At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, for most of the princes, in fact, they had the heart of disobedience, such as Dong Zhuo, after deposing the Han Shao Emperor Liu Wei and establishing Liu Xie as emperor, naturally had the ambition to be called emperor. Of course, in 192 AD, Lü Bu joined forces with Wang Yun to get rid of Dong Zhuo, which prevented Dong Zhuo from truly replacing Emperor Xian of Han. Therefore, before the abdication of Emperor Xian of Han, only Yuan Shu was the one who usurped the title of emperor. Yuan Shu (?) –199), courtesy name Highway, was a native of Ruyang County, Runan County (present-day Shangshui County, Henan Province).
In 197 AD, Yuan Shu ascended the throne in Shouchun and established a hundred officials. At that time, although the Han Dynasty was in decline, the prestige of the Han Dynasty for hundreds of years prompted many people to still have the Han Room in mind, such as Liu Bei, Guan Yu, Zhuge Liang and others. Therefore, Yuan Shu's act of claiming the title of emperor naturally aroused the anger of the public, and thus became the target of everyone. Soon after, Yuan Shu was not only betrayed by Lü Bu and Sun Ce, but also became a key target for Cao Cao.
After all, Yuan Shu's act of claiming the title of emperor was a serious challenge to Emperor Xian of Han, which would cause Cao Cao to lose the advantage of holding Tianzi hostage to make the princes. Therefore, Cao Cao absolutely could not accept the fact that Yuan Shu was called emperor, otherwise other princes would follow suit, and Cao Cao would not be able to continue to conquer the world in the name of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Therefore, in 199 AD, under the continuous blows of Cao Cao, Yuan Shu finally died of illness. So, the question is, when Cao Cao destroyed Yuan Shu, what was his brother Yuan Shao doing, and why did he sit idly by?
One
Specifically, when Cao Cao destroyed Yuan Shu, Yuan Shao did not rescue Yuan Shu for reasons, which were mainly divided into the following points.
Book of the Later Han Dynasty: So He made Shao a lieutenant and was made the Marquis of Yi. When Cao Cao considered himself a great general, Shao Shame was inferior, and false statements were not tolerated. the big fear, but give way to Shao. In the second year, the envoy kong rong held the festival of the great general, the tin bow yajie, the tiger ben hundred people, and also supervised the four states of Ji, Qing, You, and the four states, and then received it.
As far as the first point is concerned, in 197 AD, Cao Cao sent emissaries to Jizhou, and in the name of Emperor Xian of Han, he crowned Yuan Shao as a general and put him in charge of the four prefectures of Jizhou, Qingzhou, Youzhou, and Hezhou. As far as Yuan Shao was concerned, he naturally accepted the canonization of the Eastern Han Dynasty. In this context, Yuan Shu was called empress, and Yuan Shao, as a great general of the Eastern Han Dynasty, not only could not go to the rescue, but should also lead an army to fight against the other side. Of course, Yuan Shao did not do this. And this, in fact, has left Cao Cao with a handle to attack him. Therefore, once Yuan Shao went to rescue Yuan Shu, he would naturally be denounced by the hero Hao Jie in the world. Therefore, holding the army still became a reasonable choice for Yuan Shao.
Of course, this was naturally an important advantage for Cao Cao to blackmail tianzi to order the princes. For example, when the Battle of Guandu broke out, Ma Teng and Han Sui in the west and Liu Biao in the south did not take the opportunity to sneak attack Xu Du. And this, naturally, had the relationship between Emperor Xian of Han in Xudu, that is, sneaking up on Cao Cao, which would obviously be labeled as a betrayal of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and when Cao Cao pulled out, he could justifiably crusade against them.
Two
In the second point, in the process of Cao Cao's elimination of Yuan Shu, Yuan Shao was busy dealing with Gongsun Zhan, who had divided Youzhou. As early as 193 AD, Gongsun Zhan killed Liu Yu, the mu of Youzhou, and since then, he has occupied Youzhou and its surrounding areas. Yuan Shao, who occupied Jizhou, naturally could not sit idly by and watch Gongsun Zhan grow, so the two sides launched a long-term contest. For example, Liu Bei once defected to this old classmate, and even helped Gongsun Zhan and Yuan Shao to compete for Qingzhou. In 197, although Yuan Shao gained the upper hand, gongsun Zan could only stand on the defensive. However, for a moment and a half, Yuan Shao could not completely destroy the other party.
Until 199 AD, Zhang Yan and Gongsun Continued to lead 100,000 troops to save Gongsun Zhan in three ways. Before the reinforcements arrived, Gongsun Zhan secretly sent a letter to Gongsun Xu, asking him to lead 5,000 cavalry in the northern region, raise torches in response, and Gongsun Zhan went out from the city to fight. Yuan Shao obtained the letter in advance, calculated it, and raised the torch. Gongsun Zhan thought that the rescue troops had arrived, and led the troops to attack. Yuan Shao set up an ambush to attack Gongsun Zhan, who was defeated and returned to the city to hold on. Yuan Shao then dug a tunnel under the city tower, destroyed its watchtower, and gradually reached the central mound. Gongsun Zhan, expecting that he would undoubtedly lose, chose to commit suicide.
Therefore, in 199 AD, Yuan Shao destroyed the other party in one fell swoop, thus truly occupying the land of Youzhou. Of course, after getting rid of Gongsun Zhan, Yuan Shao still needed to spend time to appease his subordinates, which also left him with no energy to help Yuan Shu.
Three
As far as the third point is concerned, although yuan shao and Yuan Shu are brothers, there are more contradictions between the two, and it can even be said that they have accumulated grievances for a long time. From the perspective of blood, Yuan Shao and Yuan Shu were both sons of Sikong Yuan Feng. Of course, because Yuan Shao was a concubine and Yuan Shu was a concubine, the latter long despised the former. However, yuan shao later passed on to his uncle Yuan Cheng, which promoted Yuan Shao's status to be promoted, and gradually had a status on a par with Yuan Shu. Coupled with Yuan Shao's handsome appearance and majesty, many heroes Hao Jie gathered around him, which further aroused Yuan Shu's jealousy. Therefore, for Yuan Shu, yuan shao can be described as angry and hateful. Therefore, after the action against Dong Zhuo, the two brothers went their separate ways and divided one side.
"Book of later Han": Shao Yi wanted to establish Liu Yu as emperor, and he was good at indulging, and he was afraid of establishing a long king, and he refused to agree with righteousness, and this gap was completed.
In 191 AD, Yuan Shao wanted to establish Liu Yu of Youzhou as emperor, so that Emperor Xian of Han, who was held hostage by Dong Zhuo, naturally lost its value. However, Yuan Shu already had the ambition to become emperor and rejected Yuan Shao's proposal, which led to a further deterioration of the relationship between the two. Moreover, in the third year of Chuping (192), Yuan Shu and Yuan Shao went to war, Yuan Shu asked Gongsun Zhan for help, and Gongsun Zhan ordered Liu Beitun to go to Tang, Shan Jing plain, and at the same time join forces with Tao Qian to intimidate Yuan Shao, and Yuan Shao and Cao Cao joined forces to break the combined forces of Yuan Shu, Gongsun Zhan, and Tao Qian. Therefore, Yuan Shao's failure to rescue Yuan Shu was also a relatively normal reaction.
Four
"Book of the Later Han Dynasty": Sorrow did not know what to do, so he returned to the emperor Yu Shao, and Shao was yin and calculated. Shu wanted to go north to Qingzhou from Yuan Tan, and Cao Cao made Liu Bei reluctant to pass, and returned to Shouchun. In June, to Jiangting. Sitting on the bed, he sighed, "Yuan Shu is even hu! "Out of indignation, Ou died of blood.
Finally, in 199 AD, under the blows of Cao Cao, Lü Bu and other princes, Yuan Shu, who was cornered, wrote to Yuan Shao, preparing to give up the title of emperor to the other party, hoping to exchange Yuan Shao's acceptance. In this regard, perhaps it was Gu Nian's brotherly love, or perhaps Yuan Shao also wanted to claim the title of emperor, so he agreed to take Yuan Shu in. As a result, Yuan Shu prepared to go to Qingzhou and defect to Qingzhou to assassinate Shi Yuan Tan, that is, Yuan Shao's eldest son.
However, when Cao Cao learned of this news, he naturally could not sit idly by and watch the confluence of Yuan Shu and Yuan Shao's brothers, so he immediately sent Liu Bei to Xuzhou, thus intercepting Yuan Shu. Yuan Shu could not go to Qingzhou, but had no choice but to return to Shouchun and died of illness in this year. What is more interesting is that Liu Bei seized this opportunity to kill Xuzhou's assassin Shi Che and once again divide Xuzhou.
From zhuge Liang's point of view, Yuan Shao's act of sitting by and watching Cao Cao eliminate Yuan Shu was really unwise, or it was a manifestation of his lack of long-term vision. Because after the demise of Yuan Shu, it not only meant the growth of Cao Cao's power, but also led to his liberation from the important threat of the rear. Prior to this, it was precisely because of concern for Yuan Shu and other reasons that Cao Cao had not confronted Yuan Shao head-on. Therefore, in 200 AD, Cao Cao, who had no worries, officially broke out the Battle of Guandu with Yuan Shao.
In this battle, although Cao Cao only had 30,000 people, While Yuan Shao had an army of 100,000, the final result was that Cao Cao defeated the powerful Yuan Shao with fewer victories. In 202, Yuan Shao died of illness after quelling the rebellion in Jizhou. After his death, Cao Cao adopted various strategies to destroy Yuan Shao's sons, and thus became the most powerful prince at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty.