543 AD
Battle of Mt. Yao: Yuwen Taijiu died
In 543, the Eastern and Western Wei dynasties fought at Mount Yao (邙山, in modern Luoyang, Henan). The Eastern Wei chancellor Gao Huan won a great victory and recaptured Northern Yu Prefecture and Luoyang. Western Wei Yuwen Tai died nine times, and the elite troops were almost completely destroyed.
Not long ago, Yuzhou, north of Eastern Wei's Yu Prefecture," surrendered to Western Wei. Yuzhou was a strategic place, and its territory of Hugaoguan (northwest of present-day Xingyang, Henan) was bordered by the Yellow River in the north, with staggered mountains and mountains, becoming a natural danger, which was a place of contention for successive generations of soldiers, and it was also the gateway to the east of Luoyang.
Gao Zhongmi's surrender was simply a pie in the sky for Yuwen Tai. Therefore, he personally led the armies to receive Gao Zhongmi, marched to Luoyang, and besieged the southern city of Heqiao. Gao Zhongmi is Gao Qian's younger brother and Gao Gao's older brother. When Gao Huan and the Erzhu clan fought for the world, Gao Qian opened the gates of Jizhou to greet Gao Huan, and Gao Huan had his first base area, and Gao Qian's death was more or less because of Gao Huan; Not to mention, for Gao Huan's southern conquest of the northern war, the general who charged into the battlefield was killed in the battle of the river bridge. Gao Zhongmi had such a brother, and his treatment in Eastern Wei was not bad. Why did he surrender to Western Wei, because Gao Huan had an "unlucky" son, Gao Cheng.
Gao Cheng is lustful and has not changed his teachings. At fourteen o'clock, he committed adultery with Gao Huan's favorite concubine Zheng Shi and was almost killed by Gao Huan, but thanks to Shangshu's order Sima Ziru to circumvent and kill the relevant insiders, the father and son were reconciled. Later, Gao Cheng fell in love with Gao Zhongmi's wife Li Shi, and Li Shi did not comply, and Gao Cheng, who was lustful, actually pounced on it and ripped li's clothes. After Li Shi escaped, he cried to Gao Zhongmi, who thought: Is it intolerable or intolerable for a manly husband? Therefore, he chose to retaliate against Gao Cheng's father and son by surrendering.
When Gao Huan heard that Gao Zhongmi had surrendered and Luoyang had fallen, he personally sent 100,000 troops to cross south from the Yellow River, according to Mount Yao.
Yuwen Tai has always liked to use strange soldiers. He believed that Gao Huan's long-distance attack and unstable foothold should have a good effect by taking advantage of this opportunity to climb Mount Yao at night and raid Gao Huan. So that night, Yuwen Tai left The Heavy behind and took the cavalry into battle lightly, preparing to raid Gao Huan's camp. As everyone knows, Gao Huan was in the middle of the line, waiting for Yuwen Tai to ascend mount Yao, but saw that Gao Huan had already divided his troops and posed for the enemy. At dawn, the two armies intersected, and Gao Huan's general Peng Le rushed into the Northern Wei Army with thousands of cavalry, collapsed in all directions, and went deep into the Western Wei camp, capturing five princes and a staff officer of the Western Wei Lintao King Yuan kam and a total of forty-eight people.
The Eastern Wei army was greatly encouraged, and Gao Huan ordered the drum to attack, beheading more than 10,000 people, and at the same time ordered Peng Le to step up the pursuit. And Yuwen Tai was embarrassed, and after Peng Le was pursued, he had to run and plead with Peng Le on the horse: "General Peng, you killed me today, will you still be useful tomorrow?" Why don't you let me go and take away the gold and silver treasures I left behind? Peng Le felt that this was reasonable, and went back to the camp where Yuwen Tai had discarded, collected a large bag of gold yuan treasures for himself, and then told Gao Huan that Yu Wentai had escaped by chance, but he had already been frightened.
The next day, the Eastern and Western Wei armies regrouped and resumed the war. Because a soldier of the Eastern Wei Army had committed suicide on a donkey, he was reprimanded by Gao Huan, and he was indignant and leaked secrets, telling Yuwen Tai where Gao Huan was. Yuwen Tai then led the three armies to bypass the main force of Eastern Wei and hit the tent together, Gao Huan was in a hurry to meet the enemy, and almost all the infantry outside the camp were captured. Gao Huan himself was shot dead even by his mount for a while, and his subordinate Helian Yangshun gave up his horse to Gao Huan, and together with the remaining soldiers to follow the palace, Gao Huan barely escaped.
In order to seek merit, the surrendered soldiers of Eastern Wei reported the direction of Gao Huan's escape to Western Wei, and Yuwen Tai, in revenge for the previous day, immediately summoned three thousand cavalry, led by the governor He Pusheng. In the midst of the chaos, He Pusheng found Gao Huan and chased after him. Fortunately, the governor Duan Shao arrived on horseback, shot an arrow at He Pusheng's mount, threw him off his horse, and then shot over the Western Wei two horses to protect Gao Huan from escaping.
After Gao Huan survived, he immediately led the main force to make a comeback. The Eastern Wei soldiers counterattacked and rushed to kill, Yuwen Tai's position was scattered, and he fled in defeat, while the Eastern Wei army took advantage of the victory and pursued it. Yu Jin, Du Guxin, and others collected Western Wei pawns from the flanks to continuously harass the Eastern Wei pursuers, and Yuwen Tai had to escape and retreat to the upper reaches of the Wei River.
Gao Huan led his army into Shaanxi, but because none of his generals had any fighting spirit and were exhausted, he did not dare to fight again, so he returned to Jin.
Conclusion: At the Battle of Yaoshan, Western Wei was defeated, losing more than 400 generals and capturing 60,000 sergeants. Yuwen Tai's army, which he had worked so hard to build, was lost. And Gao Huan did not hit the iron while it was hot, missing the best opportunity to unify the north.
Gao Huan
The "Battle of Mt. Yaoshan", which has the most twists and turns, is so bizarre that even the novel does not dare to write it
547 AD
Hou Jing's return: Xiao Yan's dream came true
In 547, Hou Jing of Eastern Wei openly rebelled, led the six prefectures of Henan to annex to Western Wei, and was awarded the title of Western Wei Taifu (太傅) and Henan Daoxingtai (河南道行台).
Hou Jing was originally a subordinate of the Northern Wei chancellor Erzhu Rong, and after Northern Wei split into Eastern Wei and Western Wei, Hou Jing led his people to surrender to the Eastern Wei ruler Gao Huan. Hou Jing had participated in the Six Towns Rebellion with Gao Huan, so Hou Jing was highly valued by Gao Huan and was given the title of Situ, with 100,000 troops and ruling the Henan region. But Hou Jing never got Gao Huan's trust. On the one hand, Hou Jing controlled Henan with heavy troops and was directly responsible for defending against the threat of western Wei and southern Liang Dynasty; on the other hand, Gao Huan had always intended to keep Hou Jing away from the imperial court, so that Hou Jing had no political alliance in the central power group and was isolated in the dynasty.
Hou Jing extremely despised Gao Huan's son Gao Cheng, and openly said that there was Gao Huan there, and he had no second thoughts, but if Gao Huan was not there, he would never do anything for Gao Cheng. Before his death, Gao Huan warned his son to be careful of Hou Jing after he ascended the throne. A few days after Gao Huan's death, Gao Cheng was jealous of Hou Jing and wanted to take Hou Jing's military power, so Hou Jing immediately rebelled and submitted to Yuwen Tai, the ruler of Western Wei. So Gao Cheng sent troops to recruit Hou Jing.
Yuwen Tai accepted Hou Jing's surrender, but at the same time had some concerns about the fickle Hou Jing. Therefore, although Hou Jing was verbally granted many official titles, he did not move in Western Wei, and did not intend to join him in dealing with Gao Cheng's army, but instead sent people to receive Hou Jingxian's territory. Hou Jing realized that Yuwen Tai was not sincere, which caused him to be attacked by Eastern Wei and Western Wei, so he decided to submit to the Liang Dynasty in the south.
At this time, Emperor Xiao Yan of Liangwu was already eighty-four years old, and he was very happy when he received Hou Jing's letter of surrender with his territory. Because not long ago, Xiao Yangang dreamed that officials from all over the Central Plains had come to surrender. Xiao Yan's favorite minister, Zhu Yi, took the initiative to say that this was an opportunity to unify the country. Therefore, even though the courtiers opposed it, Emperor Wu of Liang gladly accepted Hou Jing's surrender and sent a large army to Henan to meet Hou Jing.
In July of that year, Emperor Wu of Liang sent the commander of the Northern Theater, Yang Yaren, and the Liang Dynasty clan Marquis Xiao Yuanming of Zhenyang, to the city of Hanging (瓠瓠城, in present-day Runan County, Henan), where Hou Jing's troops were located, to fight against Murong Shaozong, a general sent by Gao Cheng.
During the reign of Emperor Wu of Liang, the Liang Dynasty had few wars and chaos, and the whole country believed in Buddhism, so the combat effectiveness of the Liang army was very poor. Coupled with the Eastern Wei, Western Wei, and Southern Liang Dynasties, which were the strongest in Eastern Wei, Murong Shaozong sent by Eastern Wei was still Hou Jing's nemesis, and as a result, the Liang army was defeated, Xiao Yuanming was captured by Eastern Wei, Yang Yaren abandoned the city and fled, and Hou Jing fled into the Territory of Liang Dynasty with eight hundred remnants of defeat. At this point, Eastern Wei regained the land that Hou Jing was supposed to dedicate to the Liang Dynasty, and held Emperor Wu of Liang's brother hostage, and Hou Jing submitted to the Liang Dynasty with nothing, and the Liang Dynasty found nothing but to lure the wolf into the house.
Conclusion: Less than a year after Hou Jing's return to the Liang Dynasty, he rebelled, known in history as hou Jing's rebellion, which devastated the social economy of the Jiangnan region and aggravated the situation of the weak in the south and the strong in the north.
Hou Jing supported Xiao Zhengde as emperor and formed a new government to establish a new central government, which was greatly encouraged
Battle of Yubi: Death of Gao Huan
In the first month of 547, Gao Huan, the Eastern Wei emperor and a generation of tyrants, died of illness in Jinyang at the age of fifty-two.
Gao Huan's death had a lot to do with a defeat a few months ago, the Battle of Yubi.
Gao Huan had already passed his fifties at this time, and the "broken settlement" disciples of twenty years ago had become one of the two males in the north, and they could blackmail the son of heaven to order the princes. His only regret was that the north had not yet been unified, and the fierce enemies Yuwen Tai and Western Wei had not yet been destroyed. Therefore, in September of the previous year, Gao Huan personally led an army of 140,000 people to besiege Yubi (玉壁, in modern Jishan County, Shanxi) held by Western Wei.
Yubi was located downstream of Fenshui, at the forefront of the Eastern and Western Wei wars, and its geographical location was dangerous, directly threatening the security of Eastern Wei and Jinzhou. Gao Huan wanted to remove the nail of the jade wall first and clear the way for the army to march west.
Gao Huan had attacked Yubi four years earlier, and at that time, under the defense of the Western Wei general Wang Sizheng, he retreated in vain, which was already Gao Huan's second attack on Yubi. Yubi's defender at this time was replaced by Wei Xiaokuan, who was not very old, and his combat experience was far inferior to that of his predecessor Wang Sizheng, and there were only 7,000 men under him, and the disparity in strength between the two sides was extremely large.
Faced with such a situation, Gao Huan was originally very confident, and his more than 100,000 people camped for tens of miles outside the city, encircling the jade wall like an iron barrel. A classic siege and defensive battle in Chinese history began, and Gao Huan did everything in his power in more than fifty days, but they were all dissolved by Wei Xiaokuan's moves.
In the first round, Gao Huan adopted the strategy of cutting off the enemy's water source. The water source of Yubi City depended on the fenhe river in the north, and Gao Huan ordered his generals to dig another river channel upstream of the fenhe river, so that the fenshui would be bypassed, the water source in the city would be cut off, the jade wall would have no water, the army would be in chaos, and the city would not attack itself. But this move was not a big deal for Yubi. Yubidi is rich in underwater resources, Wei Xiaokuan ordered the sergeant to dig a well to draw water, and the water supply problem was solved, and Wei Xiaokuan easily broke Gao Huan's first move.
In the second round, Gao Huan commanded his soldiers to build a mountain outside the city and take advantage of the condescending advantage to shoot arrows inside the city. Wei Xiaokuan thought to himself: If you are tall, I will be higher than you. He had the soldiers raise the existing tower with planks. If the earth mountain is one foot high, the tower is one foot high, and it is much easier to build a tower than to pile up the earth mountain. As soon as Gao Huan's soldiers climbed up the Tushan Mountain, Wei Xiaokuan waited with a stone rocket. In the second round, Wei Xiaokuan won.
In the third round, if you can't attack from the air, you will attack from the ground, and this time Gao Huan chooses to dig tunnels. While concentrating his forces to pretend to attack from the north of the city to attract attention, he also ordered people to dig 10 tunnels from outside the city to lead directly into the city. Wei Xiaokuan looked at Gao Huan's tunnel and smiled: "You dig me, I dig." If you dig vertically, I will dig horizontally to intercept you, and then wait for the vertical to dig up, and then wait for the vertical to dig through, and then rush out to kill the Eastern Wei soldiers. Not only that, Wei Xiaokuan also piled firewood into the tunnel, and with the help of cowhide sacs to blow the wind, he attacked the Eastern Wei soldiers in the tunnel with fire.
In this way, the first three moves were all defused, and Wei Xiaokuan's soldiers did not suffer much loss, while Gao Huan's troops had already suffered a large number of casualties. Gao Huan's heart was anxious and on fire, and suddenly the old wound recurred. Gao Huan took the injury and insisted on confronting Wei Xiaokuan for more than a month. He hit the wall with the siege car, Wei Xiaokuan made a tent curtain out of cloth, wherever your siege car attacked, my tent curtain will face wherever it is, and the tent curtain full of wind will dissolve the attack power of the chariot. Gao Huan also asked his subordinates to tie dried pine branches and hemp stalks to the long poles, and filled them with anointing oil to burn the long mantle, in an attempt to burn the Yubi City Tower together. Wei Xiaokuan tied the hook knife to the long pole, and when the fire pole attacked, he raised the hook knife and cut it, cutting off all the pine branches and hemp stalks that were being lit.
Gao Huan had nothing to do. In the end, it was decided to persuade Wei Xiaokuan to surrender to the high-ranking official Houlu. He sent an emissary to send a letter to Wei Xiaokuan, saying: "After fighting for so many days, there is not a single reinforcement to save you, which shows how much Yuwen Tai does not attach importance to you, follow me, and ensure that you are promoted to the rank of knight." Wei Xiaokuan replied, "My city is strong, and the grain and grass are plentiful. How can a Man of Kansai be a surrender general? ”
Gao Huan shouted to the soldiers in the city outside the city: "You don't need to accompany the main general to the funeral, whoever can kill Wei Xiaokuan and surrender to our army, I will worship you as a lieutenant, seal the Duke of Kaiguo County, seal ten thousand households, and reward ten thousand horses." Wei Xiaokuan then shouted, "The soldiers in my city listen, whoever can kill Gao Huan will also give him the same reward." ”
Gao Huan was half dead when he heard this. The siege lasted more than 50 days, and more than 70,000 soldiers were killed or sick. After years of conquest of the East and the West, I have never been so depressed: the small jade wall cannot be taken down, and I have a recurrence of my old illness, and the dream of conquering the Western Wei and unifying the north is about to become a bubble. Gao Huan was resentful and helpless in his heart, but at this time, the grain and grass of the army had been exhausted, and he could only order the retreat.
On the way back, the morale of Eastern Wei was extremely low, in order to inspire the morale of the army, Gao Huan, despite his serious illness, gathered the generals in the open air camp to feast and drink, and sang the "Song of Shule" during the banquet, Gao Huan estimated that he also felt that his time was short, recalling the northern grasslands of Saibei when he was young, and he was extremely sad. After returning to Jinyang, Gao Huan was worried and sick, and died soon after.
Conclusion: The Battle of Yubi killed a generation of tyrants Gao Huan, and the era of Gao Huan and Yuwen Tailong tiger competition finally came to an end. With the death of Gao Huan, the situation in which the north is strong in the east and weak in the west is completely reversed. Twenty years later, Yuwen's Northern Zhou attacked Gao's Northern Qi, and northern China was reunited.