Sun Quan

Sun Quan ruled the state of Wu in the lower Yangtze for fifty-two years and was the longest-lived and longest-reigning of the three Kingdoms rulers. He inherited the territory at eighteen when his elder brother Sun Ce was assassinated, and his achievement was mostly that he kept it: the region had been conquered by his father and brother in a decade of campaigning and had no reason to stay together. He allied with Liu Bei against Cao Cao and their combined fleets destroyed the northern army at Red Cliffs in 208, the most celebrated battle in Chinese history and the one that made the three-way division permanent. He then spent the next four decades switching sides. In 219 he broke with Liu Bei, sent Lu Meng to take Jing province by surprise and had Guan Yu executed, which brought Liu Bei's army down on him and produced his second great defensive victory at Xiaoting in 222. He accepted the title King of Wu from the northern state of Wei while he needed its neutrality, and declared himself emperor in 229 once he did not. His government developed the south: land was cleared, the Shanyue peoples of the hills were subdued and absorbed, and fleets were sent to Taiwan and possibly to the Ryukyus and Vietnam, which is the earliest recorded Chinese naval expedition to Taiwan. His last years were poor. He let a succession dispute between two sons run for eight years, killing and exiling senior officials on both sides before demoting one and forcing the other to suicide, and left the throne to a ten-year-old. Wu outlived the other two kingdoms and fell to the Jin in 280.

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