Black Gobi landform
Winter black Gobi
Black Gobi location map
Located in the steppe Silk Road rush to the Black Gobi
The Black Gobi is a mysterious land in China. It refers to an area of about 200,000 square kilometers between Gansu Province, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region and Xinjiang Autonomous Region from the Ejina River in the east, to the China-Mongolia Boundary Mountain in the north, to the western section of the Hexi Corridor in the south, and to the eastern section of Tianshan in the west. In the Ma mane mountain area in the hinterland of the Black Gobi, there are two fortress fortresses built in the early twentieth century, a black lama castle and a Yang Zengxin fortress.
Mane Hill Town North Goat Sculpture
Black Lama with a steel gun
The second from the right is the Black Lama
In the middle is the Black Lama
The "Black Lama" is really "Danbi Gyaltsen", also known as "Dhambin Gyaltsen". "Danbin Gyaltsen" is an honorific title for a religious elite, and some people call him "Danbinoyan". "Noyan" means "prince" in Mongolian. Because of his large appearance and large head, the local herders called him "Big Head Lama", but his most common names were "False Lama" and "Black Lama". He was a "Kalmyk" native, a "Weyrat" Mongol who remained in Russia after turgut returned to the east during the Qianlong period, born in the Durbert Department of Astrakhan Oblast in Western Mongolia, Russia, who served in Beijing's Jiahuktu Yamen, came to Xinjiang in 1910, led an army to attack the Chinese army stationed in Kobdo from 1911 to 1912, and massacred the Han and Hui ethnic groups. In 1914, he was imprisoned by the Russian government, freed in 1917, fought against the Chinese army in Outer Mongolia in 1919, and in the winter of 1920, the Black Lama took his men out of the Central Mongolian Boundary Mountain to the Black Gobi, built the famous fortress - "Danbin Lama" Castle in the hills south of today's Mamanshan Town, guarded the largest water source in the Black Gobi "Gongbo Spring", and built more than 500 tents around the fortress, relying on robbing passing caravans for a living.
Bird's eye view of the military fortress of Pillbox Hill
Deep trenches
The "Black Lama" castle is quite spectacular, and the herders of Ma mane mountain call it "Bunker Mountain", and the hills within a radius of five square kilometers are densely distributed with bunkers, trenches, barracks and other fortifications. There is a watchtower on each hill. It is connected to the central complex by trenches, and the layers of bunkers and firing holes form an airtight fire network. The fortress is condescending, easy to defend and difficult to attack, and it is impossible to design without a fairly professional military vision; it is impossible to complete this huge project without considerable human, material, and financial resources. The "black lamas" who once dominated the black Gobi in the northwest once made the people of Xinjiang, Gansu and Inner Mongolia regarded them as flood beasts.
Black Lama's Lair
Hilltop bunker
Perimeter fortifications
People liken it to "Silk Road Robin Hood" and "Devil Black Lama". The locals frighten the children, not to say that the wolf is coming, but to say that the "black lama" and "commander ga" are coming (commander Ma Zhongying, "ga" means small, because he became a commander at the age of 20, so it is called "commander"), in the early 20th century, the "black lama" every move even affected the nerves of the whole of Asia. In 1924, the Mongol general Baledandor led an expeditionary force of the Red Soviet Union and Outer Mongolia to behead the Black Lama.
The Black Lama who was beheaded by the Sumon Expeditionary Force
In the midst of an expeditionary force fire, Lama Danbin's castle was reduced to rubble, and the Outer Mongolian military police put the black lama's head into a spear and paraded through the streets of Outer Mongolia to tell all the Mongols that the black lama was dead. In the 1920s, the Soviet Union permanently preserved the remains of two people, one Lenin and the other the head of a black lama. To this day, the head of the Black Lama is well preserved in a Peter the Great building in St. Petersburg, Russia, and is a treasure number 3394.
Yang Zengxin Rong costume
Speaking of the "Black Lama" fortress on Pillbox Mountain, it is necessary to explain the "Yang Zengxin Fortress" of water. Yang Zengxin was born on March 6, 1864 (the twenty-eighth day of the first month of the third year of qing tongzhi). In 1888, he was raised in the middle of the year and joined the Army in the following year. He served as the governor of Zhongweizhi County and Hezhou in Gansu, and in 1900 he was appointed as the envoy of Gansu Tixue and the general office of the Wubei Academy, and in 1907 he entered Xinjiang as the general office of the Xinjiang Army Primary School, and also served as the counselor of the training office. In 1911, he was promoted to Zhendi Dao and Tifa envoy. After the establishment of the Republic of China, he was appointed as the governor of Xinjiang and the chief civil administrator.
At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the People's Republic of China, internal and external troubles abounded, China was in the midst of "three thousand years of great changes", there had never been such a great crisis, the fate of the country was like a thread, the Chinese nation was in the process of extinction and self-salvation, and at this time Japan coveted the northeast; Tsarist Russia invaded Kobdo, annexed the Tangnu Wuliang Sea, and sent troops out of Mongolia; Britain invaded Tibet, the world powers were encroaching on the Chinese frontier, wanting to put China to death, wanting to colonize China to plunder resources, this unequal treaty, The humiliating clause was signed endlessly, the land was cut and indemnified, and the people were deeply in the water. At this time, Xinjiang has become a "dangerous place for ghosts" and is in danger. The central officials who were protected by Mingzhe regarded it as a dangerous place for "being discredited". However, Yang Zengxin, who has a deep understanding of the great righteousness and has the overall situation in mind, is not afraid of danger, and bravely stands on the cusp of history. The success of preserving and unifying Xinjiang in administrative isolation, relying on its own meager strength to guard the frontier of wanli, so that one-sixth of China's territory is safe and sound, and its credit is no less than Zuo Zongtang.
Yang Zengxin Fortress 1
Yang Zengxin Fortress 2
Yang Zengxin Fortress 3
Yang Zengxin Fortress 4
Yang Zengxin Fortress is located on a hill northwest of the ancient city of Mingshui and looks like a huge chicken crown. Command centers, lookouts, outposts, trenches, bunkers, fire distribution points... It's a patchwork of restaurants, even restaurants, mosques. In such a hard mountain, there are not only artificially carved steps, but even secret passages for hidden safety. The most breathtaking thing is the use of a huge "stone bowl" on the sunny slope to form a set of lighting equipment. This "stone bowl" was originally a natural concave pebble the size of a double bed, which could hold half a ton of fuel oil. At night, people lit it, which was enough to replace the searchlight, not only providing light for the fortress, but also putting passers-by and intruders under close surveillance.
Yang Zengxin Fortress 5
Yang Zengxin Fortress 6
Yang Zengxin Fortress 7
Yang Zengxin Fortress 8
In 1918, the black lama was unable to survive in Russia and Outer Mongolia and asked to take refuge in Xinjiang, but yang Zengxin, the governor of Xinjiang, flatly refused. Hearing of the Black Lama, Yang Zengxin was like a great enemy, and he would put the war against a defeated army of only a few hundred people in the highest priority. Then he immediately issued a "chicken feather letter" to the eastern Frontier Defense (Hami) - "Ordering the Hami Camp, County, and Repairing the Walls of Trnaqin City" to be cautious and cautious, thinking and thinking, only because he thought that the stakes were very high. Hami is the only city defense between Xinjiang and the Black Gobi, and is the gate facing the vast uninhabited area in the entire northeast. Yang Zengxin closed this door in time, only to enter and exit, and also closed the path for the chaotic tyrants "black lamas" to introduce unstable factors into Xinjiang. Yang Zengxin firmly believes that abandoning war is the consensus of the people of Xinjiang, xinjiang's ancient oases and pastures are not experimental stations for careerists, as long as there is a little Spark, it will cause a forest fire, which is undoubtedly a disaster for Xinjiang's fragile balance. Yang Zengxin categorically rejected the Black Lama, not out of a personal grudge. They were just on opposite sides of a line. While the Black Lama sought to have his own space during the geopolitical reorganization, Yang Zengxin wanted to lead the people of all ethnic groups across Xinjiang through the treacherous waves and reach a safe world on the other side. The two fortresses of the Black Lama and Yang Zengxin both give the impression of excessive defense, except that the Black Lama protects his own safety, while Yang Zengxin is for the continuation of civilization in one-sixth of China.
Yang Zengxin
Tomb of Yang Zengxin
Yang Zengxin opened canals in Xinjiang to reclaim the land, reward and punishment clearly, and solve people's livelihood problems. Xinjiang began a vigorous construction in history, rewarding farming and animal husbandry, adding 3749525 mu of arable land during his reign, which is 1.656 times the land reclaimed in Xinjiang in the more than 200 years from the Kangxi period to the present. Yang Zengxin advocated the establishment of industries, adopted flexible financing methods, and recruited talents in a new and changeable way; issued paper money to maintain the "blood circulation" of the social market; he took "revitalizing education and having a bearing on the fundamental plan of the state" as his purpose, and in view of the situation of ethnic chaos and language barriers, he carried out educational rectification and transformation for the purpose of collecting practical results. In 1928, he sent a telegram to support the Nationalist government in Nanjing, announcing that Yi Zhi would be attached, and on July 1, he was inaugurated as chairman of the Xinjiang provincial government. On July 7 of the same year, he was assassinated by his political enemy Fan Yaonan, and a generation of heroes ended, which made people really regret.
There are many unsolved mysteries in the Black Gobi, the Black Lama Castle, yang zengxin fortress, and the mystery of the ancient city of Mingshui, which needs to be further uncovered.