After Wu King Fu Chai surrendered to Yue King Gou Jian, he began to actively strive for hegemony in the Central Plains. King Wu Fu Chai first attacked Chen State. He attacked Chen State because Fu Chai's father He Lu asked Chen State to send troops together when he conquered Chu, but Chen State rejected He Lu's request. Therefore, after King Wu Fu Chai defeated the Yue Kingdom, he took the lead in attacking the Chen Kingdom to avenge his ancestor's hatred.
Chen Guonai was a small country between Wu and Chu. Before that, it had experienced civil strife and subjugation, and its national power had declined greatly. King Ling of Chu once destroyed Chen, and after King Ping of Chu won the throne of Chu, in order to ease the relationship with the various vassal states, he reestablished Chen. After the state of Wu became powerful, King Helu of Wu once summoned Chen Huai Gong to join Wu. Chen Huai Gong was forced to obey the order. Later, Chen Huai Gong was detained in the state of Wu and eventually died there. After Chen Minggong came to the throne, Chen State joined forces with Chu State to destroy Dun State in the 14th year of Lu Dinggong (496 BC). King Wu Fuchai captured three cities of Chen State in retaliation.
In the sixth year of Lu Aigong (489 BC), the state of Wu repeatedly attacked the state of Chen, and the state of Chu decided to send troops to assist Chen. However, the sudden death of King Chu Zhao prevented the Chu State from sending troops. Of course, Chen State was unable to defeat Wu State's powerful military, so in the end it had to surrender to Wu State and became a vassal state of Wu State.
After King Wu Fu Chai defeated the State of Chen, he targeted the State of Cai, which was friendly with the State of Chen and adjacent to the State of Chen. The king of Cai State was afraid of Wu State's strong military power, so he had no choice but to obey Wu State's arrangements. In desperation, Cai Guo could only move the tomb of his late king and moved the capital to Zhoulai.
In the seventh year of Lu Aigong (488 BC), Wu continued to advance northward, and Lu and Song successively surrendered to Wu. The State of Wu requisitioned 100 cattle, 100 sheep, and 100 pigs each from the State of Lu and the State of Song as feasts. The number exceeded the tribute paid by the two countries to the State of Jin. The next year, the state of Lu attacked the state of Zhu, which had surrendered to Wu, so the state of Wu sent troops to attack the state of Lu. The Wu army sang triumphant songs all the way, and successively captured Wucheng and Dongyang of Lu State, and stationed troops on the shore of Si River. The State of Lu saw that Wu's army was in great power, and at the same time, the State of Qi, which was close to the State of Lu, was dominating the east with great momentum. The State of Lu formed an alliance with the State of Wu and jointly targeted the powerful State of Qi. The Army of Wu withdrew its troops from the State of Lu.
In the ninth year of Duke Ai of Lu (486 BC), in order to transport troops northward when conquering Qi, Wu built a city and dug a ditch in Han, so that the ditch connected the Yangtze River and the Huai River. The following year, Wu State united with Lu State, Zhu State, and Tan State to attack Qi State. There happened to be civil strife in the state of Qi. The people of Qi killed Duke Qi and issued an obituary notice to the coalition forces. However, the coalition forces did not withdraw immediately. They did not withdraw until the navy led by Wu general Xu Cheng was defeated by the Qi army. Another year later, Wu King Fucha and Lu Aigong attacked Qi again. This time the Wu army and the Lu army attacked smoothly, and successively occupied Qi's Bodi and Yingdi, and confronted the Qi army in Ailing. Finally, the two sides fought in Ailing, and the Qi army returned defeated. The Wu army captured the commander of the Qi army, captured 800 leather chariots, and beheaded 3,000 soldiers. It was a great victory.
In the eleventh year of Duke Ai of Lu (484 BC), before the Wu army defeated the Qi army, King Gou Jian of Yue led his ministers to the state of Wu and congratulated the Wu dynasty on their return for a sure victory over the state of Qi. Everyone in the Wu Kingdom was happy, but Wu Zixu was the only one who was worried and unhappy. After the Wu army returned from victory, the Yue monarchs and ministers entered Wu again to congratulate King Wu Fu Chai on their great victory. King Gou Jian of Yue also brought many gifts to King Wu Fu Chai, which made King Wu very happy. At this time, Wu Zixu was the only one to advise King Wu, saying that he should be wary of Gou Jian's intentions.
However, after the defeat of Qi, King Wu Fu Chai became even more arrogant and complacent. Seeing the begging behavior of King Gou Jian of Yue, he paid no attention to the state of Yue. In the twelfth year of Duke Ai of Lu (483 BC), King Wu made an alliance with Lu Ai. King Wu asked Lu to continue the old alliance, but Duke Ai of Lu refused. In addition, the King of Wu sent people to summon the Marquis of Wei to attend the meeting of princes. However, after the Marquis of Wei killed King Wu's envoy, he formed an alliance with Lu and Song and rejected the alliance with Wu. King Wu Fu Chai was very dissatisfied because of this, so he sent Wu troops to surround the residence of Marquis Wei. Finally, under Zigong's persuasion, King Wu finally withdrew his troops.
At this time, the state of Wu was at its peak. Qi, which originally dominated the east, was repeatedly defeated by Wu's army, and its strength did not dare to challenge Wu's army. Song and Zheng continued to attack each other, and Jin and Chu were in decline. overlord. Therefore, King Wu Fu Chai actively planned an alliance among the princes to compete for the hegemony of the Central Plains.
In the 13th year of Duke Ai of Lu (482 BC), the State of Wu dug a deep ditch to connect the borders with Song and Lu, connecting Yishui to the north and Jishui to the west. In the same year, King Fu Chai of Wu met with Duke Ai of Lu, Duke Din of Jin and representatives of the Zhou royal family to form an alliance in Huangchi. King Wu Fu Chai and Duke Dinggong of Jin competed with each other for the order of bloodshed in the alliance. However, at this time, bad news came from the country of Wu. The Vietnamese army captured the capital of Wu and killed King Wu Fu Chai. son. In order to block the news, King Wu Fu Chai killed all seven of his cronies who knew about the incident.
At this time, the King of Wu was in a dilemma and was hesitant, so Wang Sunluo persuaded the King of Wu to form a military formation of ten thousand people on the day of bloodshed to demonstrate to the Jin State. After Jin Dinggong saw Wu's military formation, out of fear, he asked King Wu Fucha to take blood first, which shook the status of Jin's alliance leader again. After the alliance, King Wu Fucha immediately led his troops back to Wu. When the Wu army passed by the Song Dynasty, they set fire to the capital of the Song Dynasty to demonstrate to the princes.
This alliance was the pinnacle of Wu's power and prosperity. Up to this point, Wu's prosperity had declined, and it was heading toward ruin. Before Gou Jian, the King of Yue, launched an all-out attack on the Kingdom of Wu, he constantly showed weakness to King Wu Fu Chai, causing the King of Wu to relax his vigilance. At the same time, the political corruption in Wu State accelerated the transformation of Wu State from strength to decline. The State of Yue kept bribing Bo Pu, the chief minister of the State of Wu, and asked him to speak well of the State of Yue in front of the King of Wu.
At the same time, King Wu Fu Chai's lewd pleasures also became an important factor in the defeat of Wu. Gou Jian, the king of Yue, gave his favor and presented two beauties from the Yue kingdom to the king of Wu. One was named Xi Shi and the other was named Zheng Dan. After King Wu Fu Chai saw Xi Shi's beauty, he said happily: "Gou Jian is so loyal to give me such a beautiful woman!" King Wu was seduced by Xi Shi's beauty and spent a lot of manpower and material resources. A Gusu Tower was built for her, and the King of Wu also drank and had fun with her every day, ignoring political affairs, and the state of Wu became increasingly decadent. In the end, the state of Wu fell directly from the pinnacle of dominating the Central Plains to the point of national subjugation. This was the consequence of King Wu Fucha's wrong decision.
Wu Yue's struggle for hegemony not only had the negative consequences of wasting people, wealth and ruining lives, but also unexpectedly promoted social progress. The first navy in Chinese history was born in the Spring and Autumn Period. At that time, the State of Wu, located near Changzhou in the south of the Yangtze River, took advantage of the convenient natural conditions to establish its first navy. This was the prototype of the Chinese navy for future generations. Compared with the north, which was dominated by vehicle warfare at that time, the navy had greater mobility and flexibility, and therefore often had greater advantages in combat.
The construction of the navy in the Kingdom of Wu had already begun when Tai Bo founded the country here, and by the time the throne was passed to the 19th generation Sun Shoumeng, the navy was already quite powerful. The construction of the navy of Wu State was not only due to the need to stand on its own and compete for hegemony with the princes, but also benefited from its natural geographical conditions: Wu State was located in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, with dense rivers and lakes and intertwined water networks, making it easy for ships to sail and Training navy.
However, although China's naval construction began in the State of Wu, by the time of King Wu Shoumeng, the State of Wu was not the only country with a navy, including Chu, Yue, Qi and other vassal states along the river or coast. They also established their own However, among these vassal states, Wu's navy is in a leading position due to its long development time, proper training methods, and more advanced shipbuilding technology. The advantages of Wu's navy can be seen from its several battles with other countries. Because wars often occurred between these vassal states, the main areas where the wars took place were in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River and today's Shandong and Jiangsu areas.
In the Battle of Fujiao, where King Wu Fucha defeated Yue King Goujian, the key to Wu's victory was its excellent navy. After Wu King Helu died in battle, Fu Chai vowed to avenge his father and stepped up training of the army. When King Gou Jian of Yue heard the news, he ignored the dissuasion of the doctor Fan Li and wanted to take a preemptive strike, so he sent troops to attack Wu. After hearing the news, Fu Cha mobilized all the elite water and land troops in the country to fight. The main battlefield of both sides was Fujiao, a small island in Taihu Lake southwest of Suzhou, Jiangsu today. Wu's navy was well-trained and seized favorable terrain, so it defeated the Yue army and took advantage of the victory to occupy Jicheng, the capital of Yue. King Gou Jian of Yue only had 5,000 soldiers left. He was besieged by the Wu army in Kuaiji Mountain and could not move. In the end, he had to surrender to King Wu.
Because Wu, Chu, and Yue are all located in the Yangtze River Basin, the naval operations of the three countries still mainly rely on the Yangtze River and other small inland river basins. At this time, Wu's water troops can only be called naval forces. The scope of combat really extended to the sea during the battle with the Eastern power Qi.
The war with Qi took place when King Wu Fucha was in power. At that time, Fucha was very proud of his victory over Yue and wanted to further expand his ruling area. He thought that there was no opponent of Wu in the south, so he turned his attention to Qi State triggered the first naval battle in Chinese history. In 485 BC, Fu Chai took the doctor Xu Cheng as the commander and divided the sea and land armies to attack Qi. Xu Cheng led his army from the mouth of the Yangtze River and attacked the Shandong Peninsula along the Yellow Sea Channel.
There are different opinions about the course of this war. Some people believe that Qi did not send troops to fight from the sea; others insist that the armies of Wu and Qi launched a fierce battle in the Yellow Sea. The final result of this war was that the Wu army was After traveling a long distance and being exhausted, he was defeated by Qi. This war was of great significance. The Wu army went on an expedition. From the Yangtze River Estuary to the Shandong Peninsula, the coast was long, and supply problems, medical problems, ordnance maintenance problems were very complex. This showed that Wu's shipbuilding level and navigation ability had reached a certain level at that time. Achievement.
Indeed, according to Wu Zixu's ten "Water War Art of War" collected in "Hanshu Yiwenzhi", the state of Wu already had a 12-foot-long and 1-foot-6 wide, which could accommodate 26 warriors and a boat. There are three people in the ship, five people in charge, and four servants with spears, hooks and axes, one person each, and a total of ninety-one people in the ship. Moreover, Wu Zixu also imitated the situation of the army at that time and established a strict organization for the Wu Navy.
What is particularly worth mentioning is that in the process of marching north to conquer Qi, the State of Wu built the first canal clearly recorded in Chinese history, namely Hangou, for the convenience of water march.
Before the Spring and Autumn Period, the Yangtze River and the Huaihe River were isolated from each other. There were no natural waterways connecting the southeastern countries such as Wu and Yue to the northern Central Plains countries. This was very inconvenient for the Wu State, which used boats instead of chariots as its main combat tool. Therefore, King Wu Fucha decided to dig Hangou, starting from the Yangtze River in the west of today's Yangzhou City, and digging a channel in the northeast direction, connecting lakes along the way, digging waterways, extending to Sheyang Lake, and connecting with the Huaihe River five miles north of Huai'an City. . King Wu's original idea was that in this way, he could avoid the pain of traveling long distances from the Yangtze River to the sea and then from the sea to the Huaihe River, and also avoid the risks of marching by sea.
Although the Wu army ultimately chose to march by sea when they invaded Qi, it cannot be denied that Fu Chai's construction of the canal was entirely for military purposes.
The State of Wu was later destroyed by Yue, but the Hangou built by it continued until later generations. During the Daye period of the Sui Dynasty, in order to satisfy his desire for extravagance and fun, Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty ordered "more than 100,000 Huainan people to open Hangou from Shanyang to Yangjiang". Based on the work of King Wu Fucha, he further Hangou was repaired and expanded, and Beishen Weir was built at its northern end to regulate the lake water. Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty further expanded the old Hangou road, extending it from Jiangdu in the south to Shanyang in the north. Later, on the basis of Hangou, Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty mobilized 100,000 people to further build the Yongji Canal and Tongji Canal, connecting the Jiangnan River, and opened the world-famous Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, connecting the Yangtze River, Qiantang River, Huaihe River, Haihe River, and Yellow River Transportation between the five major river systems.
It can be said that although King Wu Fu Chai dug the Hangou out of military considerations, and Emperor Yang of the Sui Dynasty later expanded this artificial canal to satisfy his desire to go south to the south of the Yangtze River, it is undeniable that this canal played an important role in China's north-south transportation and transportation. Economic exchanges and even the process of national reunification have played a huge role, and can be seen as a typical example of military promotion of social progress.
