We know that among all the generals of Cao Wei, the majority of the generals with different surnames who are not related to Cao Cao by blood still account for the majority, and five of them are particularly excellent and outstanding, so in the seventeenth volume of the Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms, they are arranged separately in the same volume, which we call "five sons and good generals", and the best of them is General Zhang Liao.
The Three Kingdoms is a typical era of war, with jin ge iron horses swallowing up like tigers, bloody rain and wind, and countless wars will grow up in this fertile soil. The "force value" in my mind is not a complete single-handed achievement, but a general who should have brilliant battle achievements and full of personality and charm. A typical manifestation of Zhang Liao's "force value" is in the Battle of Hefei, where Zhang Liao successfully repelled Sun Quan's 100,000 invading army with 7,000 men and horses, and almost captured Sun Quan alive at Xiaoyaojin. As a famous general, he ranked second among the Cao Wei generals after Deng Ai.
A front-line general with both wisdom and courage
Zhang Liao was a native of Mayi County, Yanmen County, Eastern Han Dynasty. He and his fellow villager Guan Yu suffered the same thing, they all changed their names and surnames to avoid revenge and left their hometowns.
His martial arts experience was more tortuous than Guan Yu's, and he successively defected to Shi Dingyuan, Dong Zhuo, and Lü Bu. In the third year of Jian'an (198), after Lü Bu was captured and killed by Cao Cao, he followed Cao Cao until the third year of the Huang Dynasty (222) when he died of illness, and served cao Cao for 25 years.
The Peking opera "Single Knife to the Meeting" is a story dedicated to praising Guan Yunchang's lonely hero and going to Lusu's meeting alone, and Zhang Liao, on cao Cao's orders, went deep into the enemy camp in the battle to besiege Changfeng in the East China Sea, and single-handedly persuaded Changfeng to surrender, which was not only a matter of force value, but also the courage of the hero's boldness.
During the military operation to pacify Jingzhou, some people in the camp under Zhang Liao's jurisdiction plotted to rebel and set fire, the whole army was shaken, Zhang Liao strictly ordered his subordinates to stand still, he only brought a few of his own soldiers to stand in the middle of the camp, and when the battalions were calm, they immediately exposed the rebels and executed them all.
Chen Lan and Mei Cheng instigated a rebellion by the Qi people in Lu'an County, and Cao Cao sent yu Ban, Zang Ba, Zhang Liao, Zhang Gao, Niu Gai and other generals to fight, Chen Mei and the two of them were in danger of defending, and only Zhang Liao, as a pioneer, took the lead in attacking the dangerous pass and won the victory. Cao Cao commented on this battle: "Ascending the Pillar of Heaven, adventure, defeating Cheng Lan and Mei Cheng, the merits of the general (Zhang Liao). ”
Battle of The Muddy Waters
In the twentieth year of Jian'an (215), Cao Cao faced two major problems: trapped in Hanzhong and unable to win, not how strong Zhang Lu was, but the natural danger in Hanzhong was really a bit difficult to move, just flipping a chessboard Guanshan Pass made the Northern Soldiers in the Central Plains dizzy.
Cao Cao actually did not worry about this problem one by one as a soldier to eat food, and not a group to hanzhong fifteen days trip, without a little spirit of hard-working, what kind of soldier are you? He was worried that the situation in the Jianghuai area, thousands of miles away, would deteriorate. Will that good-looking but ill-intentioned Sun Quan take advantage of the old man and Zhang Lu's entanglement to jump out and do something and brush up on his sense of existence?
If he didn't even have this foresight, how could the old man go on mixing in Xuchang? Of course, I want to put three heavyweight horses zhang liao, Le Ban, and Li Dian in the huainan military town of Hefei at the same time, and command seven thousand people and horses.
Here is a digression, because Zhang Liao's outstanding military achievements, the White Wolf Mountain laid the status of a famous general in Zhang Liao's army, so there is a bit of pride, in order to suppress the balance of the Hefei Theater of personnel allocation is reasonable, Cao Cao specially in the Hefei front command to insert a ruthless Li Dian, increase the safety factor of the Hefei command.
In August of that year, Sun Quan did indeed dispatch 100,000 troops from the Yangtze River into Chaohu Lake and launch a large-scale attack on Hefei not far away.
According to Cao Cao's deployment when he left Huainan, the three generals were accompanied by a civilian xue ti to coordinate the work, and left a wax-sealed bamboo jane for Xue Ti, and it was specially written outside: "Thief to Naifa." ”
The situation was urgent, and the crowd immediately scratched open the wax seal as if hoping to win the lottery number, on which were Cao Cao's four sentences in Han Licao: "If Sun Quanzhi, General Zhang and Li Er go to war, General Le guards, and the guards do not have to fight." ”
Except for Zhang Liao, the generals were dazed: "Another Eastern Wu came with a hundred thousand horses, almost pouring out of the nest, using the fingers of his feet to dial the abacus, do you also know that only by avoiding his front, according to the city to hold firm is the perfect strategy, why do you want General Zhang Li'er to go to war?"
Zhang Liao's "Heart has a spirit and a sharp point"
At this time, Zhang Liao had been fighting under Cao Cao for seventeen years, and he could understand Cao Cao's concept of using troops, and at that time, a military expert named Wen Hui commented on Zhang Liao: "Su Zhi Wang Yi" (Su Zhi Wang Yi).
In other words, Zhang Liao was well aware of Cao Cao's intentions: he must not blindly stick to it, but must take advantage of Sun Quan's unstable footing to preemptively attack first, you can beat morale, play a mighty wind, and then retreat to hold on, in order to have a strong fighting spirit and confidence in victory.
The reason why Cao Cao named himself in the JianShu as the first battle general and had good intentions was that he hoped to take the lead and bravely take responsibility.
Zhang Liao then explained this truth to everyone in detail, and at the same time hoped that Li Dian, who was a little estranged from himself, could be public and selfless, and fight with me.
When the two generals are facing a great enemy, they give up their personal grudges, put the interests of the country first, and are determined to fight to the end!
Zhang Liao immediately recruited eight hundred brave men in the army who had good muscles and selfless thoughts, let everyone eat and drink a full meal, and then put himself in armor and held a long halberd, just like the predecessor Offinan Yao Eighteen from the army, took the lead in rushing to the place where the enemy army was in the army, killed the two generals of the other side on the spot, and then shouted out his name: "And Zhang Wenyuan of Mayi!" The famous Eastern Wu generals Gan Ning and Lü Meng desperately resisted, which was useless, and Zhang Wenyuan, who was like a crazy tiger, even dispatched all his soldiers to take advantage of the victory, and under the impact of thousands of outlaws, all relying on Eastern Wu Lingtong, who was also an outlaw, to fight for multiple wounds all over his body to protect Sun Quan from escaping.
Sun Quan saw that the situation was not good, and immediately jumped on the nearest big grave bag and waited for rescue under the guard ring. Zhang Liao wanted this effect, simply rip open the Shanxi accent to challenge, and ask Sun Quan to come down and single out!
Almost cursing, Zhang Liao took the lead in killing a bloody road to return to the city.
Hefei city is high and deep, the fortification is abnormal, the victory of the first battle made the Hefei defenders as if they were excited by chicken blood, more than ten days later, Sun Quan decided to withdraw, of course, by jiangdong big boat back, but must pass through a ferry called "Xiaoyaojin" to wait for the boat.
When Sun Quan and the last group of soldiers were preparing to leave from here, Zhang Liao, who had been observing the gate tower of the city wall, immediately rushed to his horse and led a capable cavalry straight to Sun Quan.
Sun Quancang fled in panic, and after passing a wooden bridge, the guards destroyed the wooden bridge and used the river to block Zhang Liao, otherwise Sun Quan might be captured alive!
(Zhang Liao's Yiguan Tomb in Hefei)
Conclusion
When Zhang Liao "stood for thirty years", he happened to become a general under Cao Cao, for twenty-five years, every year he had experience in major battles, it can be said that he has experienced hundreds of battles, looking at the generals of Cao Wei, only Deng Ai can be called a lone hero, and he single-handedly destroyed the Shu Han regime, he is the first general of Cao Wei should not be controversial, Cao's nephews and nephews and Xiahou generals, brave and decent, slightly lacking in wisdom, and the battle record is not as good as Zhang Liao, so I think Zhang Liao should rank second among Cao Wei's generals.