Many people know that in Chinese history, there was a famous overlord of Western Chu named Xiang Yu. This overlord of Western Chu was a very important role in the history of the late Han Dynasty. Later, although he was defeated by Liu Bang, it was widely remembered by later generations.
But you know what? After Xiang Yu, more than a thousand years later, at the end of the Sui Dynasty and the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, there was another overlord of the Western Qin Dynasty in Chinese history, and his experience was also extremely legendary. This overlord of Western Qin not only defeated Li Shimin head-on, but also almost took Chang'an, so that Li Yuan's family has been removed from the list since then. If he can live for ten more years, it is very likely that the Tang Dynasty will not be surnamed Li!
This overlord of Western Qin is named Xue Ju.
The detailed birth year of Xue Ju is unknown, but it can be verified that Xue Ju should have been born in the Northern Zhou Dynasty. Xue Ju was born in the famous Hedong Xue family, and the surname Xue was one of the six major surnames in Kansai at that time. Although the Xue family is not as prominent as the Guanlong family at the top of the list, and it is not as prosperous as the Shandong Shi clan at that time, in general, it can be regarded as a big family. Later, the Xue Wanche brothers under Li Shimin, and the later famous Tang Dynasty general Xue Rengui were all from this surname.
Of course, Xue Ju himself and Xue Rengui, a famous general of the Tang Dynasty, must not have a close blood relationship, and the two are the same ancestors many generations ago.
When Xue Ju was a teenager, he moved to live in Lanzhou, Gansu Province with his father Xue Wang. "Old Tang Book" uses twenty-four words to describe Xue Ju in his early years: magnificent appearance, fierce and good at shooting, superb martial arts, huge family wealth, rich and cunning, and majestic in Bian Shuo.
It can be seen from these twenty-four characters in the "Old Tang Book" that Xue Ju when he was young was a typical heroic character. This kind of person may not go down in history when he is in his prime, but he can often make a career in troubled times. Later, Xue Ju's experience also indirectly proved this truth. When the Sui Dynasty was stable, Xue Ju joined the army and enlisted in the army, and he only achieved a small official like the captain of Jincheng Mansion, and he was not too important. But at the end of the Sui Dynasty, Xue Ju took advantage of the situation and became a generation of heroes.
In April of the thirteenth year of the Great Cause, the area of Gansu in Shaanxi at that time coincided with the famine year, and the thieves in Longxi swarmed. At that time, Xue Ju took a fancy to this opportunity, and in the name of begging for thieves, he quickly and legally pulled up a team of thousands of people. After having the actual military power in his hands, Xue Ju directly killed the local magistrate, announced the army, and proclaimed himself the overlord of Western Qin.
With thousands of men and horses in hand, next, Xue Ju began his myth of invincibility.
After raising the army, Xue Ju led the army to quickly conquer the city and conquer the territory, and soon laid a large territory. Then, Xue Juqin led 2,000 elites to attack the Sui Dynasty defender Huangfu Juan, who had 10,000 troops. At the beginning of this battle, Xue Ju's army was against the wind, and the Sui army was downwind. But after the two sides started fighting, the direction of the wind changed in an instant, and even God was helping Xue Ju!
As a result, in this battle, Xue Ju not only defeated the Sui army, which was several times his strength, but also completely ate all the strength of the Sui army. After this battle, the Qiang Zhong of Minshan was customary, and when he saw that Xue raised his troops to the extreme, he directly led 20,000 people to surrender. The military strength under Xue Ju's command swelled all of a sudden. In the next few days, Xue Ju won the territory of Shanzhou and Kuozhou. From the beginning of the army, in just over a month, Xue Ju jumped from a small captain of the Sui Dynasty to the overlord of Western Qin who unified the land of Longxi!
After the unification of Longxi, Xue Ju already had an army of 130,000 and became one of the strongest separatist warlords in the world at that time. And all this, Xue Ju did it in just over a month.
If this does not prove Xue Ju's military talent. Then Xue Ju's next series of more exaggerated records may be enough to explain everything.
After completely unifying Longxi, Xue Ju began to consider continuing to expand outward. However, at this time, it was already necessary for Xue Ju to get a name. So, in July of the thirteenth year of the Great Cause, Xue Ju was proclaimed emperor in Lanzhou. It was only more than three months since Xue raised his troops.
After Xue Ju became emperor, he began to develop in the Guanzhong region. The first enemy he encountered was a separatist warlord named Tang Bi. This Tang Bi, in the later romance**, was Qin Qiong's top boss when he was an official in the Sui Dynasty. In real history, this Tang Bi is also a ruthless character, taking advantage of the chaos in the world at the end of the Sui Dynasty, he supported a person named Li Hongzhi as the emperor, and he monopolized the power, and there were more than 100,000 troops under his command. For Tang Bi, Xue Ju played a small conspiracy, first persuading Tang Bi to temporarily surrender and cooperate with him. Tang Bi was obsessed with the ghost and killed Li Hongzhi, who he supported. Then Xue Ju took advantage of Tang Bi's defenselessness and directly led the army to defeat Tang Bi, and then incorporated all the troops under Tang Bi's command. And Tang Bi himself, although he escaped by luck, was still killed on the way to escape.
After swallowing Tang Bi in one go, the army under Xue Ju's command swelled to more than 200,000 people at once. At this time, Xue Ju, whose strength had greatly expanded, finally connected with Li Yuan. At that time, Li Yuan had just taken Chang'an and supported Yang Yu as the emperor. Xue Ju made a plan and continued to lead the army to the east, intending to take Chang'an in one go.
But this time, the myth of Xue Ju's invincibility was temporarily ended. Because Li Yuan sent to meet him, it was his life's nemesis, the later Tang Taizong Li Shimin. Although Xue Ju's army is strong, he has swallowed too many results in one go, and he has not had time to fully digest them. So in the first battle between him and Li Shimin, it ended in the defeat of Xue Ju, losing thousands of men and horses, and Xue Ju himself had to retreat to Longyou.
Xue Ju, who failed for the time being, began to face up to Li Yuan and Li Shimin, the father and son. In the following month, on the one hand, he sent people to contact the Turks in the north, hoping that the Turks could help him and join forces with him to attack Li Yuan. However, this plan was finally stopped by Li Yuan sending Yu Wenxin to envoy the Turks.
After the first confrontation between the two sides, there were several months, and by June of the first year of Wude, Li Yuan had ascended the throne in Chang'an, and after receiving the support of the Guanzhong group, Li Yuan finally began to take the initiative to expand. Thus, the second battle between Li Yuan's group and Xue Ju began.
In this battle, Li Yuan still sent Li Shimin to meet Xue Ju. After careful consideration, Li Shimin found that although Xue Ju's combat power was strong, it was lost in logistics and supply, so Li Shimin adopted a tactic that could not be adhered to, which gave Xue Ju a big headache for a while. But then, God was on Xue Ju's side again. During the war between the two sides, Li Shimin actually fell ill! And he was seriously ill and bedridden, and he could not command the army at all!
Thinking about Li Shimin's illness, and then thinking about the strange wind when Xue Ju started the army, Xue Ju's luck is really good.
Without Li Shimin's command, the Tang Dynasty army was no longer Xue Ju's opponent. In the following battle, because of illness, Li Shimin temporarily handed over the military power to Liu Wenjing and Yin Kaishan. Although these two people are also famous for a while, they are too far behind compared to Xue Ju. Xue Ju used a method to lure the enemy into going deeper, inducing the Tang army to fight, and then the Tang army collapsed directly in a battle!
In this battle, Xue Ju wiped out five or six out of ten troops under Li Shimin's command at once. This is not an exaggeration, but something that is clearly recorded in the history books. In addition to losing more than half of the troops, even Liu Hongji, Li Anyuan and other Tang Dynasty generals were also captured by Xue Ju.
After the defeat, the generals of the Tang Dynasty probably finally understood why Li Shimin had closed up and not fought before. It's not because he doesn't want to fight, but because the combat power of this Western Qin overlord is too fierce! You can't win a head-on fight at all!
Li Shimin's defeat made the entire Chang'an panic. At that time, Xue Ju, after defeating the army led by Li Shimin, was fully capable of chasing the Tang army all the way and directly hitting Chang'an City.
But at this time, another extremely strange thing happened. It was this incident that completely changed the historical trend of the end of the Sui Dynasty.
Xue Ju fell ill and died.
Just when Xue Ju had just defeated the Tang army and was about to besiege Chang'an, Xue Ju suddenly fell ill mysteriously, and then died of illness.
This bizarre period is very rare in the entire history of China. However, it is precisely because of Xue Ju's death that the direction of history has completely changed. After Xue Ju's death, his son Xue Rengao ascended the throne. Xue Rengao's ability is far inferior to his father Xue Ju. In the first year of Wude, on August 9, Xue Ju died, and Xue Rengao ascended the throne. On 17 August, Li Yuan again sent Li Shimin to lead an army to attack. Without Xue Ju in charge, Li Shimin finally enjoyed the thrill of breaking through again this time. In the following battle of Shallow Water Plain, Li Shimin defeated Xue Rengao in a battle. In the end, on the eighth day of the first month of November, Xue Rengao, who was completely beaten and had no choice, could only surrender to the Tang Dynasty.
At this time, exactly three months had passed since Xue Ju's death. According to historical records, when Xue Rengao surrendered, Xue Ju's body had not yet had time to be buried.
A generation of Western Qin overlords ended their glory in this form.
Throughout Xue Ju's life, there seems to be a lot of luck in his success, and there seems to be a lot of luck in his failure. This can't help but make us sigh, is there really any qi in the dark? However, there has always been another saying about Xue Ju's failure, that is, the killing is unknown.
According to historical records, Xue Ju "every time he broke the formation, all the soldiers he obtained were killed, and many people killed people broke their tongues and noses, or smashed them". This kind of cruel means of killing and surrendering is undoubtedly intolerable to later historians. As for his son Xue Rengao, the history books use the words "kill as many people as possible" to describe it. In fact, from this point of view, Xue Ju's defeat was not a good thing for the people at that time.
In addition, it is worth mentioning that after Xue Ju was proclaimed emperor in Lanzhou, the imperial palace built was later changed into a temple called Zhuangyan Temple after the Tang Dynasty pacified Longxi. To this day, when we go to Lanzhou, we can still see this ancient temple.
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