《资治通鉴·秦纪》104｜阴谋失算让秦国版图又又又膨胀了

Summary

This 芮淇讲透资治通鉴 episode follows early 嬴政 / 秦始皇 rule under 吕不韦, when 韩国 sends 郑国 to make 秦国 spend huge resources on the 郑国渠. The plan is meant to “fatigue Qin,” but the completed canal strengthens Qin’s Guanzhong grain base and becomes a source case for self-defeating resource-drain strategy.

The second half turns from Qin’s growing capacity to eastern-state self-damage. Qin attacks 魏国 while 信陵君 remains politically unusable, 赵国 attacks Wei rather than rescuing it, and 廉颇 is removed, slandered by 郭开, and left to die abroad after 赵道襄王 fails to recover him.

Key Claims

• The source opens with Ying Zheng still young, while Lu Buwei decides state affairs as the dominant Qin minister.
• Qin’s own court is not stable, but the episode argues that the six eastern states keep making choices that help Qin’s unification project.
• In 246 BCE, 蒙敖 suppresses the Jinyang disturbance after the Qin succession.
• Han sends the hydraulic specialist Zheng Guo into Qin to persuade Qin to build a major canal, hoping the labor and expense will delay Qin’s eastward wars.
• The plan works only because the proposed water project is real and useful; the episode therefore treats it less as simple hidden sabotage than as a strategy with an “open” engineering surface.
• Lu Buwei already wants to improve Guanzhong irrigation and grain output, so Han’s proposed burden also matches Qin’s long-term state-capacity interest.
• In 237 BCE, when the canal is near completion, Qin nobles use the discovered plot to argue for expelling foreign guests from the six states.
• Zheng Guo admits the original Han motive but argues that abandoning the nearly finished canal would waste the sunk cost, while completion would benefit Qin for generations.
• Ying Zheng accepts the argument, lets Zheng Guo finish the project, and withdraws the expulsion order.
• In 236 BCE, the canal is completed and named 郑国渠, making the source’s central irony that Han’s attempt to exhaust Qin increases Qin’s agricultural and military base.
• In 245 BCE, Qin attacks Wei around Juancheng and kills thirty thousand, but Wei Anxi Wang still does not bring Xinlingjun back into active use.
• Zhao sends Lian Po with troops, but the campaign attacks Wei’s Fanyang rather than rescuing Wei from Qin.
• After 赵丹 / 赵孝成王 dies, Zhao Yan succeeds as Zhao Daoxiang Wang and replaces Lian Po with 乐乘.
• Lian Po refuses the command transfer, attacks Le Cheng, flees to Wei, and then remains unused because Wei also mistrusts him.
• When Zhao later wants to test whether Lian Po can return, Guo Kai bribes the envoy to report that Lian Po is old and physically unreliable despite his display of appetite and vigor.
• Lian Po is eventually invited to 楚国, but he cannot recreate his Zhao command environment and dies at Shouchun.
• The ending previews Li Mu and the Xiongnu as the next Zhao-frontier branch.

Key Quotes

“让韩国延长几年寿命” - Zheng Guo’s admitted original motive as the source summarizes it.

“廉颇老矣，尚能饭否” - the remembered question around whether Lian Po could still command.

“我思用赵人” - Lian Po’s late complaint that he cannot use Chu troops as he used Zhao troops.

Connections

• Qinji 103-2, 嬴政 / 秦始皇, 吕不韦, 蒙敖, and 秦国 - continuation from Ying Zheng’s accession into early regency-era Qin action.
• 韩国, 郑国, 郑国渠, 疲敌反强敌, and 阴谋阳谋转换 - Han’s “fatigue Qin” plan and its backfiring engineering payoff.
• 秦国东进压力, 魏国, 大梁, and 信陵君 - Qin’s attack on Wei while Wei’s most important anti-Qin aristocrat remains sidelined.
• 赵国, 廉颇, 赵道襄王, 乐乘, and 郭开 - Zhao’s command distrust and the destruction of Lian Po’s late-career return.
• 谣言侵蚀信任, 阵前换将风险, and 反间流言楔入 - adjacent mechanisms for how states damage their own usable commanders.
• 楚国 - Lian Po’s final host state after Zhao and Wei fail to use him.

Contradictions

• No direct contradiction with existing wiki content found.
• Source-scope caution: the canal exposure in 237 BCE and completion in 236 BCE are recorded as this episode’s chronology and not independently reconciled here against other Zhengguo Canal datings.
• Source-scope caution: the envoy’s report about Lian Po’s age and bodily weakness is preserved as the episode’s narrative of the “廉颇老矣” tradition, not treated as a verified medical assessment.