The Japanese have always had an inexplicable obsession with the culture of the Three Kingdoms, not only translating "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", making movies, games and other works, but also especially like to use their own historical figures to take pictures of the Three Kingdoms.
Among them, there are two characters who are extremely similar in the eyes of the Japanese, and even the image of character creation is extremely similar, namely Oda Nobunaga, the "Sixth Heavenly Demon King" of the Warring States Period of Japan, and Cao Cao, who is known as the "traitor in troubled times".
Even in Japanese game drawings and models, these two use the same face, but similarity is similar, Oda Nobunaga and Cao Cao, two people from different countries and different eras, can they really speak the same day?
01
Ritsumei Ransei
In fact, if you just look at the comparison between these two people, there are indeed many similarities, they were both born when their countries were in turmoil, they almost completed the reunification of the country, and they both had regrets at the last moment of their lives.
However, if you look at it in combination with the cultural and martial arts between them, there is still a lot of gap, after all, the two are not in the same era, let alone in the same land.
Cao Cao was born in the late Eastern Han Dynasty, and was born into a family, and at the time of the Yellow Turban Uprising, he was already an official to the rank of cavalry captain, and participated in the suppression of the Yellow Turban Army.
During the Warring States period of Japan, where Oda Nobunaga lived, although it was also a troubled time, the situation was more complicated, because he did not have an official position before he became famous, and at that time the magistrates were magistrates, and their status was similar to that of local big families or landlords, commonly known as daimyos.
However, such daimyo were almost everywhere in Japan during the Warring States period, and the family where he was born did not have a lot of land, so in the comparison of origins, even in their respective times and circumstances, Oda Nobunaga was inferior to Cao Cao.
In terms of initial performance, when the two failed to appear on the stage and become the protagonists of the times, they basically showed their respective abilities and carried them forward in the future.
According to the "Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms", "Taizu is less alert and has the power to count, and Ren Xia is debauched and does not govern the industry, so the world is not strange", which means that when he was a teenager, Cao Cao showed great strategy and also had a chivalrous demeanor.
From the descriptions in "Oda Nobunaga" and "Nobunaga Gongki", he was more naughty in the early days, and did not follow the rules, and he was also relentless about his homework, and even his father Nobuhide had a headache about it, calling him "the great fool of Owari".
After both of them showed their talents, the characteristics of both sides were more significant, Cao Cao can be called very good in terms of employing people, strategy, etc., although there are also unreasonable places, but most of them are in line with the considerations of an excellent politician and military strategist.
Oda Nobunaga, on the other hand, was even less conventional, such as developing arquebuses for the army and equipping himself with Western armor, and was dismissive of Japanese Buddhism and more interested in Western culture.
It's hard to say whether these two personalities are good or bad, but at least in terms of performance towards his subordinates, Nobunaga's flamboyant personality is not dominant compared to Cao Cao.
He showed very good qualities in innovation and other aspects, but he was far less mature than Cao Cao in terms of political thinking, and this difference will also be manifested in the war later.
02
Show promise
The two most important battles in Cao Cao's life are estimated to be the "Battle of Guandu" and the "Battle of Red Cliffs", one is to unify the north and obtain the qualification for hegemony, and the other is to be defeated by the coalition army, losing the ability to unify the world at the last moment.
In the battle of Guandu, Cao Cao's army's most dazzling record was to win more with less, and according to the investigation of later generations, Yuan Shao's proportion was about five times that of it.
Of course, the so-called hundreds of thousands of troops definitely did not exist during the Three Kingdoms period, and basically only existed in the romance of the novel, but at the level at that time, Cao Cao's army was probably only about 20,000, while Yuan Shao had about 110,000.
But this was already quite a large team at that time, after all, by the end of the Three Kingdoms, all of them added up to more than one million people, which was far from the romance, but in this battle, Cao Cao's ability could also be glimpsed.
Relying on such a large gap in strength between the two sides alone, Cao Cao's troops had been maneuvering with Yuan Shao for a long time, and in the end, with Xu You's plan, they attacked Wuchao and won a great victory, which also became a classic in the ancient wars on the mainland.
Oda Nobunaga's important battle was also won with less, that is, the "Battle of Barrel Sasa", according to records, the Oda army was about 4,000 people, and the Kanegawa army reached about 40,000, but some of them were troops left behind in other areas.
If you divide each other's main formations at that time, the Oda family is 2,000 people, and Imagawa Yoshimoto is 5,000 people, and the most exciting thing about Tsukasama is that Oda Nobunaga directly led people to surprise the opponent's base camp and caught the enemy by surprise.
However, this battle only brought him to the fore, and like Cao Cao's unification of the north, both sides went through many wars afterwards to lay the foundation for the final unification.
For example, after Cao Cao defeated Yuan Shao, he also subdued other states and counties one after another, achieving "six of the nine states in the world", and also attacked Wuhuan and other nomads, successfully stabilizing his rule in the Central Plains.
Oda Nobunaga also destroyed many castles, but the place he occupied was not so exaggerated in mainland Japan, about one-third, and established himself in the Azuchi-Momoyama period.
However, when we return to the earliest battle, we will find that there are differences between the two sides, such as Cao Cao's plan to use Xu You's strategy, and then target the black nest.
But before that, the elite of Yuan Shaojun, such as Yan Liang and Wen Chou, were basically defeated by Cao Cao's army in person, and both sides had their own intelligence networks before this, and they were fully prepared for war.
Oda Nobunaga, on the other hand, was more inclined to "gamble", taking a small force directly to the opponent's camp, which itself was full of a lot of risks, and if you were not careful, you would go straight to defeat and death.
Fortunately, he succeeded, and there was a lot of luck in this success, that is, it was raining heavily at that time, which caused their march to be blocked, so that the surprise attack of the Oda army was successful.
In fact, of course, according to the land of Japan, not only is it mountainous but also the distance is not long, and the Kanegawa army has a lot of fanfare, so surprise attacks are a relatively normal thing, and they are very common in the entire history of Japan, and we can also see a lot of suicide attacks of Nobunaga.
Therefore, in terms of bravery alone, Nobunaga may have performed very well, but the possibility of the failure of this kind of deadly surprise attack is really too great, and the bright spots of the next few wars did not show too much about the use of soldiers and the like, such as the use of new weapons, army building, etc.
03
Wenzhi martial arts
Of course, the comparison between the two is of course the most important, but there are other factors to consider, and it is always impossible to compare the superiority of Cao Cao's army in the Central Plains and the superiority of Oda Nobunaga in science and technology in the 16th century, so there are different opinions from the military alone.
Then we shifted our attention to the aspect of cultural governance, and first of all, personal cultural literacy, in the image we are familiar with about Cao Cao, in addition to being a wise and resourceful traitor, he also has an identity as a poet, and he is also an excellent poet.
We are familiar with the "wine as a song, life geometry." Famous poems such as "Facing the Jieshi in the east, looking at the sea" all came from Cao Cao, and he became the founder and representative of "Jian'an Fenggu".
And Oda Nobunaga can't compare with this aspect, after all, he didn't study well when he was a teenager, although he said "uninhibited", but it is difficult to evaluate it at the level of culture.
The most well-known sentence "50 years of life, like a dream and an illusion, there is life and death, what regrets of a strong man" is also from the ancient poem "Dunsheng" in the Heian period of Japan, one can memorize, one can write, and the writing is very good, which shows a big gap.
Secondly, when it comes to employing people, Cao Cao faced many frustration and dangerous moments, such as the "Battle of Wancheng", he was almost killed by Zhang Xiu, but fortunately, Dian Wei protected it.
When Chibi was defeated, Cao Cao's subordinates were still very many, of course, there were Cao clan and Xiahou clan who belonged to the original clan, as well as people such as Jia Xu and Xu Chu, Sima Yi was also firmly obedient at least at this time.
Of course, these ministers have also fought with him for many years, like Xun Yu, Xu Shu, Guan Yu and other people who belong to him from the bottom of his heart, although he appreciates it very much, but he can't take it for his own use, but he still gives very generous treatment.
But at least the people who work under him basically obey Cao Cao's orders, so this also gives him the name of "Boss Cao", and he is also a good boss for employees.
However, this is not the case with Oda Nobunaga, the most serious of which must be the "Honnoji Incident", the final moment of Nobunaga's brilliant life, and his defeat is due to the defection of his subordinate Akechi Mitsuhide.
At the same time, after his death, there was also a collective split among his ministers, and the queen began to attack each other, and the most ferocious ones were Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Shibata Katsuie.
The former took the final victory and achieved the highest official position at the time, "Sekihaku", and also drew a sword against Nobunaga's descendants, while the latter took the opportunity to marry his sister, "Aichi, the first beauty of the Warring States", but was defeated and died.
Other forces also fled and scattered, so in the end, there must be a very lack of personnel in Nobunaga's own employment, at least compared to many mature monarchs.
And then, such as engineering water conservancy, people's resettlement, talent selection and other aspects, Cao Cao basically won Oda Nobunaga, so if you really want to compare the two sides, at least Oda Nobunaga is really not good in terms of comprehensive ability, and luck may occasionally prevail.
04 Image extension
Of course, as an important role in Japanese history, although Oda Nobunaga's ability is definitely incomparable with Cao Cao, after all, few people in the history after that can have Cao Cao's merits and influence, but at least in the hearts of the Japanese has a high weight.
His resourcefulness and image have been shaped by various works, and he has also succeeded in becoming the number one historical figure in the hearts of the Japanese people, and he is biased towards Cao Cao because of the many similarities in the experiences of the two.
Under the restrictions of the times and the country, his achievements have been very dazzling, otherwise it would not have been reviewed by the Daming Hanlin Academy Xu Guangqi said in "Coastal Defense Roundabout":
Nobunaga was a man of great courage and wisdom. In the past, the sixty-six continents each had their own rulers and were not unified, and the letter was long marching out of all directions, and they were all subdued, and they did not dare to differ. This man is scheming, ten times Hideyoshi, and if he is a few years old, he will be in great trouble for me...
But if you insist on saying that Oda Nobunaga is the Japanese version of Cao Cao, although there are many similarities, but it's more or less a gold paste on his face, but if you insist on comparing, it may be comparable on the game's panel.
Sources
[1] Ancient Poetry Network - Three Kingdoms, Wei Shu, Emperor Wu Ji_Ancient Poetry Network
[2] Encyclopedia of Japan - Who is Oda Nobunaga? Meaning and Usage - Koto Bank
[3] Ushiichi Ota - "The Chronicle of Nobunaga"