Chapter four hundred and seventeenth wide river embankment
On the twentieth day of checking the river embankment from Dongjun to Henan Yin, Liu Xiang finally saw the place where the breach had occurred.
The nearly one-mile-long embankment looks like it has been gnawed by dogs, with gaps and gaps, collapses and fractures, and silt accumulation outside the embankment, recording the traces of floods.
The most severely collapsed section was hundreds of meters long, with its base exposed.
Fortunately, the Yellow River in the Han Dynasty was not an above-ground river, and the river flowed quietly in the river channel. If in the Song Dynasty, the stretch from Luoyang to Kaifeng had become an above-ground river, such a breach would inevitably change its course.
But then I thought, as long as humans still use river embankments to restrain the Yellow River, it is inevitable that it will become a hanging river above the ground.
From ancient times to the present, regulating the Yellow River has been a confrontation between manpower and nature.
Chinese civilization originated here. For thousands of years, our ancestors have been trying to tame this evil dragon, with some success and some failure. They have enjoyed the blessings it brings and endured the harm when it roars.
This is our destiny.
The rebellious spirit in our bones is honed in our confrontation with it.
The lower reaches of the Yellow River and the vast and fertile North China Plain are the foundation of Chinese civilization. We must not give in to this evil dragon, we must lock it.
Managing the Yellow River is an unavoidable problem when taking over the Central Plains.
The first idea that came to Liu Xiang's mind was to flood the sand with water.
In the Ming Dynasty, Pan Jixun proposed the method of "confining water to attack sand" as a river control strategy, advocating tightening the river channel and using the momentum of water to impact the sediment at the bottom of the river bed, thereby achieving the purpose of dredging and preventing floods.
This method looks beautiful, but it requires very high construction skills.
The river embankment must be able to withstand the impact of the Yellow River's water flow during the flood season. The technical level of the Han Dynasty was not up to it. Liu Xiang invented cement, but the thousands of miles of river courses in the middle and lower reaches were all built with cement. He did not have so much money.
Such a big project would drag him down.
Confining water to wash away sand is unrealistic, and it treats the symptoms but not the root cause.
Historically, Pan Jixun also used the method of "accumulating clear and brushing yellow".
The water volume of the Huaihe River is used to flush the downstream river course, but the water volume of the Huaihe River cannot be compared with that of the Yellow River. As a result, during the flood season, the Yellow River sediment pours into Hongze Lake, causing the bottom of Hongze Lake and the Yellow River bed to rise simultaneously, and the cofferdams have to be raised repeatedly.
Finally, the floods in the Huaihe River became more severe and Hongze Lake continued to expand.
During the Kangxi period, Sizhou City was flooded, and eventually Hongze Lake and the Huaihe River burst south into the Yangtze River in the late Qing Dynasty. The Huaihe River system also became a harmful river due to the loss of effective flood channels into the sea.
It proves that this method only quenches thirst by drinking poison.
Of course Liu Xiang knew the modern methods of regulating the Yellow River and built a sand control project in the middle reaches.
But he couldn't do it. That engineering system was no different from alien technology in the Han Dynasty. He had heard of it but never seen it. It was a complete fantasy.
On the contrary, in modern times, the strategy of "widening rivers and strengthening embankments" to control the Yellow River was more in line with reality.
Wide river embankment consolidation is to build embankments far away from the main channel of the Yellow River, and reduce the pressure of floods on the embankments through the vast beach area between the two banks of the embankments.
At the same time, the vast beachland is used to retain floods and sediment, reducing the extent of river bed sedimentation and uplift.
Relatively speaking, the investment is small, and it is not inconsistent with "concentrating water to attack sand".
If you have money, you can use water beams in the central river channel to attack the sand, and use wide river embankments on the periphery to prevent severe floods.
Although there is no sand control project in the middle reaches, the method of widening the river and strengthening embankments will occupy more river beach land than in modern times. However, this is the Han Dynasty, and there is no shortage of that land. There are many places that need population development.
As for the problem of population explosion and insufficient land in later generations, according to the mainstream thinking of the Han people: Wouldn't you go and rob it?
Hu, Di, barbarians, barbarians, so many places, go and rob them!
The Han Dynasty held the prestige and led all the nations. All the people who were illuminated by the sun and the moon were ministers and concubines. All the rivers and rivers reached were Han's territory.
This is the spirit of the Han people.
Both the Eastern and Western Han Dynasties ended up in the hands of their own people. At the end of the Han Dynasty, the Three Kingdoms were all beaten into a pot of porridge. The foreigners in the southeast and northwest were still beaten like Sun Tzu.
Needless to say, Boss Cao destroyed Wuhuan, conquered Xianbei, and defeated Qiang and Di. Zhuge Liang defeated the Southern Barbarians. Even Sun Quan, nicknamed Sun Shiwan, was able to defeat Baiyue with ease. He also sent a fleet to develop Yizhou, which is the island of Taiwan.
In foreign wars, no one is weak.
Liu Xiang retracted his thoughts and looked at the river flowing smoothly to the east, and then at the collapsed river embankment. No matter what strategy he would use to control the river in the future, repairing this section of the river embankment first was the top priority.
"Instruct Liu Yu to transfer 10,000 hard laborers from Jizhou to the Luoyang River section to repair the embankments."
Near Luoyang, both the north and south banks were deserted. The population on the south bank was moved to Chang'an Sanfu by Dong Zhuo, and several counties on the north bank were moved to Bingzhou by Liu Xiang. The nearest supply location was Zhihuai County in Hanoi County.
The war was approaching, and he could not support a large number of laborers to come to Luoyang to build embankments. This was not his territory. It was not safe to mobilize too many hard laborers.
Looking all the way, the water level of the Yellow River is very low. Unless there is a heavy rainstorm, there is no worry about flooding this year.
The signs of drought have appeared. The paddy fields in Youzhou, Jizhou, and Qingzhou should be able to cope with it, but the dry fields will inevitably reduce production.
It’s not a big problem. Dry fields are used to reducing production anyway, and people are very enthusiastic about replacing paddy fields. There are already many rice fields that are completely irrigated by wells.
The well water is too cold and not suitable for direct irrigation. The people would rather use part of their fields as sunbathing ponds or convert them into paddy fields. Dry fields have broken their hearts.
It's good, at least there is no hidden danger of famine under his rule.
Henan is actually better off than it was in its original history. Rice cultivation has been promoted on a large scale in Youji and other places. This cannot be kept secret, and the results are clear at a glance.
No one is a fool, and they have learned a lot. The first person to fully promote it under the rule was the treacherous Cao Mengde, who was completely usurpative and did not pay any copyright fees.
Further south, few people follow Liu Xiang's example. That area was less affected by the Little Ice Age, so normal planting is enough and there is no motivation to change.
The Yangtze River Basin has not promoted the two-crop-a-year planting technology. Only in Jiaozhou, and probably in the Pearl River Delta, has rice been grown twice a year, but it has not been taken seriously and no one has promoted it yet.
Anyway, Liu Xiang would not remind the enemy. There is not much space in his territory that can meet the two-season planting requirements a year.
It is better to do less to benefit the enemy.
"Let's stop here after looking at the river embankment. Follow me to see Luoyang. I have grown up so big that I have never experienced the prosperity of Luoyang. It's a pity."
Liu Xiang went to Luoyang and went to court once. After staying for less than two days, he led his troops to fight against Xianbei.
At that time, I was under great psychological pressure and had no intention of visiting Luoyang.
It is indeed a pity that he has never seen the true appearance of the capital of the Han Dynasty. According to those high-end people, he is just a humble warrior who has never seen the world.
Haha, I, a vulgar martial artist from a border county in Youzhou, can beat you to the point where you kneel down and call me daddy.
Moreover, he was also a little cautious. In this life, Sun Jian did not participate in the struggle against Dong, nor did he come to the ruins of Luoyang.