If thousands of miles of carriages and letters are confused, how can there be separate borders in the south of the Yangtze River?
After the annihilation of the Southern Han Dynasty, Zhao Kuangyin planned to offer sacrifices to heaven and earth and comfort his ancestors. On July 1, 971, he issued an edict to "do something in the southern suburbs" on the winter solstice of this year.
The news of the Song Dynasty's unification of Lingnan caused a huge shock in Southern China. Li Yu of the Southern Tang Dynasty immediately sent an envoy to pay tribute and congratulate him. He also sent his younger brother Li Congshan to Beijing on November 1 to beg to remove the country's title of "Tang". From then on, he was called the "Lord of Jiangnan" and asked to take back the privilege of paying homage to unknown people.
Li Yu "begged for his name" more than once, but was rejected by Zhao Kuangyin in the past. This time, Zhao Kuangyin agreed, re-engraved the "Jiangnan Kingdom Lord Seal" on him, and affectionately called him "Li Yu". Why did you agree this time? Because Zhao Kuangyin had already regarded Southern Tang as his next target. We finally have the opportunity to take a closer look at the past and present life of this tragic and subjugated king who is both familiar and unfamiliar to us - Li Yu, the empress of the Southern Tang Dynasty.
AD 958 was an extremely important year for the Southern Tang Dynasty. This year, Chai Rong, the talented and strategist Shizong of the Later Zhou Dynasty, completed the feat of "Three Expeditions to Huainan"; this year, Li Jing of the Southern Tang Dynasty was completely defeated, and his dream of a great country in his heart was completely shattered, and he was trampled under his feet along with his dignity. Friction, what is before him is no longer the stars and the sea, but survival.
In the first month of this year, the army of the Later Zhou Dynasty captured Yangzhou and occupied Taizhou, across the river from Shengzhou, the capital of the Southern Tang Dynasty. Li Jing announced the "ZTE" change to the Yuan Dynasty, hoping for a miracle to save the precarious Southern Tang Dynasty and make the Southern Tang Dynasty great again.
The places where miracles might occur in his mind were Chuzhou, Shuzhou and other key cities in the north of the Yangtze River. Although the army of the Later Zhou Dynasty was unstoppable on the eastern front, conquering Yangzhou and falling into Taizhou, it faltered in local battlefields. Among them, the important stronghold on the Huaihe River - -Chuzhou, under the command of the defense envoy Zhang Yanqing and the supervisor Zheng Zhaoye, stood firm and withstood the fierce attack of the Later Zhou army for forty days.
The stubborn resistance of Chuzhou and Shuzhou formed a certain restraint on the Later Zhou army that penetrated into Huainan, which caused certain variables in the battle situation in Jiangbei and reserved the last trace of fantasy space for the Southern Tang Dynasty.
In addition, although Yangzhou and other places were taken over by the Later Zhou Dynasty, the control power of the Later Zhou Dynasty was still limited. For example, Tianshui County under Yangzhou was still under the control of the Southern Tang Dynasty. Li Jing ordered Tianshui County to be upgraded to Xiongzhou, and Yi Wenyun, the defender of Tianshui County, was promoted to the governor of Xiongzhou. He hoped that he could regain his glory, resist the main force that went south in the later Zhou Dynasty, and then regain Yangzhou and turn defeat into victory.
This is Li Jing’s idiotic dream of “ZTE”.
In the month when Li Jing changed his name to Yuan Dynasty, Chai Rong personally visited the city of Chuzhou and commanded a strong attack. He "burned the cave city with caves" and finally chewed off the hard bones of Chuzhou. The commander-in-chief Zhang Yanqing, the supervisor Zheng Zhaoye and others persisted in fighting until the end of the war. The last moment, until he died heroically for his country. As mentioned in detail before, the Battle of Chuzhou was quite brutal. Zhang Yanqing ran out of arrows and blunted his sword, so he used bricks and chairs as weapons. He led a thousand soldiers in his army to continue fighting in the streets even after the city was broken, and eventually all died. , would rather die than surrender, and shed the last drop of blood for the Southern Tang Dynasty.
After Chai Rong conquered Chuzhou, he chose to massacre the city to vent his anger, set fire to the city, and completely razed this tough city to the ground.
In February, Chai Rong led the main force south from Chuzhou, and Yi Wenyun, the governor of Xiongzhou, surrendered without a fight; Shuzhou on the western front was also captured by General Wang Shenqi.
Li Jing's illusions were shattered.
On March 1, Li Jing changed the name to "Jiaotai" again, perhaps hoping that Fu Jitai would come. Then a high-level mission was sent across the river to seek peace, and a ceasefire agreement was soon reached with Chai Rong, ending the "Three Expeditions to Huainan".
The general content of the ceasefire agreement is that the Southern Tang Dynasty declared itself a vassal in the Later Zhou Dynasty, Li Jing cut off his imperial title and changed his name to "Lord of the Tang Dynasty", ceded the entire territory of Jiangbei, etc.
After some haggling, the formal agreement came into effect in May. According to the agreement, Li Jing was entrusted with Zhou Zhengshuo and used the post-anniversary title "Xian De". In 958 AD, the Southern Tang Dynasty successively used four dating methods: the 16th year of Baoda, the first year of Zhongxing, the first year of Jiaotai, and the fifth year of Xiande.
This battle dealt a fatal blow to Southern Tang in all aspects.
Such as economy.
Three years of war left the Southern Tang Dynasty unable to make ends meet, and one of the costs of the truce was the cession of the entire Jiangbei territory. Almost all the grain-producing areas and handicraft towns were lost. In addition, the high war indemnities and endless tributes made the Southern Tang Dynasty even more miserable. Tang made matters worse.
According to records, in the first month of 960 AD, the second year after the war, Zhao Kuangyin established the Song Dynasty. In March, the Southern Tang Dynasty paid a timely tribute of 20,000 pieces of silk and 10,000 taels of silver to celebrate his accession to the throne; in July, another tribute of 500 taels of gold, Three thousand taels of silverware, one thousand pieces of Luo, five thousand pieces of silk, plus chariot costumes, etc. Zhao Kuangyin put down the Luzhou and Yangzhou rebellions, etc., and the Southern Tang Dynasty also wanted to pay tribute and congratulate him.
During the war, the economy of the Southern Tang Dynasty had already experienced a serious crisis. In order to cope with this crisis, Zhong Mo suggested casting large coins, and Han Xizai suggested casting iron coins. When there is a money shortage, the government will cut corners on coins, pass them off as good ones, and assign a greater face value to thinner and cheaper coins. At the same time, there are also a large number of stolen and private coins among the people. , that is, counterfeit currency, which has brought serious adverse effects to the national economy.
Just like today's quantitative easing policy in beautiful countries, simply put, the money printing machine is running at full capacity and spraying money. However, the reasons for the economic downturn are the hollowing out of industry, insufficient production capacity, unbalanced supply and demand relations, unfair distribution of social wealth, etc. Increasing currency issuance can only solve temporary emergencies, but it cannot save the world. Simply relying on additional currency issuance is like drinking poison to quench thirst. If it does not affect the economy, it will cause hyperinflation and further aggravate the crisis.
Li Jing was opposed to casting big money and iron money at the beginning, but after the war, facing the almost collapsed national economy, Li Jing could only choose to compromise and treat a dead horse as a living horse. In 959, the Southern Tang Dynasty began to mint large coins "Yongtong Quanbao", one for ten, which is what coin collectors call "ten coins off" or "ten coins". They also minted "Tang Guotong Bao" coins with five denominations, and at the same time also Cast iron money, he was ill and went to the doctor in a hurry.
In just half a year, the shortcomings of the quantitative easing policy began to emerge. Li Jing decisively stepped back from the brink and stopped the monetary policy of making big money and iron money.
There is no doubt about the devastation of the war on the economy, and there is no doubt about its impact on politics.
As detailed in the previous article, the "Three Expeditions to Huainan" enabled Li Jing to end the rule of the "Four Evils and Five Ghosts" group in the Southern Tang Dynasty. In fact, this was only one part of the political impact of the war on the Southern Tang Dynasty, and it was the most insignificant. The real highlight is a deeply hidden but profoundly influential event - the battle for reserve positions.
This was the dispute between the "Crown Crown Prince" and the "Crown Crown Prince" in the Southern Tang Dynasty, known in history as the "Uncle and Nephew Struggle for the Crown Prince".
However, this political change is also only mentioned lightly in a few sentences in history books. As the old saying goes, the fewer words, the greater the amount of information. The old rule is to first retell the positive description of the historical records, and then analyze and reason.
According to records, as early as the beginning of Li Jing's accession to the throne, he repeatedly expressed his intention to give up his throne to his younger brother Li Jingsui, but Li Jingsui sternly refused, so Li Jing appointed Li Jingqian as the Grand Marshal of the World's Military and Horses, Li Jingda as the Deputy Marshal, and designated Li Jingsui was called the "Emperor's Crown Prince" and announced to the world that Li Jingsui was the heir to the throne. He also took his younger brothers to swear an oath in front of the late emperor's soul, solemnly announcing that in the future, he would be succeeded by the younger brother rather than the father after his father's death. At the same time, the emperor's eldest son would be the successor. Li Hongji was first sent to Yangzhou and then moved to Runzhou to keep him away from the political center.
At the end of the "Three Expeditions to Huainan", Li Jingsui, who had been the "Emperor's Brother" for thirteen years, suddenly asked to be released back to the vassal and went to control Hongzhou; at the same time, the eldest son of the Emperor, Li Hongji, won a great victory in Changzhou and was appointed "Emperor" by Li Jing. Prince", establishing his identity as the heir to the throne.
Soon after, some of Li Hongji's actions aroused Li Jing's dissatisfaction, so Li Jing announced that he would abolish the "Crown Prince" and establish a "Crown Prince", and threatened to welcome Li Jingsui back to Hongzhou. Li Hongji took the lead and sent someone to poison Li Jingsui to death.
At first, Li Jingsui's death was packaged as an accident. Li Jing felt that something was fishy, so he sent someone to investigate, and it was found that it was the work of Prince Li Hongji. Li Jing was furious and announced that Li Hongji would be deposed as crown prince.
Soon after, in September 959, Li Hongji died suddenly. Subsequently, Li Jing made his sixth son Li Congjia the crown prince.
History seems to have given Li Yu an opportunity to pick up the slack. Li Jing and Li Jingsui can be regarded as moral models of brothers and sisters. However, the truth is far less glamorous than it appears.
