Chapter 649: The leader of the army, but only knows how to talk about war on paper?

Chapter 649: The leader of the army, but only knows how to talk about war on paper?

The troops going out on this expedition would naturally not be the 100,000 troops led by Wei Bao himself. After all, Wei Bao was now the King of Wei, so he was naturally unwilling to take risks. Instead, he sent his general Zhang Guang.

Zhang Guang is also a person who has not been evaluated much in history, but in fact he has a great reputation. Judging from the evaluation, this person was not an orthodox military general, but a Confucian general.

This person is not a general who fought on the battlefield, but a general who was read in books. He has a sense of armchair generalism, but in fact, compared with Zhao Kuo, Zhang Guang is not even a little bit worse.

The historical evaluation of Zhao Kuo is very unfair. Many people regard Zhao Kuo, who is good at talking about war on paper, as an impractical person who knows how to brag, but not many people really examine Zhao Kuo as a person.

Zhao Kuo came from a distinguished family of Zhao State nobles. His father, Zhao She, was recognized as an outstanding military and political leader of Zhao State. Zhao Kuo received strict military and cultural education since childhood, and studied the art of war and strategies and tactics in depth. The "Historical Records" praised him: "Zhao Kuo has been learning the art of war since he was young, and he is unmatched in the world when talking about military affairs." It can be seen that Zhao Kuo's achievements in the military field are very outstanding.

Zhao Kuo's military talent became more and more apparent as he grew older. In addition to being proficient in the art of war, he was also good at putting theory into practice, and he performed outstandingly in many battles. It can be said that Zhao Kuo was one of the most promising young generals of the Zhao State at that time. Many people believe that Zhao Kuo really had never fought a single battle except the Battle of Changping. Some books even regard Zhao Kuo as a negative example. In fact, Zhao Kuo was not. Many people simply judged Zhao Kuo based on this battle, which is obviously inaccurate.

At that time, Qin had become the most powerful country among the seven major powers in the Warring States Period. Driven by Shang Yang's reforms, Qin's national strength continued to grow and its military strength grew. King Zhaoxiang of Qin ordered that all men over the age of 15 in the country should be mobilized to go to the front line. Whether they could hold a weapon or only cook and deliver meals, they had to participate in the battle. This move led to the rapid expansion of the Qin army's strength, reaching a size of 60.

Although Zhao was one of the seven major powers in the Warring States Period, its land area and population were smaller than those of Qin. The main force of Zhao was only about 40 people. Facing such a powerful Qin army, Zhao's military commander Lian Po adopted a cautious strategy of "holding firm without fighting", hoping to force the Qin army to retreat by consuming their food and grass supply.

This strategy worked to some extent, but it also caused dissatisfaction among the king of Zhao. The king of Zhao believed that adopting such a passive defensive strategy would only put Zhao in a passive situation and ultimately make it difficult to win. Therefore, he decided to replace the generals and appointed Zhao Kuo as the commander-in-chief of the Zhao army, hoping to change the situation.

After Zhao Kuo took over as commander-in-chief, he immediately changed the strategy of the Zhao army, abandoning Lian Po's defensive strategy and deciding to take the initiative to attack by "turning defense into offense". This decision caused a lot of controversy. Some people believed that Zhao Kuo's "theory was divorced from reality" and lacked practical experience, and they were worried that this decision would cause the Zhao army to suffer serious losses.

Zhao Kuo was not blindly advancing. He deeply understood that if the strategy of attrition continued, Zhao would eventually be defeated, because Qin's national strength and resources far exceeded Zhao's. As long as the two sides continued to confront each other, Zhao would inevitably suffer attrition in the end. Therefore, Zhao Kuo's choice to take the initiative and try to win a victory was undoubtedly a wise move.

Zhao Kuo was facing Bai Qi, the god of killing who was highly regarded at the time, and the Qin army, which was known for its bravery and fighting skills. This does not mean that he would definitely be able to defeat his opponent. Considering this powerful opponent, Zhao Kuo would undoubtedly face great challenges. Of course, there was another big reason that Zhao Kuo faced, which was also a reason that many people overlooked, that is, the attitude of the Zhao royal family.

The reason why Zhao Kuo was promoted to the position of general was that the Zhao royal family and many ministers wanted to fight back. Zhao Kuo was brought to power with this attitude. Zhao Kuo had to fight whether he wanted to or not. In other words, Zhao Kuo sent troops to attack not only for himself, but also because of the attitude of many people in Zhao.

The Battle of Changping had been going on for three years before Zhao Kuo took over, and food had always been a huge problem for the State of Zhao. After three years of continuous fighting, the State of Zhao had long since run out of food. This was one of the reasons why the King of Zhao had to change people at that time. After all, if the war continued, the State of Zhao would be starved of food.

At that time, the State of Zhao was extremely dependent on foreign imports for food. However, other countries were unwilling to provide food aid to the State of Zhao, which made the already serious food supply problem of the State of Zhao become a huge burden on the Zhao army. Under such circumstances, Zhao Kuo rushed to Changping. He took over the command of the army from Lian Po and led the Zhao army to fight.

Zhao Kuo quickly changed Lian Po's passive defensive tactics and turned to attack the Qin army. The Qin army was caught off guard by the sudden change in Zhao's tactics and was pushed back to the camp.

But when Zhao Kuo led his army to attack the Qin army camp, he found that his retreat route had been cut off by the Qin army. Yes, the Qin people played a trick again.

After hearing that Zhao State had replaced its general with Zhao Kuo, King Zhaoxiang of Qin also quickly made personnel changes. He appointed Bai Qi as the general and took over the full command of the Qin army. Bai Qi knew what kind of tactics Zhao Kuo would use, so he deliberately staged this retreat drama in order to defeat Zhao Kuo in the main camp, but Bai Qi still underestimated Zhao Kuo.

After finding himself surrounded by the Qin army, Zhao Kuo immediately ordered his soldiers to gather all available resources to build a fortress. The Qin army attacked the Zhao army's fragile defense line made of wood and stone several times, but it was difficult to break through.

But Bai Qi was not in a hurry, because he knew the fatal weakness of the Zhao army, which was the lack of food. The Zhao army's food supply was very weak, and the Zhao army could not carry much food when they went out to fight. Moreover, he cut off the Zhao army's retreat and the road for transporting food, so the Zhao army could not hold out for long.

But it was not until 46 days later that Bai Qi finally received the news of the capture of the Zhao army camp. This surprised Bai Qi. What surprised Bai Qi even more was that he had led people on the expedition, but more than half of them were killed or injured in these dozens of days.

During the 46 days of siege, the Zhao army even resorted to cannibalism, but even so, Zhao Kuo was still able to organize a counterattack. In the end, Zhao Kuo led tens of thousands of people to raid the Qin army positions four or five times in succession, but all failed.

In the end, Zhao Kuo fell under the arrows of the Qin army, and the remaining Zhao army surrendered to Qin, which led to Bai Qi's killing of 200,000 Zhao soldiers. The failure of the Battle of Changping was indeed caused by Zhao Kuo's mistakes in leading the army, but the fundamental reason was still the limitations of Zhao's national conditions at that time.