<h1>1. Carry Qiang ancestry</h1>
In the seventh year of Jian'an (202 AD), Jiang Wei was born in Tianshui Ji County, and his father Jiang Ran, who was then serving as Gong Cao of HanTianshui County, was unfortunately killed on the way out to suppress the Qiang rebellion, so the young Jiang Wei lost his father at an early age and relied on his mother for his life. Born in the bitter cold land of the northwest, it is natural to practice a martial art, not only that, Jiang Wei also read a lot of books, especially like to study the works of Zheng Xuan, a famous scribe of the Eastern Han Dynasty. After his father sacrificed his life for the country, Jiang Wei was worshipped as a general for his father's merits, and had the right to participate in the military and political affairs of Tianshui County, becoming a formal civil servant.
The records in the history books about Jiang Wei's entry into Shu are limited to this. However, through research, it is not difficult for us to find that in fact, Jiang Wei has a Qiang ancestry.
The surname Jiang is one of the oldest surnames in China. In the "Commentaries on the Interpretation of Characters", "Chinese", "Zuo Zhuan" and other books, it is recorded that after the surname of Jiang was Emperor Yan, the ancestors of the Surname of Jiang were also named princes for assisting Yao Yougong.
Secondly, the surname Jiang was also a royal family of the Zhou Dynasty. According to the "Records of History", the mother abandoned by the ancestors of the Zhou people was named Jiang Yuan; the book "Shuowen" more clearly pointed out that the surname of Jiang was the Uncle of the Zhou people. The Zhou people were originally a branch of the Qiang clan, and after establishing their rule, Zhou vigorously divided the meritorious nobles, among which the princes of Shen, Lü, Qi, Xu and other places were all surnamed Jiang.
One or two can also be explored in the evolution of words. In the oracle bones, the word "Qiang" on the sheep under the person, the "Jiang" character on the sheep under the woman, the similar glyph structure makes Zhang Taiyan, Fu Sinian, Gu Jiegang and other historians believe that the words "Qiang" and "Jiang" are of the same origin, or even a word, which also reflects the historical process of the gradual integration of ethnic minorities into the Huaxia ethnic group.
During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, Jiang Rong, one of the Qiang tribes among the famous Zhou Youwang Beacon Drama princes, played an important role, that is, he and Inu Rong jointly attacked the Capital of the Zhou Dynasty, Haojing, forcing the Zhou Youwang to set himself on fire to the palace.
During the reign of Duke Hui of Jin, he also recruited a group of Jiang Rong to participate in the Battle of Kun between Jin and Qin, helping the Jin state to become one of the five hegemons of the Spring and Autumn Period. Later, with the partial migration of the Qiang people, it gradually merged with the Han people in the Central Plains, and became a force that could not be ignored in the Kanto region during the Qin and Han dynasties.
In order to suppress the old days of the Six Kingdoms, the Qin Dynasty once ordered the rich families in the world to move into Xianyang. During the Western Han Dynasty, Han Gaozu, Emperor Wu of Han, Emperor Xuan of Han, and Emperor Cheng of Han ordered the migration of people to the Guanzhong region five times, and the people surnamed Jiang were also among the migrants.
The surname Of Jiang, who moved into Guanzhong, is equivalent to returning to the land where the ancestors lived, because most of the Jiang surnames are concentrated in Tianshui, so the local people also use the word Tianshui as the name of the county. Jiang Wei's father, Jiang Yuan, was born in the Jiang family in Tianshui, although at this time the Jiang surname still fell and did not return to the glory of his predecessors, but retrospectively, Jiang Wei's body still flowed with the blood of the Qiang people, which also laid the foundation for Jiang Wei to preside over the Northern Expedition strategy after entering Shu.
<h1>Second, the dream of Qilin Shu</h1>
In the sixth year of Jianxing (226 AD), Zhuge Liang began the first Northern Expedition, the deterrent power of this Northern Expedition was very impressive, Cao Wei's three counties of Nan'an, Tianshui, and Anding fell in the wind, Tianshui Taishou saw that all the prefectures and counties surrendered, and his subordinates looked at the heads of The Taishou lords with strange eyes, so Tianshui Taishou abandoned the city overnight and fled to Shangyi, Jiang Wei, who was originally a Wei general, naturally wanted to follow Taishou, but at this time, Tianshui Taishou, who was already a bird of fright, did not trust this hairy boy's city gate and drove him away without letting him in. In desperation, Jiang Weiben wanted to go home and defend the city, and did not want his hometown Jixian County Ling to turn him away. So Jiang Wei had to defect to the Shu army.
Jiang Wei's talent was gradually revealed after entering Shu.
In the seven years from Jiang Wei's entry into Shu to Zhuge Liang's death from illness to the death of Zhuge Liang, Jiang Wei first served as the governor of Cangcao Cao, did not directly participate in the decision-making of the military and political affairs of the Shu Han Dynasty, nor did he give him a heavy responsibility, but only let Jiang Wei train six thousand troops, and soon after Shu Xiang Zhuge Liang became more and more shocked by the military ability and loyalty shown by this twenty-seven-year-old young man, and praised Jiang Wei for his meticulous thinking and was called "Liangzhou Sergeant", so he was designated as his successor after a hundred years and shouldered the great cause of the Shu kingdom.
In the twelfth year of Jianxing (234 AD), Zhuge Liang died of illness, and according to Zhuge Liang's will, Jiang Huan and Fei Yi successively served as the chief administrative officers of the Shu Han Dynasty, while Jiang Wei became the supreme military commander of the Shu State. According to the idealized state, after the Shu Han appeared to be in a situation of harmony, even if the three stinky cobblers could not stand up to Zhuge Liang, they would not let the Shu Han decline too quickly, but history does not allow it to assume that the Shu Han regime was in dispute over whether to continue to implement Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition strategy.
Looking at Jiang Wei, who was like a mentor, Zhuge Liang was unsuccessful in the QiShan Mountains, always seeking opportunities to continue the Northern Expedition, but Fei Yi, who presided over the government affairs, held a strong opposition to this, and he clearly realized that his and Jiang Wei's talents were far inferior to Zhuge Liang's, and instead of carrying out the futile Northern Expedition, it was better to protect the border and the people, and to protect the foundation of the Shu state was the greatest success.
However, Fei Yi's point of view is nothing different from the view of corrupt Confucianism, he did not see that even if Zhuge Liang was alive, the possibility of the success of the Northern Expedition of the Shu State was not very likely, the Northern Expedition was precisely to deplete the national strength of the State of Wei, so as to seek opportunities to expand the strategic space of the State of Shu, only by striving for more space, the State of Shu could continue to survive or even unify the world. But the Northern Expedition would mean that the strategic space would be solidified or even compressed. On the whole, Jiang Wei's opinion of insisting on the Northern Expedition was correct.
Even with the constraints of the imperial court, Jiang Wei still sought opportunities to take the initiative.
In the first year of Jiaping (249 AD), the Gaopingling Rebellion broke out in the State of Wei, and Sima Yi launched a coup d'état and detained and beheaded a large number of Wei clan forces led by Cao Shuang.
Jiang Wei keenly captured the turmoil in the Wei dynasty, which was a good opportunity to send troops, so he proposed to use his family background in Tianshui in his early years to divide The West and Qiangrong and divide the Long Right. However, this extremely feasible plan was still strongly opposed by Fei Yi, and whenever Jiang Wei wanted to send troops, Fei Yi only had more than 10,000 soldiers, resulting in Shu Han losing the opportunity.
In the sixteenth year of Yanxi (253 AD), the old rival Fei Yi finally died, and Jiang Wei's military operations gained relatively free political space, so he began frequent military attacks on Wei. One of the most successful was that between the seventeenth and eighteenth years of Yanxi, Jiang Wei led an army to attack Longxi, Liankeheguan, Di Dao, and Lintao, and then defeated the Wei army at Taoshui and won the Great Victory of Taoxi.
Jiang Wei was going to take advantage of this great victory to continue to attack and realize his idea of dividing long and right to open up strategic space, but at this time, most of the Shu Han ministers were reckless and stealing security, and the general Hu Ji in Zhenxi even deliberately delayed the march, resulting in Jiang Wei being isolated and helpless and being broken by Deng Ai. More seriously, the eunuch Huang Hao seized power, forcing Jiang Wei to go to Tuntian in Puzhong to protect himself. Since then, Jiang Wei has not had any chance of the Northern Expedition.
<h1>Third, gather troops in the valley and wait for the opportunity to go north</h1>
The northern gate of the Shu Han regime in Hanzhong was also the forward base of the Northern Expedition, and its strategic position was very important. In the late Shu Han Dynasty, in order to realize his strategic concept of dividing the Long Right, Jiang Wei adjusted the military deployment of the Hanzhong side, which was historically called "gathering troops and gathering valleys".
"Gathering troops in the valley" means shrinking the strength of Hanzhong's troops, practicing a solid wall and clearing the wilderness, taking advantage of the fact that the enemy who has come to attack is far away and retreating without results, taking advantage of the situation to annihilate the enemy's living forces, similar to closing the door and beating dogs. So why did Jiang Wei put forward such a strategic approach?
First of all, it was because the Shu state was seriously short of troops.
According to Pei Songzhi's note "Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms", in the late Shu Han Dynasty, the national combat strength was only more than 100,000 people, and when Sima Zhao planned to cut down Shu in the fifth year of Shu Jingyao, Some Wei Chen calculated that the strength of the Shu State was only 90,000, the garrison of Chengdu accounted for more than half, the hanzhong garrison was only 30,000, and the remaining soldiers had to be divided into various parts of the Shu State, and the strength was stretched, and only by concentrating living forces could they effectively attack the enemy army.
Second, most of the cities under the jurisdiction of Hanzhong have not been at war for a long time, even if they prevent the enemy from sneaking attacks, it is useless to divide the 30,000 troops and defend them, so it is better to hold the fortress and fight with the main city of Hanzhong.
Third, Jiang Wei took the occupation of Longyou as a strategic goal, so he reduced his limited forces to the Longyou region and assembled them in preparation for attacking Longyou at any time.
Jiang Wei inherited Zhuge Liang's zhenluo thought and put forward the "gathering of troops" with the characteristics of flexible mobility and defensive counterattack. However, in specific practice, various obstacles have been encountered.
In terms of commanders, as the proposer of the "Gathering of Troops and Valleys", Jiang Wei should have been responsible for the overall strategy, but Jiang Wei's prestige in Shu Han was far inferior to Zhuge Liang's, and Jiang Wei was isolated outside the three major factions of Shu Han, namely the Jingzhou faction, the Dongzhou faction, and the Yizhou faction, and his actions were often constrained, so the actual host of the strategy became the unaffordable successor Liu Chan. This is also the fuse for the failure of the "gathering troops and gathering in the valley" strategy.
In terms of generals, the "Gathering Of Troops" needed to defend a number of strategic points, but when Zhonghui Deng Ainan invaded Shu Han, the defenders of Yangpingguan, Seoul, and Lecheng turned against each other except for Fu You's death in battle, and the hinterland Jiangyou defender Ma Mi surrendered the city just after seeing the Wei army, the former causing the collapse of the northern defense line of Shu Han, and the latter causing Jiang Wei to be unable to mobilize troops in time to return to reinforcements. As for Zhuge Zhan's stubborn defense of Mianzhu, it was contrary to Jiang Wei's flexible strategy, resulting in Jiang Wei's efforts being wasted.
<h1>Fourth, tragic heroes</h1>
In the face of the corrupt political situation and war situation of the Shu Han Dynasty, the general, who was no longer young, was physically and mentally exhausted. In the winter of the sixth year of Jing Yao, Deng Ai smuggled yinping and took Shu Han directly, and after the lord Liu Chan went out of the city to surrender, Jiang Wei, who was far away in the Sword Pavilion, had no reason to continue to insist and surrendered to Zhong Hui nearby.
Zhong Hui, who had long had different ambitions, intended to win over Jiang Wei, a major minister of the Shu Han Dynasty, and assist him in plotting to divide bashu and plot the world, and Jiang Wei also had a sharp mind and attempted to rescue Liu Chan through the hand of Zhong Hui and revive shu Han. Unfortunately, people are not as good as heavenly calculations, and the Generals of the Wei Army are not willing to rebel, so they kill zhong hui and Jiang Wei successively, in vain.
The famous Shu Han minister Hao Zheng, who worked with Jiang Wei, once said of Jiang Wei:
Jiang Wei was the "weight of a general" in the Shu kingdom, and his position of power was unmatched, but the family house was simple, had few assets, did not take concubines in his life, and there was no sound dog or horse in the family, the clothes were simple, the diet was simple, and the state only gave Feng Lu enough for family use.
Such an evaluation can be said to be very similar to Zhuge Liang, quite its "bow down to death and then have it" legacy, but unfortunately Shu Han because of his own strength limitations, even if Jiang Wei has the talent of Qilin is difficult to return to heaven, the so-called single wood is difficult to support the building, if jiang Wei is successful or unsuccessful, it is inevitable to be biased, saying that Jiang Wei is a tragic hero in the post-Three Kingdoms era, which can be described as very pertinent.