Battle of Chibi
The traditional site of the Battle of the Yangtze.
| date | Winter 208 |
|---|---|
| place | Chibi (Red Rock), Yangtze River , China |
| output | Sun Quan and Liu Bei win |
| Parties to the conflict | |
|---|---|
| Commander | |
| Troop strength | |
| Tens of thousands; possibly 250,000 | 70,000 |
| losses | |
|
unknown, but very high (according to the legend all but 27) |
unknown |
Sishui Pass - Hulao Pass - Jieqiao - Guandu - Changban - Chibi - Tong Gate - Hefei - Dingjun - Fancheng - Xiaoting - Southern Campaign - Shiting - Jieting - Northern Expeditions - Wu Zhang Plain
The Battle of Chibi ( Chinese 赤壁 之 戰 / 赤壁 之 战 , Pinyin Chìbì zhī Zhàn ), also known as the Battle of the Red Rock , more precisely: Battle of the Red Rock Wall , was a decisive battle in the dawn of the Three Kingdoms in China . It took place in the winter of 208 between the allied forces of the southern warlords Liu Bei and Sun Quan and the northern warlord Cao Cao . Together, the warlords thwarted Cao Cao's attempt to conquer the land south of the Yangtze and unite China under his rule. The battle is one of the most famous decisive battles in the history of China . The motif, which is common in Chinese battle tales, plays a role here, namely that a numerically inferior force could defeat a superior force on the battlefield. The traditional descriptions of the battle, however, differ significantly from each other. The venue is also still hotly debated.
background
Around 208 Cao Cao, who later became Prince of Wei , had the entire northern central Chinese plain under his control. In the winter of 207 he had defeated the Wuhuan in a campaign and thus secured the northern border. Almost immediately afterwards, he turned his army south (fall of 208) to defeat his southern rivals in one swift blow. In the meantime, Liu Biao , the governor of Jing Province ( Jīngzhōu , Chinese 荊州 / 荆州 ), had died and his successor had humbly submitted.
Liu Bei, who was serving in the Fan Garrison (now Xiangyang ), fled with many refugees. He was pursued by Cao Cao's elite cavalry and circled near Changban Bridge. After the Battle of Changban , Liu Bei fled eastwards to Xiakou, where he met Sun Quan's emissary, Lu Su . He sent his chief adviser, Zhuge Liang, to the Yangtze River to negotiate a mutual alliance with Wu State against Cao Cao. Zhuge Liang's eloquence and Zhou Yu's support eventually persuaded Sun Quan, King of Wu, to form an alliance against the north.
The armed forces
Meanwhile, Cao Cao had captured Jiangling, a strategic center and military depot where he stationed his extensive fleet. The combined forces of Sun Quan and Liu Bei sailed upstream to the Red Rock Face ( Chibi , Chinese 赤壁 ), where they clashed with Cao Cao's reconnaissance force. After a little banter, both sides stopped the fire for the time being. Cao Cao set up camp north of the Yangtze, the allies in the south. Cao Cao had an army of 150,000 men. This number can be believed to be accurate because there is no evidence for more men. In the historical novel History of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong , Cao Cao's army is numbered at more than one million; according to the conditions there it would have been more like 700,000 to 800,000.
Zhou Yu had around 30,000 sea troops, while Liu Bei raised around 20,000 in exile.
The battle
The decisive blow against Cao Cao came shortly afterwards, though sources disputed whether Liu Bei or Sun Quan carried it out. We have the most detailed account in the biography of Zhou Yu. It describes how the Wu captain Huang Gai prepared an attack on Cao Cao with burning ships. The source reports the devastation of the enemy camp in the flames. There is evidence that Cao Cao's army was suffering from illness and low morale even then.
Many other sources suggest that Cao Cao's underestimation and Liu Bei's cunning, combined , resulted in the Allies' victory in the Battle of Chibi . Cao Cao's generals and soldiers were mostly cavalry and infantry and had almost no experience of fighting on the water. In the light of his victory over the Wuhuan, Cao Cao assumed that he would simply overwhelm his opponents in numbers (the weighting of the two fleets is estimated at 120,000 to 50,000). He converted his vast army of infantry and cavalry into a marine corps and a navy; this was his first tactical mistake. After just a few days of training, Cao Cao's troops were decimated by seasickness and lack of water experience, as many of his young recruits could not even swim. Subtropical diseases, against which Sun Quan's men had long been immune, now plagued Cao Cao's soldiers.
In this situation, Pang Tong went to Cao Cao as an alleged advisor. At Zhuge Liang's suggestion, he recommended that his ships be connected with strong iron chains in order to reduce seasickness through the increased stability of the fleet. Although Cao Cao was known for his suspicious nature, he believed Pang Tong because he feared that the adverse natural conditions would render his army completely defenseless.
After a few days, the seasickness had drastically decreased because the ships hardly swayed due to their chain connection. Cao Cao took courage again and was determined to turn fate in his favor. But Pang Tong's magnanimous help was part of a trap by Zhuge Liang and Zhou Yu, and it would soon lead to the Wei fleet debacle.
At the same time, Zhuge Liang had calculated that the wind would only blow from the southeast at this time of year. With Cao Cao's fleet anchored northwest of Liu Bei and Sun Quan, fire was one possible way to crush him. Zhuge Liang went on the wind to make up Cao Cao's numerical superiority.
On the eve of the battle, Cao Cao realized that the southeast wind was hindering the movement of his entire fleet. The ships did not arrive against the direct wind and a full retreat was ordered. But because the ships were so tightly fastened together, panic broke out and the orderly retreat plunged into chaos. The entire fleet of 2,000 ships was finally trapped in the middle of the Yangtze, completely immobile.
In a desperate attempt, Cao Cao called for an attack against the allies, but the arrows of his archers did not reach their fleets due to the strong southeast wind. The forces of Liu Bei and Sun Quan, with the wind behind them, aimed incendiary arrows at Cao Cao's ships and hit them. In conjunction with Huang Gai's incendiary ships, they destroyed Cao Cao's entire fleet. The survivors had to flee in small boats, but the allies stopped them.
When his army disbanded, Liu Bei persecuted Cao Cao. Ambushes by Huang Zhong , Zhao Yun, and Zhang Fei kept holding his troops up until Cao Cao came to the Huarong Pass. There he was opposed by the legendary General Guan Yu . According to the legend, in the face of the ragged and poorly armed Cao Cao, Guan Yu remembered that he had once been in his service and had been treated very well. He allowed Cao Cao to escape with his remaining troops of 27 men. According to legend, Zhuge Liang foresaw Guan Yu's deed, but then pretended to be surprised and angry. He demanded Guan Yu's death for this disobedience, but Liu Bei refused.
Aftermath
When the year 209 ended, Cao Cao's command post in Jiangling fell to Zhou Yu. Liu Bei, on the other hand, had founded his own empire by taking over four command posts south of the Yangtze River. He also conquered the Jing Province ( Jīngzhōu , chin. 荊州 / 荆州 ), which had been in Cao Cao's hands until then. As a result of these successes, Liu Bei had practically unlimited access to the Land of Shu , to important waterways to Wu, and to rule over the southern Yangtze River . However, after the agreement between Liu Bei and Sun Quan, Jing Province belonged to Wu. Sun Quan was very angry about this and the two would fight for this province for another ten years. Cao Cao, however, had to refresh his strength and was therefore initially unable to intervene in the conflict.
Later, some scholasts claimed that Zhuge Liang had planned the Battle of Chibi well in advance . He had speculated on weakening Sun Quan to provide Liu Bei with a new deployment base in the south. Zhuge Liang gave command of Jing Province to Guan Yu, who maintained and guarded it until his death in 219.
meaning
Never again was Cao Cao in command of a fleet as large as Jiangling's, and never again would he have a similar opportunity to defeat his southern rivals. Therefore, the outcome of the Battle of Chibi and the loss of Jing Province sealed the division of southern and northern China and hinted at hostilities between the north and the south in the centuries that followed.
In 1999, a large panorama picture of the battle called the Chi-Bi War was created by various artists .
The Chinese director John Woo shot the film Red Cliff (Chinese title: Chi Bi ) about the Battle of Chibi in Hebei Province , which is the most expensive film production in Chinese film history with a budget of 80 million US dollars. The original version consists of two parts and is 280 minutes long. The first part was released in Asia in July 2008, the second part in January 2009. In June 2009, a shortened version was also released, which consists of one part and was shortened to two and a half hours (148 minutes) for the western market.
literature
- Friedrich Krause: River and sea battles according to Chinese sources from the time of the Chou and Han dynasties and the three empires. In: Announcements of the seminar for oriental languages at the Friedrich Wilhelms-Universität zu Berlin. Department 1: East Asian Studies. 18, 1915, ZDB -ID 208305-x , pp. 61-94. (Also reprint: Reichdruckerei, Berlin 1914).
Web links
Coordinates: 29 ° 59 '17.68 " N , 113 ° 53' 23.17" E