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The Fall of Xiang Yu: How Liu Bang Won China Against All Odds | Silk and Steel · UK Column Radio

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to another episode of the Silk and Steel podcast,
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Speaker 1: Chinese history series, where we talk about Chinese history from
0:07
Speaker 1: the deepest antiquity to what we optimistically hope will be
0:11
Speaker 1: the present day thereabouts. In our own day, we are
0:17
Speaker 1: living in a kind of warring states period, embryonic warring
0:22
Speaker 1: states period, where we see momentary truces or informal truces,
0:26
Speaker 1: where someone is plainly just rearming to.
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Speaker 2: Go at it again.
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Speaker 1: And we are going to see such an instance again
0:32
Speaker 1: in the ancient Chinese history during the Chuhan period, probably
0:37
Speaker 1: during this episode. So without further ado, here's Mr.
0:42
Speaker 2: Carl Zhang from Bali.
0:43
Speaker 1: Hey, Carl.
0:45
Speaker 3: Hey, JJ. Thank you for your lovely intro. We're going
0:48
Speaker 3: to dive right back into the ancient Chinese history around
0:51
Speaker 3: the year 203 BC. In this year, the Han general
0:57
Speaker 3: Han Xin had conquered the Qi state. and decisively defeated
1:02
Speaker 3: a large Chu army, probably 90,000, 100,000 strong. And this
1:08
Speaker 3: caused great fear in the king of Chu, Shang Yu.
1:13
Speaker 3: For the very first time, Shang Yu felt a great
1:16
Speaker 3: fear because now his back is exposed. And Shang Yu
1:23
Speaker 3: was also facing a great logistic problem because he and
1:29
Speaker 3: the king of Han, Liu Bang, had been at a
1:32
Speaker 3: stalemate fighting along the Xinyang front for almost two and
1:38
Speaker 3: a half years now. And with Xiang Yu's own position
1:43
Speaker 3: sharply deteriorated now that Han Xin had did this whole
1:48
Speaker 3: flanking maneuver of conquering a whole swath of kingdoms to
1:53
Speaker 3: the north, like Han Qing conquered the Wei State, the
1:56
Speaker 3: Zhao State, the Dai State, the Yan State, and now
1:59
Speaker 3: the Qi State. And now that leaves Xiang Yu's capital, Pengcheng,
2:05
Speaker 3: dangerously exposed. At the same time, you have Peng Yue,
2:10
Speaker 3: who is an ally of Liu Bang, who has been
2:12
Speaker 3: harassing Xiang Yu's supply line in the rear. So Xiang
2:16
Speaker 3: Yu is facing a severe supply problem. But on the
2:20
Speaker 3: other side, on the Han side, Liu Bang is also
2:24
Speaker 3: facing similar problems, you know, because he has been defeated
2:28
Speaker 3: by Xiang Yu multiple times. He cannot defeat Xiang Yu.
2:33
Speaker 3: At the same time, you know, the land of former
2:37
Speaker 3: Qin state, where his, you know, his power base now
2:41
Speaker 3: has been completely exhausted, exhausted of manpower. You know, his minister,
2:47
Speaker 3: Xiao He, pretty much mobilized any male that he could
2:52
Speaker 3: find at this point. So both sides wanted peace. And
2:57
Speaker 3: the only person, both sides are at an impasse. The
3:01
Speaker 3: only person that can make a difference right now is
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Speaker 3: Han Xin. Han Xin now leads a large army in
3:09
Speaker 3: the state of Qi. And so at this juncture, Han
3:15
Speaker 3: Xin sent an envoy to Liu Bang's camp. And in
3:18
Speaker 3: the letter, Han Xin humbly requests that because the state
3:24
Speaker 3: of Qi is such a large piece of territory and
3:27
Speaker 3: the people of Qi are crafty and untrustworthy, it's better
3:31
Speaker 3: if we have a king to rule over them. So
3:35
Speaker 3: Han Xin himself humbly requests the position of acting king
3:40
Speaker 3: of Qi to pacify the land. Now, when Liu Bang
3:45
Speaker 3: heard that news, Liu Bang flew into a rage because
3:48
Speaker 3: he said that look, I have been trapped here for
3:51
Speaker 3: two years and a half. I'm waiting day and night
3:55
Speaker 3: for Han Xin to send his army to help me. Instead,
3:59
Speaker 3: he sent me this letter asking to be acting king.
4:03
Speaker 3: So before Liu Bang is going to express himself further,
4:07
Speaker 3: his advisor Chen Ping walked close to him and step
4:11
Speaker 3: on Liu Bang's foot to signal him to shut up.
4:16
Speaker 3: And then his other advisor Zhang Liang got close to
4:19
Speaker 3: Liu Bang and said, look, right now we are too
4:22
Speaker 3: weak to do anything about Han Xin. You know, Han
4:26
Speaker 3: Xin has de facto independence now. He has the independent
4:29
Speaker 3: command of a large army. Even if we wanted to,
4:33
Speaker 3: we cannot prevent him from becoming the king of Qi. Now,
4:37
Speaker 3: at least he's following the protocol to request your permission.
4:42
Speaker 3: Just grant him permission to keep him on our side.
4:48
Speaker 3: One thing Liu Bang is really good at is he
4:51
Speaker 3: listens to advice. He continues his of being enraged. He said,
4:59
Speaker 3: a real man should have greater ambitions. What the F
5:03
Speaker 3: is a provisional king? He should be inspired to be
5:07
Speaker 3: a real king. You know, does Han Xin not think
5:09
Speaker 3: I would not give him the title of real king? Here,
5:12
Speaker 3: let me show him. So he issues an edict to
5:17
Speaker 3: make Han Xin not just the acting king, but the
5:20
Speaker 3: real king of Qi and had a seal made to
5:24
Speaker 3: send to Han Xin. And so with this, Han Xin
5:28
Speaker 3: is very happy, but Xiang Yu now is in great fear.
5:32
Speaker 3: So he sent an envoy, Wu Se, to talk to
5:37
Speaker 3: Han Xin, possibly betray King of Han, Liu Bang. So
5:42
Speaker 3: when Wu Se arrived at Han Xin's camp, he was
5:47
Speaker 3: very frank. He said, look, your majesty now holds the
5:53
Speaker 3: balance of the world in your hand. If you favor Han,
5:58
Speaker 3: the Han will win. If you favor State of Chu,
6:02
Speaker 3: State of Chu will win. Now it's all up to you.
6:06
Speaker 3: At this point, you should think about what's best for
6:12
Speaker 3: your own interest. Let's look at what happened. What happened
6:16
Speaker 3: was the world, the people... from all under heaven was
6:21
Speaker 3: getting sick and tired of qing rule that's why we
6:24
Speaker 3: all rose up you know various heroes and advisor come
6:28
Speaker 3: out of the woodworks to band together to overthrow the
6:33
Speaker 3: state of qing and once that was done you know
6:35
Speaker 3: our king shang yu has divvied up the land and
6:39
Speaker 3: and made each uh rewarded all these generals and heroes
6:45
Speaker 3: that participated in the struggle, you know, give them their
6:48
Speaker 3: own kingdom and feed. Yet the king of Han, Liu Bang,
6:52
Speaker 3: was not satisfied. He was not, because he was greedy.
6:56
Speaker 3: That's why he waged war on all the other states.
7:01
Speaker 3: But his appetite is bottomless. You know, he's greedy. He
7:04
Speaker 3: will not stop until he conquered the entire all under heaven.
7:11
Speaker 3: And right now, your fate, if you were to stick
7:15
Speaker 3: by Liu Bang.
7:19
Speaker 1: Han Xing is presumably politely listening to this revisionist history,
7:24
Speaker 1: which is total nonsense revisionist history of recent events, where
7:30
Speaker 1: basically Liu Bang was promised all the former Qin territory
7:34
Speaker 1: because he broke through into the Guanzhong region first.
7:38
Speaker 2: And just to.
7:39
Speaker 1: Recap, Xiang Yu's previous advisor came up with the explanation, well,
7:45
Speaker 1: we'll just give you the Ba Shu area, which is
7:51
Speaker 1: now Sichuan, because that's still technically part of the Qin state,
7:53
Speaker 1: even though that's like, basically, it was kind of like
7:56
Speaker 1: Australia to the British Empire was in the 1800s, kind
8:00
Speaker 1: of like a place of exile. and kind of not
8:03
Speaker 1: so developed from the perspective of the metropolis. And the
8:07
Speaker 1: actual Qin heartland, they divvied up among three surrendered Qin
8:11
Speaker 1: generals in an attempt to keep those generals weak enough
8:15
Speaker 1: not to rebel against Xiang Yu, but also hopefully strong
8:19
Speaker 1: enough to keep Liu.
8:20
Speaker 2: Bang bottled up.
8:22
Speaker 1: And they overcompensated, and they were too weak to keep Liu.
8:26
Speaker 2: Bang bottled up.
8:27
Speaker 1: And so Liu Bang burst out, and then the rest happened.
8:31
Speaker 1: But anyway, I guess this is, in a way, you know,
8:35
Speaker 1: if someone is this, let's say Chinese or Russian or
8:40
Speaker 1: government official is listening to his American counterpart, he also
8:43
Speaker 1: has to listen to an earful of nonsense revisionist history
8:46
Speaker 1: all the time.
8:46
Speaker 2: So it's not new, I suppose.
8:48
Speaker 3: Yeah, and Han Xing himself was the architect of Liu
8:52
Speaker 3: Bang's breaking out of Sichuan. He was responsible for Liu
8:57
Speaker 3: Bang to break out of Sichuan to conquer the Qin territories.
9:01
Speaker 3: So anyway, and Wu Se goes on. He said, look,
9:05
Speaker 3: right now, if there were to continue, sooner or later,
9:10
Speaker 3: even you, your majesty, will be captured by Liu Bang
9:14
Speaker 3: because Liu Bang desired all... all under heaven. The only
9:18
Speaker 3: reason right now you are able to keep your position
9:22
Speaker 3: is because King Xiang Yu is still alive. So Liu
9:27
Speaker 3: Bang still need you to fight us. That's why he
9:31
Speaker 3: leaves you alone, alone now. But, you know, once, once
9:36
Speaker 3: King Xiang Yu is defeated, you will be next. You know, you, you,
9:40
Speaker 3: you have to think about this. You have to now
9:43
Speaker 3: think for yourself. So at this point, um, why not? Uh, you, so, but, but,
9:50
Speaker 3: but this, uh, so why not join us? Join us.
9:53
Speaker 3: We can, we can, uh, together we can, we can
9:56
Speaker 3: overthrow the King of Han, but, uh, to this, Han
10:02
Speaker 3: Xin responded. He said, look, I, um, uh, before I
10:07
Speaker 3: had served Xiang Yu before, but he never promoted me
10:11
Speaker 3: beyond his, uh, the rank of his personal secretary. And
10:15
Speaker 3: at the, While I was serving him in the capacity
10:19
Speaker 3: of secretary, I offered many strategies, but Xiang Yu never
10:23
Speaker 3: listened to any of my advice. This is the whole
10:26
Speaker 3: reason I joined up with Liu Bang. Whereas on the
10:30
Speaker 3: other side, the king of Han, Liu Bang, had given
10:33
Speaker 3: me everything. He gave me his fortress. He gave me
10:36
Speaker 3: a command of army. He made me his top commander.
10:40
Speaker 3: And he entrusted me with all these responsibilities. So how
10:45
Speaker 3: can you say that I should go betray the king
10:50
Speaker 3: of Han, you know, for all that he has done
10:54
Speaker 3: for me? And then he goes on, but the Wu
10:58
Speaker 3: Si didn't give up. He said, like, look, all you
11:01
Speaker 3: have to do is to remain neutral in this struggle.
11:06
Speaker 3: Then you can split the all under heaven three ways
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Speaker 3: between you, Liu Bang, and Shang Yu. right? That, that, like,
11:14
Speaker 3: you don't have, you don't have to go fight the Obama,
11:17
Speaker 3: but if you decide to take yourself out of this,
11:20
Speaker 3: this conflict, uh, that will be enough, that, that will
11:24
Speaker 3: be enough to, to, to, to, to maintain the current, uh, uh,
11:29
Speaker 3: a three-way split of the land. Uh, still, um, Shang, uh,
11:35
Speaker 3: Han Xin would not agree and send the Chu envoy
11:38
Speaker 3: on its way. But at this very point, um, Mr.
11:44
Speaker 3: Han Xin has an advisor by the name of Kuaitong.
11:47
Speaker 3: Now the Kuaitong has made his appearance a couple of
11:50
Speaker 3: times already. The first time was when Chen Sen has
11:55
Speaker 3: sent his general Wu Chen to conquer the Zhao state.
11:59
Speaker 3: And Wu Chen was having difficulty reducing each city held
12:04
Speaker 3: by Qing commanders. Kuaitong gave him advice like, look, this
12:09
Speaker 3: is because all the Qing defenders have the expectation that
12:12
Speaker 3: that every city you take, you will massacre the commander
12:16
Speaker 3: and the Qing garrison. That's why they fight to the death. Now,
12:19
Speaker 3: on the other hand, if you were to accept surrender
12:22
Speaker 3: of the city and make the Qing commander a marquee
12:27
Speaker 3: and then send him as a messenger to all the
12:30
Speaker 3: rest of the cities to show as an example of
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Speaker 3: surrendering to you, then you don't have to fight conquer
12:38
Speaker 3: each city. All these cities will follow you, will submit
12:42
Speaker 3: to you. And that strategy worked very well for Wu Chen.
12:47
Speaker 3: But I guess he probably stayed on as an official
12:51
Speaker 3: in the Zhao state. So when Han Xin and Zhang
12:56
Speaker 3: Er conquered Zhao state, Kuaitong became Han Xin's advisor. And again,
13:03
Speaker 3: when Han Xin was poised to invade the Qi state
13:07
Speaker 3: but received the news that Liu Bang's advisor Li Yi
13:11
Speaker 3: Ji had convinced the king of Qi to surrender Han
13:15
Speaker 3: Xin at that time was prepared to withdraw his army
13:18
Speaker 3: Kuaitong was the one who told Han Xin hey we
13:22
Speaker 3: never received the official command from Liu Bang to stop
13:26
Speaker 3: advance and if you were to stop you will allow
13:29
Speaker 3: this like 70 year old Confucian scholar just with his
13:34
Speaker 3: tongue to upstage you because it's the credible military threat
13:41
Speaker 3: of your army that forced the king of Qi to surrender.
13:45
Speaker 3: But yet, at this verge of victory, you got robbed
13:50
Speaker 3: by this 70-year-old geezer who now will hoard all the
13:56
Speaker 3: glory of pursuing the 70-year-old Qi to surrender. Whereas you,
14:01
Speaker 3: you had to battle your heart is just to gain
14:05
Speaker 3: the 50 city of the Zhao state. And then the
14:07
Speaker 3: Zhao state was given away by Liu Bang to Zhang Er. Anyway,
14:10
Speaker 3: you end up with nothing if he was you right now.
14:14
Speaker 3: So that led Han Xin to march into the Qi state,
14:18
Speaker 3: which led to the death of Li Yi Ji because,
14:21
Speaker 3: you know, king of Qi thought Li Yi Ji was
14:23
Speaker 3: a spy to send in to get them, let their
14:28
Speaker 3: guards down, which they did. And so anyway, so Kuaitong now,
14:33
Speaker 3: you know, he didn't directly tell Han Xin to follow
14:40
Speaker 3: the advice of the Chu convoy. Instead, he said, you know,
14:43
Speaker 3: I'm an expert of physiognomy. You know, I have been
14:47
Speaker 3: observing you. So Han Xin's like, oh, what do you
14:50
Speaker 3: see in me? And Kuaitong mentioned Han Xin to send
14:54
Speaker 3: away all the people, you know, to send away or
15:00
Speaker 3: dispatch all the servants. So there's only two of them remained.
15:03
Speaker 3: And Kwai Tung says, well, from your front, you look
15:06
Speaker 3: like the highest rank you could attain is a marquee.
15:12
Speaker 3: And even that position is very precarious. But from your back,
15:18
Speaker 3: you know, you look so noble that your destiny cannot
15:22
Speaker 3: be described. Now that P. Conchin's interest is like, what
15:27
Speaker 3: do you mean? And now Kwai Tung start to you know,
15:33
Speaker 3: moving to the real topic. He said like, uh, listen, um,
15:38
Speaker 3: right now, the people listen, the planning is a key. Um,
15:47
Speaker 3: if one listened to too much and plans poorly yet
15:53
Speaker 3: hopeful long-term safety, uh, uh, this is, uh, one does
15:59
Speaker 3: not make, um, well, he, he, Basically, Kuaitong is telling
16:04
Speaker 3: Han Xin that he should listen to him. But then
16:11
Speaker 3: he said, look, at this point, Liu Bang and Shang
16:18
Speaker 3: Yu has been in a stalemate at the Xinyang front
16:22
Speaker 3: for two and a half years now. Neither side could
16:26
Speaker 3: overcome each other. And the people of this world have
16:30
Speaker 3: been completely exhausted. There are so many father and son's
16:35
Speaker 3: bodies lay exposed on the field with no one to
16:40
Speaker 3: bury their bodies. At such juncture, you hold the balance
16:49
Speaker 3: of power in your hands. If you favor state of Han,
16:54
Speaker 3: if you favor the king of Han, Han will win.
16:57
Speaker 3: If you favor king of Chu, Chu will win. But
17:02
Speaker 3: neither of these leaders, neither Liu Bang or King of
17:09
Speaker 3: Chu would completely trust you by the mere fact that
17:15
Speaker 3: you hold so much power because you lead a powerful
17:18
Speaker 3: army and you have the ability to sway the power balance.
17:24
Speaker 3: So even if you favor either side, neither side leader
17:30
Speaker 3: can completely trust you. Why not just be independent? Then
17:36
Speaker 3: you can split the land three ways. And in such case,
17:41
Speaker 3: you know, you can just wait for your, uh, when,
17:44
Speaker 3: when the land is split three way, neither side will
17:48
Speaker 3: want to move first for the fear of what will happen.
17:51
Speaker 3: And you can, you can have the, you have the
17:54
Speaker 3: luxury to sit here in the state of Chi and
17:57
Speaker 3: wait for, Wait for the opportune moment when the other
18:00
Speaker 3: twos are weakened. And then, you know, if you want,
18:05
Speaker 3: you can sweep in and unify all under heaven and
18:08
Speaker 3: everybody will have to respect you as the leader. But again,
18:15
Speaker 3: Han Xin, hearing this, he said, look, you know, but
18:19
Speaker 3: how can I betray the king of Han, Liu Bang?
18:23
Speaker 3: He treated me so well. I would be nothing if
18:27
Speaker 3: it wasn't for him to place his trust in me,
18:30
Speaker 3: to place me at the command of his army, and
18:33
Speaker 3: to give me all this honor and glory. And to this,
18:38
Speaker 3: Kuaitong said, look, this is how you feel right now.
18:43
Speaker 3: What do you say? It's true. But let's look at
18:46
Speaker 3: the example of Zhang Er and Chen Yu. Those two
18:51
Speaker 3: are known to be friends who would die for each other.
18:55
Speaker 3: And yet what happened after the Battle of Zhulu? Those
18:58
Speaker 3: two then would want nothing better than to have other
19:03
Speaker 3: guys' heads. Look at your own relationship with Liu Bang.
19:07
Speaker 3: Do you think your relationship with Liu Bang can match
19:10
Speaker 3: that of Zhang Er and Chen Yu before they're falling out? Yet,
19:15
Speaker 3: because of power, these two became deadly enemies. So you
19:20
Speaker 3: cannot guarantee your relationship. Do you think your relationship with
19:29
Speaker 3: Liu Bang is more stable than that of Zhang Er
19:32
Speaker 3: and Chen Yu? You cannot predict these things. All you
19:36
Speaker 3: can do is you protect yourself to look out for
19:39
Speaker 3: your own self-interest. And when the heaven gives you a
19:45
Speaker 3: chance and you don't seize it, you know heaven usually
19:49
Speaker 3: punish you for it see right now this this this
19:52
Speaker 3: is a one single lifetime chance um you know if
19:56
Speaker 3: you let it slip through your fingers you will not
19:58
Speaker 3: come back uh and but again han shin he could
20:03
Speaker 3: not he could not bear to to to betray uh
20:08
Speaker 3: Liu Bang, and he feels like he owns a debt
20:13
Speaker 3: of honor, a debt of gratitude. He says, no, that's
20:18
Speaker 3: not something I can do. Well, I think that's the
20:22
Speaker 3: difference between Han Xin and Liu Bang, because Han Xin,
20:24
Speaker 3: he basically was raised with an aristocratic education, which didn't
20:31
Speaker 3: prepare him for... for survivability because this is why he
20:37
Speaker 3: couldn't feed himself. He had to rely on the kindness
20:40
Speaker 3: of strangers to even feed himself before. Whereas Liu Bang,
20:45
Speaker 3: he was raised in the school of hard knocks. He
20:49
Speaker 3: came from the grassroots. He doesn't care for all that noble,
20:56
Speaker 3: oblige crap. He knows how to gain win friends and
21:03
Speaker 3: gain influence and how to keep it. And I mean,
21:11
Speaker 3: with hindsight 50-50, both the Chu envoy and Kuaitong is
21:15
Speaker 3: obviously correct. This is a chance for Han Xin to
21:20
Speaker 3: strike it on his own. But then again, from Han
21:22
Speaker 3: Xin's perspective, so far everything is going great. He got
21:26
Speaker 3: everything he wanted. He wants to be the king of Qi.
21:30
Speaker 3: Liu Bang granted him that. everything he asked for, he
21:34
Speaker 3: has received. There's no reason for him to side with
21:37
Speaker 3: Xiang Yu. And of course, I think Xiang Yu also
21:41
Speaker 3: knows that. But what the Xiang Yu's envoy is trying
21:43
Speaker 3: to do is just to persuade him to be neutral.
21:47
Speaker 3: That would be enough. But that again would be like
21:51
Speaker 3: a betrayal of Liu Bang. And Han Xin thought like, oh,
21:55
Speaker 3: I couldn't do that because... You know, I owe everything
21:59
Speaker 3: to Liu Bang and I can't backstab him now. You
22:02
Speaker 3: were going to say something?
22:05
Speaker 1: Han Xing is, he is still like, he's king of
22:09
Speaker 1: China and he's still, and he's like prime minister of China.
22:14
Speaker 4: As well?
22:15
Speaker 3: Yes, yes.
22:16
Speaker 2: Right, okay.
22:16
Speaker 1: So that's how he de facto still controls all of
22:19
Speaker 1: North China. The, yeah, I mean, I don't think the
22:30
Speaker 1: other example is quite so applicable of those two guys,
22:35
Speaker 1: of Zhang Er and Chen Chen Yu. Because that relationship
22:42
Speaker 1: broke down in a heated moment. It was not really
22:45
Speaker 1: the long-term contradiction of interests that led to the breakdown
22:51
Speaker 1: of that relationship. That kind of came later when they
22:54
Speaker 1: were already enemies and it kind of solidified things because
22:57
Speaker 1: they end up they end up competing over the same
23:01
Speaker 1: territory once Xiang Yu divvies up.
23:04
Speaker 3: Well, I think that it broke down at the Battle
23:08
Speaker 3: of Juilu when Zhang Er was being holed up in
23:12
Speaker 3: the city of Juilu hoping Chen Yu would come to
23:15
Speaker 3: save them. And Chen Yu is like, whoa, whoa, whoa.
23:18
Speaker 3: Did you see Xiang Yu's army? It's so strong.
23:20
Speaker 1: You know, he.
23:22
Speaker 2: Might go in.
23:22
Speaker 3: It would be like leading the lamb to the slaughter.
23:25
Speaker 3: And it would be pointless death. And so... Zanger hated that.
23:29
Speaker 3: And he sent his two close retainers to Chen Yu's
23:36
Speaker 3: camp to tell Chen Yu to send in the army.
23:38
Speaker 3: And Chen Yu's like, OK, well, the best I can
23:40
Speaker 3: do is I give you 5,000 troops. You go do
23:44
Speaker 3: a probing test. See for yourself how strong his army is.
23:48
Speaker 3: And those two did and got themselves killed. And then
23:51
Speaker 3: later when Xiang Yu actually won the battle, Zhu Lu,
23:54
Speaker 3: Zhang Er went to Chen Yu's camp to confront him
23:58
Speaker 3: about what happened to him. First of all, why didn't
24:00
Speaker 3: you come to save me? And two, what happened to
24:03
Speaker 3: my retainers? Chen Yu said, oh, I gave them 5,000
24:05
Speaker 3: troops and they got themselves killed. But Zhang Er didn't
24:08
Speaker 3: believe him. Zhang Er thought Chen Yu had those two
24:11
Speaker 3: killed secretly. And that was a break, like the big break.
24:15
Speaker 3: And then on top of that, Zhang Er, took advantage
24:18
Speaker 3: of Chen Yu going to the bathroom to seize his seal,
24:21
Speaker 3: or command to take control of his army. So that
24:24
Speaker 3: was the official break. And after that, I think there
24:28
Speaker 3: were already enemy....
24:31
Speaker 1: They were already enemies by the time, because of this
24:35
Speaker 1: personal sense of betrayal. Because it's quite different from Han
24:40
Speaker 1: Xin and Liu Bang right now. Where they are... It's
24:45
Speaker 1: more like they are thinking about... the long-term incompatibility of
24:53
Speaker 1: interests is what the true envoy is talking about. And
24:58
Speaker 1: this example, though, is more like in the heat of
25:00
Speaker 1: the moment, they have a difference of opinion as to
25:04
Speaker 1: what's the proper way going forward, whether one of them
25:09
Speaker 1: should preserve themselves to avenge the other person or whether
25:12
Speaker 1: you should die together at the same time. And I
25:16
Speaker 1: think from Han Xing with his aristocratic education, he would
25:20
Speaker 1: probably not see those two situations as being so similar.
25:24
Speaker 1: He's basically being told to think in a more purely calculating,
25:33
Speaker 1: homo economicus kind of mentality. The sunk costs, past loyalties
25:38
Speaker 1: are sunk costs. You don't let them drag on you.
25:42
Speaker 1: Because the guy, even though Liu Bang did all these
25:45
Speaker 1: things for you, because you're the king of Qi now
25:48
Speaker 1: and a de facto ruler, de facto in control of
25:51
Speaker 1: the rest of the North as well, he can't really
25:53
Speaker 1: do anything about you if you betray him now.
25:55
Speaker 2: So you should, right?
25:57
Speaker 1: This is the purely calculating mindset that is being promoted
26:02
Speaker 1: to him.
26:02
Speaker 2: And of course, he's going to recoil from that.
26:05
Speaker 1: As most normal people who have not had very traumatic
26:11
Speaker 1: early life would, right?
26:13
Speaker 2: But I guess Liu Bang is not that kind of person, right?
26:15
Speaker 1: At least Liu Bang, I don't think he kind of
26:17
Speaker 1: thinks it through like this. It's more that he has
26:22
Speaker 1: a kind of, he's more naturally charismatic with people. And
26:26
Speaker 1: when these issues come up, and if someone reminds him,
26:30
Speaker 1: then he is ruthless enough to take action, right? Han
26:33
Speaker 1: Xing is like, you know, he's not quite ruthless enough
26:37
Speaker 1: to take action this time.
26:39
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah. But Kuaidong also made a point, like, look,
26:42
Speaker 3: you are, you right now, just by the mere fact
26:47
Speaker 3: that you had so much power that threatened your own ruler,
26:51
Speaker 3: that you will never be trusted. No ruler will trust
26:55
Speaker 3: someone in your position, not because of you personally, but
26:59
Speaker 3: just because you hold that power that will threaten the
27:03
Speaker 3: ruler's position. That's why you will never be trusted. So
27:07
Speaker 3: why not just Make a clean break and use that
27:12
Speaker 3: power for yourself. But Han Xin just says, okay, say
27:15
Speaker 3: no more. And even though Han Xin has publicly rejected
27:26
Speaker 3: the true envoy Wu Se and also his own advisor
27:30
Speaker 3: Kuaitong's advice, but he still did not send army to
27:34
Speaker 3: help Liu Bang, who is now at the front, right?
27:38
Speaker 3: And who is holed up in the front with Shang Yu.
27:41
Speaker 3: Because the whole strategy of, the whole grand strategy of
27:45
Speaker 3: Han Xin is basically having Liu Bang serving as a
27:49
Speaker 3: bait to hold down to Shang Yu's main forces while
27:54
Speaker 3: he do this, while Han Xin himself lead the army
27:57
Speaker 3: to do this grand sweep through Northern China. And so
28:02
Speaker 3: it's also understandable why Niu Bang was very pissed off
28:07
Speaker 3: when Han Xin's request to be made king of Qi
28:11
Speaker 3: arrived in his camp because Niu Bang's like, I'm doing
28:15
Speaker 3: all the hard work here. I'm doing all the hard
28:17
Speaker 3: work attracting Xiang Yu's attention and now you want to
28:21
Speaker 3: be king. It's like, this is bullshit. But anyway, so
28:26
Speaker 3: the stalemate still remained the same and Both the Han
28:31
Speaker 3: forces and the Chu forces are now, you know, like
28:36
Speaker 3: they could not prevail, yet they cannot unilaterally withdraw. Otherwise,
28:42
Speaker 3: you know, like it could turn into a rout. So
28:45
Speaker 3: at this point, Liu Bang decided to sue for peace.
28:49
Speaker 3: He sent an envoy, Lu Gu, to Xiang Yu's camp
28:57
Speaker 3: to sue for peace. And Xiang Yu would not even
29:00
Speaker 3: hear it. It's like, we'll decide everything on the battlefield.
29:05
Speaker 3: Take back all your gifts. And at this point, another
29:10
Speaker 3: one of Liu Bang's advisors, another 70-year-old geezer, Lu Gong,
29:16
Speaker 3: decided to volunteer to go to Xiang Yu's camp to negotiate.
29:21
Speaker 3: And Xiang Yu knew what Lu Gong was going to
29:26
Speaker 3: ask and was going to cut him off. Well, Xiang
29:29
Speaker 3: Yu asked him, OK, what do you come here for?
29:32
Speaker 3: And Lu Gong says, oh, we came here for peace. Look,
29:37
Speaker 3: both side peoples are exhausted. Our soldiers want to return home,
29:43
Speaker 3: and we just want peace. And Xiang Yu's like, oh, okay,
29:47
Speaker 3: you want any other conditions? Liu Gong said, oh, by
29:52
Speaker 3: the way, we also want the return of the hostages.
29:55
Speaker 3: We want Liu Bang's father and his wife back. And
29:58
Speaker 3: Xiang Yu was going to denied that request. And then
30:02
Speaker 3: at this point, Shang Yu's uncle, Shang Bo, interceded again
30:06
Speaker 3: on Liu Fang's side. But Lu Gong also made the
30:10
Speaker 3: argument like, look, if you were to release the hostages,
30:15
Speaker 3: you will show all under heaven your majesty's magnanimity and generosity.
30:24
Speaker 3: And who and everyone will be seeing the praise of
30:27
Speaker 3: you the who out who who else could later than
30:31
Speaker 3: resist you um which you know like okay he's he's
30:35
Speaker 3: buttering shang yu up and and and then then shang
30:38
Speaker 3: yu's uncle.
30:40
Speaker 1: We already know that this kind of flattery works with
30:43
Speaker 1: shang yu because like a 12 year old kid man
30:46
Speaker 1: used this line on him and managed to save a
30:48
Speaker 1: city from being like massacred right.
30:51
Speaker 3: Exactly so um So in the end, Lu Gong and
31:01
Speaker 3: Shang Bo, they sat down and started to negotiate. So
31:04
Speaker 3: in the end, they decided to mark the border basically
31:09
Speaker 3: around the area of actual control. So the border will
31:16
Speaker 3: be marked by the canal called Hong Gou. Hong Gou
31:20
Speaker 3: was a canal that was dug in the Warring States
31:23
Speaker 3: period by the King of Wei that connects the Yellow
31:27
Speaker 3: River to the Huai River. Um, and it starts at
31:31
Speaker 3: the city of Xinyang. Uh, this is why city of
31:34
Speaker 3: Xinyang was very important because this, uh, state of Qing
31:37
Speaker 3: was put their granary there so they can send their,
31:41
Speaker 3: the ship, their grain to the front. And so later
31:46
Speaker 3: Hong Gou, um, Now, if you play Chinese chess, the
31:52
Speaker 3: border between each side is called Chu He Han Jie. Literally,
31:58
Speaker 3: the river of Chu and the border of Han. And
32:02
Speaker 3: that is also known as Hong Gou. The border that
32:06
Speaker 3: was delineated by this peace treaty. So to the west
32:13
Speaker 3: of Hong Gou will belong to Han. The land to
32:16
Speaker 3: the east of Hong Gou will belong to Chu. And
32:19
Speaker 3: then everyone was, the common soldiers on both camps were
32:25
Speaker 3: overjoyed that they could go home. And Xiang Yu started
32:30
Speaker 3: to withdraw. And Liu Bang planned to withdraw as well.
32:35
Speaker 3: At this time, Zhang Liang and Chen Bing stopped him.
32:37
Speaker 3: They said, look, right now, Xiang Yu is already, his
32:42
Speaker 3: force is already on the brink. their supply had been
32:48
Speaker 3: exhausted their soldiers no longer willing to fight and we
32:57
Speaker 3: should seize this opportunity to give him the final push
33:01
Speaker 3: at the time when he least expected after we signed
33:05
Speaker 3: this peace treaty when he thought we both are going
33:08
Speaker 3: to go home this is an opportunity for us to
33:11
Speaker 3: make the final push to tip them over So Liu
33:15
Speaker 3: Bang listened to their advice, gathered his army, turned them around,
33:20
Speaker 3: and started pursuing of Xiang Yu's army. And Liu Bang
33:23
Speaker 3: then sent the message to Han Xin, Pen Yue, and
33:28
Speaker 3: Yin Bu. Okay, another thing Liu Bang also did was
33:32
Speaker 3: to order his cousin Liu Gu, because Liu Gu and
33:39
Speaker 3: Liu Bang's best friend, Lu Wan, previously led the 20,000
33:44
Speaker 3: army to reinforce Peng Yue, right? To support Peng Yue's
33:48
Speaker 3: cutting off Chu supply line. So he ordered his cousin
33:51
Speaker 3: Liu Gu to lead that army further south to strike
33:55
Speaker 3: at the Ying Bu's former territory in Jiujiang. And he
33:59
Speaker 3: sent Ying Bu back to his father-in-law Wu Zui to
34:05
Speaker 3: gather a force to prepare to take Ying Bu's old territory.
34:09
Speaker 3: And the general ordered that was holding Yingbo's former territory,
34:14
Speaker 3: Zhou Ying, he's one of the few handful of capable
34:19
Speaker 3: generals under Xiang Yu. So Chen Pintou, Liu Bang, Xiang
34:24
Speaker 3: Yu only has a handful of generals that's capable. One
34:29
Speaker 3: is Fan Zhen, the old man. One is Zhong Limei.
34:33
Speaker 3: Another one is Long Ju. And the last one is
34:37
Speaker 3: Zhou Ying. Long Ju has already been killed in the
34:40
Speaker 3: battle against Han Xin. Fan Zhen died. So now it's
34:45
Speaker 3: only Zhong Libei and Zhou Ying. Now, Zhou Ying faced
34:48
Speaker 3: with a two-prong attack by Ying Bu and his father-in-law,
34:53
Speaker 3: Ying Bu's father-in-law's thief, and the army led by Liu
35:02
Speaker 3: Bang's cousin, Liu Gu. So Zhou Ying decided to defect.
35:06
Speaker 3: So he defected. And Ying Bu was able to recover
35:10
Speaker 3: his former domain of Jiujiang. And now Liu Bang's next
35:17
Speaker 3: order is order Ying Bu, Peng Yue, and Han Xin
35:21
Speaker 3: all to lead their forces to join in the pursuit
35:25
Speaker 3: of Xiang Yu's retreating army. But none of them came.
35:30
Speaker 3: And when Liu Bang led the forces under his command
35:35
Speaker 3: to pursue Xiang Yu, when he heard the news that
35:41
Speaker 3: Liu Bang breaks a peace agreement, he was enraged. So
35:46
Speaker 3: he led his forces to turn back and meet Liu
35:50
Speaker 3: Bang's forces head on. And again, Liu Bang was defeated.
35:54
Speaker 3: The guy has never won a battle against Shang Yu.
35:57
Speaker 3: And so now Liu Bang's forces had to retreat inside
36:01
Speaker 3: the fortification at a place called Gu Lin. And at
36:05
Speaker 3: this point, uh, Zhang Liang said, look, the reason why
36:11
Speaker 3: Peng Yue, Han Xin, and Yin Bu did not come
36:16
Speaker 3: is because you did not, um, you have not enticed
36:21
Speaker 3: them with enough, uh, uh, you have not given a
36:25
Speaker 3: high enough price. They're waiting for a better negotiation. They're
36:30
Speaker 3: waiting for a better offer. Um, you know, cause, cause
36:33
Speaker 3: right now they all have their own territory now. Um,
36:37
Speaker 3: you know, what, what, They need a little bit incentive
36:41
Speaker 3: to do more, you know, and they're waiting for you
36:46
Speaker 3: to give them a better offer. And so Liu Bang
36:49
Speaker 3: listened to this advice. So now Liu Bang immediately authorized
36:57
Speaker 3: a letter to Han Xin, offer him if he were
37:01
Speaker 3: to send army to pursue Shang Yu. he will gain
37:06
Speaker 3: most of the Chu territory that's held by Xiang Yu.
37:09
Speaker 3: So Han Xin will gain Xiang Yu's capital, Pengchen, and
37:17
Speaker 3: a large land surrounding that. And to Peng Yue, he
37:23
Speaker 3: offered to make Peng Yue the king of Liang. Liang
37:26
Speaker 3: is the western portion of the former state of Wei.
37:30
Speaker 3: That's a portion of the land that was appropriated by
37:33
Speaker 3: Xiang Yu into his own territory. So basically, Niu Bang
37:39
Speaker 3: offered to div up the Chu territory between Peng Yue,
37:44
Speaker 3: Han Xin, and Yin Bu. Yin Bu will receive his
37:48
Speaker 3: four commanderies as promised, you know, south of the Huai River.
37:53
Speaker 3: And Han Xin and Peng Yue will gain the rest.
37:58
Speaker 3: And so with that, letter sent. Now, Han Xin, Peng Yue,
38:04
Speaker 3: Yin Bu's army are finally on the move. So in
38:07
Speaker 3: a way, Han Xin did kind of listen to the
38:10
Speaker 3: advice of Kuaitong. But he was, in a way, he was,
38:16
Speaker 3: you know, he did not officially declare neutrality, but he
38:20
Speaker 3: was just holding back. He was holding back, but in
38:24
Speaker 3: his case, he was holding back for a better offer. Yeah.
38:29
Speaker 3: And when the better offer did come, that he will
38:32
Speaker 3: gain most control of the Mosul territory, he moved. And
38:36
Speaker 3: this time, one, two, three, four armies converged on the
38:43
Speaker 3: remaining Xiang Yu's army at a place called Gaisha. This time,
38:52
Speaker 3: Liu Bang wisely give the overall command of all these
38:58
Speaker 3: armies to Han Xin. So Han Xin's forces at this
39:03
Speaker 3: time outnumbered Shang Yu's forces five to one. According to
39:09
Speaker 3: the historical record, which I think the numbers can be dodgy,
39:14
Speaker 3: claim that Shang Yu still had 100,000 men, and whereas
39:18
Speaker 3: Han Xin's combined forces over 500,000. But again, I think
39:23
Speaker 3: that includes all the Porters who carry grains and all
39:28
Speaker 3: that stuff, all the camp followers. So I think the
39:32
Speaker 3: effective fighting force of Xiang Yu is probably around 30,000-40,000
39:36
Speaker 3: at this point. And the combat troops of Han Xin
39:40
Speaker 3: is probably around 1,500,000. Yeah, 1,500,000. So still 5 to 1,
39:52
Speaker 3: 5 to 1, you know, 30,000, probably like 30,000 versus 150,000
39:58
Speaker 3: combat troops. So Han Xin had 5 to 1 advantage.
40:03
Speaker 3: And he allied, he's both, Xiang Yu split his army
40:09
Speaker 3: into three, himself leading the center, his general Zhong Libei
40:15
Speaker 3: leading the left, and then another general Ji Bu leading
40:18
Speaker 3: the right. And Han Xing also split his force three ways.
40:26
Speaker 3: With him at the center, but in the center, he
40:30
Speaker 3: also have other Liu Bang's general like Fang Kuai, Zhou Bo,
40:34
Speaker 3: et cetera. And he put out like a layered formation.
40:39
Speaker 3: What he did was he drew Xiang Yu's troops in.
40:46
Speaker 3: After the initial engagement, Anxing ordered his troops to Weishu,
40:51
Speaker 3: so to lure the Chu army into a pursuit and,
40:55
Speaker 3: and deep into like a pocket of envelopment by his troops.
41:01
Speaker 3: And then, but then through the sheer numbers that were
41:05
Speaker 3: able to surround the, uh, the Xiang Yu's forces. And
41:11
Speaker 3: when Xiang Yu realized what happened, he ordered a breakout, um,
41:17
Speaker 3: But the defeat was inevitable at this point. In that case, numerically,
41:24
Speaker 3: he was heavily outnumbered.
41:28
Speaker 2: But the breakout was still successful, though, at this point.
41:31
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Xiang Yu did break out successfully.
41:35
Speaker 1: In a way, Han Jing is approaching this bout from
41:40
Speaker 1: the perspective that in the direct combat.
41:48
Speaker 1: Neither he nor any of his colleagues are really a
41:51
Speaker 1: match for Xiang Yu. He is going to maximize the
41:56
Speaker 1: use of this very much larger army by splitting it
41:59
Speaker 1: up such that they can still communicate so that as
42:03
Speaker 1: each layer gets hit by Xiang Yu and he breaks
42:06
Speaker 1: through and he beats each layer, there's still more that
42:10
Speaker 1: can be committed.
42:12
Speaker 2: And Xiang Yu gets exhausted and enveloped this way.
42:15
Speaker 1: Um, yeah. Yeah.
42:18
Speaker 3: And, uh, so, so Shang Yu then retreat, uh, the,
42:21
Speaker 3: his remaining forces to a place called Gaisha. Um, at,
42:26
Speaker 3: at that point he was completely surrounded, uh, on all sides.
42:30
Speaker 3: There's a, there's a famous, um, uh, there's a famous
42:34
Speaker 3: Chinese classical instrument piece called Simei Maifu ambush on all
42:40
Speaker 3: sides is actually referred to this, uh, uh, uh, Han
42:45
Speaker 3: Xin surrounding Xiang Yu's army at Gaixia. But Xiang Yu's
42:52
Speaker 3: forces remain a very potent one at this point. His
42:59
Speaker 3: forces defeated but not broken. So what happened is that
43:05
Speaker 3: Han Xin will arrange to have.
43:10
Speaker 3: I forgot. These are soldiers from the state of... from
43:14
Speaker 3: the state of Chu or the POWs they have captured
43:18
Speaker 3: in the state of Chu to line up at night
43:23
Speaker 3: to sing the songs of Chu. And this is another
43:29
Speaker 3: Chinese idiom, Si Mian Chu Ge, the song of Chu
43:33
Speaker 3: from the four sides. This is Si Mian Chu Ge
43:37
Speaker 3: is described like you are in a desperate, you're trapped,
43:41
Speaker 3: you're in a desperate situation. And the effect of these
43:46
Speaker 3: Chu songs was to break Xiang Yu's morale. And when
43:51
Speaker 3: Xiang Yu's Chu army hear the song of their homeland
43:56
Speaker 3: all around them, they thought the Han army have conquered
44:04
Speaker 3: much of the Chu land. Much of their homeland has fallen.
44:08
Speaker 3: So many start to desert. the Chu army morale completely
44:15
Speaker 3: broken and at that night as all the soldiers or
44:25
Speaker 3: their POWs were singing the song of Chu on all
44:30
Speaker 3: sides Xiang Yu was holding up in his camp with
44:34
Speaker 3: his favorite concubine Yu Ji and so his concubine Yu
44:41
Speaker 3: decided to perform a last dance for him, like a
44:45
Speaker 3: sword dance. And Shang Yu composed a famous poem. He said,
44:52
Speaker 3: what is it? And he's describing himself. He said, I'm
45:03
Speaker 3: strong enough to lift a big mountain, but yet here
45:08
Speaker 3: I am, I'm trapped in this place. with my favorite
45:11
Speaker 3: concubine and my favorite horses, what can we do? And
45:18
Speaker 3: so his favorite concubine, Yu Ji, did the last sword
45:22
Speaker 3: dance for him and killed him herself. She cut her
45:27
Speaker 3: own throat with a sword. So there's a famous Chinese
45:32
Speaker 3: opera sequence called Farewell, My Concubine. which is also the
45:41
Speaker 3: name of a movie.
45:43
Speaker 2: About the opera.
45:45
Speaker 3: About the opera. About the people who performed that opera.
45:49
Speaker 3: But the opera piece itself is a very famous piece.
45:55
Speaker 3: But the movie Farewell Concubine is about the opera actors
45:59
Speaker 3: who performed that piece. Anyway, so... And at night, after
46:05
Speaker 3: the death of his favorite concubine, Xiang Yu... called up
46:10
Speaker 3: his remaining troops and order a breakout. Um, and, and
46:16
Speaker 3: after they were only 800 writers, uh, were able to
46:20
Speaker 3: break through the, the, the, the envelope. And, uh, and
46:26
Speaker 3: Sean was at this point, he received the news that
46:31
Speaker 3: Yimbu has recovered his, the, the, the territory because, because
46:36
Speaker 3: Yimbu's territory was kind of like the, what do they
46:42
Speaker 3: call it? The strategic....
46:45
Speaker 2: Depth.
46:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, the strategic depth. And now, it's stated to have
46:48
Speaker 3: no strategic depth. They cannot go south anymore. So they
46:52
Speaker 3: try to go break out southeast. Southeast. And at this point,
46:59
Speaker 3: they lost because it was in the dark. They lost
47:03
Speaker 3: their way. And they asked a local for directions. And
47:08
Speaker 3: the local knew who he was. So, and he obviously
47:12
Speaker 3: wasn't a big fan. So he intentionally redirected them to
47:18
Speaker 3: a swamp and where their, their horses are, are, are getting, getting,
47:23
Speaker 3: getting mired in mud. Yeah. Getting stuck. So, and after
47:29
Speaker 3: that episode, only, only 18 riders remained by his side.
47:38
Speaker 3: And at that point, the pursuers started to catch up.
47:46
Speaker 3: And Xiang Yu and his 18 riders, they were trapped
47:52
Speaker 3: on top of a hill. And Xiang Yu spoke to
47:56
Speaker 3: his follower. He said, okay, it's not because I'm unable.
48:04
Speaker 3: It's heaven that has doomed me. but it's not because
48:08
Speaker 3: I cannot fight because I can still show the world
48:11
Speaker 3: how I can fight. Let's show them how we can
48:15
Speaker 3: really fight. So he had the 18 riders all lined.
48:19
Speaker 4: Up and he led the charge to charge down the
48:26
Speaker 4: mountain to break through into the Han forces formation and
48:31
Speaker 4: he cut off a Han commander's head took their flag and.
48:36
Speaker 3: Afterwards they all gather they all meet up again they
48:40
Speaker 3: only lost two riders so with the remaining rider he
48:45
Speaker 3: ordered breakout and then they did again they broke through
48:51
Speaker 3: so in the end he was finally approaching the bank
49:00
Speaker 3: of the Yangtze River and at that time the local
49:05
Speaker 3: ferryman had a boat already prepared for him. And so
49:10
Speaker 3: asked him to hurry, to hurry, get on the boat across.
49:14
Speaker 3: He said, look, the the, the land south of the
49:17
Speaker 3: Yangtze river is still true territory. You can still come back.
49:22
Speaker 3: You know, you can, you can still, you can still
49:24
Speaker 3: come back. But at this time, Shang Yu refused. He said, um,
49:29
Speaker 3: you know, back then me and my uncle let 8,000, um,
49:32
Speaker 3: let 8,000 men, young men from, um, from the South
49:40
Speaker 3: of Yangtze, from the, from the area of Wu. And
49:44
Speaker 3: he said, now, none of them have returned. How can
49:47
Speaker 3: I face their, their fathers? This is another Chinese idiom.
49:52
Speaker 3: Wu Yan Zai Jian Zhang Dong Fu Lao. You know,
49:55
Speaker 3: he has no face to face. He cannot no longer
49:58
Speaker 3: face the, the, the, the fathers of Zhang Dong, the
50:02
Speaker 3: land east of the river. This is an area of Wu. And, uh,
50:06
Speaker 3: So Xiang Yu refused to cross, and he decided to
50:10
Speaker 3: make his last stand against his pursuers. And at this point,
50:15
Speaker 3: the pursuer caught up, and Xiang Yu spotted among the
50:21
Speaker 3: pursuers one of his old acquaintances. And he said, hey, you,
50:27
Speaker 3: I heard the king of Han has promised generous reward
50:32
Speaker 3: for my head. And since that, you know, you are
50:36
Speaker 3: my acquaintance, I will give that reward to you. So
50:39
Speaker 3: he withdrew his sword, he cut his throat. And at
50:43
Speaker 3: that point, all the Han generals all made a scramble
50:48
Speaker 3: to get a piece of Xiang Yu's body. So they
50:51
Speaker 3: start fighting among each other. They start acting at each other,
50:55
Speaker 3: trying to get a piece of Xiang Yu's body. So
50:57
Speaker 3: in the end, I think 18, like a dozen guys,
51:01
Speaker 3: they each cracked a piece of Shang Yu's body off
51:05
Speaker 3: to claim the reward. And they all, you know, they
51:08
Speaker 3: all got made marquee afterwards. And so that is the
51:13
Speaker 3: end of Shang Yu. And there's still many debate on
51:17
Speaker 3: why Shang Yu did, whether Shang Yu made a mistake
51:21
Speaker 3: not crossing the river, you know, whether he should have
51:25
Speaker 3: or not to continue. But the one of the argument
51:30
Speaker 3: I heard is because, you know, ultimately, you know, you
51:34
Speaker 3: are not, your, your, your power depends on the man
51:41
Speaker 3: who follow you. Yeah. When Xiang Yu and Xiang Liang
51:45
Speaker 3: and his uncle first raised a banner of rebellion, the
51:49
Speaker 3: core of their followers, uh, is that 8,000 young men
51:55
Speaker 3: they raised in the, in the commandery of those, those 8,000
52:00
Speaker 3: men were the core of, Shang Yu's military prowess. So
52:05
Speaker 3: these later become like officers. When Shang Yu's army grew,
52:11
Speaker 3: like these 8,000 men became his officers and so on
52:15
Speaker 3: and so forth. You know, one example, what happened when
52:19
Speaker 3: you lose your core followers is the Qin General Zhang Han.
52:25
Speaker 3: Qin General Zhang Han was going from victory to victory.
52:28
Speaker 3: But once when Shang Yu had all the surrender Qin
52:33
Speaker 3: army massacred, you know, Zhang Fang was a broken man. He,
52:38
Speaker 3: he could, he could not rebuild another army after that
52:42
Speaker 3: because who, who would stick around and follow him anymore.
52:47
Speaker 3: And also Liu Bang didn't give him a chance to,
52:50
Speaker 3: to rebuild, rebuild another power base. And, and I think,
52:56
Speaker 3: I think that, that explanation makes sense.
52:58
Speaker 1: Yeah.
52:59
Speaker 3: In, Because Xiang Yu knew even if he did cross
53:03
Speaker 3: the Yangtze River, he will be a shadow of his
53:08
Speaker 3: former self.
53:10
Speaker 1: I think there is also because most of the Chu
53:13
Speaker 1: territory either has been or is being rapidly overrun.
53:20
Speaker 2: By the King of Han's armies.
53:22
Speaker 1: I mean, he would have to basically flee into exile
53:25
Speaker 1: into the Yue state that we talked about briefly. that
53:33
Speaker 1: set itself up in the final period of the Qin dynasty,
53:38
Speaker 1: of that Zhao dynasty. I think because, yeah, that's basically
53:42
Speaker 1: the other major power to the south.
53:44
Speaker 3: Well, no, no, no. I mean, he can just set
53:47
Speaker 3: him up in the land of Wu, right? The lower
53:51
Speaker 3: Yangtze Delta, right? That area, like crossing, he was crossing
53:57
Speaker 3: He could have crossed the Yangtze River to that area, Zhangdong, right?
54:02
Speaker 3: But he said, no, I cannot face the elders of Zhangdong.
54:06
Speaker 3: I got all their 8,000 sons killed. I brought none
54:09
Speaker 3: of them back. But another note is, you know, like
54:17
Speaker 3: now in the last few hundred years, the people of
54:23
Speaker 3: lower Yangtze Delta are usually... kind of portrayed as the
54:27
Speaker 3: effeminate scholars, right? But back then, they were like the
54:33
Speaker 3: core of Xiang Yu's army. They were known to be
54:36
Speaker 3: like a warlike people and warriors. But Xiang Yu said, no, no, no,
54:42
Speaker 3: I can't go back. I can't face the fathers of
54:45
Speaker 3: those 8,000 youth. That brought none of them back. Right.
54:53
Speaker 1: Probably also somewhat depressed from the concubine, Yu Jie, who
54:58
Speaker 1: committed suicide. The explanation that I heard is that she
55:02
Speaker 1: committed suicide because it's a breakout by a very small
55:06
Speaker 1: number of troops that's being attempted, right? So she would
55:10
Speaker 1: just kind of slow everyone down.
55:12
Speaker 3: Sure.
55:13
Speaker 2: I mean, because Xiang Yu.
55:18
Speaker 3: up to that point, he has not lost a single battle.
55:22
Speaker 3: It's just that the last battle that he was, it
55:25
Speaker 3: was too much for him. And, and whereas Liu Bang,
55:28
Speaker 3: he pretty much lost every battle he fought against Xiang Yu.
55:33
Speaker 3: He just won the last battle. You know, this is another, another, uh,
55:38
Speaker 3: a lesson about perseverance, you know, be like Liu Bang,
55:41
Speaker 3: you know, he, he, he, he keep on fighting and
55:44
Speaker 3: he keep on getting defeated, but he, he keep on getting,
55:50
Speaker 3: he keep fighting, even though he keep on getting defeated,
55:52
Speaker 3: but he keep on fighting until he finally won.
55:55
Speaker 4: Right.
55:56
Speaker 1: If you're not decisively defeated, then it doesn't really count.
55:59
Speaker 2: Right.
55:59
Speaker 3: So.
56:00
Speaker 1: Yeah.
56:01
Speaker 3: Yeah. He's a, he always hang in there and he
56:04
Speaker 3: started late too. He, He was still a low-level Qin,
56:09
Speaker 3: like a local Qin sheriff at age 48. And then,
56:12
Speaker 3: you know, by age 50, he already overthrew the Qin dynasty.
56:20
Speaker 3: And now it's, I think he's like 54 when he
56:24
Speaker 3: defeated Shang Yu. He spent another three, four years to
56:28
Speaker 3: defeat Shang Yu finally. And this... brings an end to
56:34
Speaker 3: the Chu-Han contention. And this is the beginning of the
56:38
Speaker 3: Han dynasty. But, you know, still a lot remains to
56:42
Speaker 3: be done because Liu Bang now has to contend with
56:46
Speaker 3: all these kings he himself created. You know, you have
56:51
Speaker 3: the most powerful Hanxin control the Qi territory and much
56:55
Speaker 3: of the former Chu territory. And Yin Bu also quadruple
57:00
Speaker 3: his holdings and you have And so....
57:06
Speaker 1: We will see the gradual shift from a kind of
57:14
Speaker 1: hegemon state dominating other hegemon state model that was revived
57:22
Speaker 1: during this Chu Han contention period to a more centralized
57:26
Speaker 1: administrative empire.
57:28
Speaker 3: We were.
57:29
Speaker 1: these generals, a bit of a spoiler, but these generals
57:33
Speaker 1: who were made kings will eventually get displaced by relatives
57:40
Speaker 1: of the Liu imperial line. And then those relatives' territories
57:45
Speaker 1: will get whittled down slowly, gradually, and eventually they will
57:50
Speaker 1: not be territorial powers until it all comes back in
57:56
Speaker 1: the Eastern Han period.
57:58
Speaker 2: But we will get that.
58:00
Speaker 3: Because right now it's uh it's a mixture governors right
58:04
Speaker 3: like uh there's a lot of the the former qin
58:08
Speaker 3: territory right now it's still following the qin rules where
58:11
Speaker 3: they get the the emperor directly appoint um you know
58:16
Speaker 3: the the prefecture governors etc and then you still have
58:19
Speaker 3: all these kings lying around you know it's state of
58:23
Speaker 3: yan state of zhao state of qi state of state
58:27
Speaker 3: of uh Jiujiang by Yimbu and the State of Liang
58:31
Speaker 3: by Pengyue. But this kind of mixed way was not
58:37
Speaker 3: going to last. We'll deal with how Liu Bang had
58:42
Speaker 3: to deal with this in his ripe old age.
58:47
Speaker 1: Going forward, we will also be entering into the period
58:50
Speaker 1: where the nomadic power to the north of China becomes
58:55
Speaker 1: a kind of existential danger. So far, all of these
59:00
Speaker 1: nomads during the Zhou Dynasty period, they're kind of not
59:05
Speaker 1: very powerful, it seems. They're all being taken down pretty regularly.
59:10
Speaker 1: by the Qing and the Zhao, and the Qing and
59:12
Speaker 1: later Zhao states and their cavalry. Even when they have cavalry,
59:16
Speaker 1: it is being incorporated into, for example, the Zhao forces.
59:21
Speaker 1: But as you have this consolidation in the Central Plains
59:25
Speaker 1: under the Han Dynasty, we will see a kind of
59:27
Speaker 1: similar consolidation of the first iteration of a nomadic steppe
59:32
Speaker 1: empire to the north that this Han state is going
59:35
Speaker 1: to have to deal with.
59:36
Speaker 3: Yeah, I will talk about that. So while the Qin
59:39
Speaker 3: Dynasty was collapsing, Xiongnu is making a comeback in this step.
59:47
Speaker 3: Because now there's nobody there to fight them, to contain
59:51
Speaker 3: them anymore. And that will lead to their clash with
59:57
Speaker 3: the new Fangtang dynasty. We'll talk about that later. Any
1:00:01
Speaker 3: other questions, comments?
1:00:03
Speaker 2: No, that should be all.
1:00:04
Speaker 1: I think this is a very sad but very dramatic end.
1:00:10
Speaker 1: to this earlier period of Chinese history.
1:00:15
Speaker 2: It's the most.
1:00:18
Speaker 1: Bloodstained glory moment uh for this hegemon king of western
1:00:23
Speaker 1: true he's basically on a hill with his 18 guys
1:00:26
Speaker 1: you know it is according to the memes what all
1:00:28
Speaker 1: the men fantasize about you know in in terms of
1:00:31
Speaker 1: in terms of dying he he lived he lived it
1:00:34
Speaker 1: and he is remembered you know for like thousands of
1:00:36
Speaker 1: years after and his in his in his protagonist in
1:00:39
Speaker 1: the opera and so forth.
1:00:40
Speaker 3: Right yeah i mean the grand uh historian sima jian
1:00:44
Speaker 3: obviously had great sympathies for shangri i mean he he
1:00:48
Speaker 3: he he criticized Xiang Yu for his massacres, you know, like, uh, but, but,
1:00:52
Speaker 3: but on the other hand, he's still have quite a
1:00:57
Speaker 3: admiration for, for Xiang Yu. Um, you know, it's, it's
1:01:01
Speaker 3: a juxtaposition between Xiang Yu and Liu Bang, right. It's
1:01:05
Speaker 3: quite amusing. Uh, you know, Xiang Yu, uh, what he started,
1:01:10
Speaker 3: but his whole career, Xiang Yu started when he was
1:01:14
Speaker 3: like 25. And he's dead by 30. Within that five years,
1:01:20
Speaker 3: that was quite memorable. And similar to Liu Bang, he also,
1:01:27
Speaker 3: late bloomer, he started his like 48, 49. And within
1:01:35
Speaker 3: the span of six, seven years, he's now the emperor
1:01:40
Speaker 3: of all China. Yeah. All right, guys. Until next time.
1:01:46
Speaker 2: Bye bye. Bye bye.