Background: The late Eastern Han Dynasty was divided into three kingdoms, but the entire Eastern Han Dynasty was chaotic, and the main reason was that the emperor's life was too short. Except for the first two and the titular last emperor, Emperor Han Xian, the longest lived to be 36 years old, and the shortest lived 2 years. This led to a serious problem of foreign relatives and eunuchs. The first is the problem of foreign relatives, because the emperor died early, and the successor was even younger. Therefore, the problem of governance fell to my mother and uncle, which inevitably became arrogant. As the little emperor grows up, he naturally breeds a desire for power, and to regain power from his uncles, he must rely on another force, that is, eunuchs. After all, they are the people around the emperor, so the power struggle of the entire Eastern Han Dynasty can be summarized as the 'Qi and Eunuch Struggle'.
The Scourge of the Party: Zhuge Liang has a saying that 'I don't sigh and hate Huan Lingye'. When Emperor Khan Huan ascended the throne at the age of 15, he tried to destroy the foreign Qi Liang clan. Later, he united 5 eunuchs and annihilated the Liang clan in one fell swoop. These five eunuchs also gained power and were made the Five Marquis. However, these five marquis are even more excessive, extorting and robbing to fill their selfish desires, which makes the people have no livelihood and the national strength is weak.
External war
In the later period of Emperor Khan Huan, a group of imperial students demanded that eunuchs be rectified in order to revive the dynasty, which led to large-scale conflicts between eunuchs and civil officials. As a result, a large number of students were arrested, and although they were later released, they were imprisoned for life and not allowed to serve as officials again, which is known in history as the scourge of the party. As a result, the politics of the dynasty became darker. It is rumored that Emperor Huan of Han was obsessed with women, and the number of people in the harem reached five or six thousand, and later Emperor Huan died at the age of 36, and his successor was Emperor Ling of Han. Emperor Han Ling favored eunuchs like Emperor Han Huan, and a second party disaster occurred in his hands, and at the same time, because of the Han-Qiang War to conquer Xianbei and other external wars, resulting in empty national strength, so the country appeared to buy and sell officials, so the officials wantonly amassed wealth and looted the people's fat and anointed the people, resulting in the people's livelihood and civil riots, which is the famous 'Yellow Turban Rebellion' in history.
Yellow Turban Uprising
The Yellow Turban Uprising was a peasant uprising organized in the form of a religion, and the leader of the uprising, Zhang Jiao, founded the religious 'Taiping Dao', and it is said that many sick people drank rune water and were cured without medicine. As a result, there were more and more believers, numbering in the hundreds of thousands. Believers are also found in two-thirds of the country. Zhang Jiao rebelled with the slogan 'The sky is dead, the yellow sky is standing'. Within a month, there were peasant uprisings in twenty-eight counties in seven states across the country. The Yellow Turban army was in full swing, and the imperial court was unable to cope with it, so it had to delegate power and allow private armed forces, and Liu Bei relied on this to stand on the stage of history. And Dong Zhuo, Cao Cao, Sun Jian and others also had outstanding military merits and had the real power to divide one side. Later, the Yellow Turban Rebellion was put down, and Emperor Ling of Han still did not regret it, and at this time the question of who his two sons Liu Wei and Liu Xie was the crown prince caused a confrontation between the foreign general He Jin and the eunuch clique.
After the death of Emperor Ling, He Jinli ascended the throne by his nephew Liu Feng, known as Emperor Shao of Han or King Hongnong. He Jin thus began to openly fire and eunuchs, and recruited the northwestern warlord Dong Zhuo to help him by force. Later, He Jin and the eunuch Huo died together, and Dong Zhuo sat down to collect profits and monopolized the dynasty, and even deposed the Han Shao Emperor Liu Wei and installed Liu Xie as emperor, and this Liu Xie was the last emperor of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Emperor Han Xian. At this point, the rule of the Eastern Han Dynasty existed in name only.
Dong Zhuo's actions were unpopular, so various princes led by Yuan Shao jointly attacked Dong Zhuo, including Yuan Shu, Sun Jian, Cao Cao, and Liu Bei. Dong Zhuo was afraid that the coalition forces would first kill the deposed emperor Liu Feng, so as not to cooperate with the outside world, and chose to move the capital from Luoyang to Chang'an to avoid the alliance forces, and Luoyang tycoons were all captured and confiscated their wealth, and ordered the general Lü Bu to dig the imperial tomb to loot the treasures, and millions of people were forced to move countless lives and die, and finally burned Luoyang. At this time, there was internal strife against Dong Zhuo's coalition army, such as Cao Cao advocating immediate action, but Yuan Shao set up banquets and gatherings every day and did not want to forge ahead, such as Yuan Shu and Sun Jian were afraid that the other party would compete for the head and hinder each other. Later, the coalition forces moved forward, and Sun Jian attacked Luoyang, seemingly successful in the crusade, but most of the heroes in the coalition army formed a grudge in this battle, and turned from fighting Dong Zhuo together to opening up their own territory.
The princes attacked Dong Zhuo
The good days when the coalition forces dispersed Dong Zhuo did not last long. Lü Bu was known as the first fierce general of the Three Kingdoms, and Dong Zhuo was worthy of his father and son, and used him as his personal bodyguard. And Dong Zhuo had a suspicious personality, always afraid that Lü Bu would mess up his inner room, and once threw a halberd at Lü Bu. And Lü Bu did fornicate with Dong Zhuo's maid in private, and this story is Lü Bu's play with mink cicadas. The minister of the DPRK took this as an opportunity to separate Lü Bu and Dong Zhuo, and Lü Bu killed Dong Zhuo. Later, Dong Zhuoyu's party Li Wei and Guo Xian captured Chang'an to avenge Dong Zhuo, and killed the minister Wang Yun and held Emperor Xian of Han hostage. Li Wei and Guo Xian were in internal strife, and Emperor Xian of Han took advantage of the chaos to flee Chang'an and return to Luoyang, and there was no need to say that the road was difficult and dangerous.
Back in Luoyang, Luoyang has become a scorched earth and has nowhere to hide. At this time, because of the suppression of the 'Yellow Turban Uprising', Cao Cao, who already had a powerful army, Qingzhou Bing, and established his own territory throughout Shandong. Seeing that Emperor Han Xian had fled, he went to meet Emperor Han Xian at the suggestion of the adviser Xun Yu, 'Fengtian Son Ling Buchen', and moved the capital to Xu County under the name of the destruction of Luoyang, which was later the Xu capital. This is an important juncture, because Cao Cao can act in the name of the Son of Heaven in the future, so the novel also calls this 'holding the Son of Heaven to order the princes'. In order to ensure the safety of the capital, Cao Cao began to fight in all directions. He first pacified Zhang Xiu of Nanyang Commandery, then conquered Xuzhou under Lü Bu's rule, then conquered Hanoi County, and then captured the land of Huainan after Yuan Shu's death from illness and Shouchun, which made Cao Cao the hegemon of the north, and the only person in the world who could compete with him was Yuan Shao of Hebei. However, in this process, Liu Bei also began to emerge.
Cao Cao held the Son of Heaven hostage to order the princes
When Cao Cao attacked Xuzhou, Liu Bei led people to rescue Xuzhou, and when the consul Tao Qian died, Liu Bei took Xuzhou Mu, that is, became the chief of Xuzhou. However, before it could cover the heat, it was taken away by Lü Bu. Lü Bu here was taken into Chang'an by Li Wei and Guo Qian after Dong Zhuo was killed, Lü Bu fled and defected to Liu Bei, who asked Lü Bu to garrison Xiaopei, not far from Xuzhou, and listen to Chen Gong's advice to capture Xuzhou. Later, Liu Bei was defeated and defected to Cao Cao, and finally Cao Cao and Liu Bei combined forces to defeat Lü Bu and take Xuzhou. After Cao Cao's class teacher Xu Du, Cao Cao treated Liu Bei with courtesy, and the hero of brewing wine also happened at this time. At this time, Emperor Xian of Han was already disgusted by being controlled by Cao Cao, so he issued a 'cloth belt edict' to plot Cao Cao's murder, that is, to write a decree on his personal belt to call on the heroes of the world. Liu Bei conspired to join the Yidai Zhao, and then took the opportunity to defect and retake Xuzhou as his base. He also sent Yuan Shao of Hebei to join forces to attack Cao Cao, and at this time the anti-Cao Cao momentum was strong. Cao Cao attacked Liu Bei in anger, but Liu Bei was defeated and went to Yuan Shao. Liu Bei's wife was captured, and the general Guan Yu surrendered to Cao Cao.
Battle of Guandu: Cao Cao solved Liu Bei and turned back to fight a decisive battle with Yuan Shao, in the process began a series of battles known as the Battle of Guandu. In one of the battles, Yuan Shao sent his general Yan Liang to attack Baima, which was an extremely important military artery between Yuan Cao's territory. Guan Yu, who surrendered to Cao Cao, was at this time in the vanguard, and when the two armies saw Yan Liang in front of the formation, they rushed to Yan Liang's side and assassinated him, which is the only case in the Annals of the Three Kingdoms that takes the first rank of enemy general in the ten thousand armies. After Guan Yu made meritorious service, he thought that it was enough to repay Cao Cao's grace of not killing, so he returned to Liu Bei. And Cao Cao admired Guan Yu Zhongyi and did not allow his generals to catch up, so 'passing five levels and killing six generals' is just a story of righteousness.
In the Battle of Guandu, Yuan Shao was strong and Cao Cao was weak, with a strength of 110,000 versus 40,000, and there was a huge difference in the amount of food and grass that could be mobilized. On the eve of the decisive battle, according to Yuan Shao's adviser Xu Fu, he concluded that Cao Cao was "running out of food", but Yuan Shao did not listen to the adviser's advice to fight a protracted war, and concentrated his forces on Guandu in the hope of defeating Cao Cao in one fell swoop. Although Cao Cao was on the verge of collapse, he heeded the advice of his adviser Xun Yu: hold on and wait for a miracle. Yuan Shao's advisers repeatedly offered Yuan Shao but did not comply, Xu Yu was greedy for money, and Yuan Shao could not be satisfied. After that, Xu Yu's family was severely punished for breaking the law, so Xu Fu turned to Cao Cao and told Yuan Shao that all the grain and grass were in Wuchao. Cao Cao then attacked Wuchao by surprise, burning all the materials of the Yuan army, and the Yuan army completely collapsed. Although Yuan Shao fled back to the north, his vitality was greatly damaged. Later, he fought with Cao Cao and died of defeat. After Yuan Shao's death, his son Yuan Tan and Yuan Shang competed for the throne, and Hebei was in chaos, and Cao Cao took advantage of the chaos to take Hebei and unify the north.
Cao Cao unified the north
At this time, Liu Bei had already left Yuan Shao and ran to Runan, Cao Cao waved his troops to capture Runan, Liu Bei was running, and ran to Jingzhou to join Liu Biao. Cao Cao hated Liu Bei because he had told Liu Bei about the idea of attacking Yuan Shao, but he did not expect that Liu Bei defected to Yuan Shao and revealed everything to Yuan Shao, which made Cao Cao very passive for a while. Liu Bei received a warm reception after defecting to Liu Biao. Liu Biao increased his troops and guarded the northern gate of Jingzhou. Cao Cao sent people to attack Jingzhou, and Liu Bei defeated it in the Xinye ambush, which is the story of burning the Xinye ambush Bowangpo, but it is attributed to Zhuge Liang in the speech.
Liu Bei defected to Liu Biao
Liu Bei rested peacefully in Jingzhou for several years, and in the process won the hearts of the people of Jingzhou, and also gained his own wisdom Zhuge Liang. Another year later, Cao Cao went south to Jingzhou, Liu Biao died of illness, and his second son Liu Jun ascended the throne, Liu Bei feared that Cao Jun would surrender and sacrifice Jingzhou, Liu Bei did not know about this, and it was too late to know. Faced with the siege of Cao Cao, he had to flee, and along the way, many people and officials fled together, totaling more than 100,000 people. There are many people and slow speed, and some people suggest that Liu Bei abandon the people and go as the best plan, Liu Bei replied: Fuji must be people-oriented, and now people will return to me, how can I bear to abandon it! When he arrived at Dangyang Changsaka Slope and was overtaken by Cao Jun, more than 100,000 people were scattered, and Liu Bei abandoned his wife and fled with Zhuge Liang, Zhang Fei, Zhao Yun and others. The familiar 'Zhao Zilong Single Riding Savior', 'Zhang Yide drank off Changsaka Slope', happened at this time, but Zhang Fei was true after he broke it, but Zhao Yun did not enter and exit seven, and Zhao Yun protected Ah Dou and Mrs. Gan in the back slowly.
Battle of Chibi: Liu Bei had fled to Hanjin at this time, and encountered Guan Yu who came to meet him and Lu Su of Eastern Wu and escaped. And Cao Cao had already received the Jingzhou army to the south at this time. Eastern Wu, which was in a quiet corner, also felt pressure, and Zhuge Liang sent Jiangdong to persuade Sun Quan, so the Sun-Liu coalition army was established. At this time, Cao Cao had 260,000 troops and claimed that 800,000 were going south to Jiangdong, and the total strength of the Sun-Liu coalition army was very different, but most of Cao Cao's hands were northern soldiers who were not accustomed to water warfare, so they connected the warships so that they could walk on the ground. Zhou Yu, the governor of Eastern Wu, ordered Huang Gai to surrender to Cao Cao, and when he surrendered, Huang Gai prepared more firewood and grass in the ship and anointed oil, and lit a fire, and the ship hit Cao Cao's army and caught fire. The southeast wind and fire took advantage of the wind to burn down the northern ship, and Cao Cao was defeated and fled through Huarong Road, but there is no record of 'Guan Yu Yi Shi Cao Cao', which is the Battle of Chibi.
The defeat at the Battle of Chibi deprived Cao Cao of the opportunity to unify the world, and then the Sun-Liu coalition forces began to counterattack Jingzhou and occupy it. After Zhou Yu's early death, Lu Su took over as the governor of the capital. Liu Bei borrowed Jingzhou, and Lu Su persuaded Sun Quan to stabilize the alliance to lend Jingzhou, so Liu Bei took this important land and did not return it. According to Zhuge Liang's plan at that time, taking Jingzhou and Yizhou was within the plan, so Liu Bei's next step was to enter Sichuan.
Yizhou Mu Liu Zhang and Hanzhong Zhang Lu had a headache, while Cao Cao set his sights on Hanzhong after the defeat of Chibi. Liu Zhang, fearing that Cao Cao would encroach on Hanzhong and further invade Yizhou, invited Renyi Liu Bei to help. When Liu Bei heard the news and led his army to Yizhou, Liu Zhang personally greeted him and rationed Liu Bei's sergeant food and grass, hoping that Liu Bei would attack Zhang Lu. However, after Liu Bei got money, food, and horses, he only garrisoned troops at home and did not send troops, blindly buying people's hearts. Later, Cao Cao attacked Sun Quan, and Sun Quan asked Liu Bei for help, but Liu Bei could not divide his troops in Yizhou, so he asked Liu Zhang for help. Liu Zhang, however, gave only a very small amount of supplies to the men and horses. Liu Bei was furious, broke with Liu Zhang, and killed Liu Zhang. Liu Bei's army was all the surrendered all the way, but when he was blocked in Luocheng, Liu Bei's army commander Pang Tong died. Subsequently, Zhuge Liang, Zhao Yun, Zhang Fei and other troops entered Shu to help Liu Bei, and Zhang Lu's general Ma Chao also submitted to Liu Bei at this time and joined the Yizhou War. Later, Luocheng was conquered, Liu Bei's army surrounded Chengdu, besieged the city for dozens of days, at that time Chengdu still had 30,000 elite soldiers, a year's money and food, all the soldiers were willing to fight to the death, Liu Zhang did not want the people to suffer from the war, so he surrendered to Yizhou and returned to Liu Bei.
Liu Bei occupies Chengdu
The following year, Cao Cao submitted to Zhang Lu and occupied Hanzhong, seriously threatening the gateway to Shu, and Sun Quan also came to claim back Jingzhou because Liu Bei had benefited from the prefecture, Liu Bei took advantage of the excuse and Sun Quan attacked him angrily. Liu Bei was shocked and marched with Guan Yu to confront Sun Quan. At this time, Sun Quan was in a dilemma before and Cao Cao was in a dilemma, and Liu Bei had to make peace with Sun Quan and transfer the eastern part of Jingzhou to Sun Quan with Xiangshui as the boundary, and then left Zhuge Liang to guard Chengdu and Guan Yu to guard Jingzhou, and led his own troops to fight for Hanzhong.
Liu Bei's division was unfavorable to the Cao army, and then Hanzhong was the gateway to Yizhou, 'if there is no Hanzhong, there is no Shu'. Liu Bei requested reinforcements from Chengdu, Zhuge Liang devoted his efforts to increase his troops, and Liu Cao continued to confront him. After a year of confrontation, Huang Zhong offered his plan to Dingjun Mountain and killed the general Xiahou Yuan, the Cao army was in chaos, Cao Cao hurriedly sent reinforcements, and then personally came here to supervise the battle, and during the period of the confrontation between the two sides, small battles continued, and the Cao army suffered many casualties, and finally retreated back to Chang'an, and Liu Bei occupied Hanzhong.
At this time, the results of the battle between Eastern Wu and Cao Wei Hefei were unfavorable, and they had changed from the Sun-Liu alliance to the pro-Cao faction. Sun Quan had previously tried to marry Guan Yu, but Guan Yu refused and insulted the messenger. After Liu Bei captured Hanzhong, Guan Yu led his troops to the Northern Expedition to Fancheng, and once Fancheng was broken, Xudu had no danger to defend. At that time, there was heavy rain in August, and the Han water soared, and the Cao army was all flooded, which was to flood the Seventh Army, but there is no record in history of the details of Guan Yu's breach of the embankment, so the flooding of the Seventh Army should be caused by natural disasters. Taking advantage of the water momentum, Guan Yu took Fancheng and received 30,000 troops to threaten Huaxia, and Guan Yu sent troops to besiege Xiangyang and conquer it.
Guan Yurui could not make Cao Cao want to move the capital to avoid his edge. Cao Cao's adviser Sima Yi pointed out that Sun Quan could be used to contain Guan Yu, and Sun Quan also had this idea, and wanted to use Cao Cao's power to return to Jingzhou. So the two sides hit it off, and the two sides stopped fighting in Hefei to deal with Guan Yu together. Cao Cao sent a large army to conquer Guan Yu himself, and Sun Quan used Lü Meng to infiltrate the city disguised as a merchant, captured Jingzhou and cut off Guan Yu's back road, and at the same time, Lu Xun captured the mouth of the Yangtze River Gap to block Guan Yu's gateway to escape to Sichuan, Guan Yu was defeated and took Maicheng, and later Guan Yu was captured and killed by Eastern Wu, Sun Quan's battle to occupy most of Jingzhou and Xiangfan officially ended, and the Sun-Liu alliance was officially broken.
After the Battle of Xiangfan, Sun Quan wrote to Cao Cao as a minister and persuaded Cao Cao to become emperor, but Cao Cao was unwilling to usurp Han, and Cao Cao died of illness in Luoyang. When Cao Cao died, Liu Bei sent mourning to show favor to Cao Wei, hoping to avoid fighting on two fronts and preparing to attack Wu here. Cao Cao's son Cao Pi then ascended the throne as King of Wei, and in the same year forced Emperor Xian of Han to abdicate and formally establish the Cao Wei regime. Liu Bei ascended the throne in Chengdu with his Han ethnicity and proclaimed himself Emperor of Han.
Battle of Yiling: In the same year, the general Zhang Fei was killed by his subordinate villains, and Liu Bei insisted on destroying Wu in order to avenge Zhang Fei's revenge. Seeing this, Sun Quan hurriedly revised the book and ignored Liu Bei, and Sun Quan had to face the battle and appointed Lu Xun as the governor of the capital. The Shu army was menacing, and Lu Xun avoided its front, retreating the Wu army to Yiling to occupy favorable terrain first. Liu Bei's army was huge and joined forces for hundreds of miles, and the Shu army frequently called for battle, but Lu Xun could not hold on, and the Shu army designed to attract the Wu army to attack Lu Xun only did not know, and the two armies held each other for half a year. It was not until June, when the weather was scorching hot, and the Shu army moved into the dense forest to camp to escape the summer, that Lu Xun began to counterattack. Lu Xun used fire to attack, set fire to the company and battalion, and attacked on all fronts. A year after the crushing defeat of the Shu army, Liu Bei was killed in White Emperor City, and Liu Chan ascended the throne. Later, the military and political power of the Shu state was held by Zhuge Liang.
Sun Quan was canonized as King of Wu by Cao Pi in 222, and in 229, the first year of the Yellow Dragon, he officially ascended the throne as emperor in Wuchang, now Hubei Echeng, and established the state as Wu, which was the Eastern Wu regime during the Three Kingdoms period. Zhuge Liang once again allied with Eastern Wu, after which the situation of the Three Kingdoms once again became an alliance between Eastern Wu and Shu Han against Cao Wei. In the second half of his life, Zhuge Liang failed to make five Northern Expeditions, and finally died of illness after accumulated labor. Jiang Wei took over the Northern Expedition for a total of eleven times, but in the end, it was unsuccessful, and finally the state of Shu was destroyed by the state of Wei. Although Eastern Wu chose to resist Cao Cao but had little effect, Sun Quan also made a series of mistakes in his later years, resulting in internal strife within Eastern Wu due to the issue of the crown prince, and the famous general Lu Xun also died in internal strife. After Sun Quan's death, Eastern Wu also declined. Finally, Cao Wei was powerful enough to unify the three kingdoms, but Cao Pi claimed that the emperor died six years ago, and his son Cao Rui was also very fond of Cao Cao during his lifetime, but died 11 years after ascending the throne, and his adopted son 8-year-old Cao Fang ascended the throne. After Cao Fang ascended the throne, the powerful minister Sima Yi staged a coup d'état, known in history as the Gaopingling Rebellion, and the clan destroyed the general Cao Shuang, who assisted him, after which all military and political power fell into the hands of Sima Yi.
Three Kingdoms formed
Wei Shu
Sima Yan established the state as Jin
The Western Jin Dynasty unified the world
In 220, Cao Pi usurped the Han dynasty as emperor, the state name "Wei", and the history of the Three Kingdoms officially began. In the following year, Liu Bei continued the Han Dynasty in Chengdu, and was known as the Shu Han.
In 222, Liu Bei lost the Battle of Yiling, and Sun Quan gained most of Jingzhou. When Liu Bei died in 223, Zhuge Liang assisted Liu Bei's son Liu Chan in reuniting with Sun Quan. In 229, Sun Quan was called emperor, the state name was "Wu", and the history was called Eastern Wu, and the three kingdoms were officially established.
In the following decades, Zhuge Liang and Jiang Wei of the Shu Han led troops to the Northern Expedition against Cao Wei many times, but they never changed the pattern of the three-legged tripod. The real power of the later Cao Wei period was gradually controlled by Sima Yi. In 263, Sima Zhao, the son of Sima Yi of Cao Wei, launched the Battle of Wei and Shu, and Shu Han perished.
Two years later, Sima Zhao fell ill and died, and his son Sima Yan deposed Emperor Yuan of Wei and established himself as "Jin", known as the Western Jin Dynasty. In 280 AD, the Western Jin Dynasty destroyed Eastern Wu and unified China, ending the Three Kingdoms period and entering the Jin Dynasty.