"Left left and right, left left...turn right!"

On a large open space outside a simple camp two kilometers east of Yamolin, nearly a thousand laborers who had just been transferred from Austro-Hungarians were undergoing simple training. |[2][3][w][x]} In fact, Chinese workers recruited to Europe received simple military training and were also very suitable for life in the military camp.

With the strong support of Li Haidn, Chinese workers in Austro-Hungary were reorganized into the General Group of China Workers in accordance with the military organization. Wu Guangxin became the general group of general groups, with six "bosses" under it, with 1,500 officers and soldiers in each "bosses".

There are four Chinese workers' volunteers in Galicia and southwestern Ukraine, and one in Romania. In addition, the 1st Chinese workers' volunteers assisted the Austro-Hungarian garrison in the Balkans to maintain local public order. These Chinese workers from Shandong, Hebei, Henan and Anhui have undergone physical examinations and screenings before going abroad. Most of them are strong and able to endure hardships.

However, these workers who dare to travel across the ocean and go to foreign countries to venture to make money alone are mostly proletarians who have lost their land and wandered around. They are of varying quality, and some of them are destined to be bandits. Therefore, eating, drinking, gambling, fighting and stealing are constantly banned in the Chinese workers' camps, and they occasionally cause some criminal cases in the local area.

Officers like Ye Quan and others who had just left the military academy were directly appointed as battalion commanders with hundreds of people under their command, and their positions at the regiment level and above were served by senior officers from the Land University. Most of them led troops for the first time, and many things were still a little confused. Fortunately, Austro-Hungary and Germany recruited nearly 8 million supplementary soldiers after the war and had rich training and organizational experience. Now these Chinese workers' corps are basically controlled by the officers and non-commissioned officers' advisory groups sent by Austro-Hungary, which has reduced most of the burden on them.

Weapons are not a problem. Due to Italy's defeat, Germany and Austria confiscated 2,700 cannons, 20,000 machine guns, 1,200 mortars and more than 1.3 million rifles from the Italians.

Although the Italian-style Manlicha-Carcano m18.91 rifle has good performance, it uses 6.5mm caliber rifle bullets, which cannot be matched with the standard rifles used by Germany and Austria, so there is no problem to provide them to the Chinese legion. Due to its light weight and short body, the Carcano rifle is more suitable for short orientals.

With the defeat of Italy and Serbia, the Austro-Hungarian Empire was finally able to concentrate its main forces on the Eastern Front. By the spring of 1916, the total force of the Austro-Hungarian Empire gathered on the Russian-Austrian front had reached 1.5 million. However, Falkenhein transferred the three German armies on the Eastern Front to the Western Front and devoted them to the meaningless Battle of Verdun.

On the Western Front, by February, the Battle of Verdun, which Falkenhein insisted on launching, seemed to have become another massacre of mutual depletion and protracted by both sides. The German dreams of the Germans broke down again and their offensive momentum had been curbed. Falkenson drew troops from the Eastern Front regardless of everything, giving the Russians an opportunity to take advantage of.

The large forces of Germany and France fought against each other around a fortress with no military value. The continuous force flocked from the entire France and Germany to the battlefield. Then, the train full of wounded soldiers and dead people drove back from the front line. Falkenson is now desperate because this battle will determine his personal future and reputation. The Germans have used their elite troops in a meaningless battle.

In February 1916, the port of Constantinople, the capital of the Ottoman Empire.

The Turks finally welcomed another fleet, and the Minister of the Navy, one of the three giants of the Ottoman Empire, welcomed the support fleet sent by the former enemy's current allies with a complicated mood. Admiral Sorochin, the commander-in-chief of the Ottoman Empire's naval commander-in-chief, was still on the list.

Lieutenant General Mauf commanded a German fleet composed of four battleships and two armored cruisers. Lieutenant General Pachner led the Austro-Hungarian fleet composed of the battleship battlecruiser "Emperor Teresa" and "Moretz" and the armored cruisers "Emperor Maximilian" and "Emperor Carl I" to Constantinople.

The Marmara Sea is sunny in February, and the luxurious and declining Istanbul is not too cold. On the building of the Ottoman Navy Command with a strong Italian architectural style, the Ottoman Crescent Flag hung listlessly on the roof of the main entrance.

The Russians tore off the Ottoman Empire through repeated wars: the Crim Peninsula, the Caucasus in the inner and outer regions, Azerbaijan, Bukhara and Astrakhan in Central Asia. Europe now has no hope of getting it again. The Austrians annexed almost the entire Balkans and North Africa’s homelands, which are the legacy of the Ottomans.

But now the Austrians are allies, leaving the Turks helpless.

The glory of the Barbarossa Heiding era has long dissipated. Now the Austro-Hungarian fleet is galloping across the Mediterranean. They extend their claws to the Black Sea. In Constanta, Romania, the Austro-Hungarian Black Sea Fleet was established. At the same time, an inland fleet called the Danube Fleet was established.

A sudden cold air from Russia south hit the entire Black Sea coast, and the temperature suddenly dropped below zero, which made the Austro-Hungarian sailors brought from the warm Mediterranean seem quite uncomfortable. There was rain and snow floating above Constantinople, and the streets were filled with undissolved white snow and ice. A thin layer of ice formed on the northern coast of the Bosphorus, which seemed to be back in winter.

In such weather, Admiral Sorochin led the battlecruiser of the "Great Sulim Sultan" (Avos) and the "Mittyri", the original German "Goben" battle cruiser and the "Brest" cruiser set sail from the Golden Bay Naval Base in the Sea of ​​Marmara and headed to the Port of Thessalonika for overhaul. The Ottomans were unable to provide their warships with a large enough dock for repairs. The big holes on the two warships that were blown out due to mines could not be completely repaired. The Turks could only use wood to block the holes on the "Avos" hull, which was also a pioneering move.

General Sorochin had been commanding such a broken ship, and was worried about the Russians, fearing that two skylights would be opened on the ship, so that he could only lead his German sailors to swim in the Black Sea.

The arrival of the German-Austrian joint fleet commanded by Lieutenant General Pachner and Lieutenant General Mauf made him breathe a sigh of relief.

The war is imminent, and the Austro-Hungarian fleet has taken over the Turkish defense on the Black Sea for him. Now he can finally take this riddled warship to find a larger shipyard for repairs.

After Italy's defeat, its main battleship was divided by Germany and Austria. The Austro-Hungarian Navy obtained the Dante and three "Earl Cafur" class battleships, four front dreadnoughts, four armored cruisers and six cruisers. The Germans were divided into two "Durio" class battleships, two armored cruisers and four cruisers. After lifting the blockade of the Dardanelles between Britain and France, the German fleet led by Lieutenant General Mauf was also under the command of General Sorochin. Now that he has four battleships and a battle patrol, Sorochin finally straightened his back and was qualified to challenge the British Mediterranean Fleet.

However, the current strategic focus seems to be shifting to the Black Sea.

Now the Russians are starting to move again, and this time they have regrouped 2.7 million troops on the Eastern Front.
Chapter completed!