books44 Chapter 145 Disaster Victims
Chapter 145 Disaster Victims
"Section Chief, the commander has assigned us a total of 3,000 workers and 40 technicians."
In the room, Li Yuncai held a record sheet and said to Zhao Tianyang: "The chief said that the four mines should start working at the same time and mine the iron ore as soon as possible!"
"Great."
Zhao Tianyang said happily: "With these people, we can complete the construction of the mine within a month."
"By the way, there's one more thing."
Li Yuncai picked up the record sheet and looked at it, then said, "The commander also said that they harvested 20 tons of sugarcane and tons of cotton in Nanniwan."
"The sugar cane has been made into 62.5 tons of white sugar. The chief asked me to ask you, what are you going to do with this stuff?"
"Send the cotton to Huangyadong, and have Liu Ding arrange for people to make it all into propellant."
Zhao Tianyang thought for a moment and continued, "As for the white sugar, send it to the newly built cannon factory. I will deal with it after I finish my work in a few days."
"Okay, I'll do it right now!"
After Li Yuncai got up and left, Zhao Tianyang picked up the pen on the table and continued drawing the blueprint.
Early December 1938, Yan'an County, Mazhuang.
Zhao Tianyang, under the leadership of Li Yuncai, is inspecting the work progress of the four mines.
"Chief, the mine in Mazhuang was built three days ago because it is a poor mine and the area is small."
As Li Yuncai walked towards Mazhuang, he introduced to Zhao Tianyang beside him: "There is not much ore mined. We have only mined 1,000 kilograms of ore in three days."
"That's enough. One thousand kilograms of low-quality iron ore can produce at least two hundred kilograms of iron."
Zhao Tianyang smiled and said, "These two hundred kilograms of iron can produce two hundred grenades according to the specifications of the black powder grenades we are currently producing!"
"Please be kind and give me something to eat!"
"You are a good person, just give us something to eat!"
Just as the two men walked to the entrance of the village, they suddenly discovered that many refugees with ragged clothes and disheveled hair had gathered at the entrance of the village.
At this time, the uncle from Shaanxi had already brought the militia from their village to stop these people.
"Everyone, listen to me!"
The old man from Shaanxi shouted loudly: "It's not that we don't want to help you, but our village is also poor. If the Communist Party hadn't come, we would still be working as farmhands for the landlords!"
"These years, we have barely made ends meet with the little corn we grew. With so many of you, we really can't do anything!"
"You're talking nonsense. This morning, I saw several carts carrying food entering your village."
A slightly sturdier refugee in the crowd retorted sharply.
"Oh, those grains are not from our village."
The Shaanxi uncle hurriedly explained: "Those grains are for the workers who helped us build the mine. We can only eat corn paste!"
"Mine?"
The sturdy refugee immediately said, "Since you have a mine, can you hire us to work there? We don't want money, just food!"
"this......."
The uncle from Shaanxi was in a bit of a dilemma. The mine built in their village was very small. Zhao Tianyang had made arrangements for them. The men went into the mountains to mine, and the women made grenades in the village.
The positions for all the people in the village have just been arranged. If these people are allowed to go in to work, someone in their village will have to give up their place. Who would agree to this?
"No, if you guys go, where are we going?"
Sure enough, one of the militiamen looked at the refugees angrily and said, "We don't have any jobs here, get out of here!"
"No, we're not leaving!"
"Please, please!"
After finally finding a village that seemed to have surplus food, the refugees were unwilling to leave and began to beg for mercy.
Seeing that the militiamen had raised their red tasseled spears, Zhao Tianyang, who had almost figured out what was going on, shouted loudly.
"stop!"
…………
"Here comes Section Chief Zhao!"
Zhao Tianyang now has a great influence in Mazhuang. When the militiamen saw Zhao Tianyang coming, they put away their red tasseled spears and broadswords.
"Chief Zhao, please think of a solution!"
The Shaanxi uncle pleaded, "You also know the situation in our village. If you give these people a bite to eat, one of us will go hungry!"
"We understand, leave it to me!"
Zhao Tianyang patted the Shaanxi uncle on the shoulder and turned to look at the ragged refugees: "Hello, everyone. I am Section Chief Zhao of the Military Industry Department of the Eighth Route Army."
"I know all your difficulties. Don't worry, we, the Eighth Route Army, will not watch the people starve to death."
"real or fake?"
"Section Chief Zhao, he seems to be a high-ranking official. The one who didn't let us leave Henan in the first place seemed to be called something like Section Chief!"
"I don't care if he's a high-ranking official or not, as long as he can give me enough food to eat, he's a good official!"
After hearing Zhao Tianyang's assurance, the refugees began to talk.
"Don't worry, I will definitely let you have a meal!"
After saying this, Zhao Tianyang gave instructions to Li Yuncai in front of the refugees.
"Go get all the food from the mines, set up a few big pots at the entrance of the village, and cook some corn paste for them."
"Yes!"
Li Yuncai nodded and ran towards the village without hesitation.
Seeing this, the militiaman and the uncle from Shaanxi hesitated for a moment and swallowed what they were about to say.
"Everyone heard it, there will be corn paste to drink soon."
Zhao Tianyang looked at the refugees and asked, "Now can you tell me where you are from?"
“We are from Henan.”
"In June this year, the Yellow River suddenly burst its banks and many people died!"
"We wanted to flee to the south, but soldiers stopped us, and many government officials told us to go back."
"What can we do if we go back? The land is flooded, and the local officials don't care about our lives and they want to collect taxes from us."
"So we ran north. Shanxi and Shandong were full of Japanese invaders, so we ran to Shaanxi."
Listening to the refugees' explanations, Zhao Tianyang understood what was going on with these people.
"Huayuankou Dam Burst"
In order to delay the advance of the Japanese army, the Kuomintang leader suddenly issued an order to blow up "Zhengzhou Huayuankou".
What’s even more ridiculous is that in order to maintain confidentiality, the local people were not notified to evacuate.
After the Huayuankou dike burst, 89 people died on the spot, millions of people were displaced, 44 counties and cities were affected, and more than million people were affected. What does this mean?
More murderous than the Japanese!
"I remember there were KMT members in Shaanxi, too. How did you get here? Didn't they care?"
Zhao Tianyang asked doubtfully.
"Whatever!"
The sturdy refugee said, "But there were so many of us, so many of us that they could only stop some of us. The rest of us scattered and ran over here."
"Chief, we are here!"
At this time, Li Yuncai came over with several workers, pulling a cart and carrying pots, pans, and utensils.
"food!"
"I'm hungry!"
The refugees who saw the food suddenly became agitated.
"Everyone be quiet, we'll cook right away."
With the help of the militia, Zhao Tianyang barely maintained order. After the corn flour was put into the pot, the refugees finally calmed down.
"call....."
Zhao Tianyang wiped the sweat from his head and felt a little scared. There really was a fine line between the refugees and the mobs!
"Go back immediately and report what happened here to the chief and see how to solve it!"
Zhao Tianyang gave instructions to Li Yuncai.
"Okay, I'll go back right away."
Li Yuncai found a donkey to ride on and ran quickly towards Yan'an.
During this period in history, Yan'an was still in a state of difficulty in taking care of itself and could provide very limited help to the people affected by the disaster.
But things are different now. The early development of Nanniwan has provided the capital for these refugees to barely survive.
Once they conquer Ningxia, they can resettle these disaster victims there, which will not only solve their living problems but also improve local stability.