The Conservative Liu biao.

[dymlos timbre]

In 207 while Cao Cao was away Fighting the battle of White wolf Mnt. Liu bei (crafty devil ) urged liu biao to attack Cao Cao, of course liu biao refused. Just how far do you think Liu biao would have gotten? was Cao prepared? guo jia predicted liu biao would not attack so if he actually had idk how prepared do you think cao cao would have been?

Would His reformed army after the battle of guan du help repel liu biao? ( the "central army" and "outer army")

[Qu Hui]

One of the reasons that Liu Biao did not attack Cao Cao was a lack of available troops. In 207, Liu Biao probably had near the 100,000 troops he had in 200. Cao Cao's army had probably five times that number, if not more. If Biao had attacked, he would have lost.

[Stallion Fury]

Even with a surprise attack, Liu Biao would have been crushed by Cao Cao's massive army.

[Dong Zhou]

500,000? Seems rather large and the majority of what he did have was away in the north

Liu Biao leaves say... 10,000 to defend south, 10,000 to defend against Liu Zhang, 10,000 to remain in order, Biao's 60k join up with Liu Bei's 10,000. Now who leads the attack? The main guy for the attack Wei is the biased and untrustworthy, but able, Liu Bei or call someone from central like Wei Ping? Invading someone leaves Jing open to invasion elsewhere, can that 10,000 border guard and 10,000 reinforcement hold? Whoever leads the charge is going to face the likes of Li Tong, Xun Yu, Cheng Deng and whoever else had been left to help hold the home front, Wei should have enough to prevent a quick victory for Liu Biao. The longer the war drags on, the worse it will get for the Jing forces

[jiang cheng]

I thought about it.

Liu Biao was a very smart man who chooses not to attack for any reasons.

1.) No confidence - Even through Cao Cao's army is away, they still have enough reserves to ward his campaign. The cao cao officers here might not likely to win here. They will not need to win anyway. All that they would need is to hold on till Cao Cao comes back. In the worse case situations, they would send someone to ask for help. Cao Cao will likely to come back or send someone back. They would not likely to success in any case. Even if they do, they will still have to face the main bulk of cao cao's army later. Cao Cao might have turn his attention to Liu Biao instead.

2.) liu bei - Liu Biao by now would have know the feuds between Cao Cao and Liu Bei. He did not want to go in between them and offend the powerful cao cao. Especially when the emperor was with Cao Cao (hostage by cao cao). Liu Biao didnt really trust liu bei. He was worried that in the event he suffered from a huge defeat, Liu Bei will take the chance to get rid of him and take over his land.

3.) Welfare of Jing citizens - Jing had been relatively shelter from all the violence. Cao Cao is not likely to fight him yet. At least not now. The people are not accustomed to lives in war. The welfare of the citizens was his first priority not expansion of land. If Cao cao was to launch an invasion, he would likely to spare the citizens. if they had sneak attack on Wei, Cao Cao would likely to slaughter everyone.

[Crazedmongoose]

One of the reasons that Liu Biao did not attack Cao Cao was a lack of available troops. In 207, Liu Biao probably had near the 100,000 troops he had in 200. Cao Cao's army had probably five times that number, if not more. If Biao had attacked, he would have lost.

Uh...where are these numbers coming from? They seem way too high.

Cao Cao at his HEIGHT would have had maybe 300,000. And that's including garrisons he needs to defend his many many many many fronts.


I highly disagree with the assessment that it was a military issue. Cao Cao was known to be cautious but there's only so many ways you can stretch so many men. He probably would have had a few thousand near the border, no more than one hundred thousand below the yellow river with no capable commanders except Xun Yu. And communication would have been near impossible. Cao Cao's cream troops, esp. the Qing Zhou troops and elite cavalry were all in the north. I don't think a successful attack could have completely destroyed Cao Cao militarily but it would may have put Liu Biao on equal footing with Cao Cao. As opposed to awaiting inevitable surrender/defeat like he ended up doing. Would have forced the court to move from Xu Chang to Ye most likely.


But that's just the military issues. In reality I do agree Liu Biao, even if he had been capable and decisive, had numerous really good reasons not to attack Cao Cao, some of them mentioned here. Firstly he wasn't a warlike man. As said, Jing Zhou at the time prospered because it was a peaceful region in a world embroiled in war. Talents and refugees from everywhere flocked to Liu Biao (such as Liu Bei). I don't think Liu Biao wanted to invite war on that. Besides if he went to war there's a chance he couldn't surrender to the court when the time came and live in peace/moderate power in all likelihood.

And secondly as mentioned by Jiang Cheng, Liu Biao did not trust Liu Bei. Liu Bei was renowned the world over at the time, as a talent and an ambitious man who could not serve under others. (This always baffled me, since he did no great deeds really and just suffered defeat after defeat at that time. I guess he must have been, as everybody suspects, a really extraordinary man).

[Dong Zhou]

He was recognized as a capable commander after many years in the north, a man of immense charisma and a capable governor. They also recognized that Liu Bei's record included defeats were he was outnumbered and had no real chance of winning so the battlefield record looked worse then it was

[Crazedmongoose]

Yeah I think I spoke hastily. I was just putting emphasis on how high profiled Liu Bei was at the time, which would have made Liu Biao in all probability feel very threatened.

And to clarify my earlier post, in my opinion a significant military success from Liu Biao would have only been possible if Liu Biao made a very serious (ie. all his available strength) persistent attack. Not like the type Yuan Shao made against Yu Jin.