In February 1960, the people of Lin County, under the leadership of the county committee, faced the waves of class struggle and the struggle between two lines, and boldly advanced into the Taihang Mountains. Over more than ten years, the heroic people of Lin County, guided by Chairman Mao’s revolutionary line, with fearless revolutionary spirit, fought a battle that shook the mountains and rivers. They resolutely resisted the “order to dismount” from a small group of bourgeois elements, crushed all kinds of class enemies’ sabotage and chaos, overcame severe cold and heat, and numerous difficulties. Finally, they built a mountain-ringed canal over 1,500 kilometers long, flattened more than 1,300 mountain peaks, drilled over 180 tunnels, installed more than 150 aqueducts, diverted water from the Zhang River, and created an artificial sky river—the Red Flag Canal.
The completion of the Red Flag Canal ended the drought and water shortage in Lin County. It is now irrigating 600,000 mu of land with a continuous flow of canal water. In 1964, before the Red Flag Canal was fully completed, it could only exert partial benefits. At that time, Lin County’s grain output had already risen to the “outline” level, tripling the pre-liberation level; by 1973, after criticizing the bourgeois line and extensively promoting the Dazhai agricultural movement, the supporting projects for the Red Flag Canal were completed, and the county’s grain output increased by another fifty percent. With water, there was not only grain but also a significant boost to the rapid development of agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, fishery, and the “Five Small Industries.” Lin County transformed from a drought-stricken area into the “Taihang Water Town.”
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