It has been four years since the first year of Jingyou that he was awarded a vocational examination and won’t be delayed anymore. In May, Zhao Zhen issued an edict to open the next year, and in June, he issued an edict to hold the military examination at the same time, and the civil and military examinations were officially carried out at the same time.

The Tang Dynasty had a military scholar, and a Guo Ziyi was born, who was a general and prime minister, and his name was kept in history. After entering the Song Dynasty, especially after the Zhenzong Dynasty, there have been people who have always proposed to reopen the military scholar. However, this time, Zhao Zhen really made up his mind because of Xu Ping's suggestion that through the military scholar, he selected the assistants for the Xuanwei army who had recently entered the capital, and began to have different organizational arrangements.

Although the martial arts in this era also tested the martial arts skills of the archery, horses and martial arts, it was not the main content. The most important thing was the same as the Jinshi subject, which was also the strategy and military strategy. From the examination content, it can be seen that the position that was most suitable for these martial arts Jinshi was the military assistant, and it was actually inappropriate to be the commander of the military. But the embarrassing thing was that there was no position of the military assistant in the Three Ya Imperial Guards, so these martial arts Jinshi were at a loss. Therefore, in history, the Northern Song Dynasty's military judges started and stopped, and many martial arts Jinshi also changed to civil officials.

In the Southern Song Dynasty, the Three Ya system was actually the inherited border military commander of the Border Army, and the original commander of the Three Ya was actually abolished. The Corporate Army had always had officials, although it was not complete, at least it was organized there. Therefore, all the top martial scholars in the Southern Song Dynasty were all included in the Third Ya as officials. With their position in the system, the martial arts jubilation persisted and some talents emerged.

In large-scale military combat, individual courage is actually not that important. The most important thing is organizational ability and command ability. The selection criteria for commanding soldiers should not be compared with fighting. The reason why many famous generals can fight is because they rise from the bottom and are particularly important at the bottom. If they can fight, they can make more military achievements and establish prestige among soldiers, so that they can rise much faster than others, such as Di Qing and Yue Fei. However, organizational and command ability has always lacked an effective selection mechanism, and they can only select suitable talents in war. This forms a cycle. After a long time of peace, the combat power of the army will decline rapidly. It is necessary to fight for ten or eight years before outstanding talents can grow. However, after fighting for ten or eight years, the entire country cannot support it, and these growing talents have no place to use their skills.

The martial arts are actually a suitable supplement. They originally chose organizational and command capabilities. I won’t say how much value it is. In short, there is such a mechanism. However, the military system is not suitable, so the martial arts can only become embellishments.

The original three imperial guards in the capital obviously did not welcome the Xuanwei army from Yongzhou very much. In order to avoid conflict, they were arranged outside the remote Weizhou gate. After the military camp was built, Zhang Kang was selected as the deputy commander-in-chief and Jingtai was the Du Yuhou.

Zhang Kang and Jingtai were both Jinshi, and because they knew the military, they changed their culture to military affairs. Their common background was that they both lived in the northwest. Zhang Kangtiansheng served as the chief judge of the Zhenrong Army in the later period, while Jingtai had just stepped down from the chief judge of the Qingzhou army, and they were both the pro-war factions at this time.

This is the army brought out by Xu Ping. Zhao Zhen asked him to participate in the training of the new army and settled down a few months before letting go. Originally, Zhao Zhen wanted Li Zhang to be the capital of Yuhou in the army, but Xu Ping pushed him back. The two were in-laws and should have avoided it. When Xu Ping didn't care about Zhao Zhen's trouble, wouldn't he give someone a handle on doing this now?

In the military camp outside Weizhou City, Sang Yi brought two new deputys to Xu Ping to visit.

When the veterans of Yongzhou met the old commander, they cheered together, making Xu Ping feel as if he had returned to the glorious years of Yongzhou.

After seeing the military camp, Sang Yi led Xu Ping to the armory and pointed to the swords and guns he had just sent, saying: "The imperial guards are indeed not comparable to local wing troops. They are well-equipped and armored. They are something we dared not think about when we were in Yongzhou."

Xu Ping smiled and nodded: "That's natural. The money and food collected by the court every year are spent here."

It has been four or five years since I returned to Beijing, and Xu Ping has been in charge of the Three Divisions again, and the military weapons have been replaced. With the technology of steelmaking, of course, we have to use swords and guns. Now the weapons of the imperial guards are all made of good steel, which is not comparable to those in the past.

Industrial capacity can indeed make rapid progress when conditions are met, but the problem is not met now, and it is impossible to make steel and factories all over the place. Xu Ping knew this well that it is time to cultivate the conditions, and great development will be achieved for decades. As long as the seeds are left, everything will go with the flow.

With the current equipment level, the Song army had no problems in fighting Dangxiang or even Khitan. It was not a problem of equipment, so there was no need to spend more energy on it.

What Xu Ping did in military orders was to replace all the shoddy military weapons, including using all the swords and guns, and stocking up arrows on a large scale. The second was to expand the preparations for siege and make various small steel cannons. Another was to work hard to reform the horse politics and strive to have enough animal power. The herdsman can now produce 2,000 qualified war horses a year, and it is also rising year by year. With ten or eight years of hard work, he would no longer rely on horses from the Northwest Market.

The most important thing is actually not the war horses in the herds' prison, but the large number of horses that cannot be used as war horses, but horses, donkeys, mules, etc. in the northwest war. Mobility is related to life and death. Heavy armored cannons are not the first choice. It is the most suitable to be able to use the military force to move quickly with the help of the military animal to fight hard battles. The Song army is not afraid of Dangxiang and Khitan every time the Song army fails. This is not the reason. Flexibility and mobility are what the Song army lacks the most.

Xu Ping always wanted the court to abolish the ban on slaughtering oxen, at least to cancel the policy of limiting beef prices, and divide the cattle into cows and vegetable cattle, which are for food. This suggestion directly challenged the bottom line of agricultural emphasis in this era. Once it was proposed, it was attacked collectively by the government and the country, so he had to forget it. With vegetable cattle, the price of beef increased, raising cattle would be profitable, and the herds and cattle and sheep department could be cultivated in large quantities. With a large number of cattle for slaughter, there was enough raw materials to make crossbows, which could greatly strengthen the strength of the army. In this era, the biggest threat to the two armies was the crossbows. With crossbows, the role of small steel cannons could be fully utilized, otherwise the effect of facing a vast army would be very limited.

Zhang Kang was big and walked forward to touch a row of small steel cannons. He smiled at Sang Yi and Xu Ping and said, "I have seen this kind of thing when I was performing martial arts in the army, and its power was amazing. But at that time I saw it much bigger than this. When I shot it out, the earth was shaken. Why did the cannons in the mighty army have these small cannons? Wouldn't it be better to use a cannon?"

Xu Ping said: "Of course the cannon is good, but the horse cannot be pulled and the people cannot carry it away. It can only be used to defend the city. Whether it is Dangxiang or Khitan, which one of them will attack the city we have heavily guarded, it is easy to fight in this way. Therefore, the cannons made by Guangbei are only used to guard several big cities, and they are not very useful in the army. If you have been in Zhenrong Army for several years, the geography there should be clear. Now, the cannons in the army, not to mention being pulled from the wilderness, it will be extremely difficult to transport them from the capital to the place."

Zhang Kang nodded: "It's right that the advisory said, the mountains and rivers in that area are broken, and it's extremely difficult for people to walk empty-handed."

Jingtai also said: "Yes, from Fuyan Road to Jingyuan Road, there are valleys and it is difficult to have flat ground."
Chapter completed!