Meng Pian was not afraid and said: "Since ancient times, the two countries have been at war without killing the envoys. What's more, if I am a person who is greedy for life and afraid of death, how can I get here? Please consider these words of mine carefully, not only It’s for the good of Tanzhou, and it’s also for your own good. Young man, rat tail juice.”
Ma Xi'e admired his courage and released him. He also asked him to bring a message to Ma Xiguang: "Don't deal with that useless thing. This is the end of the matter. The righteousness is gone. We will not meet until we meet underground."
The competition between Tan and Lang is all-round, three-dimensional and without blind spots. In addition to military affairs, diplomacy, culture and other fields are also battlefields without smoke. For example, Meng Pian's lobbying revealed a cultural competition. Tanzhou blamed Langzhou with "Three Kingdoms"; Langzhou responded with "Zuo Zhuan" (Zheng Zhuanggong "is not as good as Huangquan, and there is no way to meet each other").
The Battle of Yiyang enabled the Langzhou army to complete the military encirclement of Tanzhou, and the Battle of Meizhou disintegrated Tanzhou's fighting spirit. Zhu Jinzhong, the commander-in-chief of Langzhou, persuaded Ma Xi'e to go all out and conquer Tanzhou personally to complete the final blow.
Ma Xi'e then called himself the "King of Shuntian" and asked his son Ma Guangzan to stay in Langzhou, while he mobilized all armed forces to personally conquer Tanzhou.
Mahi Kuang was frightened and hurriedly asked Zhou Zhou for help. Liu Chengyou of the Later Han Dynasty planned to let Wang Lingwen, the governor of the Anyuan Army in Anzhou, take command and go south to reinforce Tanzhou. However, it was early November 950. A few days later, on November 13, the "Xiao Qiang Incident" happened, killing Shi Hongzhao, Yang Bin and others. , and then Guo Wei entered Bian. The troops of the Later Han Dynasty who aided Tan did not have time to dispatch.
Ma Xi'e's thinking was very clear. After joining forces with Zhu Jinzhong in Yutan, he did not rush to attack Tanzhou. Instead, he detoured northeast and attacked Yuezhou first.
Yuezhou is located at the intersection of Dongting Lake and the Yangtze River, and is also the junction of the borders of the Four Kingdoms (Nanchu, Jingnan, Houhan, and Huainan). By controlling Yuezhou, you can welcome reinforcements from Huainan and block reinforcements from Tanzhou.
However, Ma Xi'e attacked fiercely for five days without making any progress, because the governor of Yuezhou was Wang Yun, the son of Wang Huan.
Ma Xi'e changed his mind and turned to political persuasion to surrender. He went to the city in person to shout to him, reprimanding him in a stern tone: "Aren't you a subject of the Ma family? If you don't serve me, do you want to serve the enemy country? You are a minister but you harbor evil intentions. If you have second thoughts, wouldn’t you insult your ancestors?”
This is called substituting a beam for a pillar, or maliciously substituting a concept. This is a brotherly dispute between Ma Xi'e and Ma Xiguang. No matter which side Wang Yun is loyal to, he is loyal to the Ma family. What's more, the legal heir of the Ma family is Ma Xiguang, not Ma Xi'e. Furthermore, it is he, Ma Xi, who betrayed the country and surrendered to the enemy. Calyx, Ma Xihe was called a vassal in Huainan. However, Ma Xihe described Wang Yun's loyalty to Ma Xiguang as treason and betrayal of the enemy and double-mindedness.
Wang Yun clasped his fists and saluted, and said: "My father, Wang Huan, was a loyal subordinate of the late king (Ma Yin). He defeated the Huainan army six times. Now, the king's brothers are fighting and incompatible with each other. I have always been worried that Huainan will take advantage of it." If we, the second generation of Reds, are allowed to surrender to our enemy Huainan, it would be an insult to our ancestors!"
Wang Yun's situation is very embarrassing, just like the "Battle of Jingnan" in the early Ming Dynasty. If you were a general guarding the city and guarding the pass, and King Zhu Di of Yan came to the city, accused you of disloyalty, and ordered you to switch and let go, how would you respond?
Therefore, Wang Yun "avoided the important and ignored the light", bypassed who was right and wrong, and raised his realm from "home" to "country". Judging from his situation, this should be the standard answer.
In the following words, different historical materials have seemingly similar but very different records:
"Your Majesty, if you can forgive your regrets and stop fighting, your brothers will be as harmonious as ever. How dare you not risk your life to serve your brothers? How can you have second thoughts?" - "Zi Zhi Tong Jian"
"I hope that when your Majesty enters Changsha, you will not hurt your comrades. How dare I fail to uphold integrity and have two minds?" - "Spring and Autumn of the Ten Kingdoms"
At first glance, they seem to have similar meanings, but upon closer inspection, the meanings of the two sentences are completely different.
According to the records in "Zi Zhi Tong Jian", Wang Yun persuaded Ma Xi'e to stop fighting and coexist peacefully with Ma Xiguang. In other words, Wang Yun recognized Ma Xiguang as the only legitimate ruler of Southern Chu;
According to "Ten Kingdoms Spring and Autumn", Wang Yun had recognized Ma Xi'e's rule and had tactfully submitted to him.
In other words, these two sentences involve a sensitive principled issue in the civil war in Southern Chu - whether you are a "supporting the Guangdong faction" or a "supporting the calyx faction".
Regarding this most critical question, history has given us seemingly consistent but completely opposite answers.
In short, after listening to Wang Yun's statement, Ma Xi'e felt very ashamed, so he lifted the siege of Yuezhou and marched south. From this move, I am more inclined to the records in "Ten Kingdoms Spring and Autumn".
Ma Xi'e arrived at Xiangyin (today's Xiangyin County, Hunan Province) in the north of Tanzhou, where he smashed, looted, and burned, and then entered the city of Tanzhou.
The last of the "three major battles" of the Southern Chu Civil War - the Battle of Tanzhou, is about to begin.
The north-south Xiang River and the east-west Liuyang River meet in the north of Tanzhou. The two rivers have become natural moats on the north and west sides of Tanzhou.
Ma Xi'e stationed on the west bank of the Xiang River, across the water from Tanzhou; he sent infantry to join forces with the barbarian tribes and stationed at Yuelu Mountain on the west bank of the Xiang River; Zhu Jinzhong also rushed from Yutan to the west of Tanzhou to join the army.
Ma Xiguang sent Xu Dexun's son Xu Qiong to lead 500 warships to anchor in Beijin. The warships were connected from the north pier to the south pier. They were squeezed under the nose and felt very safe. The supervisor of this force turned out to be Ma Xichong. This was A foreshadowing for later chapters;
The cavalry commander-in-chief Li Yanwen was sent to lead the cavalry to Tuokou (the intersection of the Xiang River and Liuyang River); the infantry commander-in-chief Han Li was sent to lead two thousand infantry to Yangliu Bridge to block the river crossing channel for the Langzhou army on the west bank.
The two armies faced off along the Xiang River. This was the silence before the storm.
On the west bank, Langzhou general Zhu Jinzhong and the barbarian coalition, a total of 7,000 people, were gearing up to launch an attack on Tanzhou. On the east bank, the Tanzhou garrison was low in morale and panicked. However, there was a general who was calm and composed. He climbed up and looked into the distance. , and then showed the joy of victory, and hurriedly reported to Ma Xiguang that he had a strategy to defeat the enemy.
This man's name is Peng Shihao, and he is Peng Shiran's second son. His family has been the barbarian chiefs of Xizhou for generations. During the period of Ma Xifan, he invaded Nanchu. After being defeated, he surrendered to Nanchu. Peng Shihao was detained in Tanzhou as a hostage.
Southern Chu continued the Central Plains' consistent policy towards ethnic minorities, which was to restrain and treat ethnic minorities. Peng Shiran was still appointed as the governor of Xizhou and managed Xizhou. The second son Peng Shihao "entered the court as an official" and became the governor of Chenzhou.
However, Peng Shihao suffered discrimination because of his "barbarian" status, and his rough and straightforward character was incompatible with bureaucracy, so he was ostracized. Only Ma Xiguang took good care of him and warmed his little heart. Peng Shihao was very grateful to Ma Xiguang and secretly vowed to dedicate his life to him.
