Chapter 1669 — The Second Five-Year Plan
To solve chronic water scarcity, the Senate had commenced construction of Hainan Island's principal reservoir upon the conclusion of Operation Engine: the Songtao Reservoir.
It would be the island's largest—total storage capacity reaching 3.125 billion cubic meters, irrigating 3.122 million mu of farmland. Upon completion, Lingao, Danzhou, Chengmai, and Qiongshan in northern Hainan would all benefit, with Lingao receiving the greatest share. Beyond agricultural gains, the reservoir would ease industrial water shortages plaguing the manufacturing sector.
Yet the project's scale was immense. In the original timeline, construction began in 1958 and the dam was not finished until 1961; supporting irrigation canals came online only in the 1990s. Against the Senate's ambitious industrial blueprint for the next Five-Year Plan, Songtao was a drop in the bucket—distant water that could not quench the immediate thirst.
The Pearl River Delta surpassed all alternatives. Whether measured by transportation, water resources, manpower, or markets, it stood as seventeenth-century China's premier location. Expanding productive forces demanded industrial relocation.
The Planning Agency's Second Five-Year Plan reflected this reality: Ma'niao Iron and Steel Company would not expand further. The center of gravity for the Senate's steel industry would shift to Guangdong, where a second machinery-manufacturing center would rise in Guangzhou.
The following industries and projects comprised the Plan's priorities:
Power: Complete sets of self-contained power station equipment; 220V and 380V low-voltage transmission and distribution systems with associated instruments; incandescent bulb manufacturing.
Machinery: Focus on equipment manufacturing; complete self-replication of basic industrial mother machines—lathes, milling machines, planers; trial-manufacture hundred-ton hydraulic presses. Expand professional mechanical equipment production for metallurgy, machinery, and chemical industries. Increase investment in process equipment, improving output and quality of standard parts, gears, and bearings.
Precision Instruments: Increase R&D for optical devices, instrumentation, and measuring tools; prioritize hand-cranked mechanical calculators.
Chemical Industry: Expand "Three Acids and Two Alkalis" production; scale up synthetic ammonia via combined carbon process; focus on salt and coal chemicals. Begin preliminary organic chemical exploration. Key projects: pharmaceuticals, pesticides, reagents, pyrotechnics. Search for rubber substitutes.
Metallurgy: Launch a second steel complex in Guangdong; expand output and increase grades and profile types. Pursue breakthroughs in critical special steels: silicon steel, stainless steel, manganese steel, tungsten steel. Expand electrolytic copper; improve non-ferrous metal output and purity.
Power Equipment: Enhance boiler and steam engine performance. Explore medium- and high-pressure boilers under strict quality controls. Steam engine development to emphasize multiple-expansion, high-horsepower designs for ships and power stations. Batch-produce small diesel engines; trial-produce gasoline engines.
Transportation Vehicles: Standardized production of steam locomotive heads and wagons; promote iron-ribbed wooden hulls for vessels; expand inland river motor vessels; trial-build iron-hulled ships and piston aircraft.
Light Industry: Promote silk weaving, garment manufacturing, and food processing.
Electronic Appliances: Pursue vacuum tube R&D and radio component manufacturing; batch-produce fully self-sourced transceivers, radios, loudspeakers, and first-generation manual exchange telephone systems.
Transportation and Communications: Complete a simple highway network encircling Hainan and crossing it in cruciform pattern, plus wired telegraph lines. By Plan's end, all Hainan counties connected by highways and telegraph. Construct Guangzhou-Sanshui Railway; Haikou Port Phase I; Sanya Port Phase II; Kaohsiung Port Phase II; Changhua Port Phase I; Changhua-Shilu highway; Sanshui River Port; Guangzhou Wireless Broadcasting Station; Sanya Time Service Station.
Mining: Tiandu Iron Mine Phase II; Shaoguan Coal Mine Phase I; Hongay Coal Mine Phase II; oil exploration in Southeast Asia.
Water Conservancy: Complete Songtao Reservoir and supporting channels. Ensure industrial, agricultural, and domestic water needs in Lingao by Plan's end. Construct coastal dykes in Kaohsiung and Lingao to resist seawater intrusion.
Culture and Education: Complete Primary Schools in every Hainan county; Junior Primary Schools in counties below 10,000 population. Ten-year National Demonstration Schools in Guangzhou and Kaohsiung modeled on Fangcaodi. Kaohsiung and Jeju: Junior Primary Schools at one per 16,000 residents. Higher education: Naval Academy in Hong Kong, Army Academy on Jeju, Comprehensive Polytechnic College and Higher Normal College in Lingao.
Tom Liu held the document, scanning the long roster: Shaoguan Iron and Steel No. 1 Blast Furnace, No. 1 Open Hearth Furnace, Shaoguan Coal Mine No. 1 Shaft, Shaoguan Central Coal Washing Plant, Hong Kong Shipyard No. 1 Large Drydock, Lingao Optical Equipment Factory, Guangzhou No. 2 General Machinery Plant, Hongay Coal Mine No. 2 Pit, Hongay Central Coal Washing Plant, Lingao Instrument Factory, Lingao Electronics Factory, Lingao Cable Factory, Ma'niao Ferrotungsten Alloy Factory, Ma'niao Metal Structure Factory, Guangzhou Glass Factory, Guangzhou Meat Processing Plant, Guangzhou Silk Factory, Guangzhou Gas Plant, Guangzhou Motor Factory, Qiongshan Building Material Cement Plant, Changhua Cement Plant, Wenchang Coconut Processing Plant, Haikou Seafood Processing Plant, Jeju Meat Processing Plant, Leizhou Sugar Factory...
This was genuinely "Go Big and Go Fast," and Tom Liu felt both elation and anxiety. The difficult birth of silicon steel sheets had stalled the power sector. Beyond self-contained stations for non-ferrous smelters and salt chemical plants, Lingao's prime movers remained dominated by steam and gas engines. Tom Liu sensed the Electric Power Party held diminishing influence within the Planning Agency.
Yet the Plan's language suggested the Senate still affirmed electricity as development's direction! With such policy support, the Great Leap Forward in Electric Power would no longer be a slogan shouted by enthusiasts in the Nanhai Coffee House.
The IT Senators felt profoundly sidelined. Rebuilding a modern IT system within their lifetimes was a fool's dream; at best, they could maintain dwindling devices from the other spacetime. Their brightest hope was vacuum tube mainframe computers—the Lingao ENIAC—someday.
Until then, they would satisfy themselves with "mechanical computers" in the Second Five-Year Plan: paper tape punching, organizing punch-card indices. Secretary of State Ma Qianzhu was enthusiastic, but IT engineers knew these projects required fitters more than programmers.
Technical Senators threw themselves into heated discussion. The venue hummed with rare excitement. Many projects merely expanded scale and improved quality—but relied entirely on this spacetime's industrial capabilities, without support from products carried over from the old world. This was a severe test of five years' industrialization efforts.
Precisely because of this, passing the test would mean genuine capability for industrial "self-maintenance" and "self-upgrade," mastery of the highest technology and strongest productive forces of the seventeenth century. After that, conquering the mainland—and eventually the world—became merely a matter of time.
"With so many port and road projects, I worry our construction company cannot cope." Mei Wan was caught between delight and concern.
"The General Construction Company will definitely expand," Ma Qianzhu assured him. "Senators must embrace roles as industry leaders and managers, giving naturalized citizens free rein. You cannot forever serve as contractors yourselves. Besides, after we conquer Guangdong, all indigenous construction enterprises in the province will be unified and incorporated. Carpentry, bricklaying—they handle it; perhaps better than workers we trained ourselves."
"Good. That relieves me." Mei Wan nodded repeatedly.
"Also, do not be intimidated by 'Phase II' projects. Old spacetime civil engineering concepts do not apply—the difference is vast." Wu De laughed. "Sanya Port Phase II is just a breakwater and trestle bridge—do not overthink it."
"Regarding oil, where is our target? Brunei or Taiwan?" The long-suppressed Oil Party members finally spoke.
Given enormous resource consumption in oil shale mining, the Second Five-Year Plan focused on shallow oil field exploitation rather than Danzhou or Zhaoyuan deposits.
Taiwan's Miaoli County contained shallow oil resources—small quantities mined during Qing and Japanese eras, wells maxing at 120 meters, suited to the Senate's modest drilling technology. But output was minuscule; larger reserves lay buried below 2,000 meters.
Brunei's fields combined shallow burial, large reserves, and excellent quality—ideal targets. But distance was considerable; development required an entirely new base.
(End of Chapter)