In ancient Chinese history, there were many strategists who used insidious stratagems to achieve their goals, and these people were often called "poisoners", and those schemes were naturally "poisonous schemes".
Among them, the strategy of Wei Guo's horse Gongsun to divide Wei Wuhou and Wu Qi can be called one of the masterpieces.
Wu Qi was a well-known military strategist in the early years of the Warring States period in China, although his family was wealthy, but due to the early death of his father, Wu Qi, who was young, also suffered discrimination from the powerful around him.
This made him deeply resentful of the hereditary system, and he planned to rely on his own power to change all this.
So Wu Qi began to study everywhere, hoping to improve his ability, and eventually he worshiped Zeng Shen, the second son of Confucius's master disciple Zeng Shen, and studied classics such as "Zuo Chuan" under the leadership of Zeng Shen.
In the book "Zuo Chuan", Wu Qi comprehended a lot of military and political knowledge, which made him obsessed with learning, and began to read books such as "The Art of War" without asking about other things.
During this period, Wu Qi's mother died of illness, but Wu Qi refused to return to his hometown for the funeral on the grounds of studying, which was unacceptable in the eyes of Zeng Shen, who valued filial piety, so he drove Wu Qi away.
After that, Wu Qi found a position in the state of Lu, during which he achieved good results with his outstanding military talents, but because Wu Qi's political ideas caused the dissatisfaction of the magnates, they played right and wrong in front of Lu Mugong, and finally forced Wu Qi to enter the state of Wei to seek opportunities.
At that time, the monarch of Wei was a generation of Ming monarchs, Wei Wenhou, who greatly appreciated Wu Qi's ability and gave him a lot of power.
With his support, Wu Qi not only formed the first professional army of the Warring States, Wei Wushu, but also conquered a large area of land west of Hexi for Wei, making Wei the most powerful country at that time.
In terms of politics, Wu Qi adopted Li Kui's political line, not only abolishing the hereditary privileges of the old aristocracy and establishing a new bureaucratic system, but also conferring titles and titles on commoners according to merit and positions according to talent.
The aristocratic bureaucrats who were on the corpse were purged in large numbers, which gave a new political atmosphere to the Wei state.
However, these moves by Wu Qi also touched the core interests of the Wei aristocracy, who did not dare to act during the reign of Wei Wenhou.
However, after the death of Wei Wenhou, they tried their best to sow discord between Wu Qi and the newly succeeded Wei Wuhou, especially the most active in the case of Gongsun Acne.
Gongsun Yan married the princess Gui as a concubine at that time, and also had a certain status in the Wei court, but this person did not have any extraordinary ability, so if Wu Qi was in power, he was likely to be eventually cleared out of the bureaucracy.
But with Gongsun Acne's ability and prestige, it is almost impossible to bring down Wu QiTherefore, he decided to drive a wedge between Wu Qi and Wei Wuhou, and in order to achieve this goal, he came up with a brilliant bitter plan.
At that time, Wu Qi had been working and living in Wei for a long time, but he never got married.
At this time, there happened to be a princess who had not yet married in the Wei Hou family, so Gongsun Acne, who was a concubine, found Wei Wuhou and proposed that Wei Wuhou could marry the princess to Wu Qi, so as to enhance the relationship between the monarch and the minister.
But at the same time, he also spoke in the ears of Wei Wuhou, who suggested that Wu Qi had been operating in the Hexi region for more than twenty years, holding the most elite troops of Wei, and some people said that he had already become disobedient.
This marriage can also be a small test to test Wu Qi's loyalty, if he readily accepts, then it means that Wu Qi has no objection, otherwise he will have to be more wary of him.
After the Marquis of Wei succeeded to the throne, the magnates of Wei often spoke ill of Wu Qi around him, so he quickly accepted Gongsun Acne's suggestion and decided to marry the princess Xu to Wu Qi.
After completing the preparations, Gongsun Acne's second task was to get Wu Qi to refuse the marriage, and he naturally didn't dare to make up rumors about the princess, so he came up with a sinister solution.
For a period of time after that, Gongsun Acne often let his wife beat and scold him, and even went to Wu Qi's side to perform.
This made Wu Qi have a bad impression of the women of the Wei royal family, so when the letter proposing marriage was sent to him, Wu Qi refused almost immediately.
Wu Qi's attitude aroused the suspicion of Wei Wuhou, and later, under the influence of the slanderous rumors of his close minister Wang Cuo, Wei Wuhou transferred Wu Qi out of the Hexi area, where he had operated for many years.
Wu Qi, who knew that he had lost the trust of the monarch, was extremely annoyed that he had lost the opportunity to defeat the Qin state, and left the Wei state soon after.
After Wu Qi left, many of the political reforms he implemented were overturned by the elites, and people like Gongsun Qi benefited from them.
At the same time, however, the Wei state also experienced a significant decline in national power, and soon they lost their towns west of the river and lost their former bravery.
Gongsun Xuan used a bitter trick to force away a top military strategist like Wu Qi, which also made this scheme a famous poisonous trick in Chinese history.
However, the reason why this strategy was successful was also related to Wu Qi's own character flaws.
First of all, Wu Qi's attitude towards his wife is very bad, When he was living in Weiguo in his early years, Wu Qi took off his wife because the size of the belt he made did not meet his requirements, which directly caused him to be excluded by Weiguo**.
When he was in the state of Lu, Wu Qi had already married a Qi woman, and when the state of Qi attacked the state of Lu, Wu Qi directly killed his wife in order to show his loyalty.
It can be seen that he doesn't care much about the love of his children, which is also one of the key factors for Gongsun Acne's strategy to work.
In addition, although Wu Qi had outstanding military and political talents, he was not good at speculating on the mind of the ruler, and it was difficult to hear the voice of the ruler.
For example, his understanding of Wei Wuhou's marriage to the princess only stayed on the surface, which made him fail to react correctly, and finally lost everything he had worked so hard to manage.
After leaving the Wei State, Wu Qi went to the Chu State to develop, but he still did not learn a lesson, and he was completely indifferent to easing the relationship between himself and the powerful, and finally ended up with a tragic death.
Wu Qi's sluggish political sense is also an important factor in the effectiveness of Gongsun Acne's poisonous plan.
Gongsun Acne's poisonous plan to divide Wei Wuhou and Wu Qi eventually led to the decline of the Wei state, which is also the key reason why this strategy has been repeatedly discussed.
But the author thinks that even if there is no Gongsun Acne to get in the way, it will be difficult for Wu Qi to have a chance to show his strengths and kicks.
Because he did not properly handle the relationship between himself and the powerful, and the political structure of the Wei State still had fundamental problems, Wu Qi's defeat was actually an inevitable outcome.
Part of the content of this article is referred to from "**Wei Guo Wu Qizhi Three Sayings", published in "Caizhi" 2018 Issue 03.
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