What is the relationship between the real border of immigrants and the long-term stability of border areas?

"Immigrating to the solid frontier" embodies the frontier strategy of "strengthening the frontier" and "strengthening the defense", conforms to the objective needs of frontier governance, and has far-reaching significance for developing the frontier and consolidating the frontier defense.

First, it fundamentally solved the difficulty of long-term border defense in the Central Plains Dynasty. Historically, the main threat of the Central Plains Dynasty in border management came from powerful nomadic tribes in the northern and northwestern border areas. Nomadic people are good at riding and shooting, have strong mobility, come and go freely, have strong military advantages, and the harassment of border areas is extremely sudden. As Chao Cuo said, "Hu people's livelihood is out of reach, and it is easy to disturb the border." However, after the implementation of "immigration and border consolidation", with the development of immigrants in the frontier, settled agricultural bases gradually formed. Correspondingly, the construction of water conservancy projects and roads began one after another, which enabled settlers to deal with the enemy for a long time, avoiding the simple military defense mode of perfunctory and panic in the face of unexpected events. The organic combination of border construction and border defense can effectively resist the harassment of nomadic people on the agricultural areas of the Central Plains and guarantee imperial politics.

Second, it is conducive to enhancing national defense potential, consolidating border defense, and achieving stability and development in border areas and the mainland. A large number of immigrants have settled in the frontier and established military and agricultural reclamation positions in the frontier, which can be based on it for a long time. This is conducive to improving the economic and traffic conditions in the border areas, enriching the military forces in the border areas, providing an extremely important economic foundation for strengthening the military construction in the border areas, not only alleviating the pain in the rear when the army is fighting, but also supplementing the population and soldiers fighting in the border areas, and can also station heavy troops in the border areas for a long time. In this sense, the strengthening of border defense has actually effectively defended the mainland, so "solid border" is also "solid inside".

Third, a large number of immigrants settled in the border areas, which changed the resident structure in the border areas, promoted ethnic integration, improved the local economic model and structure, and thus promoted the progress of the border society. Historically, with the implementation of the policy of "moving people to the real border" and the central government steadily pushing the Central Plains system to the frontier and establishing administrative divisions, organized village settlements and towns have formed in the frontier areas, and immigrants have thrived in the frontier areas, which has changed the original resident structure in the frontier areas and is conducive to breaking the state of ethnic isolation. For example, in the second year of Han Yuan Shuo (BC 127), 654.38+10,000 people immigrated to Shuofang. The following year, more than 700,000 people moved to the south of Kansai and Shuofang, and a large number of Han people settled in ethnic minority areas, which contributed to the changes in the composition of border residents and increased the number of border residents' accounts. According to statistics, at the end of the Western Han Dynasty, the population of Liaoxi, Youbeiping and Yuyang counties was about 930,000. The population of Inner Mongolia is more than 6.5438+0 million, and the total population of border areas is more than 3 million, which has changed the barren situation in the northern border areas and promoted the local development. For another example, at the beginning of the policy of "moving the people to the real border" in the Han Dynasty, except for the Huns, most frontier nationalities were still in the primitive society, and then a large number of immigrants entered the frontier. By the Tang Dynasty, after hundreds of years of development, most frontier ethnic groups had entered the class society, and some had entered the feudal society. They were not only brought into the Central Plains system, but also developed economically and had a large population, which was objectively conducive to the integration of all ethnic groups and the maintenance of a unified order.

In a word, stationing wasteland and "migrating people to the real border" stand at the height of maintaining China's unity, and their rationality lies in developing the frontier to consolidate the border; The governance and stability of border areas are closely related to the stability and development of the whole country. Because the key to the strength of the frontier lies in the word "strong", and the fundamental basis of the strength of the frontier lies in the relatively developed frontier economy, convenient transportation and the continuous improvement of people's living conditions in the frontier areas. Only in this way can the country have sufficient and reliable human, material and financial resources to manage the frontier, the frontier can be truly strong, and all ethnic groups in the frontier can have greater centripetal force towards the mainland. On the contrary, the Song and Ming Dynasties pursued the strategy of "weak frontier" in history, and tried their best to move the border people to the open and imaginary frontier, leaving the nomadic people "without money". This method of stabilizing the frontier at the expense of its development has the opposite effect. The frontier is weak and the national defense is lost. China has a similar experience in modern border management. Compared with ancient times, the modern frontier situation has undergone a qualitative change and an unprecedented crisis has emerged. However, although a large number of frontier problems have different manifestations, the fundamental crux is still the low level of economic development in frontier areas. In this sense, it is undoubtedly a valuable experience to strengthen border defense through "immigration and solid border".