History of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms

Chapter 592: The Battle of Hutuo River 1
2. Sun Fangjian from Langshan
Two hundred miles northwest of Dingzhou (between Dingzhou and Yizhou, southwest of Yi County, Hebei Province today), there is a Wolf Mountain, also called "Langshan". Later, it was renamed, and I believe every Chinese knows this name - Langya Mountain.

The terrain here is dangerous, easy to defend but difficult to attack. The nearby residents built a fortress on the mountain to avoid harassment from rebel soldiers and bandits, and it became a safe haven for the nearby people.

Over time, the common people built a Buddhist temple in the fortress, with a nun named Sun Shenyi as the abbess, who was dedicated to the salvation of all life. Nun Sun Shenyi had been wandering around for many years, and knew some close-up magic and tricks. She took advantage of people's superstitious ideas to recruit believers, and used "magic" to seduce good men and women. She was revered as a living god by the local people. A complete cult organization.

The brothers Sun Fangjian and Sun Xingyou from Dingzhou were the most devout believers of Sun Shenyi. They claimed to be Sun Shenyi's nephews. They did not drink alcohol or eat meat. They acted as Sun Shenyi's servants, taking care of his food and daily life in every possible way. Taking advantage of the popularity of the demon nun Sun Shenyi, they became well-known "angels".

Later, the demon nun Sun Shenyi passed away. Seeing that the big IP that he had worked so hard to cultivate was going to be lost, Sun Fangjian was very unwilling, so he technically processed Sun Shenyi's body, made her appear in the public eye in a sitting position, put heavy makeup on her, and claimed to the public that she was just "sitting in meditation" (the soul ascended to heaven, the body temporarily held its breath and meditated), not really dead.

At the same time, Sun Fangjian continued to perform some tricks taught to him by Sun Shenyi.

As a result, the number of Langshan believers not only did not decrease, but increased more than before.

This area is the border between the Central Plains and Khitan, where wars are frequent and bandits are rampant, which is also the main reason for the formation of the Langshan base. As the war progressed, both countries passed the cost of the war on to the people. Years of natural disasters and heavy taxes further led to a large number of people fleeing. As mentioned earlier, tens of thousands of refugees left their homes in many parts of the country, especially in Hebei.

Another result of the refugees was the serious banditry. Refugees also needed to eat, so apart from begging along the way, they could only rob along the way.

Of course, some refugees fled to Langshan. Sun Fangjian selected the young and strong among them, incorporated them into his own armed forces, and then expanded the Langshan fortress and gradually built the Langshan base.

When the Khitans marched south, Sun Fangjian led the heroes of Langshan to take advantage of their home field, set up ambushes and specifically ambushed the Khitan army, seizing their weapons, armor, cattle, horses, food and other supplies.

Soon, the story of the heroes of Langshan spread all over the country, and the Langshan base became a revolutionary holy place in the hearts of countless Han people, so more people came to seek shelter from the organization. The Langshan base soon gathered more than a thousand households, and Sun Fangjian armed them all, and the whole people became soldiers, and their power grew stronger and stronger.

With more people, there were more mouths to feed. Under the leadership of Sun Fangjian, the heroes of Langshan had no choice but to rob houses and do banditry in Dingzhou and Yizhou.

Sun Fangjian was very smart and knew that the so-called "Wolf Mountain Heroes" were a bunch of bandits after all and would be wiped out by the imperial court sooner or later. After thinking it over, Sun Fangjian came up with a good idea: recruit them.

The heroes of Langshan entered the system and helped the imperial court fight against the Khitan. Both sides got what they needed and they agreed on the issue of amnesty.

The imperial court appointed Sun Fangjian as the "Northeast Recruiting Commander", giving him the power to organize militia and rob the Khitan on orders.

Of course, Sun Fangjian had to submit a letter of surrender to the imperial court, so he led his troops across the border many times, deep into the Khitan territory, burning, killing, looting, and reaping rich rewards.

If Sun Fangjian and his Langshan heroes had acted in this way, it would have been a legendary story. But Sun Fangjian was, after all, the leader of a cult and a bandit leader, and his bandit nature had not changed. He not only robbed the Khitans, but also the Han people, and had criminal records in both countries. Because he was not a real soldier, the purpose of his actions was not to systematically destroy the Khitans. The "strategy of exhausting the enemy" and the immediate short-term interests were the guiding principles for all his actions. They not only crossed the border to rob the Khitans' property, but also robbed the Han people's property in their own country. Anyway, they would rob whoever had money and food.

Whenever Sun Fangjian returned from crossing the border to plunder, he would report his achievements to the court and ask for rewards.

The court gradually became indifferent to Sun Fangjian. They wanted to use him to consume the Khitans. Killing the Khitans would quell the foreign invasion, and killing Sun Fangjian would put an end to the internal strife. The spoils looted by Sun Fangjian were already a policy allocation by the court. How could he really think of himself as an imperial general?
Think about the fate of the Liangshan heroes after they were recruited, and the image of the Langshan hero Sun Fangjian in the eyes of the court is almost the same. Therefore, the Later Jin court gradually could not satisfy Sun Fangjian's appetite.

The imperial court hated Sun Fangjian, and Sun Fangjian also disliked the imperial court. He thought that the imperial court made him provoke the Khitans and did not provide him with enough military pay, food, armor and weapons, which was obviously to make him a cannon fodder and send him to his death.

Therefore, in May of the third year of Kaiyun (946), Sun Fangjian led his Langshan heroes to angrily defect to the Khitan, expressing their willingness to act as guides for the Khitan army.

As for the token of surrender, Du Chongwei ran into trouble.

In this month, Du Chongwei sent his confidant Liu Yanhan to the border area to buy war horses, but was successfully intercepted by Sun Fangjian. Sun Fangjian presented Liu Yanhan to the Khitan, indicating that he had drawn a clear line between himself and the Later Jin regime.

Liu Yanhan took the opportunity to escape and brought the news of Sun Fangjian's rebellion back to Bianzhou.

The defection of Sun Fangjian, a hero of Langshan, to the enemy enabled the Khitans to obtain a qualified guide dog, laying a solid foundation for the Khitans to move south from Dingzhou.

3. Tuyuhun Baikejiu

When An Zhongrong rebelled before, he used sweet words to win over Bai Chengfu, the chief of the Tuyuhun tribe. Bai Chengfu was confused for a moment and got on board An Zhongrong's pirate ship. After being won over by the Later Jin court, Bai Chengfu came to his senses and returned to the right path. Through his relationship with Liu Zhiyuan, he defected to the Later Jin central court.

Shi Jingtang summoned Bai Chengfu to the central government and gave him generous rewards. After Shi Chonggui ascended the throne, Bai Chengfu led his Tuyuhun tribe to participate in the military operations against the Khitan, and was subsequently reorganized into Zhang Cong'en's troops in Weizhou and stationed in Huazhou.

Liu Zhiyuan, the guide for Bai Chengfu to defect to the Later Jin Dynasty, had ulterior motives towards the Tuyuhun tribe. He first annexed Bai Chengfu's elite Tuyuhun troops, and then became interested in Bai Chengfu's private property.

After the battle, Bai Chengfu transferred his troops to Lan and Shi states for grazing. Liu Zhiyuan used the excuse that his soldiers had committed crimes to severely punish them, openly oppressing the Tuyuhun people.

(End of this chapter)