Jiangji wrote:Can anyone give me info on the achievement of zhou yu other than battle of chibi ?
Zhou Yu had no lone grand achievements, heck Zhou Yu had no lone minor achievements to his name either. Everything he did was hand in hand with other generals. Chi Bi was a team effort between Wu and Liu Bei and the fire attack wasn't even Zhou Yu's doing. Suffice to say he's completely overrated.
Zhuge Liang however, you'll notice most of the people that say he wasn't a military strategist are the hardcore Wei and Wu supporters. Rarely do their claims have anything to do with the actual history so much as they are just trying to make their chosen sides look nicer in comparison. And before anyone tries to brand me, no I'm not a Shuist; I just give credit where credit is due.
Zhuge Liang's texts on war are numerous, and he was widely regarded as a phenomenal military leader not just for his clever ambushes and his superb leadership ( in fact I have a book here called Mastering the Art of War that includes Liu Ji's interpretations of military formation and Zhuge Liang's essays on the perfect general/ideal leader ), but for his nearly legendary ability to gain popular support wherever he went. He held the highest civil and miliatry ranks in Shu and pretty much single-handedly ran all the affairs of the kingdom. It's been said when he died he was doing so much work himself the burden was enough to kill two men. I'd recommend looking up some of his essays and other notes, they're quite impressive reads.
Much credit of Cao Cao's escape actually belonged to Cao Ang, his own son that offer him his own horse -- after Cao Cao's Dawan's horse was died of an arrow.... And to some lesser extent, Cao Amin, his nephew. Not much of Dian Wei since the pursuers already catching up even without Dian Wei guarding the front gate...