At the end of the Warring States period, Yue Yi’s feat of annihilating Qi brought the state of Yan into its heyday. Taking advantage of the situation, King Yan Zhao ordered the valiant general Wei man Tong army to march into the Korean peninsula for a pioneering conquest. The peninsula will be incorporated into the territory of Yan state within a year. Later, the Qin Dynasty killed Yan and collected all its land. The Korean Peninsula became an indisputable part of the Qin Dynasty. In fact, North Korea was under the jurisdiction of Liaodong Prefecture until the three emperors of Hanhui, Hanwen and Hanjing. Although Wei man and his descendants have inherited officials from generation to generation, in the final analysis, they are only subordinates of the Liaodong prefect. Therefore, the DPRK is not a dependent country at all. But the appearance of one person changed everything. This person is Wei Youqu, the grandson of Wei man. After Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty ascended the throne, Wei Youqu inherited his father’s position and governed Korea for the Han government. However, as a minister of Han Dynasty, Wei Youqu was a true ambitious. He coveted day and night and dreamed of becoming king of Korea. Over the years, Wei Youqu has made many small moves: accepting the outlaws wanted by the imperial court, expanding the army, robbing merchants and envoys, and murdering money and life; what’s more, he has repeatedly sent troops to harass cities in Eastern Liaoning. The reason why Wei Youqu dared to be so arrogant and domineering without a strong man was that he decided that the Han court would never free up its hands to deal with himself. The reason is very simple. At this time, when the war between Han and Hungary was the most intense and bloody sensitive period, Emperor Wu of Han was militaristic and devoted the whole country to the northern expedition against the Xiongnu, so he was unable to look East. In addition, the Korean Peninsula is thousands of miles away from Chang’an. How can the Hanting mobilize the masses for a North Korea that is insignificant and of little benefit? It has to be said that weiyouqu’s wishful thinking crackled. If it is the two emperors of Hanwen and Hanjing, it will certainly be led by him. However, it is a pity that weiyouqu is facing the great Hanwu emperor who is “powerful and moral”. At the critical moment when swords and swords collided and blood flowed in the northern desert, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was furious about the provocation of the villain Wei Youqu, but out of reason, he decided to try to use political means to ease the contradiction first, so he “asked Qiao Youqu what was involved”. Unexpectedly, Wei Youqu, who was obsessed by the “King”, was not afraid of political intimidation. Instead, he became even more cynical and immediately sternly refused to be involved. He worried that he would be punished by the emperor if he failed to serve as an envoy, so he secretly ordered his followers to assassinate a North Korean general. Sure enough, the aggressive Emperor Wudi of Han Dynasty heard that he had done such a beautiful thing. Instead of being punished, he promoted him to be a lieutenant in the eastern part of Liaodong province and ordered him to “protect the fortress, and no barbarians would steal the border”. Weiyouqu, who learned that he was promoted and made a fortune by attacking and killing his own generals, immediately raised his eyebrows and led his troops out. He killed him and took the city. Therefore, he formally challenged the Han court on the table. What was involved in the great humiliation of being punished made Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty furious. As a result, a war to determine the ownership of the Korean Peninsula was like an arrow on the first string, which was ready to break out. No matter what, in the eyes of Emperor Wu of Han Dynasty, North Korea is a land of bullets, so there is no need to prepare for the war in detail. Just make a small move, and the big storm will subside in an instant. However, this mentality of belittling the enemy undoubtedly blinded Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty and made him ignore many special difficulties existing in this rebellion. First, the journey is so long that the Han army will inevitably travel long distances. Weiyouqu guards the pass and waits for work with ease. Second, the Wei family has been in Korea for three generations. Although the policy of wanton collection and heavy taxes is unpopular, they are familiar with the terrain and have short food routes, so they take the initiative in the war. Although many senior generals with rich combat experience have tried hard to persuade them, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty obviously doesn’t pay attention to them. This can be seen from the anti insurgency plan he drafted in a few days. In terms of the choice of generals, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty used Xun swine and Yang Fu as partners, but the two men were always at odds. Besides, swine was only a small captain beside Wei Qing. As the commander of the first army, he had neither qualification nor experience. Yang Fu, who was known as the “General of the building ship”, was also a military vase. The reason why Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty made such a point was that both Xun swine and Yang Fu were his confidants. The palms and backs of their hands were all flesh. For a victory that was easy to capture, they had to let the two men share half the effort. In terms of army formation, the “criminal army” formed by Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty with the wonderful initiative of “recruiting sinners” is difficult to achieve even though it is restricted by the current situation that there are no soldiers to adjust. In contrast, the most dazzling part of the plan is the tactical concept. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty decided to divide his troops into two routes, sea and land. Xunxiu led 50000 troops to kill the Yalu River from Liaodong County, while Yang Pu led his long-term building ship army across the sea and into the enemy’s rear. After Yang Pu successfully landed, the two armies attacked weiyouqu from the north to the South and from the south to the north. They tried to make a quick decision and avoid being sloppy. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty’s operational plan, which was the same as that of the “military exercise”, undoubtedly went against his habitual style of being steady and steady. What’s more, although the building ship is known as the aircraft carrier of the Han Dynasty, it has never been tested in actual combat. For its debut, it has to carry out a very difficult cross sea battle, and it is a strange area that has never been visited before. There is no need to say more about the risk. However, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty believed that the Han army would fight a famous battle that would shine through history, and he himself could achieve unparalleled feats because of it. However, to the surprise of Xiong Junwei, the Han army suffered a big setback just after the war began.
Official fire
Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty despised the enemy so much that generals who were eager to make contributions would naturally follow suit. Xun swine, who was the first to go to the front, could not bear the torture of waiting. Regardless of the attack date agreed with Yang Fu in advance, he ordered the Ministry to launch more exploratory attacks. Unexpectedly, Zhengduo also wanted to be promoted to the rank of nobility through this counter insurgency campaign. He led the leading troops to go deep alone. As a result, he fell into the ambush circle preset by weiyouqu and was killed in a panic.
Although the loss was not large, the morale of the Han army fell sharply since then. At the same time, it also realized that the Korean army was not as vulnerable as it imagined. Although the angry Xun swine got a positive result, he fell into another psychological trap from being greedy for work: wandering in fear of war. This inadvertently eased the fatal crisis of weiyouqu.
After landing on schedule and succeeding, Yang Pu found that everything was surprisingly smooth, so he marched northward with a high head, and within a few days he was under the king’s dangerous city, the “capital” of weiyouqu. Wei Youqu was caught off guard, but fortunately Xun swine stopped his troops, so he rushed back to the rescue.
In the end, the garrison of Wang Xiancheng and the reinforcements returning to the North formed a torrent, and with an overwhelming number of advantages, Yang Fu’s building ship army was completely defeated.
According to the records of the historian, the defeated Yang servant was quite miserable. “He lost his people and hid in the mountains for more than ten days.”. Fortunately, the louchuan army was its direct force after many years of training. Yang finally “gathered and scattered the soldiers and reunited” with great efforts. However, the louchuan army suffered heavy losses in strength and morale. The soldiers are eager to return home and have no intention of fighting again.
There was no tacit understanding between the two groups. After the news of the great defeat reached Chang’an, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was so angry that he immediately sent envoys all the way to the front to scold Xun swine
Terrified, swine led his troops south to fight to the death. After many battles, swine finally killed Wang Xiancheng.
In the critical period when the northern and southern armies of the Han Dynasty were about to join forces, both Xun and Yang believed that it was time to destroy the city. Therefore, both of them are trying to win the first merit by pinching the small Jiujiu in their hearts. Of course, Xun swine, with a heavy army, wanted to attack the city directly, but he needed Yang Fu to lead his army to feint from the flank and disperse the enemy troops. Only in this way could he minimize the losses. However, Yang Pu knew that once the city was destroyed, swine, the main attacker, would capture weiyouqu alive, and all the credit would go to him.
Greedy, Yang Bujian never agreed to cooperate with Xun swine’s strong attack, and secretly contacted weiyouqu to persuade him to ask for surrender to the louchuan army. Wei Youqu guessed Yang Pu’s intentions and dispatched all the main forces to the north of the city to focus on resisting the fierce attack of Xun swine. The sad Xun swine attacked many times without success. The corpses of the Han Army under the city had already piled up like a mountain, but the king dangerous city still stood firm and was as solid as gold.
Gou swine, who was defeated at the expense of his troops, naturally hated Yang Pu, but he was at his wit’s end. However, the arrival of one person made Xun swine see a turning point. It turned out that Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty calculated the date and thought that the anti rebel army should have triumphed long ago. With such a muddle and no news, he must have encountered an emergency. Therefore, the worried Emperor Wu of Han sent his special envoy Gongsun to supervise the war with the gold medal arrow.
As soon as swine saw Gongsun’s arrival, he immediately took it to heart. He complained with a sad face that the reason why he could not attack for a long time was that Yang Fu was too selfish and did not cooperate with him. He also said alarmingly: “if you don’t take it now, it will be a great harm. It’s not only the building ship, but also destroy our army with North Korea.” Gongsun had always been friendly with Xun swine in the imperial court. Hearing that Yang Fu was likely to rebel, he immediately decided to cut off the mess. So he lured Yang servant to Xun swine’s military camp with the talisman bestowed by the son of heaven, and then tied him up.
Xun swine, who finally got the command of the building ship army, was about to attack the city in an all-round way when a coup took place in Wangxian city. It was this sudden coup that sent almost all the parties to the West.
A disastrous victory turns into a defeat
It turned out that weiyouqu was also a tyrannical native emperor. As an external force, the Wei clan inevitably has interest disputes with indigenous groups. However, the Wei Youqu canal has adopted a bloody policy of massacre against all those who have gone against its will. Those highly respected indigenous elders have always had grievances against them. Over the years, hatred has been accumulating more and more.
When the Han army besieged the city, the aboriginal elders in Wangxian city thought that the defeat of weiyouqu was coming, so they decided to seize this golden opportunity. After careful planning, they finally successfully assassinated the defenseless weiyouqu in the middle of the night.
The power of Wang Xiancheng fell into the hands of the Korean aborigines. There were only two ways before them: one was to continue to stick to the end, and the other was to surrender Kaesong. When the situation is clear, people with normal thinking understand that tenacious resistance to death can only lead to their own death. But for the North Koreans, how to surrender and to whom are difficult problems.
Gou swine is always cruel and fond of killing. The Korean aborigines are extremely afraid of him. Moreover, Wei Youqu and Xun swine have already formed a death feud. If Wang Xiancheng falls into his hands, it is inevitable that he will be killed. Although the louchuan army once issued the order to recruit and surrender, it was not the main force of the besieged city after all. Once Xun swine’s army became angry, how could the louchuan army deal with the crisis.
In the end, the North Koreans adopted a wonderful plan: abandon the city and surrender. As long as he arrived at the louchuan army camp, Xun swine would not dare to attack the friendly army even if he had the courage of a leopard.
Therefore, the aboriginal elders led the crowd to the camp where the louchuan army was stationed and collectively surrendered. In this way, swine tried his best to win only an empty city full of holes.
The anti insurgency campaign, which took many years and suffered heavy casualties, made Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty surprisingly furious. Many generals were sentenced to death if they made a slight mistake, and several leading characters could not escape severe punishment.
Xun swine was found guilty of the most heinous crimes. First, he violated the battle plan and gave improper command. Then he kidnapped Yang Pu and provoked internal strife. He killed a lot but made no contribution. Of course, such heinous crimes could not be forgiven. Swine was abandoned and beheaded. Gongsun followed swine blindly and failed to do his duty of supervising the war. He was also beheaded in public.
Although his crime was minor, Yang Pu was also sentenced to death for admitting to surrender without permission in order to achieve military merit. Later, he redeemed his life at the expense of his family. However, he was demoted to a commoner. He was down and out and soon died.
From the disposal of several people by Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, we can indirectly smell some unusual smells. In the battle against Hungary, there were countless defeated generals, but most of them were only symbolically dismissed, and they would soon make a comeback. In contrast, the disastrous defeat of the generals in the Korean War clearly revealed the subtext of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty: it takes so much trouble to fight a small Korea. It is really a disgrace to the reputation of our eternal emperor. It should be killed and cut!
So, is there any beneficiary of this extraordinary war in which blood flowed back from the Korean front to Chang’an, the capital of the country?
The beneficiaries can see at a glance from the later canonization of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. When most of the Han generals who had been fighting hard for many years were destroyed, all the Korean elders who had just assassinated weiyouqu were granted Marquises. After the withdrawal of the Han Army, they became the de facto masters of the Korean Peninsula.
From a practical point of view, the reason why Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty established a prefecture in Korea in name and handed over power to the Huns in essence was that the Han Hun war was becoming white hot at that time, and the Han Army in the deep desert was in urgent need of support to accumulate strength and give the Huns a fatal blow. Therefore, as soon as the Korean War ended, Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty ordered Liaodong regular troops to go to the desert without stopping. From the perspective of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, North Korea is neither an important military area nor an economic interest, so it is not worth the trouble. What’s more, if Hanchen is used to guard Korea again, many troubles will be inevitable.
Therefore, the Han Dynasty paid a huge price, and the war that ended with a disastrous victory undoubtedly handed over the actual control of the Korean peninsula from the evil minded Han people to the Korean aborigines. In this way, generations of indigenous people have been attacking power, speeding up the historical process of “de Sinicization” of Korea. By the time of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Korean Peninsula had become a dependency of the Han Dynasty. The special word “vassal state” seems to show the arrogance of the Central Plains regime, but in essence, it is only a temporary submission to other powerful states.