At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the world was in chaos, and the Eastern Han Court existed in name only, so the warlords in various localities took all the local official positions, property, population, and land for themselves, and incorporated the prefectures, counties, and counties that originally belonged to the Han Dynasty into their own private property, taking Jingzhou, one of the thirteen states of the Eastern Han Dynasty, for example, after Jingzhou Assassin Wang Rui was killed by Sun Jian, the imperial court controlled by Dong Zhuo appointed Liu Biao as the Assassin of Jingzhou.
Liu Biao relied on the local power of Jingzhou to quell the rebel forces in Jingzhou and control Jingzhou.
If we look at the fait accompli at that time, Jingzhou belongs to Liu Biao
It was not until after Liu Biao's death that his son Liu Chun inherited all of Liu Biao's possessions and became the Pastor of Jingzhou, but soon after Liu Qi took the throne, he surrendered to Cao Cao, and at this time, Jingzhou belonged to Cao Cao.
Liu Bei
However, at that time, Liu Biao's other sons Liu Qi and Liu Bei occupied Jiangxia County in Jingzhou, formed a resistance force, resisted Cao Cao with Sun Quan, and finally defeated Cao's army in the Battle of Chibi and the Battle of Nan County, but because Sun Quan's army was dominant in Sun Liu's coalition army, Zhou Yu occupied the entire Nan County after the war, and Liu Bei took this opportunity to go south and occupy the four counties of Jingnan: Lingling County, Wuling County, Changsha County, and Guiyang County.
At this time, the ownership of Jingzhou was disputed.
Nominally speaking, Liu Chun represented Liu Biao's orthodoxy, and he chose to surrender to Cao Cao, so nominally Jingzhou still belonged to Cao Cao, but in terms of practical control, Jingzhou was divided into three parts: Cao Wei occupied Xiangfan and Nanyang Commanderies, Liu Bei and Liu Qi occupied Jiangxia County, Lingling County, Wuling County, Changsha County, and Guiyang County, and Sun Quan occupied Nan County.
The situation in the world in 207 AD
Liu Bei lost the direction of the development of the entire regime due to his occupation of the remote jingnan four counties, and on all four sides was a dead end, with Sun Quan's south county to the north, Chongshan Mountains to the west, Sun Quan to the east, and jiaozhou to the south.
Liu Bei could only borrow Nan Commandery from Sun Quan to have a chance to develop, and Sun Quan, out of the idea of letting Liu Bei directly face the military pressure of Cao Wei, lent Nan Commandery to Liu Bei, and the so-called borrowing of Jingzhou was also the borrowing of Nan County
。
After borrowing Nan County, it is obvious that Liu Bei returned Jiangxia County to Sun Quan, which should be a supplementary agreement for Liu Bei to borrow Nan County, as for what agreements the two sides signed in Borrowing South County, there is no historical record, and can only be analyzed according to the facts.
According to Sun Quan's later request for Jingzhou, it should be agreed between the two sides that Liu Bei would return Nan County after taking Yizhou, but Liu Bei did not return Nan County, and also said to Sun Quan's emissaries: Wait until yongzhou and Liangzhou are returned to Nan County. So Sun Quan was very angry, so he sent an army to attack the four counties of Jingnan, while Lu Su and Guan Yu confronted each other in Yiyang.
Liu Bei's territory after the Battle of Chibi
Sun Quan's great move to regain Jingzhou surprised Liu Bei, and he was not willing to lead 50,000 troops to Jingzhou to support Guan Yu against Sun Quan, the two sides were fierce, and at this critical moment Cao Cao attacked Zhang Lu in Hanzhong, endangering Liu Bei's core Yizhou, so Liu Bei quickly compromised and assigned Changsha County and Guiyang County east of Xiangshui to Sun Quan.
The crux of the matter lies in this, after the demarcation of the Xiangshui River,
Liu Bei thought that he had paid off the debt borrowed from Nan County, but Sun Quan thought that it was not cost-effective, he wanted the whole of Jingzhou, so this was not a question of Liu Bei's willingness to pay it back, but Sun Quan's ambition was too big, Liu Bei had returned the territory of Jiangxia County, Changsha County and Guiyang County to Jingzhou, Sun Quan was not satisfied, if you were Liu Bei, would you return the whole Jingzhou to Sun Quan without reservation
？
If anyone is Liu Bei, he will not agree to it.
Jingzhou after the demarcation of the Xiangshui River
If the two sides sign an agreement, then act according to the agreement, if the two sides do not sign the agreement, then they can determine the ownership of Jingzhou on the basis of facts, in fact, this is already a confused account, no one can distinguish what their agreement is?
If in terms of actual control, even if it returns to the most primitive state, Liu Bei has laid down four counties in Jingnan, and these four counties were personally laid down by Liu Bei, even if the Southern Counties are returned, then Liu Bei still has four counties plus half jiangxia county, but in 219 AD, Sun Quan took advantage of Guan Yu's northern expedition to Xiangfan and annexed the entire Jingzhou, which is not a question of whether Liu Bei is willing to return Jingzhou, but Sun Quan's ambitions are too big, and he wants to annex Liu Bei's forces.
After Sun Quan lent Nan County to Liu Bei, he actually got 2 and a half counties, that is, Changsha County, Guiyang County and half Jiangxia County, this transaction Sun Quan is not cost-effective, Presumably anyone can see that the population was the first productive force at that time, the population of 2 and a half counties must have exceeded That County, South County is only geographically more important, Sun Quan did not suffer losses in the transaction with Liu Bei on South County.
Jingzhou was divided
But what did Sun Quan do? Stabbing a knife in Liu Bei's back, although politics is inherently fraudulent, but if it is all fraud, there is no way to carry out political transactions, Sun Quan, under the premise that Liu Beishang is allied, blatantly attacked the entire Jingzhou, this matter is not reasonable anywhere, and the attack on Jingzhou led to the unification of the three kingdoms, because after shu Han lost Jingzhou, it lost the capital to dominate the world, and gradually went to extinction, and could not consume Cao Wei's strength, and the demise of one of the three kingdoms directly heralded the unification of the three kingdoms, because the balance was broken.
In fact, Liu Bei's approach was already benevolent enough, at least he really let Sun Quan take advantage, although this matter arose because of Liu Bei, besides, if nominally speaking, Jingzhou still belonged to Cao Cao, if in terms of actual control, Liu Bei's borrowing of Jingzhou was not a political fraud? Was It that Liu Bei deliberately borrowed Jingzhou from Sun Quan and then deliberately did not return it?
Sun Quan marries his sister
Of course, it is possible, the history books do not record, can only be guessed by the facts, Liu Bei borrowed Nan County, there is actually no agreement flowing out, it is likely that the two sides are verbal agreements, Liu Bei did not return Jingzhou after laying down Yizhou, it may be that at this time the understanding of their respective oral agreements has deviated, Liu Bei although he borrowed Nan County, but returned half of Jiangxia County, and also at the front line for Sun Quan to resist all the military pressure from Cao Wei, so that Eastern Wu was spared from cao Wei's attack in the direction of Jingzhou, but Sun Quan obviously did not think so.
However, Liu Bei later made concessions, using 2 and a half counties to one southern county, which was also a response, but still failed to keep the remaining three Shu Han counties in Jingzhou. Therefore, no matter what Liu Bei did, he could not change Sun Quan's ambitions for Jingzhou, so Liu Bei's approach was not wrong, it was that Sun Quan was too short-sighted.