Chapter 148, Liaodong Theater Aftermath Strategy (Middle)

Through exchanges with some climatologists in the modern world, Yellowstone now knows very well. So far, the Xiaoice River period in the entire northeast region has lasted for almost fifty years, and it will continue to suffer for more than ten years before it passes. According to historical records, during this long period of disasters, the grain production of farmland in eastern Liaoning will be reduced to a very sad level.

Therefore, during the Apocalypse, the soldiers and civilians of Dongjiang Town in the Ming Dynasty under the command of Mao Wenlong, although they seemed to occupy a large area from the map, they had always relied heavily on the sea transportation from Shandong for rations, and they also pulled down their faces and went to North Korea to extort and fight the autumn wind. But this is the case, the soldiers and civilians in Dongjiang Town are still starving every year. After Yuan Chonghuan ordered the closure of Hong Kong and the lack of food, Dongjiang Town, which seemed to be strong and strong, was even more starved all of a sudden.

As for the Eight Banners, theoretically it is even worse. In fact, as early as the early years of Chongzhen, the famine brought by the Xiaoice River period had completely collapsed the entire agriculture of Liaodong. At that time, although the ruling area of the Jurchen Eight Banners was slaughtered by Nurhachi to the point that there were only 700,000 Han people left, but because most of the crops were not harvested, the remnants of the people still changed their children to eat, and the price of rice was as high as 801 stones, and the price of cloth also rose to 221 horses.

Thanks to the traitorous Jin merchant group attached to the Jurchen regime, Huang Taiji was able to resell the looted property, antiques, gold and silver from the Central Plains back into daily necessities such as grain and cloth to feed the Jurchen Eight Banners and the millions of people who had been taken captive.

During these years of war between the Ming and Qing dynasties, the Jin Shang Group provided all the gunpowder, eighty percent of the grain and more than sixty percent of the metal to the Eight Banners Army, which was almost the general logistics department of the Jurchens! Once the assistance of the Jin merchant group is lost, and these spoils stained with the blood of the Han people cannot be resold to the Han people, then the seemingly majestic soldiers of the Eight Banners will quickly degenerate into a state of bone arrows and animal skin clothing.

According to historical records, as early as in the fifteenth year of Chongzhen, the eight families of the Jin merchants have been cellared tens of millions of silver taels, and later because of these achievements and got the status of the emperor of the Qing Dynasty, thus creating the immortal legend of the eight families of the Jin merchants who have been rich in the world for more than 270 years, and it has not gradually declined with the rise of maritime trade until modern times.

However, now, with the change of ownership of the entire Liaodong, the Shanxi Jin merchants, the lifeline that once maintained the Jurchen Eight Banners regime, will naturally be broken.

Although Huangshi didn't think that these Shanxi traitorous profiteers would have iron-like loyalty and an unbelievable sense of identity to Huang Taiji after burying tens of millions of Han compatriots with their own hands without changing their faces and hearts, they would rather go bankrupt than live and die with the Jurchen Eight Banners.

However, even these Jin merchants, who lacked discipline, did not mind betraying the Qing Dynasty again after selling the Ming Dynasty and continued to do business with the Huameng, which occupied Liaodong. The highly productive traversers can also come up with enough trading items, but it will take a long time for Huangshi to reconnect with them to make a deal so that the Kannai Jin merchants can start supplying goods again and reach a suitable price agreement. During this period, it was obvious that the grain in Vladivostok alone was not enough to meet the consumption of the entire Liaodong, so did it have to rely on the random transfer of rations from the Americas? After absorbing millions of immigrants, the Americas can still make up so much food? And is that there willing to take out so much grain for free to feed millions of Liao people?

Fortunately, after consulting with the central think tank's expert group via video conference call, Huangshi found that he seemed to be thinking too pessimistically. For Huameng, which has modern science and technology, the abnormal climate during the Xiaoice River period has not caused such a serious blow to grain production, or that he has somewhat underestimated the huge role of science and technology, and does not know that the ability of modern agriculture to resist natural disasters has long exceeded that of the ancients.

The so-called Xiaoice period refers to a large drop in global temperatures, resulting in a general abnormal climate in various places. In the grasslands, frequent outbreaks of white plagues led to the death of a large number of livestock, forcing nomads to plunder the necessities of life in the south. In the northeast and central regions, the precipitation zone shifted southward, leading to severe drought in the former major agricultural areas, resulting in a sharp decline in grain production and eventually large-scale famine.

At first glance, this seems to be a rather frightening sight.

But let's not talk about cooling. Is the drought in the eyes of the ancients really the same thing as the drought in the imagination of modern people?

Specifically, although there is still a drought in Liaodong this year, in the eyes of all the immersive traversers, the Liaohe River at this time is still a vast and mighty water, not to mention that the flow is broken, and even the drop in the water level is not obvious. As for the scene of the land cracking and the vegetation withering, at least along the Liaohe River, it is basically not visible, but the weather is relatively rainy, so it can be regarded as a major drought?

But the problem is that the ancients' ability to resist natural disasters was really so weak!

First of all, the seeds sown by ancient farmers are not the high-quality seeds carefully developed by modern seed companies, but the original version that is much worse in all aspects, although it may be very sought after by those "little fresh" in later generations, thinking that it is a green and pollution-free superior product. But in fact, these ancient "green crops" not only have very low yields, but are also neither drought nor cold-resistant, and there will be a situation of reduced output and no harvest at every turn.

Secondly, in the absence of farmland and water conservancy facilities, the ancient farmers basically relied on the sky for food, once God rained a few less, the harvest of the crops would have a bad trend. After all, no one has the strength, not only to use wooden barrels to go to distant rivers and lakes to fetch water, and then to water dozens of acres of crops by hand. Even those fields where irrigation channels have been dug are not assisted by modern pumping machines. If the water level of rivers and lakes drops slightly, so that the water from the rivers cannot flow into the irrigation channels, the harvest of farmland will still be reduced or even eliminated.

Finally, in the face of the onset of drought, the modern Chinese government will organize various actions to "fight drought and ensure harvest", while the ancient landlords and gentry and eunuchs would only hide in the county towns with their grain and money, watch the peasants slowly starve to death outside the city, and then divide up the land they left behind.

Under the backwardness of technical conditions and the deliberate indifference of the ruling class, the despair of the ancient peasants in the face of natural disasters can naturally be imagined.

On the contrary, the people who came to this time and space did not ignore the ruthless mentality of the natural disasters and starved to death, but were very active in fighting the disaster and ensuring the harvest. Then, under the rule of the traversers, all kinds of basic crops have been used with modern high-quality varieties. In the sparsely populated Americas and Vladivostok, farmland has been planned, leveled, and transformed on a large scale, along with concrete ditches and small reservoirs, plus windmills or steam-powered water lifting stations. The droughts that were enough to make the ancient peasants hang themselves or flee the famine were little more than a trivial matter for the traveler to start the steam pump for a while. As long as the drought is not so severe that even the groundwater runs dry, there will be no widespread crop failure.

In addition to the drought, the so-called global cooling of the Xiaoice period also only made the ancients who were backward in productivity despair. If it is placed in front of modern agricultural technology, it is far from terrifying. After all, although this place in Liaodong is a bitter cold place in the eyes of the Han people in the Central Plains, in the eyes of the Russians, it is already a "warm south"! If the Soviets in the twentieth century were able to grow large quantities of potatoes and cabbage on the Kamchatka Peninsula, and the descendants of the Vikings grew oats and turnips in Iceland, how could the farmland along the Liao River not grow food? Even if Liaodong in the late Ming and Xiaoice periods is colder, is it colder than the Kamchatka Peninsula and Iceland in the modern world?

Therefore, since the Far East Company, which is mainly composed of veterans of the People's Liberation Army, crossed the plane through wormholes and established a base in Vladivostok in this time and space, it has not felt anything about the drought and cold wave that have raged year after year, but has easily reclaimed large areas of farmland and pastures, and the yield is also good.

It can be seen that at least along the Liaohe River, where water is guaranteed, Huangshi can completely replicate the reclamation experience of the Far Eastern Company in Vladivostok and build a large number of modern farms. There is no need to worry about coal burning, Liaoning Province is already a major coal-producing province in China, otherwise it will not be able to support the coal-steel complex of future generations. The arable land in the Liaohe River valley alone is enough to resettle the two or three million people outside Shanhaiguan.

Of course, if you want to carry out construction in the northeast with peace of mind, you must at least have a relatively peaceful external environment...... Thinking about this, Huang Shi grabbed the wireless telephone and connected to the headquarters of the Jinzhou front. Then, based on the list of high-ranking captives reported there, Yellowstone found a historical figure who was influential in the modern media and a good fit for his plans.

“…… Wu Sangui? Is that the guy who is angry at the crown and is red-faced? This time he was actually arrested in Jinzhou? ”

Wang Qiu, who came to watch the battle by airship with Huang Shi, couldn't help but light up when he heard the news, "...... So is Chen Yuanyuan also there? ”

“…… Please, I'm afraid Wu Sangui's age is not as old as you now! In terms of seniority, I have to call me uncle or uncle, as for Chen Yuanyuan, it is estimated that the age is not as good as the two Romanian silver-haired Loli in your family, and it is difficult to say whether they have been sold to the Qinglou at the moment. ”

Huang Shi rolled his eyes and replied, and Wang Qiu immediately became distracted, "...... So, what are you going to do with this little brother Wu Sangui? Through him to persuade the Guanning army to surrender? Or do you want to recruit this guy directly and work under you? ”

“…… No, no, no, I'm just going to look at the past friendships and give them a great wealth for the Wu family! Huang Shi smiled meaningfully, "...... Give the territory of Beijing and the Central Plains to the Guan Ning army, and let them live the addiction of being a king! How is the idea? ”

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PS: Since 2011, about one-fifth of the western United States has been in the midst of a persistent terrible drought, with countless lakes and reservoirs drying up and inland waterways collapsing. Judging from the documentaries filmed on the spot, the water level of many lakes and rivers has dropped by more than 30 meters, and various interruptions of the flow also abound, and its severity is definitely no less than the Chongzhen drought in the Ming Dynasty in Chinese history.

But despite this, there has been no large-scale famine and displacement in the United States, and the huge US military continues to fight endlessly around the world. It can be seen that the impact of this drought on American society is very limited, and it is even worse than the previous economic crisis. The reason for this is none other than the scientific and technological progress of these centuries, which has greatly strengthened the ability of human beings to resist natural disasters, and the so-called "conquest of nature" is not empty words!

In California, for example, after five years of drought, not only have rivers and lakes bottomed out, but the authorities have even drained the groundwater, forcing residents to conserve water and force them to shovel lawns and paint their yards. At the same time, it forcibly closed down various golf courses that were extremely water-intensive. And although the people of California complained about this, they never thought that they would starve to death because of it......

If the same drought had been put in the feudal era, California would have already started cannibalism three years ago!