Why Ma Chao Joined Liu Bei

Ma Chao was one of the most famous warriors of the western frontier.

But fame did not save his original power base. After conflict with Cao Cao and the collapse of his position, he searched for a new place to stand.

That path led to Liu Bei.

Ma Chao Came From the Liangzhou Frontier

Ma Chao, courtesy name Mengqi, was the son of Ma Teng.

Ma Teng had Qiang ancestry and long held power around Guanzhong and Liangzhou. He and Han Sui sometimes rebelled, sometimes accepted court titles, and sometimes shifted again. One day they were officials. The next, they might be treated as rebels.

Ma Chao grew up in that world.

The language of loyalty, legitimacy, and imperial order did not bind him in the same way it might bind a court official from the center. Frontier politics taught him force, survival, and shifting alliance.

As an adult, Ma Chao was tall, fierce, and famous even among the hard men of the Liangzhou armies.

In 196, Ma Teng and his sworn brother Han Sui turned against each other. Han Sui killed Ma Teng's wife and children, making Ma Chao the most important surviving son beside Ma Teng.

Later, Cao Cao tried to draw the Guanzhong powers into his system. He appointed Ma Chao as General of the Household and let him command Ma Teng's old troops.

Ma Teng entered court service as Commandant of the Guards, and his family was moved to Ye. Ma Chao remained in Guanzhong with the family troops.

Cao Cao would eventually have to settle Guanzhong.

Tong Pass Broke the Coalition

In 211, Cao Cao sent Zhong Yao to attack Zhang Lu in Hanzhong.

On the surface, this was a campaign against Zhang Lu. The Guanzhong commanders suspected the deeper aim was to pass through them, destroy Zhang Lu, and then settle Guanzhong itself.

Ma Chao, Han Sui, and ten groups of western troops rose together, claiming one hundred thousand men and holding Tong Pass.

Cao Cao first sent Cao Ren to hold them, ordering him not to fight. Then Cao Cao came west himself.

Cao Cao and Ma Chao faced each other at Tong Pass. Cao Cao pressured Ma Chao openly while secretly sending Xu Huang and Zhu Ling with four thousand infantry and cavalry across the Yellow River to establish a camp west of the river.

A month later, Cao Cao crossed north from Tong Pass. Most of his soldiers had already crossed when he remained on the south bank with only about a hundred elite guards. Ma Chao attacked with more than ten thousand troops. Arrows fell like rain. Xu Chu used a saddle to shield Cao Cao, allowing him to cross.

After crossing, Cao Cao built covered roads along the river and moved south.

Ma Chao had to camp south of the Wei River and asked to cede land west of the Yellow River in exchange for peace.

Cao Cao refused. He wanted to end Guanzhong separatism, not accept a line on a map.

The western coalition was large. If it had stayed united, Cao Cao's task would have been hard.

Cao Cao asked Jia Xu what to do. Jia Xu advised pretending to agree to talks while sowing distrust.

Cao Cao Split Ma Chao and Han Sui

Cao Cao agreed to negotiate and met Han Sui alone.

Ma Chao was present in the larger setting, and the tension was deep. Han Sui had once killed Ma Chao's mother and brothers. Yet the two men now had to cooperate against Cao Cao.

That cooperation was brittle. The Guanzhong commanders each had their own territory and troops. Fear of Cao Cao had brought them together, not trust.

Ma Chao relied on his courage and even thought about seizing Cao Cao during the meeting. But he saw Xu Chu glaring with his hand on his sword and stopped.

Cao Cao and Han Sui were old acquaintances. At their meeting, their horses stood close and they talked for a long time. They did not discuss military secrets. They spoke of old days in Luoyang and mutual friends, even laughing and clapping.

Afterward, Ma Chao asked what they had discussed. Han Sui said only old stories.

Ma Chao began to suspect him.

A few days later, Cao Cao sent Han Sui a letter with deliberate erasures and corrections, making it look as if Han Sui had altered it. When Ma Chao saw it, his suspicion deepened.

The coalition was already full of mistrust. Cao Cao fixed a date for battle.

In the decisive fight, Cao Cao first sent light troops to provoke them, then struck with elite cavalry. Ma Chao and Han Sui were defeated. The western coalition collapsed.

Cao Cao was pleased that the Guanzhong commanders had gathered together. If each had guarded his own strongpoint, he said, it would have taken a long time to reduce them one by one. Gathered under no single commander, they could be broken at once.

Ma Chao and Han Sui fled back to Liangzhou.

Cao Cao said that if Ma Chao did not die, Cao Cao might have no burial place.

Then Cao Cao killed Ma Teng and Ma Chao's family in Ye.

From that moment, Ma Chao had no way back. A battlefield defeat might be repaired. Family extermination made his feud with Cao Cao absolute.

Jicheng Turned Against Him

Cao Cao returned east because of trouble in the rear, giving Ma Chao and Han Sui a little time.

Ma Chao went back to Longxi, allied with Qiang and Hu groups, and attacked the commanderies of Longyou. Many places submitted. Only Jicheng, the seat of Liangzhou, held out.

Zhang Lu also sent men to help Ma Chao.

Ma Chao besieged Jicheng with more than ten thousand troops. Wei Kang, Inspector of Liangzhou, sent Yan Wen out to ask Xiahou Yuan for help.

The city was surrounded. Yan Wen could not break out directly, so he swam through the moat. At dawn, Ma Chao's men saw his tracks, chased him, and captured him.

Ma Chao brought Yan Wen beneath the city and ordered him to shout that no rescue was coming.

Yan Wen instead shouted that the army would arrive within three days and the defenders should hold firm.

The men on the wall wept and cried out in encouragement.

Ma Chao was furious, but still tried to use Yan Wen to persuade Wei Kang. Yan Wen answered that serving one's lord left only death, not divided loyalty. Ma Chao killed him.

Relief still did not arrive. Jicheng eventually gave out. Wei Kang wanted to surrender, and even though his followers wept and opposed it, he opened the gates.

Ma Chao entered, killed Wei Kang, and claimed high titles over the region.

He seemed to have recovered a gateway into Liangzhou. But the local scholars did not truly accept him. After Wei Kang's death, many outwardly obeyed while waiting for a chance to strike back.

Ma Chao Lost His Base

Yang Fu remained in Ma Chao's service, but he was not loyal in heart.

He went to his cousin Jiang Xu and wept, saying Wei Kang had been killed and he himself had failed to die with him. Ma Chao had betrayed father and court, killed the provincial chief, and shamed Liangzhou's men.

Jiang Xu's mother urged her son to rise, saying death for loyalty was death in the proper place.

Yang Fu, Jiang Xu, and others planned revolt and secretly contacted men inside Ma Chao's own forces.

In the ninth month, they rose.

Ma Chao left the city to attack them. The insiders shut Jicheng's gates behind him and killed his wife and children.

Ma Chao lost his base at once.

He attacked Licheng and captured Jiang Xu's mother, hoping she would persuade her son to surrender. She cursed him as a rebel son and an evil man who murdered his superior. Ma Chao killed her in anger.

Yang Fu fought Ma Chao, suffered many wounds, and still defeated him.

With nowhere to stand, Ma Chao fled south to Zhang Lu in Hanzhong.

Zhang Lu gave him office and at one point considered marrying a daughter to him. His followers objected. A man who did not care for his own parents, wife, and children, they asked, how would he love anyone else?

Zhang Lu abandoned the idea.

Ma Chao had a famous name in Hanzhong, but he could no longer become an independent lord. His old Liangzhou followers were scattered, his family was gone, and Zhang Lu's men distrusted him.

Ma Chao Joined Liu Bei

In 214, Ma Chao asked Zhang Lu for troops to attack north and recover Liangzhou.

Zhang Lu sent him to besiege Qishan.

The Liangzhou commanders shook when Ma Chao returned. Jiang Xu, guarding Qishan, asked Xiahou Yuan for help.

Some urged Xiahou Yuan to wait for Cao Cao's orders. Xiahou Yuan answered that Cao Cao was four thousand li away in Ye. By the time instructions returned, Qishan would have fallen.

He immediately sent Zhang He with five thousand infantry and cavalry as the vanguard.

Ma Chao besieged Qishan for a month. Just as Longyou seemed within reach again, Zhang He arrived, and Ma Chao withdrew to Hanzhong.

Back in Hanzhong, his position became even more unstable. Zhang Lu's subordinates disliked him. Guanzhong and Longyou were increasingly under Cao Cao's control. Hanzhong itself was exposed. If Cao Cao attacked, Ma Chao might have no escape.

Then Liu Bei sent men to recruit him.

Liu Bei was attacking Yi Province and needed a famous commander who could shake morale in the west.

Ma Chao accepted secretly, fled into Shu, and joined Liu Bei.

Liu Bei was delighted. He said he had gained Yi Province.

He gave Ma Chao troops and stationed him north of Chengdu.

Inside Chengdu, the news was alarming. Ma Chao's fame and fearsome reputation in the west were enormous. His arrival told Liu Zhang's people that even the fierce Liangzhou commander had joined Liu Bei.

Less than a month later, Liu Zhang surrendered.

Liu Bei appointed Ma Chao General Who Pacifies the West.

For Liu Bei, Ma Chao's arrival was not only the addition of a warrior. It gave the conquest of Yi Province momentum, prestige, and a western frontier name that frightened the city he was trying to take.

The next episode follows the struggle for Hanzhong, where Liu Bei and Cao Cao fought for the gateway that would define Shu's northern frontier.