The Real Han Xin: Honor and Humiliation

The True Han Xin: Pride and Humiliation is a new installment in Cheng Bu’s “Seeking the Truth” series. Han Xin is a household name in Chinese history. We usually regard him as a military genius and the greatest contributor to the founding of the Han dynasty, who was ultimately killed because his achievements threatened the emperor.

But the author points to facts that people have overlooked: though poor, Han Xin managed to mooch meals from a village head’s family for a long time; two different men named Han Xin proposed the same strategy of secretly crossing the old road to attack Chencang; after being appointed commander in chief, Han Xin took no part in the three major battles that followed; his midnight river crossing and formation with their backs to the water seem rather comical when you consider that he stood for half the night in the bitter cold; of the three stages of Liu Bang’s rebellion, Han Xin took part only in the latter half of the third, yet was made King of Qi; and at the Battle of Gaixia, Liu Bang already controlled four-fifths of the realm, while Han Xin’s kingdom of Qi amounted to only one-tenth, among other things.