It took the Northern Song Dynasty about 10 years to eliminate local separatist forces one after another. The Nanping, Wuping, Houshu, Southern Han and other regimes also perished. Wuyue Kingdom had actually surrendered to the Northern Song Dynasty. The Southern Tang Dynasty was among the southern countries. He was considered the strongest, and the Southern Tang Dynasty had always been submissive, making it difficult for Zhao Kuangyin to find a reason to use troops. Therefore, Zhao Kuangyin had to conquer the surrounding countries first and form a siege of the Southern Tang Dynasty, and then look for opportunities and excuses to destroy the Southern Tang Dynasty. Zhao Kuangyin first sent an envoy to ask Li Yu to go to the DPRK for pilgrimage. Li Yu had a premonition that the situation was not right and refused on the grounds of illness. Zhao Kuangyin Li Yu refused to come to the court as an excuse to prepare to send troops to attack.
In May 974, the Song army attacked the Southern Tang Dynasty in three routes. Cao Bin, the middle route army, led 100,000 troops from Jingzhou, Hubei along the river to capture Anhui's Chizhou, Tongling, Wuhu, and Ma'anshan, approaching Jiangning ( Nanjing).
On November 15, the West Route Army defeated more than 3,000 people of the Southern Tang Dynasty in Wuchang, Hubei Province. The East Route Army sent troops from Wuyue King Qian Chu and Song Dynasty General Ding Deyu to support the attack from Hangzhou.
On the eighth day of the first lunar month in 975, all forces attacked across the board. On the 20th of the first lunar month, the Song Army of the Middle Route occupied southwest Nanjing, Jiangyin and other prefectures, and the East Route Army also captured Changzhou. On the second day of June, Cao Bin's army defeated more than 20,000 Southern Tang troops under the city of Jiangning (Nanjing) and captured thousands of warships. In August, Ding Deyu defeated 5,000 Southern Tang troops in Zhenjiang, and joined forces with the Wu and Yue troops to capture Zhenjiang on September 9th.
Jiangning (Nanjing) was isolated in the city for help. Li Yu sent another envoy to Tokyo to ask for peace. Zhao Kuangyin refused with the words "the world is one family, how can we allow others to snore on the side of the bed". The Song army attacked from three sides, and on November 27, Jiangning City was defeated.
This was a large-scale river-crossing operation in ancient China. The Song army successfully built a pontoon bridge on the lower reaches of the Yangtze River. It was a pioneering work in the history of ancient Chinese warfare. It allowed the army to overcome natural obstacles, divide its forces to defeat the Southern Tang defenders, and capture Jiangning. , forced landing in Southern Tang Dynasty.
Let’s talk about the two key characters in this article, Cao Bin and Li Yu.
Cao Bin was the nephew of the concubine of Guo Wei, Taizu of the Later Zhou Dynasty. He was better at fighting and was later reused by Zhao Kuangyin. He participated in assisting Wang Quanbin in the battle to destroy Hou Shu and led the battle to destroy the Southern Tang Dynasty. Zhao Guangyi, Emperor Taizong of the Song Dynasty, was the commander-in-chief of the Eastern Route Army in the Northern Expedition (Yongxi Northern Expedition), but he was demoted due to the defeat of his rash advance. Cao Bin never killed indiscriminately in battle. When he besieged Jiangning (now Nanjing), he deliberately delayed the attack and persuaded Li Yu to surrender early so as not to let the people suffer. Cao Bin was kind-hearted and never arrogant about his achievements.
Li Yu was the last monarch of the Southern Tang Dynasty, and he was a very kind king. She has a very deep relationship with the two queens, the Queen Zhou and the Queen Zhou (two sisters). During his reign, he was proficient in calligraphy, painting, music, and poetry. In particular, his level of writing lyrics was very extraordinary. His most famous masterpiece was "Poppy Beauty". This poem later made Zhao Kuangyin unhappy, and it is said that his death was related to it. Chairman Mao once commented that although Li Yu was versatile, he did not pay attention to politics, which led to the destruction of the country.