After establishing the commander of the West Route Army and appointing Huang Guangmao as the commander, Luo Zhixue continued to prepare for war in Xiangyang City.

On June 28, the main force of the 3rd Infantry Brigade, which had previously captured Zaoyang, arrived in Xiangyang City.

When the 3rd Infantry Brigade also arrived in Xiangyang City, the 1st Infantry Brigade, Guards Brigade, Artillery Brigade, Cavalry Brigade and other units that were originally stationed in Xiangyang and subsequently arrived south with Luo Zhixue, plus

The last 8th Infantry Brigade who just completed recruit training.

Then Xiangyang City has gathered more than 10,000 main troops with three main brigades as the core.

At the same time, the Baoxiang Army has been continuing to recruit and train new recruits. It will not be long before thousands of new recruits complete the training and join various combat units. Luo Zhixue will definitely need to establish several more main units in the future.

But before that, Luo Zhixue still had to solve the current problem of confusing organization and confusing titles of the Baoxiang Army.

As the Baoxiang Army has more and more brigade-level unit numbers, almost reaching twenty, it has become increasingly difficult for the Baoxiang Army to directly command so many troops.

Although the North Route Army Headquarters and the West Route Army Headquarters were established successively before, these were only temporary measures and could not fundamentally solve the problem.

At the same time, the main brigades and the traditional mixed brigades are highly similar in name and difficult to distinguish. They are both brigade commanders, and the military ranks of the two are also very different.

In order to solve the problems of confusing titles and chaotic establishment, Luo Zhixue officially issued an order on July 1st to establish a garrison establishment.

All existing traditional units will be reorganized into garrison units, and their designations will be reordered.

At the same time, in view of the current situation that each brigade has too few troops, a relatively large military-level establishment, and a large defense area, it is difficult for the military headquarters to directly manage the operations of each brigade.

Luo Zhixue instructed: Add a regiment-level establishment, all existing brigades will be downsized to a regiment-level establishment, and the brigade-level establishment should evolve into a larger-scale establishment.

It is tentatively decided that two regiments form one brigade and two brigades form one division.

The division envisioned by Luo Zhixue is a strategic-level unit that needs to be responsible for fighting on a single front. Therefore, it needs to be directly equipped with auxiliary forces such as cavalry, artillery, and baggage. Such a division is expected to have a strength of 12,000 to 3,000 people.
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A division can work together to fight a large-scale battle, or it can separately strengthen artillery, cavalry and other auxiliary units for a brigade to form a mixed brigade of about 5,000 people.

This kind of mixed brigade is also a classic organization in the history of modern warfare. It is mainly more convenient for senior generals to command, but it is also flexible and conforms to the new tactical application of the Baoxiang Army.

After this series of name changes, all units were renamed and divided into infantry regiments, infantry brigades, garrison regiments, garrison brigades, etc.

For example, the Fourth Mixed Brigade and the Eleventh Mixed Brigade, which are under the jurisdiction of the North Route Army and are stationed in the Yuzhou area, are reorganized into the First Garrison Regiment and the Second Garrison Regiment.

The above two garrison regiments were reorganized into the 1st garrison brigade.

The 12th Mixed Brigade stationed in Nanyang City and the 6th Mixed Brigade stationed in Xinye area were also renamed as the 3rd Garrison Regiment and the 4th Garrison Regiment, and were organized into the 2nd Garrison Brigade.

The above-mentioned two garrison brigades are combined into the First Garrison Division, which is still under the jurisdiction of the North Route Army Headquarters. The division commander is temporarily served by Zuo Yingzhe, chief of staff of the North Route Army.

The three traditional mixed brigades under the West Route Army will also be gradually reorganized into the Fifth Garrison Regiment, the Sixth Garrison Regiment, and the Seventh Garrison Regiment, and plans are being made to establish the Eighth Garrison Regiment.

The above-mentioned four garrison regiments are respectively preparing to establish the 3rd garrison brigade and the 4th garrison brigade, which are jointly organized into the 2nd garrison division. They are still under the jurisdiction of the West Route Army Headquarters. The division commander is temporarily served by the commander of the West Route Army Huang Guangmao.

The fifth mixed brigade stationed in Xiangyang City has been reorganized into the ninth garrison regiment. It is planned to build a tenth garrison regiment in the future. The above two brigades will be reorganized into the fifth garrison brigade and will be temporarily under the direct jurisdiction of the staff headquarters.
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Luo Zhixue also made adjustments to the main forces.

The 1st Infantry Brigade was reduced to the 1st Infantry Regiment, the 8th Infantry Regiment was reduced to the 2nd Infantry Regiment, and the 3rd Infantry Brigade was reduced to the 3rd Infantry Regiment. At the same time, a number of sentries will be drawn from the above three regiments to form the basis.

To form the Fourth Infantry Regiment.

The 1st Infantry Regiment and 2nd Infantry Regiment were organized into the 1st Infantry Brigade, and the 3rd Infantry Regiment and 4th Infantry Regiment were organized into the 2nd Infantry Brigade.

The above two brigades will be combined into the First Division.

The 1st Division also has jurisdiction over the 1st Artillery Regiment, the 1st Cavalry Regiment, and the 1st Baggage Regiment.

The 1st Artillery Regiment will be downsized from the 1st Artillery Brigade in the future, with a planned organization of thirty-six field guns.

The First Cavalry Regiment was selected from the mounted infantrymen of each department and was designated to have 650 cavalry.

The division does not have a division commander for the time being, but is under the direct control of the staff department, which is personally commanded by Luo Zhixue.

There is only one main division for the time being, because the main force of the Baoxiang Army is not large.

Even the newly formed First Division still lacks a Fourth Infantry Regiment.

The Second Infantry Brigade and the Seventh Infantry Brigade stationed in Nanyang will be downsized into the Fifth Infantry Regiment, the Sixth Infantry Regiment, and combined into the Third Infantry Brigade.

Luo Zhixue instructed the staff department to continue reorganization in the future. When adding new troops, they must be reorganized in strict accordance with the serial numbers.

The strength of the above-mentioned divisions, regardless of whether they are garrison divisions or main divisions, if the strength of each division is fully established, it will reach more than 10,000 people, and it can completely stand on its own.

However, although Luo Zhixue added regiment-level and division-level establishments, he did not abolish the North Route Army Headquarters and the West Route Army Headquarters, but continued to retain these two military-level organizations.

Because these two organizations are not establishment organizations in the traditional sense, but belong to campaign direction command organizations.

For example, the Northern Route Army is responsible for the northern defense area, and depending on the severity of the task, the forces under its jurisdiction will also change. For example, when reorganizing various ministries this time, Luo Zhixue assigned the Fourth Garrison Regiment (formerly the Sixth Mixed Brigade)

), the Sixth Infantry Regiment (formerly the Seventh Infantry Brigade) was transferred to the Northern Route Army Headquarters.

The same is true for the West Route Army. Although there is currently only a unit such as the Second Garrison Division (less than a garrison regiment), it seems that there is no need to set up a military-level organization, but in fact this is not the case. The West Route Army will still need to continue

Fighting on the Western Front.

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Luo Zhixue will also appropriately send additional troops to the commander of the West Route Army according to the situation.

If we add it in the future, we might as well just keep it.

Although Luo Zhixue issued a lot of orders during this reorganization operation, in fact, it was mostly a change in the number of troops, and there was not much mobilization of the troops under each defense zone.

The troops fighting in the north and west are still the same troops.

The really big change is actually the plan to expand the Fourth Infantry Regiment.

This is the second expansion of the main force of the Baoxiang Army after the Second Infantry Regiment (formerly the 8th Infantry Brigade) and the 5th Infantry Regiment (formerly the 7th Infantry Brigade).

And unlike the previous establishment of a completely new unit, this time Luo Zhixue transferred units from other main forces to serve as the backbone of the new unit to shorten the formation time of the new unit.

Although this will weaken the combat effectiveness of the old troops, Luo Zhixue believes that this impact is acceptable.

After seeing that the Fourth Infantry Regiment had recruited thousands of new recruits in just a few days, Luo Zhixue made a big move.

A battalion from the Fifth Infantry Regiment will be transferred as the core, and the Seventh Infantry Regiment will be formed after recruiting new soldiers.

A battalion from the Sixth Infantry Regiment will be transferred as the core, and new recruits will be added to form the Eighth Infantry Regiment.

The recruits lacking in the above-mentioned regiments will all be replenished from the recruits in the recruit camp in Nanyang Mansion.

Although the two regiments were still on paper, in order to avoid subsequent troubles, Luo Zhixue directly combined the two regiments into the Fourth Infantry Brigade.

The brigade will be combined with the 3rd Infantry Brigade to form the 2nd Division. The division commander will be temporarily served by Huang Dingquan, commander of the Northern Route Army.

Then on July 13, Luo Zhixue transferred more than a thousand people from the First Division as the backbone of the new Third Division. The missing recruits were supplemented by recruits from Xiangyang Prefecture.

After entering mid-July, the paper organization of the Baoxiang Army became the First Division, the Second Division, the Third Division, the First Defense Division, the Second Defense Division, and the Fifth Defense Brigade.

In addition, the First Cavalry Brigade still maintained its independent organization. Wang Xiazi still led the most elite cavalry in the rural protection army. At the same time, Luo Zhixue also gave the cavalry brigade a cavalry artillery sentry organization. It was subsequently planned to have six guns and two pounds.

Half artillery.

It is worth noting that after this reorganization, the Guards Brigade still maintains the designation of the Guards Brigade, but like the main force, the establishment is directly expanded to a mixed brigade-level establishment of more than 5,000 people.

However, the above-mentioned units may seem to have large establishments, but in fact many units are empty.

For example, the Second Division currently only has a total of more than 5,000 people, and it has not even fully recruited new recruits.

The third division only has a thousand men, and it will take at least two months to form an army.

On the other hand, each garrison division is relatively fully staffed. After all, the Baoxiang Army has captured too many Ming soldiers, bandits and other prisoners of war. If you choose, thousands of people can always come out to supplement them.

After all the reorganization was completed, Luo Zhixue also personally led the army south.

The reason why Luo Zhixue went south at this time was because a sentinel sent news that a Ming army with nearly 20,000 troops in the south was heading north to Yicheng along the Han River.

This news finally prompted Luo Zhixue to personally lead the main force southward.

Because there are already eight to nine thousand Ming troops garrisoned in Yicheng. If another Ming army of about 20,000 people is allowed to enter Yicheng smoothly, then the subsequent attack on Yicheng will be even more troublesome.

Therefore, even though the reorganization of the troops has not yet been completed, new weapons such as siege mortars and large-caliber field guns are not available.

Luo Zhixue still led the First Division (under the Fourth Infantry Regiment), Cavalry Brigade, Guards Brigade, and Fifth Guards Brigade southward.

As for Xiangyang City in the rear, it is temporarily garrisoned by the Third Division and the Fourth Infantry Regiment.

It’s funny to say that Xiangyang City now seems to have divisions and regiments garrisoned, and it seems that it is safe and sound, but in fact the total garrison strength is only a few thousand people...

Because the Third Division has just been established, even the soldiers are not yet in place. Most of the current thousand-strong force are officers and non-commissioned officers, and only about half are pure soldiers... The scheduled soldiers for the Third Division are still being recruited.

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The Fourth Infantry Regiment is fully staffed, but only about a hundred of them are veterans, and the rest are all new recruits, and they don’t even have muskets, so they can only hold spears for the time being...

Adding up one regiment after another, this division may not even be able to defeat a strengthened main regiment...

However, Xiangyang now belongs to the rear. As long as the army led by Luo Zhixue in front does not suffer a disastrous defeat, then Xiangyang City will not face the threat of a large number of enemy attacks.

As for the scattered enemy troops of hundreds and thousands of people charging long distances, Xiangyang City's walls, moats, and the large number of old-fashioned artillery on the city walls are for viewing.

When Luo Zhixue personally led an army of tens of thousands southward, the Ming army in Yicheng also immediately discovered the unusual movements of the army protecting the thieves.
Chapter completed!