Emperor Yang again orders that soldiers be gathered at Zhuo Prefecture, as he prepares a second campaign against Goguryeo in spring 613.

He also selects the most elite of the soldiers into a specialized corps, the Xiaoguo Army (meaning, "the strong and brave").

Hereafter, the Xiaoguo Army becomes his own personal guard.

In response to the conscription order, even more men desert and joined the agrarian rebels, throwing the northern central part of the empire into a state of confusion.

With the prefecture officials having little military training, the rebels largely go unchecked but for the efforts of the general Zhang Xutuo, who is able to defeat some of the rebels but is not able to generally suppress them.

Emperor Yang crosses the Liao River again and puts Manchuria under siege in summer 613.

However, at this time, news arrives that Yang Su's son Yang Xuangan had rebelled near Luoyang.

With the people disaffected by the Goguryeo campaigns, Yang Xuangan receives much popular support and threatens Luoyang.

Emperor Yang, in fear, lifts the siege on Liaodong and also orders the southern offensive to be terminated, returning to Zhuo Prefecture while …

The external menace of the Avars and the Persians is the most threatening problem faced by Heraclius, and neither people has abated its pressure on the empire during the first years of the new regime.

The Persians, having thoroughly penetrated Asia Minor, now turn to the south.

Khosrau's ablest general, Shahrbaraz, leads a second invasion of Mesopotamia in 613.

Damascus is taken in this year.

Emperor Heraclius’ forces besiege Antioch in 613, but lose Syria, Tarsus, and Armenia to the Persians within the year.

Roman Palestine has largely enjoyed centuries of peace and prosperity.

This changes when Khosrau II, king of Persia, finally launches his invasion against the Roman Empire.

The Jews of Palestine, led by the wealthy Benjamin of Tiberias, revolt against Emperor Heraclius and the Christian Roman Empire, and give their assistance to the Persian invaders.

Agilulf seems to have been a pagan in his personal religion, though he may have been an Arian Christian; there are certainly many Arians among the Lombards, including most of the kings.

His wife and son are, however, Catholic, and Catholics are common among the Lombards as a whole from at least the 590s as well.

Germans had often been Arians in the fifth and sixth centuries (the Ostrogoths were, for example) but the Lombards seem to be less committed to Arianism than had been the Goths or the Vandals.

Although the Lombards do not in any case seem to have been religious fanatics, it may well be Agilulf, once more, who lays the basis for a peaceful conversion of his people to Catholicism, owing to his careful cultivation of links to Catholic figures such as the late Pope Gregory I (despite his wars with Rome), or the Irish missionary Columban, who founds the monastery of Bobbio near Pavia in 613.

Yang Jishan and Yang Xuangan's strategist Wei Fusi are publicly executed around the new year 614, by Emperor Yang's orders, in exceedingly cruel manners—the officials all fire arrows at them, then they are drawn and quartered, and finally their bodies are burned and the ashes scattered.

Around the same time, there are also rebellions south of the Yangtze River, and Emperor Yang sends the official Wang Shichong against the rebels.

Wang is able to suppress the rebellions, for the most part, and thereafter begins to rise in prominence at Emperor Yang's court.

Meanwhile, Emperor Yang orders that rebels' possessions can be confiscated at will.

The local officials, however, use this as an excuse to execute and confiscate properties of those they dislike.

In spring 614, Emperor Yang again proposes another campaign against Goguryeo.

Although his officials do not approve, none dare to oppose him.

Many of the soldiers ordered to report to Zhuo Prefecture desert.

Emperor Yang tries to stop desertions by executing those who have deserted, but still cannot stem the tide of desertions.

Goguryeo forces have also been constantly ambushing the Sui army’s supply line.

Goguryeo offers of peace have also been exhausted.

Gogryeo also returns Yan Xuangan's associate Husi Zheng, who had fled to Goguryeo after his association with Yang Xuangan was discovered.

Lai initially opposes ending the campaign, but does finally withdraw after ordered by Emperor Yuan.

Emperor Yang executes Husi using the same kind of cruelty that he had employed against Yang Jishan and Wei Fusi, but afterwards, when he again summons Goguryeo's King Yeongyang to meet him, King Yeongyang again ignores the request.

Emperor Yang declares a fourth campaign against Goguryeo—but he never actually launches it.

Meanwhile, agrarian rebellions continue to rise.

While generals such as Zhang Xutuo and Wang Sichong enjoy victories here and there, the situation is deteriorating for the welfare of the Sui state at large.

The Persian invasion destroys Ghassanid power in 614.

Jerusalem's Christian golden age is brought to an end in 614 by the Persian invasion by Khosrow II's ablest general, Shahrbaraz, after a twenty-day siege, in which the inhabitants of Jerusalem are massacred and the churches razed.

The Holy Sepulchre is destroyed and the True Cross carried to Ctesiphon.

Khosrow himself is generally tolerant of Christianity (and is famously in love with his Armenian Christian wife Shirin), but Shahrbar'z permits his Jewish aides to torture thousands of Christian prisoners and deport some thirty-seven thousand.

The Persians permit the Jews to run the city government.

There are at this time approximately one hundred and fifty thousand Jews living in forty-three settlements throughout Palestine, primarily in Judaea and Galilee.