All along, there have been countless people discussing what would happen if Alexander the Great led an army to attack China, which was in the Warring States period at that time, and most people were inclined to alexander the great's army would be annihilated, and then the Qin state would expand west after destroying the six kingdoms or uniting the six countries to form a federal state. Therefore, many people believe that the main reason why the Qin State, at least Qin Shi Huang did not develop to the west, has become a problem of the qin state's cognition.
What is a cognitive problem? Quoting the scriptures, that is to say, the Chinese's understanding of the world at that time was still in the "heavenly circle place" theory period, in fact, this is a misunderstanding of the "heavenly circle place", in fact, the real "heavenly round place" refers to a philosophical idea in the yin and yang theory, the heaven and the circle symbolize movement, the earth and the square symbolize stillness; the combination of the two is the balance of yin and yang, and the complementarity of dynamic and static. It's not just the ancients' perception of the world.
Otherwise, how to explain how the Xiongnu, Xijong, etc. came from? Moreover, according to the current archaeological findings, Qin Shi Huang has long known that Europeans, or that there will be countries and civilizations in the west, because from many ancient tombs of the Qin period that have been excavated today, many buried White remains have been found; these White people may be merchants from the West, or they may have been captured from the Western Regions.
In short, in any case, it shows that people at that time knew about the outside world; then why did Qin Shi Huang not expand his territory to the west after unifying the Six Kingdoms? Here we will analyze why Qin Shi Huang used troops to the south. During the reign of Qin Shi Huang, he sent a large army to attack Baiyue in the south three times, and only after paying a huge price did he incorporate the Lingnan region into the territory of the Qin state, and set up three counties of Nanhai, Guilin, and Xiang County.
Therefore, many people think that Qin Shi Huang was a very aggressive emperor, and they feel that Qin Shi Huang attacked Baiyue for the sake of land, treasure, or simply for the sake of flaunting his might; is this really the case? In fact, according to the analysis of the historical data obtained now, the reason why Qin Shi Huang wanted to attack Baiyue was actually because Baiyue was a huge threat to the Qin state, or to the Central Plains Dynasty, especially the Ouluo state, which was powerful and the people's style was fierce, and if it could not be properly handled, the future would inevitably be a huge threat.
All the things that Qin Shi Huang did after the establishment of the Qin Dynasty were comprehensively aimed at establishing a country that would reign for a long time and be able to pass on to all generations, which could also be seen from his title of "First Emperor", and if there was a threat to him, he was bound to eradicate it, which was also the most important reason why Qin Shi Huang wanted to conquer Baiyue. The same was true for the Northern Xiongnu, first Pai MengTian Northern Expedition, and then after seeing that it was impossible to completely eradicate the Xiongnu, they mobilized a large number of people's forces to connect the fortifications built by the previous countries, that is, the "Great Wall".
As for why it didn't develop to the west, who knows that the Qin state did not use troops to the west? How did the white people in the Qin Kingdom come from? It was just that the Western Regions at that time did not have much value in using troops, and more crucially, in terms of the social productive forces at that time, the territory ruled by Qin Shi Huang was already large enough, and if it was larger, it would lose its dominance, which Qin Shi Huang did not want to see; later the Han Dynasty and the Tang Dynasty only symbolically ruled the Western Regions, nominally submitting.
If they really attacked the west, they would only bother to work hard and not please, and as soon as the Qin soldiers left, they would immediately rebel, and would this rebellion be suppressed or not suppressed? Not suppressing is equivalent to fighting in vain, and suppression is equivalent to sending troops on expeditions; the remaining troops are even less cost-effective, not to mention whether they can guarantee the loyalty of the army, and many other factors cannot be solved; not to mention the expedition to Europe, will not always adopt the system of sub-sealing, right?
Why, one might ask, did Alexander the Great travel all the way from Europe to Central Asia and India? Did Alexander the Great achieve true rule? After Alexander the Great's death, the vast empire quickly collapsed, and it has been analyzed that even if Alexander the Great did not die of illness, his empire would not exist for long, because Alexander's empire did not have a unified economic foundation, nor did it have a long-term unified political institution and organizational system.
This should be the cognitive difference between the European countries that were dominated by the city-state system at that time and China at that time, and since it was impossible to achieve effective and long-term rule, what was the point of fighting down? And at that time, Alexander the Great's army was all based on war, he was lucky, did not meet the real opponent, if Alexander the Great really arrived in the western region at that time, and engaged the Qin army, as long as a defeat, the entire Pressure Mountain Empire will instantly disintegrate.