My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 323 Only a man who can bend and stretch can be a husband

Cao Hong's temporary defeat at the city of Nanpi was ultimately due to insufficient foresight and lack of intelligence.

In addition, the troops were not used to naval battles and were not mentally prepared for a naval battle with a strong enemy.

Of course, Cao Cao also knew that Cao Hong was extravagant and domineering by nature and acted decisively.

So strictly speaking, the biggest blame for the failure of this battle should still be borne by the great leader Cao Cao.

Over the past year or so, Cao's army has won many battles, including three consecutive victories at Guandu, Dong'a, and Cangting, and in each battle they were able to annihilate a lot of Yuan Shao's active forces.

After that, he continued to chase Yuan Shao all the way north, and within half a year, he had occupied three or four counties in Jizhou, and two more counties were still under dispute. If nothing unexpected happened this winter, Cao Cao would be able to occupy at least five or six counties of Yuan Shao before the beginning of next spring.

The battle was going so smoothly that it was inevitable that Cao Cao became a little complacent and was not so cautious in his deployment of personnel.

In Cao Cao's view, Cao Hong was only responsible for maintaining the battle line in the winter on the eastern front, so there was no need to keep many elite soldiers. The main force of the direct line was basically withdrawn, and some newly surrendered troops from Hebei were relied on to fight the main force, and the old soldiers of Cao's army were only responsible for supervising the battle.

More importantly, the three front-line advisers available to Cao Cao were now responsible for work in other areas.

Guo Jia was in poor health, so he stayed in the rear near the front line of Weijun, responsible for attacking Yuan Shao's mind and face. He planned various small actions that "had little military value but could make Yuan Shao more embarrassed" to accelerate the deterioration of Yuan Shao's condition and make him die sooner.

This matter cannot be said to be unimportant. After all, for Cao Cao, Yuan Shao's early death was more important than anything else. Guo Jia was also responsible for this work in history. After Yuan Shao's death, he continued to be responsible for instigating Yuan Shang and Yuan Tan to fight each other.

The rest, including Xun You, Jia Xu, etc., are now in charge of controlling the siege of Julu and Anping, and directing Le Jin and Xu Huang to do things. Cheng Yu was transferred back to the south to be in charge of the Xuhuai defense line in case of any emergency.

In other words, if Cao Cao had paid a little more attention to Cao Hong's siege and given him a top-notch strategist, he would not have suffered such a loss. It was really Cao Cao who was too greedy and took a big step.

Fortunately, although Cao Hong suffered a minor defeat, he only lost the siege camp on the Nanpi front line. After retreating in an orderly manner along the Zhangshui River to Dongguang County, he regained his footing.

Normally, the number of casualties in a battle is said to be over 10,000, but in reality, less than 2,000 were killed, and several thousand were wounded, because many wounded were captured, so it is difficult to count. The rest were because Zhang He and Gao Lan's former troops were originally Yuan's soldiers. Seeing that the Yuan family was shaking again, they decisively surrendered after being cut off and surrounded.

On the other side of the battle, the total number of casualties among Taishi Ci's troops was less than a thousand, with only a few hundred killed in battle.

Yuan Tan suffered two to three thousand casualties, but because he cut off and surrounded a lot of prisoners, he also pulled back the Hebei soldiers under Gao Lan and Lu Weihuang. In the end, Yuan Tan gained four thousand men.

It’s a pity that Yuan Tan was also a man who couldn’t keep his composure. After Nanpi was relieved, he became a little arrogant and wanted to press on with the victory, expand his results, and counterattack Dongguang.

Taishi Ci urged him to just complete the pre-war plan and was unwilling to participate in the subsequent counterattack. Yuan Tan was unable to control the enemy troops, so he asked Zhang Nanguan to lead his troops in pursuit.

A few days later, in early December, Yuan Tan hit Cao Hong's wall again and lost half of the 4,000 chips he had earned in the Battle of Nanpi under the city of Dongguang. Only then did he calm down and took the remaining half of the net profit and stopped while he was ahead.

After comparing the victory and the defeat, Yuan Tan became more sober and realized that he could not do anything without the support of Uncle Liu. He had hoped to take advantage of his father's serious illness to make some achievements in the war so that Yuan Shao would recognize him, but it would be bad if he ended up making things worse.

……

On the other hand, Cao Cao, who was in Qinghe, was surprised when he learned that Cao Hong was defeated and retreated to Dongguang.

"What? Zi Lian was defeated by Yuan Tan? This is impossible! How could Yuan Tan be so capable?" Cao Cao's tone sounded horrified, and he confirmed it several times.

The messenger sent by Cao Hong spoke with certainty, and only then did Cao Cao slowly calm down and accept the fact.

He was indeed a great hero, with a very good psychological quality. He soon stopped worrying and chose to look forward: "How did Zi Lian lose? Tell me in detail!"

The messenger handed Cao Hong's letter to Cao Cao, who read it carefully and saw that it said "the warships used by the enemy were obtained from Liu Bei, and they are good at naval warfare and have powerful weapons and armor, which are not comparable to Yuan Tan's army."

Finally, it was written that although Cao's army was the defeated side in this battle and captured many prisoners, the battlefield was chaotic and some soldiers and even officers of the other side were also captured, but on a much smaller scale.

Of course Cao Hong tortured these enemy prisoners severely, trying to pry out some valuable information. In the end, he found out that Liu Bei's troops were supporting Yuan Tan, but they just didn't make it public.

"That's not surprising. I said that Liu Bei had rested for half a year after defeating Sun Ce. How could he be so patient and not launch a northern expedition? It turns out that Liu Bei and I had the same idea. I didn't want to be attacked from all sides before Yuan Shao was defeated, so I turned a blind eye to him.

He was also unwilling to help Yuan Shao share the pressure in advance and force my main force to go south to deal with him. And because of the relationship with Yuan Shao that he and I both received the forged edict, it was not easy to not help at all, so he resorted to such despicable tricks!
However, this is a bit unlike the Liu Bei I am familiar with. In the past, he always talked about justice and justice, and he would not give in at all. Why has he become so smooth and sophisticated now? Is it because he has grown old, suffered too many losses, or has he been led astray by the Zhuge brothers? "

Cao Cao analyzed to himself while feeling a little sad.

Liu Bei is no longer the hot-blooded, absolutely pure, and principled Liu Bei.

Cao Cao neither wanted to see a respected old rival fall, nor did he want his enemies to become more flexible - after all, once the enemies became flexible, the price he would have to pay to destroy them would be greater.

Who doesn't want his enemy to be a good person all his life? Good people are easy to bully.

After Cao Cao sighed, the generals around him could no longer hold their temper. Cao Ren, who was in charge of the Qinghe-Weijun battlefield, took the lead in making a loud proposal:

"Since Liu Bei dares to do this, why don't we take advantage of the deepening winter when it is difficult to deploy troops in the north, divide our forces and march south to help Miao Cai strike Guan Yu in the direction of Xu and Huai! If we don't fight back after suffering a loss, will Liu Bei think we are afraid of him?"

Cao Cao just smiled when he heard this, but he didn't agree. He even said self-deprecatingly, "I am not Benchu, I can still afford to lose some face. Besides, Liu Bei doesn't dare to openly fight with us, which means he is also afraid. If I tear off this cover in a fit of rage, it will not be good for both Cao and Liu. If I want to fight back, I don't have to fight back openly."

After Cao Cao finished speaking, Cao Ren did not dare to refute.

Cao Xiu, who was still young and vigorous and not even 30 years old, thought about it and changed his mind and asked for a fight: "Since it is inconvenient to go to war with Liu Bei, let's let the main force return to the east and attack Yuan Tan hard. We will capture Nanpi at all costs! Let Yuan Tan see the might of our army's full-strength attack!"

Historically, Cao Xiu was just a middle-level general of the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry at this time.
Although he joined the army during the campaign against Dong Zhuo and has twelve years of experience in the army, he was only sixteen or seventeen years old when he first started out, so he is only about twenty-eight or twenty-nine now.

The current Tiger and Leopard Cavalry commander should have been Cao Chun, but Cao Chun was dragged down by Lu Bu and Dong Cheng in the Lu Bu and Dong Cheng incident a year and a half ago. Cao Xiu was promoted to be the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry commander in advance. Before the Battle of Guandu, he had been following Cao Cao closely, leading the personal guard cavalry around Cao Cao, and had received far more opportunities to make meritorious contributions than in the same period in history. Now he has a lot of say around Cao Cao.

Cao Cao remained noncommittal and asked Guo Jia, who was standing beside him, with a smile, "Fengxiao, in your opinion, how should our army respond to the defeat in Nanpi?"

Guo Jia looked sick and thin. He stroked his goatee and said slowly, "If Yuan Shao is dead, it is not impossible for you to go to war with Liu Bei. But you must prioritize now.

I heard that Yuan Shao was very ill, and even his civil and military officials could not see him even if they had important matters to attend to. At this critical moment, even if he has not yet died, he will inevitably be isolated from inside and outside and manipulated by others. Our army should never create unnecessary trouble. Although General Zi Lian lost some soldiers in his defeat, only one or two thousand of his elite troops who followed you were killed, which is not worth mentioning. The rest are newly joined soldiers. Moreover, Liu Bei can only use this opportunity once.

Now our army has been on guard and knows the true and false of Liu Bei's actions. Even if we don't fight back, Liu Bei won't dare to look down on us because of a small victory. If he dares to advance again, it's just right for General Zilian to counterattack and dampen the enemy's spirit."

Guo Jia's words are always very straightforward, hitting the source of interests directly, and even inspiring many people to reflect on their instinctive reactions.

For example, when a person is hit, the normal instinctive reaction is to hit back immediately. So much so that no one has ever thought about "why should we hit back, and what will happen if we don't hit back".

But if you really think about it calmly instead of just relying on instinct and emotional reactions, then this problem is actually very easy to figure out:
First, the reason for revenge is to prevent the other party from thinking you are easy to bully and continuing to harm you. Although counterattacks do not directly benefit you, they can let potential enemies know that you are not easy to mess with.

Second, if you are beaten in public, if you do not fight back, not only will the other party think you are weak and can be bullied, but a third party will also find out that you have lost face. At this time, if you want to regain your public prestige, you must fight back.

However, these two points did not happen in today's battle when Liu Bei sent Taishi Ci to make a small profit temporarily.

Liu Bei's side knew that they had taken advantage of the enemy's unpreparedness, but this could not happen again. If Cao Cao did not fight back, they would not think that Cao Cao was weak and could be bullied.

Secondly, Liu Bei's army did not act under its own banner, so Cao Cao did not publicly lose face in front of the major princes. This was known only to both parties, and at most Yuan Tan knew about it.

In this situation, Cao Cao could take revenge like a gentleman, a year is never too late. He had the magnanimity to focus on killing Yuan Shao first and then create other problems.

Cao Ren, who was standing by, felt somewhat dissatisfied after hearing these unpleasant and sinister words, but he knew that Guo Jia was terribly calm and emotionless, so Cao Ren could only tentatively refute:

"According to Feng Xiao, our army is not in a hurry to take revenge just because Yuan Shao is still alive. But if the time is right and Yuan Shao is dead in the future, has Feng Xiao thought of a plan for revenge in advance?"

Guo Jia still looked unhurried. He knew that Cao Ren wanted to prove "whether it is impossible or not, there is no rush".

If you can come up with a response plan, then it’s “no rush”; if you can’t, then it’s “no go”; you have to make the distinction clearly.

Fortunately, Guo Jia was quick-witted and could come up with a solution:

"If Yuan Shao really died, the situation could be divided into several situations. If Yuan Shao died and Yuan Tan was made his successor, and all the civil and military officials in Yecheng continued to respect Yuan Tan, Yuan Shang would lack real power.

At that time, we will have to continue to attack Yuan with all our strength. The matter of Liu Bei can only be put on hold temporarily, or we can instigate other princes to attack Liu Bei in the name of the court, and use bluffing to trick those southern princes into taking the bait and find something for Liu Bei to do.

However, if Yuan Shao did not choose Yuan Tan to succeed him, and everyone in Yecheng respected Yuan Shang, then the split of the Yuan family would be inevitable. In this case, we can consider temporarily restraining our army in Hebei, or even negotiate with Yuan Shang or Yuan Tan and propose a land exchange.

Hejian and other places are too far to the north, so we can give them up and trade with Yuan Shang or Yuan Tan for some land in the south that is not between Yuan Shang and Yuan Tan, even if we suffer a slight loss in terms of population and counties.

As long as Yuan Tan and Yuan Shang have more contact, they will naturally harm each other. This is better than the current situation, where the two Yuans guard the east and west of Jizhou respectively, and our army penetrates the center and goes straight to Yishui, cutting the enemy in two, so that the two Yuans cannot fight each other.

As long as there is a sign of internal fighting between the two Yuans, we can add fuel to the fire, such as pretending to attack Liu Bei, so that they no longer worry that our army will go north, unite with one side and attack the other side, so that they will be more daring to provoke open internal fighting. When they are beaten to a pulp and unable to reconcile, we can then strike back and return to Hebei, and it won't be too late to reap the benefits -

Unfortunately, Yuan Tan has already flirted with Liu Bei. When the time comes, we will not be able to win over Yuan Tan, and can only use Yuan Shang to cooperate. "

Guo Jia analyzed it eloquently, Cao Cao listened carefully, but Cao Ren was already a little impatient: he felt that Guo Jia was talking too much, and all he talked about was diplomacy to divide the enemy and win over the friend, without touching on the specific tactics of war.

Finally, Cao Ren took advantage of Guo Jia's pause and interrupted:

"Mr. Fengxiao's words are indeed mature, but I would like to ask, if we really plan to 'pretend to attack Liu Bei', how will you deploy? Where will you attack Liu?
Should we let Yuan Rang start from Runan, or let Miao Cai start from Xu Huai? Or should we recapture Wancheng, weaken Liu Biao, and then go downstream? Have you really thought about this, sir?"

Guo Jia was interrupted but was not angry at all: "Why are you in such a hurry? Aren't we almost there? I think that if we really get to that point, we can naturally start from Langya - this can also be regarded as starting from Xu Huai, but I am more specific than General Zixiao."

"Langya? How could such a remote and dangerous place like Mengshan and Yishui hurt Liu Bei's bones?" Cao Ren asked in disbelief.

Cao Cao, who had been watching the show in a neutral manner without showing any emotion, could not help but become curious and asked, "Good question, Fengxiao. I also have some questions. Please elaborate."

Guo Jia: "It's actually very simple. Whether you choose Wancheng, Runan, or other directions in Xuhuai, there is a major drawback, which is that you can't control it freely.

Although our army defeated Yuan Shao, we were attacked from both sides. A good general knows both himself and the enemy, and thinks of defeat before thinking of victory. If Liu Bei's strength increases greatly in the past few years, and we fail to succeed in one blow, but are dragged into a quagmire, it will be difficult to stop.

Even if we look south next year, our goal is not to destroy Liu Bei in one fell swoop. At most, we will weaken Liu Bei first and make the two Yuan brothers look down on us, thinking that there is an opportunity and solving the problem of the feud between brothers now.

Therefore, we must consider where it is easier to control the attack so that we can stop at any time once new opportunities arise on the northern front. Attacking the eastern part of Langya is the most suitable option for us to control the attack.

Now that Yuan Shao had not yet died, Yuan Tan did not dare to openly cede the counties to Liu Bei, lest he humiliate his father. According to the intelligence collected by General Zi Lian after his defeat, it is estimated that Yuan Tan only allowed Liu Bei to appoint a few local officials and actually control some areas, but in name Qingzhou was still completely Yuan Tan's.

But among the lands that Yuan Tan gave up, there were two counties that were particularly special, namely the counties of Langya and Ju County. Yuan Tan entered Xuzhou because he was instigated by Liu Bei when Lu Bu was defeated. It was a coincidence that he got it for free. It was not granted to him by Yuan Shao.

Yuan Tan handed over the land he earned to Liu Bei for full control, which had little impact on Yuan Shao's reputation. It was not like "future generations will not know the hardships of starting a business from scratch, and will give away their ancestors' land to others."

On the other hand, Liu Bei has to take into account the face of the Yuan family, and will certainly cooperate with Yuan Tan's statement first. Liu Bei only wants practical benefits for the time being, not status. Therefore, we can completely take advantage of the situation and pretend that we don't know which lands Yuan Tan has ceded to Liu Bei. We can just treat the counties in the eastern part of Langya as Yuan Tan's and attack them as Yuan Tan's land!

Although these lands have few people and little land, there are three benefits if they can be conquered: first, it can test Liu Bei's determination to hold on and his fighting power.

Our army has not fought Liu Bei's army for many years, and we don't know the enemy's strength, so it's hard to assess how much stronger Liu Bei has become than when he first took over Xuzhou six or seven years ago. Trying it out can help us know ourselves and the enemy.

Moreover, as long as Liu Bei is determined not to give up an inch of land and is willing to hold on, no matter where we attack, we can consume Liu Bei's troops and make some preparations for expanding the results of the victory in the future.

Secondly, although Langya was not worth recruiting soldiers and raising food, it was located at the junction of Liu Bei and Yuan Tan. As long as these two counties were captured, Liu Bei and Yuan Tan's land connection would be cut off, and they could only sail along the coast.

But even if we take the sea route, as long as the counties are in our hands, we can also harass the coastal routes, making it much more difficult for Liu Bei to support Yuan. In this way, as long as Yuan Tan cannot get Liu Bei's support, the chances of further wavering and joining us will increase greatly.

Finally, only when attacking Langya can our army deliberately pretend to be deaf and dumb, pretending to be unaware and pretending to still attack Yuan Tan's territory. If things really don't go well, we can also pretend that nothing happened and withdraw our troops to make other plans.

Liu Bei doesn't want to go to war with us directly, so we can use this opportunity to test him, why not?"

(End of this chapter)