Since the day Yang Guang ascended the throne, he has torn off the veil of disguise, and the long-term repression and disguise have made him eager to realize his ideals. For this reason, he disregarded the lives and deaths of the people, and often drove hundreds of thousands, or even millions of people, to engage in labor, which made the entire Great Sui Dynasty complain and the people lived in dire straits.
In the first year of the Great Cause (605), Yang Guang ordered Yang Su, Yang Da, and Yu Wenkai to start building the eastern capital of Luoyang, and as many as two million people were forced to go to Luoyang every month to do labor. In addition, he also ordered Yu Wenkai and Feng Deyi to build the Xianren Palace, and transported rare plants and trees from all over the country to meet his aesthetic needs.
In the same year, he ordered Shangshu Youcheng Huangfu to mobilize more than one million people in Henan and Huaibei to open the Jiqu to connect Luoyang with Huaishui. At the same time, he also mobilized hundreds of thousands of people in Huainan to dig a ditch from Shanyang (Huai'an) to Yangzi (Yangzhou South) into the river, this canal is also known as "Shanyang Desert", a total length of more than 4,000 miles. Not only that, but he also asked for willow trees to be planted on both sides of the river for greenery and roads to be built. From Chang'an to Yangzhou, he built at least 40 palaces for him to live in when he went out to make rounds.
In addition to this, he also ordered Wang Hong to build dragon boats and tens of thousands of transport ships in Jiangnan. The dragon boat was designed with four floors, forty or fifty feet high, and two hundred feet long. The top floor has the main hall where the emperor works and rests, and the middle two floors have more than 100 luxurious rooms, which are decorated with gold and splendor. The lowest level is the dwelling of the servants and maids. Of course, the dragon boats were accompanied by nine three-storey floating boats, as well as thousands of ships for princes and ministers, as well as warships loaded with weapons and ammunition. The boats were pulled by more than 80,000 slender men, and were guarded by numerous Great Sui cavalry on both sides of the river. Everywhere such a large team goes, it will bring great trouble to the local area.
In the fourth year of the Great Cause (608), Yang Guang requisitioned more than one million people in Hebei to dig the Yongji Canal, which led Qinshui to the Yellow River and then to Zhuojun (now Beijing) in the north.
In the sixth year of the Great Cause (610), he ordered the digging of the Grand Canal from Jingkou to Yuhang (Hangzhou), connecting the five major water systems of the Qiantang River, the Yangtze River, the Huai River, the Yellow River and the Haihe River, with a total length of 2,400 kilometers, becoming the longest canal in the world at that time, greatly improving the north-south traffic situation, and still playing an important role until the beginning of the 20th century.
In the eighth year of the Great Cause (612), he again mobilized more than 1.13 million people in North China to launch an expedition against Goguryeo (Korean Peninsula), but suffered a crushing defeat at Liaodong City.
In the ninth year of the Great Cause (613), he once again sent 1.5 million troops to attack Liaodong City, intending to take it in one fell swoop, but at this time, Yang Xuangan's rebellion occurred in the country, and he had to be forced to withdraw his troops.
In the 10th year of the Great Cause (614), he sent a million troops to attack Goguryeo for the third time, during which he recruited troops and rations, and although he finally defeated the Goguryeo army at Beisha City, the losses caused by the war were huge. Goguryeo eventually sued Yang Guang for peace and returned the Sui rebel general Hu Sizheng who had fled to Goryeo.
In three campaigns against Goguryeo, he mobilized millions of troops, but only a few soldiers survived. On the Liaodong Road, the bones of the Great Sui soldiers can be seen everywhere, and it was not until later that Li Shimin, Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, went on an expedition to Liaodong, and these bones were collected and buried one by one.
Although Yang Guang has completed many great deeds that are worthy of eternal fame in a short period of time, his quick success and quick profit have caused Yang Jian's hard-working foundation to be lost, and the world is in chaos. At that time, men were either conscripted to serve in labor or to fight, and many prefectures, counties and towns were left behind with only left-behind children, the elderly, women and children, and the disabled.
Maybe he really wants to be a good emperor and make a difference. However, his approach failed to treat the people well, and eventually led to embattlement and the flames of revolt ignited everywhere.