Guan Yu had the advantage of the Han River navy as he was on the northern route. Although it seemed that he was deep behind enemy lines, it was not possible. Guan Yu could also rely on the support of the Han River navy to temporarily retreat and rest.
In other words, Guan Yu has a way out.
But in Wancheng today, there is no retreat in the north. If Deng Ai really dares to lead his troops deep into the north of Wancheng, what awaits him will definitely be encircled and suppressed by Wei thieves, and there is no possibility of survival.
Xu Shu saw this very clearly, so when he heard that Deng Ai was going to take this risk, he stood up and stopped it.
But as for Deng Ai, he is not an unintelligent person. It is impossible not to know that the geographical situation of Wancheng is different from Jiangling, and he cannot simply copy his father-in-law's Juebei Road plan.
Deng Ai still had his own reasons.
Judging from Sima Yi's previous attitude towards the "emergency at Wuguan", this old turtle was determined to defend it. Therefore, even if he really led troops to Juebei Road, he would not easily send troops to encircle and suppress him.
And for three consecutive months, there are still only 20,000 defenders in Wancheng, and no reinforcements have arrived. It can be seen that it is impossible to gather enough troops from the Central Plains direction for a while.
Finally, Deng Ai also had his own way of retreat. There were not many Wei troops guarding the mountain road between Wuguan and Wancheng. Now Sima Yi was hiding in defense, and the defenders in the direction of Wuguan could not abandon the pass city defense and come here. Besiege yourself, so this place can be used as a retreat when Deng Ai's advance fails.
Yes, this plan is a bit risky, but it's not worth trying.
Therefore, Deng Ai really wanted to implement this plan. For this reason, he seriously explained his reasons to Xu Shu.
But Xu Shu still disagreed.
Sometimes, Xu Shu was also curious. How did Zhang Yuanchang, a boy with a cautious and almost timid character, teach such a bold disciple? !
Yes, Xu Shu admitted that Deng Ai's plan was reasonable and feasible, but the risk was too great.
As long as there is one link here that is different from Deng Ai's expectation, then Deng Ai will only have to die in the northern part of Wancheng, and there is no second option at all.
Moreover, if the benefits of Deng Ai's plan are greater than the risks, then Xu Shu has to admit that this is a way to solve the problem. But your father-in-law originally defeated the North Road, and with Zhou Yu's ability to lead the army, he still fought nine times. It took Jiangling a month.
How can we have so much time to waste with Wei Thief? !
If he had that kind of skill, it would be better to brave the military taboo and directly risk casualties and attack Wancheng.
At this time, Deng Ai was still young, and his thinking was still not very comprehensive. This was why Xu Shu had to rein in Deng Ai.
But Deng Ai had a question, and he asked Xu Shu in return.
"It won't work this way, that won't work either, so is the only option to attack hard?!"
This is also the reason why Xu Shu has not been able to make up his mind completely until now.
The book of war says: The first is to attack the enemy, the second is to attack the enemy, the second is to attack the enemy, and the third is to attack the city. The method of siege is a last resort. It takes three months to complete the repair of the oars, Benwen, and equipment, and it takes another three months to build the distance. If the general cannot bear his anger and the ants attack him, killing one-third of the soldiers, but the city cannot be taken out, this attack will be a disaster.
Sun Wu has long said that attacking a city by force will result in one-third of the casualties among the soldiers, which is a "disaster caused by attack" and should not be done.
The problem now is that Xu Shu is not sure that he can capture Wancheng with one-third of his casualties.
The efficiency of sieges these days is really low, but the casualty rate is very high. The attackers suffered 30,000 casualties, and the defenders probably suffered less than 10,000 casualties. If Sima Yi continued to endure, Xu Shu still could not capture Wancheng.
Therefore, Xu Shu's advice to Guan Ping before was to attack the enemy's mind first, to use force to overwhelm others, and to lure the enemy into dividing his troops. However, Sima Yi saw through all these strategies one by one.
As for Xu Shu, he was not Zhuge Liang's kind of person who bravely led the army into battle, but found out that he was also very capable of leading troops. Xu Shu had a certain ability to lead troops, and he could use it when he was guarding Jingnan, but Now facing Sima Yi, an old turtle who is determined to defend, Xu Shu really has no choice.
After all, this is Sima Yi. If he is determined to be a turtle, Zhuge Liang will have nothing to do with him.
It took about twenty days to attack Wancheng. During the siege, I found that Sima Yi was well-defended and the defense of the city was well organized with no flaws at all. And his tactics were seen through one by one. It seemed that there was really nothing he could do except attack hard and consume the city.
When things got to this point, Xu Shu also knew that there was no chance of taking any chances anymore.
When your heart is broken, you must be cruel when you should be cruel.
Just attack hard.
Wancheng is so important. Without opening up Wancheng, there will be no gateway into the Central Plains. For this strategic point, it is worth making some sacrifices.
In this way, in early February, Wancheng fell into the flames of war again.
And Sima Yi had already expected this.
In other words, Sima Yi was eager for the Shu thieves to attack.
Everyone is a student of military science, and no one knows less than anyone else.
A strong attack is the least efficient means of siege, and if it cannot be attacked for a long time, it will inevitably affect the morale of the Shu thieves. Being able to force the Shu thieves to use a strong attack to attack Wancheng, for Sima Yi, is equivalent to occupying the city. The upper hand of war.
Therefore, Sima Yi is really not afraid of fighting against the Shu thieves, and at the same time, he really does not hope that Cao Zhen will really follow the edict to rescue Wancheng.
It's not that Sima Yi is too generous, it's mainly that no matter what Sima Yi thinks, Cao Zhen coming to Wancheng to rescue is a thing that does more harm than good.
Yes, now Sima Yi is short of troops after all, but he has forced the Shu thieves to use hard attacks to attack the city. So as long as Sima Yi fights steadily and pays attention to boosting the morale of the army, then fighting to the end will depend on whose will to fight. Higher, it can withstand casualties and losses better.
Although it is not very safe, the original situation in Wancheng is not a 50-50 situation. It is a situation where Wancheng may fall at any time. It is not easy for Sima Yi to get back to the current situation.
Although Sima Yi was also worried about the problem of too few troops, at least in a short period of time, Sima Yi controlled the Wancheng garrison and was confident enough to stop the Shu thieves.
But now that Cao Zhen comes, things will become difficult to say.
First, Cao Zhen is here. Who is this Wancheng guard? !
In any case, Cao Zhen's official position and status are definitely higher than Sima Yi. Once he arrives in Wancheng, he will definitely take over the command of Wancheng. What should he do if he disagrees with his defensive strategy? !
Second, if Cao Zhen comes, will he really be able to defend Wancheng? !
It's not that Sima Yi looks down on Cao Zhen, it's really that Cao Zhen's combat performance over the years is a bit too stretched.
In this time and space, at this point in time, Sima Yi and Cao Zhen really don't have much friendship.
Although Sima Yi had also heard about Cao Zhen's reputation, and also heard from others that Cao Zhen was a very capable general of the Cao clan. He could be the governor of Yongliang. He defeated the two states of Yongliang and lost them. What kind of thing is this? "Very capable"? !
Oh, that's not right, at least according to Sima Yi's eldest son Sima Shi, Cao Zhen is still capable.
"This man uses his troops like a dolphin and a dog, but he still has the dignity to live in this world. It's an ability."
Master Sima said.
At this time, Cao Zhen's status in Sima Shi's heart was probably equivalent to Xia Houmao's status in Cao Zhen's heart - he was just a loser. If he was not of noble birth, there would be no chance for such a person to lead the army in battle.
Sima Yi is an old fox, and he is very smooth in everything he does. Hearing what Sima Master said, he directly reprimanded Sima Master. But Sima Yi's point was not to reprimand Sima Master for what he said was wrong, but to teach Sima Master how to assess the situation. Some things can be said, but some things will cause trouble for oneself.
It can be seen that even though Sima Yi didn’t say it, he might not have thought so in his heart.
Sima Yi was also afraid that at this critical moment, Cao Zhen would come to Wancheng and give random orders, messing up the situation that he had finally recovered.
We are lucky to be able to hold Wancheng now, but we must not make any mistakes. If the governor of Yongliang loses Wancheng again, we will be in big trouble.
But no matter how worried Sima Yi was, Cao Zhen's arrival would not be based on his will.
After holding on to Wancheng for almost a month and facing a strong attack by the Shu army outside the city for more than ten days, Sima Yi finally waited for Cao Zhen's reinforcements.
To be honest, Sima Yi was very happy to have reinforcements coming at this time.
The strong attack of the Shu thieves is really not that easy to defend. It is impossible for our side to lose no more than 20,000 defenders. Now we have lost more than 3,000 people. If we continue to defend like this, we will not see the arrival of reinforcements. It was also a blow to the morale of his own soldiers.
But at the same time, Sima Yi was still worried that when Cao Zhen arrived, he would feel that he was capable again and had to lead his troops to fight and fight to repel the Shu thieves. Really, this was what Sima Yi was most worried about.
Fortunately, this incident did not happen after all.
After Cao Zhen arrived with reinforcements, he did not act like a superior at all. As soon as he saw Sima Yi, he clarified their responsibilities with Sima Yi.
Sima Yi was the general of Wancheng ordered by the emperor, and Cao Zhen was just leading troops to help. Therefore, Cao Zhen made it clear to Sima Yi that he would obey Sima Yi's command and dispatch.
From this point alone, Sima Yi had to lament Cao Zhen's magnanimity. To be honest, this is really not something a Cao clan general can say.
There was no way. When Cao Cao was in power, the method he used was to control the generals of foreign surnames with the clan generals such as Xiahou Cao, and Sima Yi was already used to it.
Now it is not easy for Cao Zhen to take the initiative to say that Sima Yi is the main general, and he is still willing to obey Sima Yi's orders, which shows Cao Zhen's generosity.
The second point is that Cao Zhen took the initiative to confess to Sima Yi that the 15,000 reinforcements he brought were newly recruited soldiers. It would be okay to put these people on the city wall to scare the Shu thieves because of the large number of people. But they must go into battle. In battle, success will be considered as long as it does not cause trouble.
This frankness and recognition also made Sima Yi look at Cao Zhen with admiration. This person is not incompetent. It can be seen that this person was also hurt by others in the Guanzhong battle.
As for the third point, Cao Zhen suggested to Sima Yi that Wancheng is the gateway to the Central Plains and is the top priority. Now that Wuguan is guarded by General Guo Huai, it is impossible for the Shu thieves in Guanzhong to invade in a short period of time. In this case, we only need to hold on to Wancheng and drive back the Shu thieves in Jingzhou.
As soon as he said this, Sima Yi sighed: Cao Zidan is such a beauty.
(End of chapter)
