In 201 AD, the wandering Liu Bei temporarily defected to the Jingzhou warlord Liu Biao. Liu Biao was still quite generous and generous, and did not look down on this disgraced little brother, and allocated Xinye County to Liu Bei, allowing him to take shelter as a place for soldiers and temporarily shelter. Looking back at the beginning of the army in 184 AD to the present, Liu Bei has been running on the road of entrepreneurship for 17 years, but there is still no place to stand under the tiles, and the soldiers under him are not more than a thousand generals to stop the Closure of Zhang, and the dream of unifying the rivers and mountains to restore the Han Room is even more distant.
Liu Bei, who was in a state of bitterness, thought bitterly and believed that the root cause of the problem still lay in the lack of talent. The reason why Cao Cao was able to dominate the Central Plains and the reason why Sun Quan was able to dominate the left side of the Longpan River was that in addition to their own heroic talents, they were also inseparable from their rich talent reserves.
At that time, the situation in the Jingzhou area was relatively stable, and many hermits lived in seclusion between the mountains and forests around Jingxiang. Liu Bei then made a careful visit, and finally found out that a high-ranking person lived in Xiangyang. Liu Bei then made a special trip to visit Sima Hui, hoping to get his advice. Who knew that Sima Hui had long since given up his name and had no intention of going out of the mountains. However, Liu Bei was not completely rewarded, and Sima Hui recommended one person to him: Zhuge Liang, the master of Wolong. This person has the talent of heaven and earth, and the ambition of An Bang to determine the country, if he can be invited to go out of the mountain, he will not be a small supplement to Liu Bei's career.
Liu Bei was overjoyed and hurriedly set off for Longzhong, running back and forth three times before he could see Zhuge Liang. Zhuge Liang is also a cheerful person, he and Liu Bei saw the same, did not take a tone to pretend to be sophisticated, but unreservedly immediately tailored the development strategy "Longzhong Pair" for Liu Bei.
Longzhong's strategy has since become Liu Bei's founding policy and a guiding light in the history of the development of the Shu and Han Dynasties. The core spirit of Longzhong, in short, is two bases or two fronts. The two bases were to let Liu Bei seize Yizhou as the rear base and Jingzhou as the outpost. The land of Yizhou is fertile, rich in products, densely populated, and dangerous in Shu Road, which can be used as the best foundation for the founding of the Shu Han Dynasty. Jingzhou, on the other hand, was right between Cao Cao in the Central Plains and Sun Quan in Jiangdong, leading his whole body to threaten Cao Cao to the north and Sun Quan to the south.
By taking Jingzhou Yizhou, Liu Bei's great cause of Shu Han was already in an invincible position. In the overall situation of the Three Kingdoms, Shu Han had already taken full advantage of the opportunity, and could attack and retreat. It can be said that Liu Bei benefited greatly from Longzhong. However, the four words in Longzhong were the most critical, but Liu Bei did not pay attention to it, resulting in the failure of the Shu Han Dynasty.
These four words are "Xihe Zhurong". At that time, the Three Kingdoms were fighting feverishly in the Jianghuai area of the Central Plains, while the desolate northwest area, which was sparsely populated, was generally ignored by the Three Kingdoms. At that time, the northwest region had a high and steep terrain, a cold climate, and a vast expanse of grassland, which was an excellent natural pasture and rich in good horses, so it became a gathering area for many nomadic tribes, living with many nomadic tribes such as Qiang, Xianbei, and so on, which is what Zhuge Liang called "Zhurong".
These nomadic tribes, with their unique horse resources and grassland resources, built up a powerful cavalry force. At the beginning of the Three Kingdoms period, the herds of heroes chased the deer in the Central Plains and had no time to look west, and these nomadic tribes rose rapidly and became armed groups with strong combat effectiveness. Their cavalry units were fierce and fierce, and they were the natural enemies of the traditional infantry-based armies in the Central Plains.
During the Three Kingdoms period, the nomadic tribes in the west twice had fierce armed conflicts with the Central Plains Imperial Court, and both showed extremely strong combat effectiveness. First, during the sixteenth and seventeenth years of Jian'an, the Kansai warlord Ma Chao raised troops and cao Cao in a military conflict, and the battle was fierce. Cao Cao's strength was second to none at the time, but it suffered several heavy blows, causing Cao Cao to lament: "Horses do not die, I have no burial ground." The main body of Ma Chao's army was the elite Qianghu Legion composed of nomadic tribes.
In the late Three Kingdoms period, after the establishment of the Western Jin Dynasty, the Xianbei people in the west rose again, and the Xianbei leader Bald Tree was able to raise an army against the Jin Dynasty, sweeping the Western Province with an unstoppable momentum, and successively beheading the Western Jin generals Hu Lie, Su Yu, Qian Hong, and Yang Xin, and the world shook. Emperor Wu of Jin, who was so talented, lamented in the courtroom, "Who can please me for this prisoner of Liangzhou?" As a result, "the courtiers are not right", and no one dares to take the stubble. It can be seen that the combat effectiveness of the nomadic tribes in the west is strong.
Zhuge Liang was keenly aware of this with his advanced insight, and very earnestly hoped that Liu Bei would be able to "make peace with Zhu Rong in the west" and unite or use this powerful armed force to serve the Shu state. With the assistance of this force, Liu Bei's military strength of the Shu Han Dynasty will be fundamentally enhanced by leaps and bounds, and there will be greater hope and certainty for the rejuvenation of the Han Dynasty in the unification of the Three Kingdoms. Unfortunately, Liu Bei did not notice these four most crucial words, which eventually led to the failure of the great cause of the Shu Kingdom.
References: Zizhi Tongjian, Romance of the Three Kingdoms