At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, why didn't nomadic people take advantage?

Nomads have long been a menace to the Central Plains dynasty, and they often take advantage of the weakness or division of the Central Plains dynasty to indirectly or directly lead to the replacement of the dynasty. But strangely, during the historical period of the division of the Three Kingdoms at the end of the Han Dynasty, they did not take advantage of it with great fanfare or even disappeared. Why?

First of all, the nomadic people at this time are in a period of disintegration and weakness, and it is difficult to form an effective threat. Just as the Central Plains dynasty was in a period of division and war, so were the nomadic people in the north. Take the active Xiongnu in Qin and Han Dynasties as an example. At the end of the Western Han Dynasty, it was divided into two parts, north and south, and its strength was greatly weakened. After the establishment of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the southern Xiongnu chose to be attached to the Eastern Han Dynasty, and the northern Xiongnu continued to be an enemy of the Eastern Han Dynasty. In the middle of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the government of the Eastern Han Dynasty and the Southern Xiongnu jointly launched several wars, defeated the Northern Xiongnu and forced it to move westward, thus withdrawing from the historical stage of China.

The southern Xiongnu left behind also fell into internal division at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. In A.D. 188, Khan of the Southern Xiongnu died in a coup d' é tat, and the new capital of Oracle bones was set up by all the ministries in the retouching. /kloc-in 0/89, the Duke of Oracle Bone Inscriptions died and the tribal elders took his place. At this time, Yu Fuluo, the son of Qiangqu, led his troops to help the Eastern Han Dynasty Wang Chao counter-insurgency. However, he can only lead his troops to set up another Wang Ting in Pingyang, Hedong, and set up his own business. The division and civil strife of the southern Xiongnu made it impossible to launch a large-scale invasion during the period of warlord melee and separatist regime. Yu Fuluo and Hu Chuquan could only choose to join the peasant rebels in Bing area or join Yuan Shao in the separatist war, but Cao Cao finally defeated them one by one and surrendered to the imperial court.

The Xianbei nationality, which rose at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, was the same as the Huns. After the defeat of the Northern Xiongnu, the Xianbei nationality gradually occupied the native land of Xiongnu, and its leader Tan briefly integrated the ministries of Xianbei during the reign of Emperor Wu of Han Dynasty, posing a great threat to the Eastern Han Dynasty. However, after Tan's death, Khan's ability to succeed to the throne was mediocre, and the ministries of Xianbei soon fell into division and civil strife. Although Bi Ke was able to rise once in the early period of Cao Wei, he was beheaded by Cao Wei soon, which caused Xianbei not to form an effective threat until the demise of Cao Wei.

The Qiang, Di and other ethnic groups active in northwest China have been fighting against the Central Plains dynasty for a long time, but they have not been able to form a joint force, and they are basically fighting on their own, and their relations are extremely loose. Therefore, on the whole, the nomadic people in the north happened to be in the weak period of civil strife at this time, and it was difficult to pose a substantial threat to the Central Plains Dynasty without a strong ruler.

Secondly, the Central Plains Dynasty carried out a moderate "strategic contraction", giving up some border territories and easing the relationship between the two sides. Although the northern nomads did not pose a substantial threat to the Central Plains Dynasty, small-scale harassment continued and occupied some northern border counties. However, the divided Eastern Han and Cao Wei regimes were limited by their national strength, and finally there was a certain degree of "strategic contraction", which they had no choice but to accept.

It is especially obvious in the Bingzhou area, which was invaded most seriously by Xianbei and South Xiongnu. Yunzhong, Shuofang, Dingxiang and Wuyuan counties are located in the north of Bingzhou, adjacent to South Xiongnu and Xianbei. After the Yellow turban insurrectionary broke out, Xianbei and South Xiongnu took advantage of the Eastern Han government to suppress the rebellion, and the Eastern Han government had no time to take care of it. These four counties soon fell, and the southern Xiongnu forces gradually penetrated into the whole territory of Bing. After Yuan Shao occupied Bingzhou, he chose to maintain relations with the southern Xiongnu for the sake of competing for the Central Plains, but he did not want to recapture the four counties. After Cao Cao occupied Bingzhou, although he defeated the southern Xiongnu and rebuilt the ruling order through measures such as resettling the population and cleaning the strongmen, he could not recapture the four counties for the time being. In 2 15 AD, Emperor Xian of Han Dynasty under the control of Cao Cao wrote to abandon Yunzhong, Shuofang, Dingxiang and Wuyuan counties and set up a new county in the north of Taiyuan County to accommodate the existing population of the four counties and implement "strategic contraction".

The map of the secretariat of the Eastern Han Dynasty shows that the above four counties are all in northern Xinjiang.

Cao Cao's move is a true manifestation of the decline and fragmentation of the Eastern Han Dynasty, because he urgently needs to stabilize the rule and end the division, and the harassment of nomadic people is a "scabies disease" in comparison. Without posing a substantial threat, some concessions can be made to the lost territory, so as to appease Zhu Rong and ease the relationship between the two sides. If we persist in recovering lost ground, we will definitely fight, and the loss will outweigh the gain. The recognition of the vested interests of the divided South Xiongnu and Xianbei will temporarily dispel the idea of large-scale invasion.

Thirdly, the Central Plains dynasty moved nomads inward on a large scale, which promoted national integration. Due to the influence of war, famine and epidemic disease, the population loss in the Central Plains is very serious and the labor force is seriously insufficient. When Cao Cao initially consolidated his rule in the north, how to resume production and fill the labor vacancy became a problem that must be solved. Cao Cao, who controlled the government of the Eastern Han Dynasty, gave the countermeasure of "immigration". When Yuan Shao defeated and occupied Bing, Cao Cao moved many local people to Yuzhou.

However, in this way, there is a population gap in the border area of Binzhou, which is not conducive to restoring production and stabilizing border defense. In this regard, Cao Cao came up with a way to kill two birds with one stone, and moved the southern Xiongnu from northern Xinjiang to the hinterland of Bingzhou. Cao Cao didn't do this, because by the middle of Jian 'an period, some southern Xiongnu, under the pressure of Xianbei, had moved to the south and lived with the local people for a period of time. Historically, it is said that "Hu Di was in the boundary, Zhang Xiong was domineering, and the officials and people rebelled and joined his family". Cao Cao re-established the ruling order in Bingzhou, and formally abandoned Yunzhong, Shuofang, Dingxiang and Wuyuan counties in 2 15. The following year, when he went to Hu Chuquan to appear before Yecheng, he detained Khan, divided the southern Xiongnu into five parts and moved to Fenyang County, Qixian County, Xixian County, Xinzhou City and Wenshui County in Shanxi Province. The number of immigrants is nearly 30,000, and the population is about 6.5438+0.5 million. The ministries were ruled by the southern Xiongnu nobles, and the Eastern Han government sent Sima to supervise and manage them.

The inward migration of the southern Xiongnu on such a scale alleviated the shortage of labor force to a certain extent, and provided military strength for Cao Wei to enrich the border defense and resist Xianbei in the Eastern Han Dynasty. Later, Cao Cao extended this experience to Guanzhong area, and moved Qiang and Di nationalities on a large scale to enrich the local population to resist the harassment of Liu Bei and Shu Han. This series of policies was continued by Cao Wei. This is the first time in the history of China that the nomadic people have been moved to China on a large scale by an official organization, which has brought far-reaching influence. Although the immigration policy has played an important role in restoring social and economic development and promoting ethnic integration, it has objectively changed the ethnic composition of Bingzhou and Guanzhong areas, laying the groundwork for the emergence of the "Five Chaos" in the future.

To sum up, the southern Xiongnu, Xianbei, Qiang and Di nationalities in the Three Kingdoms period at the end of the Han Dynasty were all in a period of division and civil strife, which could not pose a substantial threat to the Central Plains dynasty. In addition, in the face of the pressure of nomadic people, the Eastern Han Dynasty and Cao Wei regime implemented the policy of "strategic contraction" and "national migration", which eased the relationship between the two sides and promoted national integration. Therefore, during the split of the Three Kingdoms at the end of the Han Dynasty, there was no large-scale invasion by nomadic people in the north.