Video spoilers history, starting with the blitzkrieg on Poland

Chapter 867 How difficult was it to transport grain in ancient times? The Prime Minister's Nort

A new sky screen appears.

In the vast twilight, a team that stretched for dozens of miles was crawling in the valley like a tired giant snake.

Countless civilians were hunched over and wearing tattered sackcloth clothes.

Pushing the wooden-wheeled ox cart through the mud with difficulty.

Suddenly, an arrow flew through the air, and the leading civilian in front was hit in the throat and fell backwards.

The grain cart lost its balance and overturned.

The corn poured onto the dark red soil and was instantly soaked with blood.

After the video played, the sound began to play.

[How difficult was it to transport food during wars in ancient times? 】

[What do you think was the most difficult part of fighting in ancient times? ]

[What consumed the most in ancient wars? ]

[Do you think that in ancient times, fighting was just a general raising his arms and the soldiers charging forward with their weapons on their shoulders? ]

[Too naive! Just the question of how to feed the soldiers would make 99% of the generals collapse on the spot.]

[Don't believe it? Let's take a look today at how difficult it was to transport food during wars in ancient times! ]

【Let me first tell you some basic common sense. 】

【In ancient times, an army of 10 went out to fight. 】

[Just transporting the food costs 30 laborers...! ]

[You heard it right, it’s 30…or starting from 30! ]

[I am not making this up. The Art of War by Sun Tzu says: "One bell of enemy food is equivalent to twenty bells of our own."]

【What do you mean? 】

[It means to steal 1 liter of food from the enemy. ]

[Equivalent to the value of transporting 20 zhong of food from one's own rear.]

[We cannot trust the ancients completely. ]

【Then let’s do the math ourselves. 】

[When it comes to transporting food, the first problem is the means of transportation. ]

[In ancient times, there were no large trucks. People mainly carried things on their backs, mules and horses, or pulled ox carts.]

[But the question is: How much food should a person carry? ]

[If you carry too much, you can't walk; if you carry too little, you won't have enough to eat. 】

[A civilian can carry at most 6 dou of rice (about 72 jin). ]

[But I would consume 4 dou on the way, and only 2 dou could be delivered to the front line.]

[During the Han Dynasty, Emperor Wu of Han Dynasty launched a northern expedition against the Xiongnu. In order to ensure the supply of food and fodder for the Battle of Mobei, hundreds of thousands of civilians and livestock were mobilized, but less than half of the food was actually delivered to the front line.]

Outside the sky.

When Emperor Wu of Han, Liu Che, saw this, he couldn't help but smile bitterly.

"Not even half?"

"If half of the food could be delivered to the front, I would be so happy..."

"I have led several northern expeditions against the Xiongnu. Although I have achieved a lot, the cost has been enormous."

"An important reason for the alarming consumption is that logistics and transportation are extremely difficult."

"Especially when fighting outside the Great Wall, transporting food and fodder across the vast grasslands and Gobi Desert is an almost impossible task."

"If only half, or even one-third of the food could reach the front line successfully."

"I have already completely wiped out the Huns!"

Next to Liu Che, Huo Qubing said:
"To fight the Huns, I think we should still fight to support the war, seize food from the Huns and their tribes, and solve the food and grass problem."

"Otherwise, due to logistical constraints, it would be difficult to fight thousands of miles across the grassland."

Huo Qubing spoke based on his own experience, but Wei Qing standing beside him shook his head.

"That style of fighting is only suitable for small elite troops."

"But the real decisive battle involves tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of troops."

"But I can't take such a risk."

"Otherwise, if we make a mistake, the whole army could be wiped out."

"From the current situation, it is really difficult to solve the logistical problems."

"All I can say is that I try to satisfy you as much as possible... but obviously, it's impossible to be perfect."

What Wei Qing said was very realistic and helpless.

And the sky curtain continues to tell the story.

[Take Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition as an example. The distance from Hanzhong to the Qishan front was about 500 li.]

[According to ancient transportation standards, a 30-day journey would consume 60% of the food.]

[That is to say, if you transport 100 kilograms of food, only 40 kilograms will be left when you reach the front line.]

[If the battle line is extended a bit longer, the food transport team will starve to death before the food arrives! ]

【Weather and roads are also a serious problem.】

[The roads were muddy on rainy days and the grain trucks couldn't move at all.]

【Food tends to get moldy on hot days.】

[The mountains were blocked by heavy snow in winter, and even the roads could not be found. ]

[Even if the weather is good, transportation is not that easy. 】

[Don’t think that the official roads in TV dramas are all asphalt roads! ]

[In fact, most of the grain transportation routes are bumpy dirt roads, which turn into quagmires when it rains.]

[During the Three Kingdoms period, Zhuge Liang was on a northern expedition. In order to cross the rugged Shu Road, he invented the wooden ox and flowing horse. However, no matter how powerful the means of transportation was, it could only move at a snail's pace in front of the Qinling Mountains, which were "harder than climbing to the sky."]

【Imagine the soldiers fighting on the front line with empty stomachs. 】

[The food and fodder are stuck halfway up the mountain and can't be moved. How can we fight this battle? ]

[Moreover, with their low combat power and slow speed, the grain transport team is simply a sitting duck! ]

[The enemy's favorite thing to do is to attack the food supply route. ]

[The civilians responsible for transporting grain are even more miserable. ]

[Not only did they have to carry hundreds of kilograms of food over mountains and across ridges, but they also had to be on guard against enemy sneak attacks at any time.]

[When faced with an emergency military situation, eating and sleeping became a luxury. ]

[The trigger for the Chen Sheng and Wu Guang uprising was that the deadline was delayed due to heavy rain, and according to Qin Dynasty law, they would be punished.]

[It can be seen that in ancient times, it made no difference for civilians to fight on the battlefield! ]

[During the Battle of Guandu, Cao Cao burned Yuan Shao's granary, causing the collapse of Yuan's 100,000 troops.]

[One of the important reasons why Zhuge Liang invented the wooden ox and the flowing horse was to prevent the Wei army from robbing food.]

[But even so, the Shu Han's grain transport teams were often attacked by Sima Yi's men.]

【When it comes to food preservation, it is even more of a mystery. 】【Without preservatives and vacuum packaging, food will either get moldy or be eaten by insects if left for a long time. 】

[The army of the Song Dynasty often suffered from mass poisoning due to eating moldy food. ]

[Even worse was the Later Liang army during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, which was defeated because all its food was eaten by rats.]

[After a battle, even mice became the deciding factor! ]

[Do you think this is the end? ]

【There's something even more amazing! 】

[In ancient times, especially in times of chaos, grain transportation had to pass through the territories of various local officials, and plucking feathers from passing geese was a basic operation.]

[During the An-Shi Rebellion in the Tang Dynasty, the grain shipped from Jianghuai to Chang'an was deducted from every level, and if only half of it was left, it was considered clean.]

[The food has arrived, ready to be sent to the front line. 】

[But the cost of transporting food is greater than that of fighting! ]

[When Emperor Wu of Han fought against the Xiongnu, the transportation cost of transporting grain from Shandong to Mobei was 192 times the value of the grain itself! ]

[That is to say, for every 1 yuan of food that a soldier on the front line eats, the rear has to spend 192 yuan to transport it.]

[This isn't a war, this is clearly a money-burning competition! ]

[After reading this, do you finally understand why ancient people would often retreat when food ran out during a war? ]

Why did Zhuge Liang insist on making the "wooden ox and flowing horse"?

[Why do you insist on a quick victory when there are so many famous generals who can still fight? 】

[Because transporting food is really difficult! ]

[But then again, it is precisely because transporting food is so difficult that those battles that succeed in transporting food are so impressive.]

【For example, the Battle of Changping, the King of Qin fought to win the battle. 】

[As the King of Qin, he gritted his teeth and personally led the transport team, forcing the State of Zhao to force a decisive battle.]

[For example, during the Qin's campaign to conquer Chu, Wang Jian led an army of 60 soldiers and camped on the border of Chu for more than a year, relying on his perfect grain transportation system to wear out the Chu army.]

[So after the Qin Dynasty unified the country, it spent a lot of national strength to build roads and artificial canals to facilitate the subsequent transportation of grain for warfare.]

[Also, Yue Fei led the Northern Expedition. He was able to win battles one after another even though his logistics were constrained by the imperial court. This is real talent! ]

[In order to solve the problem of transporting grain, the ancients came up with various operations. 】

Cao Cao invented the "military farming system" to allow soldiers to farm while fighting, thus achieving self-sufficiency;

【Zhu Yuanzhang proposed "storing grain and building high walls" and built granaries in various places in advance;】

[However, these methods either require a long period of time to accumulate, or are too dependent on the external environment. When the critical moment comes, it is inevitable that a good cook cannot cook without rice. ]

[Some people may ask: Why not just collect grain from the local area? ]

[The answer is very realistic: During the war, the common people themselves could not even get enough to eat, so how could they have surplus food for the army?]

[Even if the tax is collected by force, it will provoke a civil uprising. ]

[Even if the common people can't fight, can't they run away? 】

【As for those who rob the fortress? 】

[The power of the various landlords was already intertwined, and there were city walls for protection. Even a powerful military leader like Shi Le had no choice but to cooperate with the northern tyrants.]

【Finally, let me tell you a fact that is extremely scary when you think about it carefully.】

[90% of the failures in ancient wars were not due to defeat, but due to lack of food! ]

[So, next time you read a historical novel, don’t just look at how the generals deployed their troops.]

【See more about how they solve the problem of eating. 】

[Because this is the true military wisdom! ]

The video ends here, and comments begin to appear.

"Before the troops move, food and fodder must be sent first. In ancient times, food was always the most important factor in determining the outcome of a war."

"It's not that there was no food in ancient times, it's mainly because the food couldn't be transported to the front line."

"Not to mention ancient times, even in World War II, the German army's supplies were piled up like mountains at the rear railway hubs, but they could not be transported to the front line."

《Even in modern times!》

"The value of the big, rotten road is still rising."

"The Prime Minister's Northern Expedition is too difficult, and the logistics are too much for him."

"Cheng Yu: Is it difficult to find military rations?"

"Huang Chao: What's so difficult about this? It doesn't matter what you eat."

"Sun Tzu said: If 10 men go to war, they will need 70 families to support them."

"Shen Kuo calculated that if there were too many soldiers, there would be no benefit, because of logistical problems."

"The Mongols were still ruthless back then, they just relied on robbing!"

"How could they rely entirely on robbing? When the Mongols went west, they brought a lot of military rations with them, which were basically milk powder and dairy products that were easy to carry, as well as a small amount of dried meat, and they set up some supply stations along the way."

"If I were Zhuge Liang, I would be shocked when I saw the road for transporting grain to the Northern Expedition!"

"It is indeed very difficult to transport food. No wonder ancient armies often ran out of food."

"So in ancient military groups, the person in charge of logistics was basically the second-in-command level."

After watching the entire video and netizens’ discussions.

Outside the sky.

Three Kingdoms.

Zhuge Liang, who was repeatedly used as an example, smiled bitterly with helplessness.

"It's difficult to transport food, and it's even more difficult to transport food to the front line through the Qinling Mountains."

"It seems that Tianmu has also said that even if I, Zhuge Liang, try my best, it will be difficult to ensure the long-term stability of military rations at the front line."

"If we want to have enough military rations, we may have to find a way from the front line."

"Zhuge Liang thought about it."

"I suddenly thought of an idea. Since it is difficult to transport grain."

"Can we solve the food problem directly at the front line?"

"Of course, Cao Wei won't let me harvest their grain for nothing."

"But if I can occupy a favorable base in the Guanzhong Plain."

“Reclaim the land and grow food right here.”

"After harvesting the grain in a few months, we can at least double the time of the Northern Expedition!"

"In this way, we can find an opportunity to break the deadlock in a decisive battle with the enemy."

“There will definitely be more.”

"So, if we really want to find a place to farm after leaving Qishan, where should we choose?"

Zhuge Liang thought as his eyes moved repeatedly on the map.