Everyone knows that it took less than twenty years for the Qin State to unify the world, but few people know that in this journey, the most powerful and energetic force and energy of the Qin State was the battle to destroy Chu fought by the 600,000-strong army led by Wang Qi.
Among the six countries, why does the only Chu state have this "treatment"? What is so difficult about the Chu state? Does the battle to destroy Chu really require absolute numerical superiority to be won? In the battle between Wang Qi and Li Xin over the strength of the chu forces that year, what did the veteran general Wang Qi see that made him always firmly insist that 600,000 troops could not attack Chu?
The first place where the Chu state is difficult to attack - geographical location
The State of Chu bordered the State of Qin in the northwest, and correspondingly, the State of Chu began to deploy from the north.
In the early years, after the Chu state moved its capital due to the failure of the joint attack on Qin by various countries, it was a military fortress that renovated the Qin-Chu border, not only tun soldiers and grain, but also the military construction of border defense never fell behind. On the other hand, if the State of Qin wanted to take the State of Chu directly, it must wipe out the military fortresses along the way, because the second choice for attacking the city was only to confront the powerful water division of the State of Chu, and the Qin army that had been fighting land battles for many years undoubtedly had no chance of victory. Therefore, from the geographical advantages of "manpower" alone, the Chu state should not be underestimated.
Secondly, looking at the natural geographical advantages, that is, the second siege choice just mentioned - the countless rivers and swamps that cannot be avoided in the western part of the Chu State. On these muddy and difficult and specialized "gram" land, the Qin state is bound to be counterattacked or even "crushed" by the Chu state's water division, so this area can also be regarded as providing a natural defensive "barrier" for the Chu state.
The second place where the Chu state is difficult to attack - morale
Why was the Qin state finally willing to send a staggering 600,000 troops to attack the Chu state, was it the number that the old general Wang Qi casually said? And is it because no matter what country it is, six hundred thousand troops will definitely be wiped out? Strictly speaking, these 600,000 figures were actually obtained by the Qin State through "experiments" that taught a heavy lesson.
Before the Qin state destroyed Chu, two generals of the Qin state, Li Xin and Wang Qi, had a dispute over the strategy of using troops to attack Chu: Li Xin, who was young and promising and had made outstanding achievements in the war against Zhao Andyan, thought that he could take the chu state with only 200,000, while Wang Qi thought that he needed 600,000.
At the beginning, the Qin dynasty and the public all thought: Why should it cost 600,000 people to solve things that can be solved with 200,000 people? Not to mention the combination of leading soldiers to fight, although the difference between the two is only that the number of soldiers has multiplied, but in terms of logistical pressure, it is an increase in the way of standing!
Thus, Li Xin won the controversy without a doubt, and set out with confidence with an army of 200,000 men.
But. The attack method of few people and few people will naturally have corresponding disadvantages. Li Xin attacked Chu as if in a broken position, but the rear was unstable and unevenly deployed, resulting in 200,000 troops completely insufficient to fight in the vast territory of the Chu state, so they were also seized by the Chu army and beaten, and finally returned with a big defeat.
You must know that Li Xin had participated in the war to destroy Zhao and was also a general of the Yan army. Its combat experience, if not the top at the time, could be ranked in the popular ranks. Such a general, such a morale-boosting army, was "violently beaten" by the army of General Xiang Yan in the Chu State, and how could the Chu State, which was already full of martial arts, not be demoralized? Therefore, after this battle, how high the morale of the Chu army can be, how low can the morale of the Qin army be, and if the momentum is still lost, how can it be victorious?
Therefore, the Qin state finally firmly determined: the war to destroy Chu must be 600,000! Morale may lose a little at first, but momentum definitely cannot be lost!
The third difficult place for the Chu state to attack is that it is easy to attack the city and difficult to defend the city
It is not difficult to see from the fact that Li Xin and his 200,000 troops did directly open the gate of the State of Chu and go deep into the border of the State of Chu that opening the gate of the country and capturing the city was not a difficult task for the Qin army, and the difficulty was to resist the counterattack and siege made by the State of Chu against the terrain of the city. Don't forget, in the land of the Chu Kingdom, the Chu people have lived for hundreds of years! Even if the frontal battle is lost, using the terrain to counterattack is the absolute advantage of the "ground snakes" of the Chu Kingdom!
On the other hand, at this time, the Qin state was no longer as simple as taking two cities, expanding the territory, and pushing out the borders of the country as in the past. The State of Qin wanted to unify the world, which determined that the ultimate goal of this war was to destroy the entire State of Chu, and it was a full-scale war that not only defeated the Chu army, but also destroyed the Chu army.
Therefore, the Qin army should make a comprehensive deployment according to such "needs", not only to kill the enemy head-on to have an overwhelming victory, but also to have the defense of the rear and the continuous support of grain and grass, and more importantly, to have a reliable source of military intelligence reports.
In the Chu state with such a vast territory, in order to achieve the above three points and achieve the final victory, it is obvious that an army of 200,000 people is obviously not enough, and 600,000 troops is the basis for maintaining the final victory.
In view of Li Xin's earlier defeat, when Wang Qi entered the Chu state with 600,000 troops, he did not fight the Chu army at the first time. He knew very well that his numerical superiority had been able to overwhelm the Chu army that was facing him head-on, but the real battle between the big powers was not the strength of the army, but the logistics!
Therefore, when the two armies confronted each other, Wang Qi was not in a hurry to attack, nor was he in a hurry to attack the city and plunder the land, but first built a high wall, trained the soldiers, and engaged in a "sit-in battle" with the Chu army on the opposite side. During this period, the Chu army saw that the Qin army was not moving, and naturally launched an attack first, but Wang Qi's army relied on the strong wall barrier built to make the attacking Chu army have nowhere to fight. Over time, the logistics of the Chu army began to be out of supply, and they had to retreat. At this time, Wang Qi suddenly launched an attack when the Chu army was careless, directly wiped out the main force of the Chu army, and finally swept through the Chu state.