In the autumn of the 27th year of Chengshun, the Chang'an to Baoji section of the Northern East-West Railway, one of the two longitudinal and two horizontal railways, was completed and opened to traffic.
So far, the construction of most sections of the Longhai Railway, an important plan of the East-West Railway, has been completed. You can take a train from the coastal city of Haizhou in the east, passing through Xuzhou, Luoyang, Chang'an and finally reaching Baoji.
The Longhai Railway section has only the last hardcore section left, that is, the section from Baoji to Lanzhou.
However, it is not easy to build a railway from Baoji to Lanzhou.
Because although this straight-line distance is only more than 300 kilometers, it is separated by mountains and mountains, and the terrain along the way is very harsh.
Judging from the current technical and engineering construction capabilities of the Chu Empire, it is very difficult to build railways in harsh terrain. The Nanling Mountains Section of the Guangdong-Jiangxi Railway currently under construction and the Nanling Mountains Section of the Yue-Chu Railway currently under construction are proof of this. , it is extremely difficult and costly to repair.
However, the reason why the Chu Empire still builds railways in the Nanling Mountains is because it is backed by the Pearl River Delta Economic Belt... The governor's office of Guangdong is rich, and your railway company cannot afford to build it, so they will directly give you various subsidies. To put it bluntly, It means that local governments provide money to help railway companies build railways.
However, the economic conditions in the northwest region are not very good, especially in Gansu Province to the west of the Longhai Railway. The economy itself is very poor. If you want them to spend money to support railway construction, you basically have no hope. Although we have requested various financial supports from the central government in 2016, there is no money to give to your railway company.
There is no money in the local finance, and the local economy is not doing well. After building the railway, it is impossible to rely on commercial operations to recover costs or even make a profit...
Therefore, purely from a commercial perspective, the Bao-Lanzhou Railway cannot be built...
However, the Great Chu Empire was engaged in border defense, to avoid local separatism, and to continue to expand its territory in Central Asia. It also urgently needed a railway to connect the northwest region.
This is why the Dachu Empire insisted on keeping the official monopoly on the operation of the railway.
Since it cannot be repaired purely from a commercial perspective, then official administrative power should be directly used to repair it.
And this level is also called a strategic railway in the Chu Empire.
The Northwest Railway, the Prairie Railway, and even the Changsha-Kunming Railway (Changsha-Guiyang-Kunming), the Henghe Railway (Hengyang-Nanning-Hanoi), the Henan-Kunming Railway (Hanoi-Kunming) and other southwest railways are all still under planning. A very typical strategic railway.
For these places, the Chu Empire needed to build railways not only to ensure border security, but also to strengthen personnel and industrial and commercial contacts in these border provinces and the hinterland of the empire, and to avoid local centrifugalism.
However, it is difficult and costly to build railways in these places, and the cost cannot be recovered!
This kind of railway is also called a strategic railway in the Great Chu Empire, and it is the kind that must be built even if it costs money.
This is why there is an official monopoly on railway operation, because only the government will do this kind of money-losing thing, and it is impossible for private capital to do this kind of thing. This requires official investment in railways.
In order to ensure that there are funds to do this kind of money-losing business, it is necessary to extract profits from other profitable railway operations, which requires a monopoly.
This combined is an important reason for the official monopoly on railway operations.
Although the strategic railway in the southwest must be built, it is not too urgent. After all, the Chu Empire's various suppression and purges in the southwest were very severe in the early years. A large number of southwest chieftains who had troubled the Central Dynasty for thousands of years were eliminated. Sweep it away directly.
Later, the Chu Empire immigrated to these places in large numbers to fill the vacancies left after the chieftains were cleared.
Therefore, the risk of chieftain rebellion in these places has dropped to a very low level. While border troubles still existed in the early years, there is no danger now. After all, neighboring Burma and Nanzhang have both become the Great Chu Empire. The puppet state... As for the original Annan, it had long ago submitted to the Great Chu Empire and became part of the Great Chu Empire.
Moreover, in recent years, the entire Nanzhang Kingdom has also been seeking to join the Great Chu Empire.
As the Great Chu Empire further attracted and divided many forces in the Nanzhang Kingdom, the king of the Nanzhang Kingdom, Solina Wangsa, had been under house arrest in Jinling City in the name of tribute for a long time, and the Great Chu Empire in Nanzhang Kingdom The kingdom sent an imperial envoy to assist the local prince in handling affairs. He was called a co-organizer, but in fact he was just a supervisor... This imperial envoy from the Chu Empire was the veritable governor of Nanzhang.
At this time, the Nanzhang Kingdom was no longer a normal country. From military to financial and even internal affairs, everything was firmly controlled by the Chu Empire.
Many nobles in the Nanzhang Kingdom resisted in various ways at first... but after they couldn't resist, they felt that they were being squeezed and might as well be annexed.
How about being a country noble in a small place and being bullied by Chu officials every day? Why not just become a decent gentry in the Chu Empire or even become an official of the Chu Empire...
As the saying goes, if you can't beat it, join it!
At present, many nobles of the Nanzhang Kingdom are trying their best to follow Annan's example and join the Great Chu Empire.
It’s just that the Chu Empire has been holding them back and not agreeing!
Yes, the current situation is that the Nanzhang Kingdom wants to join the Da Chu Empire, but the Da Chu Empire is very cautious about this.
Why?
Because once the entire Nanzhang Kingdom joins the Da Chu Empire, the Da Chu Empire will no longer be able to use this place as a dumping ground for industrial goods, nor will it be able to reap benefits in various ways. Instead, it will have to build schools, water conservancy and other facilities in the area. infrastructure!
To put it simply, not only can’t you make money by annexing it, but you have to repay it...
Just like later generations of modern Americans, they don't want Mexicans to join.
The high-ranking officials in the empire are fine. After all, the expansion of territory can completely eliminate some potential threats in the southwest region. However, the middle and lower levels of the empire, especially the people in Yunnan, have great opinions...
The local business community believes that everyone from Nanzhang has become one of their own, so who the hell am I going to exploit?
The local people at the bottom believe that if the Nanzhang Kingdom is annexed and the people from the Nanzhang Kingdom go to Kunming and other cities to look for jobs, the job opportunities of the local people will be taken away.
So this matter has been discussed for several years. However, due to the strong resistance from the middle and lower-class groups in the southwest region of the empire, it has not been reached until now.
If you want to annex the Nanzhang Kingdom, you may have to appease the southwest region, otherwise the local people will not agree.
Myanmar has no plans to actively join the Chu Empire for the time being. They still have the ambition to be independent. This independence does not mean fighting against the Chu Empire, but wanting to be the younger brother of the Chu Empire.
For this reason, the Burmese people have not hesitated to send troops to fight for the Chu Empire many times over the years, and they have worked very hard... In fact, they just want to show the senior leaders of the Chu Empire: We are qualified juniors, boss, please stop hitting me...
Overall, there is basically no threat to the southwest border, and the risk of chieftain rebellion in the southwestern provinces is basically negligible... After all, there are no living chieftains in these lands!
Because the threat from the southwest is not great, the strategic railway in the southwest can also be developed slowly.
At the same time, the grassland railway is not a high priority. After all, there is no threat to the grassland. The northern border of the Chu Empire has expanded to the Arctic Ocean... Nowadays, the grassland railway is still built mainly to solve local people's livelihood problems and solve local problems. The problem of centrifugalism.
Change source app]
But the northwest direction is different.
The Central Dynasty's rule over the Western Regions had been cut off for more than 800 years before the Great Chu Empire. Such a long period of time has caused a huge deviation in the cognition of the people in the Western Regions and the people in the Central Plains... In other words, people I don't think of myself as Chinese.
Fortunately, when the Great Chu Empire entered the Western Regions, it adopted military conquests. At the same time, before the Great Chu Empire entered the Western Regions, this place had been cleansed by the Jungar people, which greatly reduced the number of local indigenous people. At the same time, the Great Chu Empire After the empire took control of Turpan Province, it implemented a large-scale civilization policy and organized a large number of Han people from the Shaanxi-Gansu region to immigrate to the Turpan area for cultivation.
At present, Han people have taken up the majority of the local population, but there are still a large number of indigenous people, and local centrifugalism is very serious.
The Chu Empire urgently needed a strategic railway to strengthen the connection between Guanzhong and even the Central Plains region and Gansu and Turpan provinces.
This further increased the number of immigrants, population exchanges, and trade exchanges between the two places, and finally completely integrated these two places into the economic and cultural system of the Great Chu Empire.
At the same time, the Dachu Empire also hoped that after the completion of the Northwest Railway, it could completely solve the logistics supply problem in the northwest.
The Chu Empire's military problem in the northwest has never been about how powerful the aliens are, but about its own logistics and supply.
If you want to transport food, weapons and ammunition from Chang'an, an important industrial town in the Guanzhong region at the rear, to the Yinning area at the front, and even to Yibohai (Lake Balkhash) further forward, it takes more than 3,000 kilometers. ah!
The terrain along the way is not very good, it is either mountains, Gobi Desert, or simply desert. There are sparsely populated areas along the way and the size of the cities is limited.
Such a long distance greatly limits the number of troops stationed by the Da Chu Empire Army in the Yin Ning frontline area and its ability to launch large-scale battles.
This is why the Chu Empire has not launched any military attack on the Kazakh Khanate in these years!
It costs too much and the logistics are overwhelming!
After all, the Chu Empire still needs to maintain its battle with the Russians in the Ob River Basin further north. If it opens two fronts in the northwest at the same time, the logistics pressure will be too great.
If we want to completely solve the logistics problem in the northwest, there is no other way except railways.
Therefore, even if the Baolan section of the Longhai Railway is difficult and costly, the Chu Empire will still build it.
Route surveying began a few years ago. After the railway section from Chang'an to Baoji was opened to traffic, the construction team of the Railway Corporation did not stop. Instead, they continued to build the railway westward and began to build the railway line from Baoji to Lanzhou.
Moreover, the construction scale is very large. Tens of thousands of railway workers are working hard here, striving to open up the chokepoint of this section of the Northwest Railway as soon as possible.
After all, as long as this section of road is passed, the subsequent railway construction in Lanzhou will be able to go all the way to the Yinning area. It seems that it will pass through the Gobi Desert and the desert all the way, but except for a few places, the terrain in most places is actually fairly flat, and there is no need to build a railway. There are too many tunnels... The difficulty is how to transport a large amount of construction materials from the rear to the Gobi Desert at the frontline construction site... But, this may be difficult for other types of projects, but it is not difficult for railway construction itself. What the heck... because all the construction materials in the rear can be transported all the way forward through the already built railway.
This railway was built and transported materials at the same time.
For the current Chu Empire, the most troublesome thing about building railways is encountering mountains... which means that a large number of tunnels need to be built.
There is also the fear of encountering big rivers... Ordinary small rivers don't matter. The construction of small and medium-sized railway bridges is not a big problem for the engineering technology of the Dachu Empire. What I am afraid of is the fear of those big rivers, which require the construction of several meters or even thousands of meters. bridge.
This is very difficult to do!
A railway bridge across the Yellow River in Zhengzhou has put the bridge design and construction-related institutions and enterprises in the Chu Empire to death, and the cost is extremely huge.
However, the Yellow River cross-river bridge in Zhengzhou did not take into account the navigation needs of large-tonnage ships... After all, the middle and upper reaches of the Yellow River itself does not have the ability to navigate large-tonnage ships.
However, if you encounter a river that requires navigation by large-tonnage ships, then building a bridge will be even more troublesome, because the bridge you build needs to ensure a clear height for navigation, which is very difficult for the current Dachu Empire.
This is why the Chu Empire has not built bridges in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River until now... In fact, if you simply build a bridge across the Yangtze River, you can build a bridge spanning several kilometers, but this kind of porous Bridges cannot ensure navigation needs!
If we want to build those single-hole long-span bridges with a net height of tens of meters, this is not something that the current Da Chu Empire can handle.
Not to mention important trunk waterways like the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, even the tributary of the Huangpu River has no bridges in the middle and lower reaches...
There is only one reason. After the bridge is built, merchant ships of this large tonnage will not be able to pass!
Therefore, before there is a major technological breakthrough in bridge technology in the Chu Empire, it is basically impossible for any cross-river bridge to appear on any river that is responsible for major shipping.
This is why many railway lines do not have cross-river railway bridges, but need to be transported by boats.
Tunnels and bridges are the two main problems in railway construction at present. The solution of the Dachu Empire Railway Company is to go around it as much as possible. If it cannot be circumvented, it can only dig tunnels and build construction. Bridge.
The Baolan Railway is a section that cannot be bypassed!
When the Bao-Lanzhou Railway was built westward from Baoji, the Dachu Empire was also making preliminary preparations for the next step of the construction of the Northwest Railway and even the further development of the northwest region.
The most important one is to continue to organize large-scale immigrants to Gansu and Turpan provinces for reclamation, further increasing the number of local Han people, increasing the actual control of the Chu Empire over the local area, and also developing some local specialties, such as cotton.
The textile industry of the Great Chu Empire found that the geographical climate in Turpan was very suitable for the cultivation of high-quality long-staple cotton. The cotton grown was of high quality, no less than the Egyptian cotton imported from Egypt.
Currently, many people are planting cotton in Turpan Province, but it is very difficult to transport the cotton grown locally.
At present, it can only be transported by traditional horse-drawn carriage, all the way from Turpan to Lanzhou, and then transported to the hinterland of the Central Plains via the Yellow River to be processed and sold by local enterprises into high-quality cotton textile products.
The entire transportation route is long and the cost is extremely high... that is to say, the long-staple cotton produced locally is of high quality, and even if the freight is expensive, someone will pay for it. After all, if long-staple cotton is imported from Egypt, the freight is also very expensive.
However, if the Northwest Railway is opened, the long-staple cotton from the Turpan area can be imported all the way to the hinterland of the Central Plains and even the Yangtze River Delta and other economically developed areas through the railway. This will alleviate the domestic supply shortage of high-quality long-staple cotton in the Chu Empire, and at the same time, it will also benefit the local Turpan area. The economic stimulus is huge.
Therefore, even if the Northwest Railway has started construction of the Baolan section and is not yet open to traffic, local government agencies and some enterprises have begun to make long-term plans.
Suqin Textile Company, the largest textile company in the country, has begun to set up a subsidiary in Turpan Province. In addition to supplying wool to the local area, this subsidiary also has a major task: to open up cotton planting fields in the local area.
Su Qin Textile Company's idea is very simple. Once the Northwest Railway is opened, they will be able to continuously obtain a large amount of affordable and high-quality long-staple cotton. This is very important for the future development of Su Qin Textile Company.
After all, for a textile company, nothing is more important than ensuring the supply of high-quality raw materials.
As for the imported Egyptian cotton... that stuff is our own, and there are many uncertain factors. Unexpected factors such as wars and storms can cause the import of Egyptian long-staple cotton to be cut off.
Suqin Textile Company began to make early arrangements in Turpan, northwest China, and other textile companies followed suit. The advanced investment layout of these companies also brought new economic vitality to Turpan and promoted local economic development.
The local economic development, coupled with the long-term and continuous support from Jinling, has also caused Turpan Province's population and economic scale to grow rapidly.
Not only has the grain output increased significantly, but the production capacity of Yin Ning Arsenal has also increased significantly.
Turpan Province is, to some extent, a supply base for the frontline army. As the food and military production capacity at the rear increases, the logistics supplies for the first group army on the frontline will also be available.
Even if it is still not possible to let the First Army fight a long and large-scale battle, it can barely fight a medium-sized battle.
In addition, the Kazakh Khanate also fell into internal strife after the death of Yangir Khan.
The senior officials of the Dachu Empire believed that the time was ripe to take action against the Kazakh Khanate.
