Even though Zhuge Liang has a great talent, the national strength of Shu is limited, and there is no general available in the later period. In addition, due to the geographical location of Shu, it is difficult to supply food and grass. Such various reasons doomed Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition to fail.

The helpless Shu state

The financial resources of Shu state are simply unable to support the long-term war against Wei. After Guan Yu lost Jingzhou, Shu lost nearly one million people, and it was only in ancient times that someone could have everything. The fall of Jingzhou had an incalculable impact on Shu, and the subsequent Yiling War made Shu's elite lost.

How can such a Shu state support Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition? But at that time, due to the gradual growth of Wei, if Shu did not take the initiative to attack, after several years of development of Cao Wei, Shu might perish faster. In this context, Zhuge Liang clearly knew that the Northern Expedition would not succeed, and he had to continue the Northern Expedition.

There is no general in Shu, and Liao Hua is the pioneer.

Although Shu had numerous good generals in its heyday, there was no general who could be independent after the death of General Five Tigers. There is also the fact that Shu only owns Yizhou, a tiny place, and its population base can't be compared with Cao Wei. Because of Liu Bei's failure in the battle of Yiling, the backbone of Shu's army has been consumed.

Just as Zhuge Liang wrote in "After the Teacher's Watch":

Since I arrived in Hanzhong, I lost more than 7 people, including Zhao Yun, Yang Qun, Ma Yu, Yan Zhi, Ding Li, Bai Shou, Liu He, Deng Tong, Qu Chang and Tunjiang, who were suddenly, unprecedentedly, and completely lost their lives. This is all the elite of the quartet that has been rectified within decades, not owned by a state; If the number of years is plural, two-thirds of the losses will be incurred. How can we make enemies?

All the soldiers in Shu were later recruited by Zhuge Liang. How can this new soldier, who has not been baptized by soldiers, compare with battle-hardened Wei Jun? It is really difficult for such a Shu country to win.

It's difficult to get to the sky by the way of Shu.

In terms of the location in the field, Shu can only take the way of Shu if it wants to make a northern expedition to Cao Wei after losing Jingzhou, which adds a lot of difficulties to logistics support. In Zhuge Liang's five northern expeditions, he withdrew his troops for the second and fourth time because food could not be supplied normally.

To sum up, all these factors led to the failure of Zhuge Liang's five northern expeditions. Even though Zhuge Liang had amazing talents, as Mr. Shui Jing said, although Kong Ming had his master, it was not the right time!