cakes, and complete unification.
Until then, they were all quietly
"Build high walls, accumulate grain"
3. Experiences and lessons learned
Everything is more or less inseparable from the experience and lessons of predecessors.
The first rebel army lacked experience in all aspects, not only in military combat, but also in politics, diplomacy, personnel and other aspects. There is no experience, no way to learn, only to take one step at a time, one wrong step at a time, maybe a small mistake will make the uprising fail.
Those who revolt in the back have learned from each other, look at the losses and lessons of their predecessors, avoid repeating mistakes, and at least avoid some low-level mistakes.
4. The limitations of the peasant uprising
The peasant rebel army was easy to get rich and peaceful, and free and loose ideas were very common.
We often see that some rebel armies have just gained a foothold and fall into infighting, which has greatly depleted their own strength.
For example, everyone is very familiar with the Taiping Rebellion, the power struggle between Hong Xiuquan and Yang Xiuqing, and the departure of Shi Dakai.
In addition to infighting, the desire for pleasure and the lack of progress were also the fatal shortcomings of the peasant rebel army.
Since Chen Sheng Wu Guang shouted out
After the slogan, the leaders of the rebel army had a little strength, and began to call themselves kings and marquises, one by one, wearing the big hat of the prince, where was the blood and courage of the original uprising?
Of course, the most important thing is the peasant rebel army
Lack of rationality, longer than destruction, shorter than construction
。 They have broken an old world without building capacity for a new one.