Since ancient times, war seems to be the business of military commanders. The weak scholars have basically no possibility of going to the battlefield. At most, they are only the chief generals and staff members who have made some tricks in the rear. Although
has many examples in history of civil officials leading soldiers, such as Jiang Taigong in the early Western Zhou Dynasty, Zhuge Liang in the Three Kingdoms period, etc., but after all, there are too few, civilian generals and soldiers did not basically become the norm until the Song Dynasty.
In fact, in the middle of the Tang Dynasty, there was also a scholar general. He led a small number of Tang troops to defend a city. "The use of soldiers is not in accordance with the ancient law." . He used various tactics ingeniously and repeatedly broke several times his own. The Anshi rebels successfully prevented the rebels from advancing into the Jianghuai area and provided valuable time for the Tang army's counteroffensive. He was the protagonist of the "Suiyang Defence War" in the Tang Dynasty-Zhang Xun.
Scholar generals
Zhang Xun (708-November 24, 757), a native of Puzhou Hedong (now Yongji, Shanxi) ("Old Tangshu"), one said he was from Dengzhou Nanyang (now Nanyang City, Henan Province) ("New Tang Book").
Zhang Xun was in Qinghe (now Qinghe, Hebei) county magistrate at the end of Kaiyuan (741), and was appointed as the county magistrate of Qinghe (now Qinghe, Hebei) under the post of Prince Tongshi. Yuan County (now Luyi, Henan) will be the magistrate again.
In the winter of the fourteenth year of Tianbao (755), the "Anshi Rebellion" that changed the national fortune of the Tang Dynasty broke out. A few months later, Anlu Mountain captured Luoyang, the eastern capital, and became the emperor and the country, and the country was named "Dayan".
Then, the Anshi rebels marched westward. As Datang inherited the peacetime for a long time, "suddenly heard that Fan Yang’s soldiers rose up, shocking them far and near" , the rebels pointed at the front, the direction and the direction, beyond the state and county The prefects and county magistrates either fled without a fight, or surrendered.
Qiaojun (now Bo County, Anhui) prefect Yang Wanshi also surrendered to the rebels, and Zhang Xun's Zhenyuan County is under the jurisdiction of Qiaojun. After Yang Wanshi descended on the enemy, he ordered Zhang Xun to respond to the rebels.
Zhang Xun was extremely angry when he learned about it. He led the officials and the people to cry at the Emperor Xuanyuan Shrine, then recruited strong soldiers to resist the rebels, and more than a thousand people responded.
At this time, the magistrate of Yongqiu (now Qixian, Henan), Linghu Chao, had already surrendered to the rebels. Zhang Xun led the tribe to attack Yongqiu, and Linghu Chao abandoned the city and fled.
Defense of Yongqiu
In March from Tang Suzong to Deyuanzai (756 years), Linghu Chao led more than 40,000 rebels to the city of Yongqiu. At this time, there were only two thousand defenders in Yongqiu City. Faced with such a disparity of power, the soldiers and civilians in the city were greatly frightened.
Zhang Xun analyzed to all the soldiers: "The enemy knows the reality of the city, and there is a light heart. If you are unexpected, you can be frightened and collapsed. If you take advantage of it, you are bound to collapse." After hearing this, the soldiers of
were greatly encouraged. So Zhang Xun sent a thousand people to defend the city, and he led a thousand people, divided into several teams, and suddenly shot out of the city.
Zhang Xun took the lead and directly killed the rebels. Although the rebels were too crowded, they had not had time to fight. They suddenly encountered Zhang Xun’s troops who had rushed out, panicked, and hurriedly retreated. Zhang Xun and others killed and wounded a large number of enemy troops. Only withdrawn to Yongqiu City.
The next day, the rebels assembled again to attack the city. Zhang Xun commanded the defenders to resist stubbornly, and the rebels had not been able to reach the city. Zhang Xun took advantage of the slack of the rebels to make a surprise attack out of the city; or, when the night was quiet, he made a sneak attack on the enemy camp.
In this way, Zhang Xun took the lead, fed with armor, wounded and fought, defended Yongqiu for more than 60 days, and repelled more than 300 attacks by the rebels.
Seeing that Linghu Chao couldn't hold Yongqiu for a while, he had to withdraw his troops. Zhang Xun was aware of the rebels retreating from the city, and led his troops to pursue them. He really made a lot of gains. He captured a large number of rebels and grain, and even almost caught Linghu Chao alive.
Linghu Chao was defeated by the retreat and was greatly furious, so he turned around and besieged Yongqiu again. The two sides started a seesaw siege war again, causing deaths and injuries to each other.
In May, news of Chang'an's loss came, Linghu Chao was very happy and wrote a letter persuading Zhang Xun to be surrendered. At that time, six generals in Yongqiu City saw the situation so unfavorable, so they persuaded Zhang Xun to surrender.
Zhang Xun was silent, but called the entire army the next day, arrested the six people on the spot, first blamed them for infidelity and disturbed the military's morale, and then pushed them out and beheaded on the spot. This showed his own mentality. Also stabilized the military spirit.
Yongqiu has been surrounded for a long time, and food in the city is becoming scarce. At this time, exactly one hundred grain ships for the Yan army stopped by the river. Seeing this situation from the city, Zhang Xun gathered his army to the south of the city at night, pretending to go to war.
Z0z Linghu Chao saw that Zhang Xun's army was concentrated in the south of the city, and he also transferred his army to the south in advance to prepare for the battle. When Zhang Xun learned that the rebels had transferred their main forces to the south of the city, he sent people to the river and took away more than 1,000 Hu of grain from the rebel grain ships, and then burned all the remaining grain with a fire. .The grass man borrowed the arrow
Zhang Xunzhi stole the enemy’s food, making Linghu Chao furious, and ordered an all-out attack on the city. Zhang Xun organized soldiers to force the rebels back with arrows. However, the days of the war were long and the arrows in the city were almost used up. What should I do?
Zhang Xun thought of the story of Zhuge Liang's "grass boat borrowing an arrow" during the Three Kingdoms period. So, one night, there were hundreds of black soldiers on the head of Yongqiu city, faintly climbing along the ropes. Down the city wall. After the
Linghu Chao received the report, it was determined that Zhang Xun sent troops to sneak attack at night, so he ordered the soldiers to throw arrows at the city to kill Tang Jun. For a time, the rebels rushed to shoot, until the sky turned white, only to find that the walls were all scarecrows.
On Zhang Xun's side, the soldiers happily pulled up the grass man filled with secret arrows, and roughly counted them, and roughly got hundreds of thousands of enemy arrows, which temporarily alleviated the problem of lack of arrows in the army.
For several days in a row, there were grass men hanging from the walls. The soldiers of Linghu Tide were angry and funny when they saw him. They all laughed at Zhang Xun for trying to repeat the old tricks. They came to lie to them again, and they didn't take precautions.
Don’t know, one night, Zhang Xun hangs down five hundred death squads. These five hundred warriors attacked Linghu Chao’s camp because the rebels were unprepared. In a panic, the rebels rioted, and Linghu Chao also Unable to organize effective resistance, tens of thousands of rebels let these five hundred warriors rush and flee, fleeing more than a dozen miles away, before stopping. Z1z
was so resourceful and resourceful that Linghu Chao hit the target in a row, gritted his teeth with anger, and after integrating the troops, he attacked the city vigorously. Zhang Xun asked Lei Wanchun to command the defense of the city on the head of the city. When the rebels saw a general appear on the head of the city, he suddenly released an arrow. Lei Wanchun was unprepared and was shot in the face. Six arrows. But Lei Wanchun still stood upright in order to stabilize the army and resist the pain.
Linghu Chao thought it was another wooden man, so he sent someone to detect him, only to find out that it was guard Lei Wanchun, and he was shocked. He said to Zhang Xun from a distance: "I saw General Lei's bravery, and I knew that your military discipline is indeed strict, but it's a pity that you don't know the destiny!"
Zhang Xun sneered and replied, "You don't even know how to be human. I don't understand, what fate are you talking about?"
At this time, due to the long siege of Yongqiu City, the wood in the city has been exhausted. Therefore, Zhang Xun deliberately pretended to abandon the city and said to Linghu Chao: "I want to lead the army to retreat. Please retreat your troops sixty miles back, so I can abandon the city and flee."
Linghu Chao I couldn't attack for a long time, but I didn't know it was a plan, so I agreed. As soon as Zhang Xun saw the Linghu Chao army retreat, he led the city's lieutenants to tear down the rebel barracks within 30 miles outside the city, and took the wood back to the city as a tool for city protection.
Linghu Chao learned that he was hit again, and was furious, and was about to attack the city. But before the army lined up, suddenly there were thirty cavalry soldiers in the city. The Yan Jun was in a panic.
Thirty cavalry rushed from left to right to kill, unexpectedly captured 14 traitors, beheaded more than a hundred ranks, and also seized many weapons and horses.
Linghu Chao had no choice but to retreat to Chen Liu (now Kaifeng, Henan), and for a while did not dare to besiege Yongqiu again.
In early October, Linghu Chao and the rebel general Wang Fude led more than 10,000 troops to attack Yongqiu. Zhang Xun led the army to meet, and defeated the rebels, killing thousands of enemies, and the rebels fled.
In December, because Linghu Chao and other rebels were unable to attack the Yongqiu defending Zhang Xun for several months, the rebels stationed troops to the north of Yongqiu City in order to block Zhang Xun's food passage.
Suiyang Defense Battle
So Zhang Xun took the initiative to abandon Yongqiu and led more than 3,000 soldiers to move east to Ningling (now Ningling County, Shangqiu City, Henan Province), where he and Sui [suī] Yang Taishou Xu Yuanbu Combine Nan Jiyun with troops, break through the rebel Yang Chaozong's army, kill 20 rebel generals, and behead more than 10,000 ranks. Because of his outstanding military exploits, Tang Suzong appointed Zhang Xun as deputy envoy of Henan Jiedu. In January of the second year of
to Germany (757), after An Lushan’s son An Qingxu killed his father and became self-reliant, he sent the love general Yin Ziqi led the elite troops of Turkic and Xi ethnic minorities to join Yang Chaozong, totaling 130,000 people, and besieged It is located in Suiyang City (now Shangqiu City, Henan Province), which is to be washed by Suiyang Canal.
Suiyang Prefect Xu Yuan was busy sending someone to Zhang XunAsking for urgent documents, Zhang Xun led three thousand elite soldiers into Suiyang and joined the 6,800 defenders in the city to defend Suiyang. As soon as the rebels led by Yin Ziqi arrived, they immediately launched a siege war. In the face of a rebel army with dozens of times as many as their own, Zhang Xun and Xu Yuan encouraged the soldiers to stay on. From morning to noon, they fought more than 20 times, and the city remained unharmed.
Xu Yuan knew that he was inferior to Zhang Xun, so he elected Zhang Xun as the coach, and he only raised military rations and strategic materials.
Zhang Xun, as the coach, led his army out of the city, took the initiative to attack the rebels, repeatedly defeated the large number of rebels and fled, and seized a large number of carts, horses, cattle and sheep. After this great victory, the court worshiped Zhang Xun as Yushi Zhongcheng, and Xu Yuan as Yushi.
Originally, with a crowd of 130,000, besieging Suiyang, which was defended by more than 10,000 people. Yin Ziqi thought that Suiyang City was easy to break, but he did not expect that Zhang Xun was actually resourceful and broke his own siege many times. After a few battles, the rebels The continuous loss of more than 60 generals and more than 20,000 soldiers could not help Zhang Xun at all.
Yin Ziqi had to stop attacking the city after several failed sieges, then dig trenches and build fences outside the trenches, preparing to besiege Suiyang for a long time to starve the defenders inside the city to death. During the
period, Zhang Xun sent Nan Jiyun to lead 30 elite cavalrymen to break through to Linhuai, and found the new Linhuai Jiedu to make Helan Jinming borrow troops to strengthen Suiyang. However, Helan Jinming was jealous of Zhang Xun’s prestige and refused to agree to send troops. He saw that Nan Jiyun was brave and wanted to stay and set up a banquet. Nan Jiyun said generously:
"When the cloud comes, the people of Suiyang will not eat for more than a month." The sun is rising! Although the cloud wants to eat alone, he can't bear it; although he eats, he can't swallow!" Because he pulled his knife, he broke a finger, bloody, to show Helan. A shocked, grateful to cry for the cloud. Yun knew that Helan had no intention of doing anything, and immediately went away; he would leave the city, draw a arrow at the floating picture of the Buddhist temple, and hit the brick and half an arrow on it, saying: "When I return to break the thief, Helan will be destroyed! This is the goal. "(Han Yu's "Zhang Zhongcheng")
Later, Nan Jiyun got three thousand troops from the city envoy Liantan in Ningling, and returned to Suiyang City by night. The rebels knew that the defenders had "absolutely no foreign aid and urgent encirclement."
defended a city to defend the world
When Suiyang’s food was exhausted, some soldiers proposed to abandon the city and run east, replenish food and grass, and then fight to the death with the rebels.
However, Zhang Xun and Xu Yuan believe that Suiyang is the gateway to the east of Henan, the key to Zhongzhou, the Jianghuai barrier, the throat of Heluo, and the rebels will continue to lead the war to the south of the Yangtze River, thus making Datang lost. Jianghuai’s food and food supply; not to mention the fact that the soldiers in the city have long been tortured by starvation, injuries, and unable to escape, so it is better to stand in the isolated city and wait for the arrival of the imperial government’s reinforcements.
In this extremely difficult battle to defend Suiyang, Zhang Xun, as a scholar of scholars and scholars, wrote a five-character poem to express the perseverance and determination of the defenders to fight the rebels:
"Shou Suiyang Works" Zhang Xun
takes the battle in the spring, and the isolated city is in danger.
encircles Mi Yue faint, and divides and guards like Yuli.
repeatedly hates the yellow dust, and sometimes swings the white feathers.
The sore is still out, and the blood is even worse.
Faithfulness should be hard against the enemy, steadfast and forgiving.
No one tells the emperor, what he wants to do. The poem
is a masterpiece of Zhang Xun's blood and life when he was in danger of Suiyang. The whole poem is vivid and vivid, the language is simple and vivid, the style is generous and heroic, and it is full of heroic spirit to defend the country.
However, in the absence of foreign aid in Suiyang City, the defenders not only died in battle and disease, but the city was also completely out of food. Even the bark and tea paper were also eaten. The soldiers first killed the horse. And the food, when the horses are killed, and the nets are opened to catch birds and mice to feed their hunger, and finally develop to the point where even the leather armor is cooked and eaten.
After eating the birds, mice, and armor, Zhang Xun first killed his beloved concubines and ordered the soldiers to eat them to satisfy their hunger; then Xu Yuan also killed his servants as military rations; and then the old and weak in the city. Women and children. The "War of Suiyang" can be described as extremely tragic! According to statistics, there were 40,000 registered permanent residences in Suiyang City before the war, and only 400 living people remained in the city!
Suiyang City broke
On the ninth day of October, the rebels attacked the city again. Zhang Xun and the defending soldiers were unable to fight due to hunger and injuries. Suiyang City was broken and Zhang Xun, Xu Yuan, Nan Jiyun and others were captured.
Yin Ziqi asked Zhang Xun: "Every time Wen Jun fights, his eyes are cracked and his chewing teeth are broken. What is the point?"
Zhang Xun replied: "I want to swallow the rebels, but I can't help my ears." ("Old Tang Shu·Zhang Xun Biography)
Yin Ziqi was angry and ordered someone to pry open Zhang Xun's mouth with a knife, and found that only three or four teeth remained.
Yin Ziqi forced the generals to surrender, "Tour unyielding, that is, take it away, and cut it off; and drop Jiyun, but the cloud did not respond. The tour said:'Nanba, the man is dead ear, don't be wronged for injustice!' Yun He laughed and said: "If you want to do something, you can do something; public words, Yun dares not die!" That is unyielding." ("Zhang Zhongcheng Biography")
Zhang Xun, Xu Yuan, Lei Wanchun, Nan Jiyun and other 36 people then Unyielding death. It is infinitely regrettable that three days after Suiyang City was broken, the newly appointed Henan Jiedu of the Tang Dynasty made Zhang Hao lead his army to defeat the rebels and retake Suiyang.
Zhang Xun’s outstanding military ability
Zhang Xun demonstrated outstanding military ability in fighting the rebels. Although Zhang Xun’s official position is not high, he is just a small county magistrate, but after the rebellion, he clearly realized that he would stick to it. The significance of Yongqiu.
And when Yongqiu is no longer suitable for defense, he can judge the situation, take the initiative to abandon Yongqiu, retreat to Ningling, change passive to active, and defeat the rebels. After Ning Ling won, he took the initiative to join forces with Xu Yuan to stick to the strategically important Suiyang.
Moreover, Zhang Xun is not a passive defensive war, but an offensive in defense, using offense instead of defense, and unexpectedly counterattack and sneak attacks by paralyzing and deceiving. Even the logistics supplies are half taken by the enemy, thus Achieved the purpose of holding on to the city.
In the past two years of hard defense, Zhang Xun and the rebels have fought more than 400 wars before and after. They have successively directed the fire to burn the rebels, the grass man borrowed arrows, went out of the city to get wood, lied to borrow horses, beat drums to disturb the enemy, The scenes of defensive battles, ambushes, night attacks, counterattacks, and pursuit battles, such as setting up trenches and cutting wormwood as arrows, can be described as numerous tactics and have reached the "infinite as the world, inexhaustible as the river" state.
Zhang Xun "Using soldiers is not in accordance with the old methods" 's various tactics, not only impressed by his own soldiers, even the rebels also admire him for their ingenuity, and finally had to switch to the tactics of prolonged siege, not dare Conquer the city easily. Zhang Xun’s wisdom in the war is really rare in the history of Chinese and foreign wars.
Ming Dynasty thinker and historian Qiu Jun commented in "University Yanyi Supplement": "Since ancient times, the three famous generals who did not use the ancient art of war, Han Huo Qubing, Tang Zhang Xun, and Song Yuefei are nothing but meritorious services at that time, and they are named for future generations."
The significance of the Suiyang defense war
Zhang Xun contained and annihilated a large number of rebels in the defensive battle of Yongqiu and Suiyang, prevented the rebels from developing in the direction of Jianghuai, and ensured the smooth flow of water transportation between Jianghan and Han during the Tang Dynasty. The Tang Dynasty’s wealth and transportation lines were protected, and Jianghuai's materials and energy were continuously transported to Guanzhong, which won precious time for the Tang army to organize a counterattack.
Therefore, the same can be said: The Suiyang Defence Battle is not only to guard the city of Suiyang, but to guard the important military and wealth land of the Tang Dynasty.
Only ten days after Suiyang City was broken, Luoyang, the eastern capital, was regained. This shows the importance of the Suiyang defense battle to the Tang Dynasty in the "Anshi Rebellion".
Just like Han Yu's emotion in the masterpiece "Zhang Zhongcheng Biography": "Keep a city, defend the world, kill by a thousand, fight the division of millions of suns, cover the Jianghuai, curb its momentum, and the world is not Whoever did it!”
Zhang Xun’s righteous and loyal spirit has attracted countless future generations’ admiration. The famous patriotic poet Wen Tianxiang in the late Southern Song Dynasty used Zhang Xun and Yan Gaoqing (Yan Zhenqingtang) in "Song of Righteous Qi". Brother, in the Anshi Rebellion, he was guilty of scolding An Lushan in front of him and he was guilty of his tongue.) He wanted to follow suit as a model: "is Zhang Suiyang tooth, and Yan Changshan tongue."
Zhang Xun, as a county magistrate, was at the head of the national crisis. Resolutely civilian officers and soldiers, and in the two years of fighting against the rebels alone, he firmly defended the lone city, and obtained precious opportunities for the counterattack of the Tang dynasty. Therefore, he became a model of officers and soldiers in the history of our country, and he has also become an eternal name. Patriotic hero.
This article is referenced from: "Biography of Famous People in Ancient Chinese History", "Chinese Historical Stories: Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties"
