Chapter 892 - Yuan Ziguang
To ensure refugees could survive winter on Jeju Island and allow the Fubo Army to operate freely on the Shandong Peninsula, the Joint Logistics Headquarters had to solve the cold-weather clothing problem.
The cheapest and most convenient solution was cotton-padded jackets and greatcoats—low cost, excellent insulation. Under conditions of material abundance, this would have been the obvious choice.
The Planning Commission had adequate cotton cloth, but not much cotton wadding for filling. Hainan Island's cotton cultivation was primarily managed by the Li people; they planted extensively, but yields were limited, and they had no tradition of making padded clothes or quilts. Consequently, no cotton wadding was available locally.
If padded garments were to be made regardless, kapok could substitute for the filling. Kapok wasn't particularly suitable for spinning, but its hollow fibers provided excellent buoyancy—the elders already used it to make life jackets. Processing it for padded jacket filling was probably acceptable; the insulation should prove sufficient. Kapok reserves were deemed adequate for producing some quantity of padded jackets.
The Planning Commission also maintained down reserves—high-quality feathers selected from slaughtered ducks and geese, cleaned and stored for future down jacket production. However, Zheng Shangjie and other female elders in the fashion club had failed in their attempts to create down jackets. Though down jackets appeared to be simple padded garments filled with feathers, the technical content was considerable, particularly regarding the fabric, which had to prevent feathers from escaping. In the old time-space, this was achieved with specialized synthetic fibers. Using pure natural textiles in Lingao—whether cotton, linen, kudzu, woolen cloth, or rare banana fiber—none could meet the requirement. Zheng Shangjie, Ai Beibei, and the others had tried every material they could find, even considering lining the garments with oiled paper, but all attempts ended in failure. Recreating down jackets was out of the question for the foreseeable future.
Finally, there was woolen cloth. The Planning Commission had purchased some in Macau in the past and seized more from the Gou Family Village spoils. After signing the trade agreement with the Dutch East India Company, the Dutch had shipped additional woolens to Lingao. The total came to about five or six thousand bolts, mostly in cyan, black, and red. The original purpose had been autumn and winter clothing for the Fubo Army and dispatched personnel heading to northern regions.
Excluding the high-grade fine woolens that were too thin for the purpose, the remaining coarse woolens made excellent material for military greatcoats and blankets. Hong Huangnan knew that compared to cotton-padded jackets, which readily absorbed moisture, woolen greatcoats offered considerable water resistance. For operations in high-humidity coastal areas, woolen clothing was far superior. The Navy's fondness for short woolen heavy coats—pea coats—wasn't merely about looking Western or stylish.
Hong Huangnan organized the Joint Logistics Forward Command team to draft a memorandum to the Planning Commission requesting allocation of sufficient materials for Operation Engine's winter clothing requirements.
Woolen cloth would be used for military greatcoats and winter uniforms for both Army and Navy. At least 4,500 sets of woolen winter uniforms had to be prepared before the winter of 1631. Additionally, warm military boots—preferably with some waterproofing function—had to be readied for the Fubo Army.
To reduce costs and conserve materials, both Army and Navy woolen greatcoats would be made in the short coat style. Matching supplies included woolen or cotton military caps, plus warm gloves and socks.
By old time-space standards, soldiers' warming gear and socks were generally made of wool for its lightness, warmth, and water resistance. But Lingao had no wool and certainly no knitting yarn. Hong Huangnan settled for the next best option: using labor-protection cotton yarn gloves currently in widespread use throughout Lingao's factories as substitutes. For warm socks, a similar approach was adopted: knitting thread socks from coarse cotton yarn.
Such equipment would pose no problems on Jeju Island, but Hong Huangnan didn't know how cold Shandong would get during the Little Ice Age. These hand and foot warming measures could make do above zero degrees, but if temperatures dropped to minus five or six degrees, they might clearly prove insufficient.
Cotton-padded jackets were designated for refugees. In his memorandum, Hong Huangnan specified that dimensions might as well run larger—the garments would serve not only as clothing but also as quilts. Padded jackets had to be as durable as possible, especially the outer fabric. This way, after transporting one batch of refugees south, the jackets could be disassembled, washed, and reused for the next wave. The Forward Command estimated 10,000 sets of padded jackets would need to be prepared before year's end. The problem of warm footwear for refugees was difficult to solve, so Hong Huangnan decided to ignore it—destitute farmers typically couldn't afford shoes in winter anyway. As long as they endured until reaching Jeju Island, they wouldn't freeze their feet off.
Given the crude quality of the clothing and the inevitable quantity shortfalls, sufficient buildings capable of sheltering from wind and rain had to be constructed on Jeju Island and in Shandong—structures that could protect refugees from the elements while providing minimum safety guarantees. The camp areas also required transport facilities for moving personnel and supplies.
In this era, port infrastructure barely existed; piers allowing Fubo Army vessels to dock directly didn't exist anywhere. The Forward Command planned to build one simple 1,000-ton class pier each at the transfer points in Dengzhou and Jiangnan-Zhejiang, and one 3,000-ton class pier each at Jeju Island and Taiwan's Kaohsiung area.
Shandong required a temporary camp capable of holding 20,000 to 30,000 people; Jiangnan-Zhejiang required one for 10,000 to 20,000. Per the Ministry of Colonization and Trade's recommendation, Jeju and Kaohsiung would need reception and quarantine camps capable of holding 50,000 people each. Construction materials would be partly procured locally and partly shipped from Hong Kong. Approximately 3,000 tons of building materials and equipment would need to be transported.
Additionally, the Ministry of Health assessed that monthly medical supplies and water purification agents for refugees would total about ten tons. Water purification plants would be established at each location: a facility processing 20,000 liters daily in Shandong, and plants processing 50,000 liters daily each in Kaohsiung and Jeju Island.
To guarantee steam power equipment requirements and civilian fuel needs in both areas, each location would require 1,000 tons of steam coal monthly.
Ship supply stations would be established at both Kaohsiung and Jeju Island, also capable of performing simple repairs. The shipbuilding industry currently lacked capacity to establish widespread facilities or deploy sufficient workers and heavy machinery. Hong Huangnan planned to construct only minimal infrastructure locally—sand slipways, simple winches, and booms—while stockpiling ship materials. Additionally, three repair ships would be refitted, equipped with professional workers, equipment, and tools, taking turns on duty at Kaohsiung and Jeju ports to maintain and repair vessels.
Hong Huangnan finished reviewing the draft supply plan the Forward Command had just compiled and felt momentarily startled. The scale of Operation Engine was truly immense. Compared to Operation Giant, though the variety of transported materials had decreased, the quantity and transport distances far exceeded those of the previous campaign. The organizational complexity was no less daunting than anything from the old time-space.
"Just have to take it one step at a time," he thought. "Solving food, clothing, shelter, and transport is already half the battle."
Dawn light spread across the land of Lingao.
Melodious bells rang out "Ding-Dong"—in Lingao, where serving the nation through industry was the rule and all metal belonged to the Senate, metal bells were extremely rare items.
With the ringing of the bell, commands rang out from throughout a large complex of red brick and wooden buildings beside the Wenlan River:
"Stand up!"
"Salute!"
"Sit down!"
This was Fangcaodi National School—the hub of the Senate's education system, the cradle of the Empire's future elites and backbone.
Accompanied by the orders of class monitors, students began their first class of the day.
A crude unpainted wooden classroom door swung open, and a young man in his twenties walked in hurriedly. He wore a blue local-cloth "cadre suit" and possessed all the hallmarks of an otaku: glasses, obesity, messy hair... roughly resembling Kohta Hirano from Highschool of the Dead or Itaru Hashida from Steins;Gate. Yet he was indeed one of the few genuinely qualified teachers among the Elders.
"Stand up!"
Since Fangcaodi National School's founding more than two years ago, daily classroom etiquette had become fixed habit. This transmigrator named Yuan Ziguang was long accustomed to the routine. He returned a 45-degree bow to the second-year Senior Primary students who stood and bowed 60 degrees to him. Then he surveyed the classroom.
The class of thirty sat in silence. Fangcaodi National School implemented coeducation. In the old time-space, separated classes or even separate schools for boys and girls had been gradually becoming a retro trend for the petit bourgeoisie and the wealthy. But in this era, breaking social barriers between men and women and promoting modern gender relations was an important task in the Elders' campaign to "change customs and habits." Except for a few specialized single-gender classes, all were split evenly between male and female students.
The classrooms at Fangcaodi looked remarkably like the rural primary schools in underdeveloped areas Yuan Ziguang had once visited on "exchange." Crude whitewashed lime walls, wooden windows, unpainted wooden desks and chairs. Even the rough wooden board with peeling black paint at the back of the room, specially designated for blackboard newspapers, was strikingly similar.
He noticed the latest propaganda board—"Grasping student ideological trends and theoretical indoctrination is one of the primary tasks of Elder teachers." This sentence appeared in a document recently transmitted to the Education People's Committee and Fangcaodi, causing professional Elder teachers led by Hu Qingbai some confusion. The document had mentioned several items as "one of the primary tasks," creating divergence about what exactly the primary task actually was.
According to the latest issue of Public Opinion Guidance from the Propaganda Department, the topic Hu Qingbai had set for the blackboard newspaper was "Natural and Man-made Disasters of the Ming Dynasty"—classes were even being evaluated on it. The content included materials students had found in the library under teacher guidance, as well as their own personal experiences. Densely packed white chalk characters covered nearly the entire board. The masthead drawing was clumsy: Yuan Ziguang could barely make out a broken basket and a skull.