Dmitry's idea is very pragmatic, but Li Xiao cannot completely agree. His opinion is that there is nothing wrong with focusing on building Bulgaria's frontline defenses, but other directions cannot be completely ignored.
He reminded: "Although the direction of Turkey is the most dangerous, we cannot forget the weak flanks. I must remind you to pay attention to Transylvania! The Austrians have to guard against it!"
Dmitri was stunned. Although the Holy Alliance has been a bit dim in recent years, Austria and Prussia are still nominal allies of Russia. Even if they can't count on their support, at least you don't have to worry about them stabbing you in the back, right?
Li Xiao told him frankly: "General, I'm not being alarmist. Since the rebellion broke out in Hungary, our relationship with Austria has fallen to a freezing point. Austria's interests are not completely consistent with ours on the Balkans issue, and now we have a monopoly
Moldavia and Wallachia, and then looking for Bulgaria, which the Austrians will never accept!"
Dmitri asked: "So?"
"So," Li Xiao sighed, "so once Britain and France make their stance clear, then Austria will most likely not stand on our side, and may even secretly undermine us. They don't have to do anything, as long as they concentrate their forces in Transylvania
If Asia conducts several military exercises, it will put a lot of pressure on us!"
Li Xiao solemnly warned: "So we must not ignore the threat on our flanks. We must build certain fortifications in the direction of Transylvania. We do not need to build a complete line of defense, but we must contain key nodes.
Let the Austrians know that we are not unprepared!"
After hearing this, Dmitri immediately spread out the military map and looked at it carefully. If the area bordering Wallachia and Transylvania is undefended, then if the Austrians really make moves,
For example, placing Chen Bing on the border can make them very uncomfortable.
At that time, there was no particularly good way except to deploy troops to confront the Austrians. However, Wallachia was already facing huge pressure from Turkey, and he only had 40,000 people on hand, so there was no surplus.
The strength of the troops is so big that the Austrians are looking at each other?
If we could build strong fortifications at key hubs in advance and dispatch capable troops to garrison them, it might be much easier to face the Austrian threat.
"Will this cost a lot of money?" Dmitri hesitated.
Li Xiao replied: "It doesn't take too much money. That is the key direction for Austria to defend against Turkey. Historically, Turkey and Austria have built a large number of fortresses. As long as they are renovated and reinforced and some new supporting facilities are built, they can
kick in!"
Dmitri thought for a moment and agreed with this suggestion. He really had to be careful in the direction of Transylvania. He couldn't trust the Austrians anyway.
"Other than that? Do you have any other suggestions?"
If Dmitry asked Li Xiao for his advice before, it was still a courtesy. After all, in his opinion, Li Xiao was just a young man who had never fought in any wars and had not received particularly strict military education and training. He was not familiar with war.
He had only a little knowledge. Naturally, he couldn't make any decent suggestions. But after listening to what someone said just now, he felt that he had underestimated Li Xiao. This man still had two skills in the military.
"I don't have any more suggestions. After all, I am not an expert in this field," Li Xiao replied humbly. "In addition to preparing for military preparations, I suggest that you better prepare for epidemic prevention. I
I have been to some military bases and found that the health conditions are very worrying!"
Dmitry was stunned. As generals of this era, they were more concerned about strategic and tactical issues, and were accustomed to preparing for war from these two aspects. But Li Xiao told him to do a good job in hygiene, which was a bit wrong.
Okay! Does he need to take care of this matter?
Li Xiao understands Dmitri's incomprehension very well, because this is the limitation of the times. Historically, it was only after the Crimean War that countries began to pay attention to health and epidemic prevention work in war, and these experiences are all bloody.
In exchange for lessons.
To put it bluntly, in the Crimean War, infectious diseases and poor sanitary conditions caused many more casualties than on the battlefield. Both warring parties paid a heavy price for this, and these could actually be dealt with in advance.
At least Li Xiao didn't want to see a large number of soldiers die from the plague because of unclean drinking water or food, nor did he want to see the wounded soldiers who finally saved their lives on the battlefield die from infection due to poor hygiene.
So he explained to Dmitry carefully: "General, I have carefully studied the casualties in the previous wars against Turkey and found that there were not particularly many soldiers who died directly from enemy gunfire. More soldiers were
Deaths due to infectious diseases, plagues and lack of timely treatment, especially among our army, account for an astonishingly high proportion of casualties!"
How could it not be high? Just look at the condition of the Russian army’s gray animals. They were originally a group of illiterate serfs who were rushed to the battlefield in a hurry. Their living habits were unhealthy. Once they were a little bit
Infectious diseases can break out in an instant in densely packed and undefended military camps.
In the last Russo-Turkish war, the main reason for the weakness of the Russian army, apart from the inability to keep up with supplies, was these damn plagues. A large number of soldiers were infected and completely lost their combat effectiveness, resulting in the Russian army's human resource advantages being unable to be used at all.
"Is it that serious?"
Dmitri was shocked when he heard those terrible numbers, and subconsciously thought that this was impossible, because in his impression, the battlefield with mountains of corpses and seas of fire was the Shura field, and it was the root cause of the large number of casualties.
But Li Xiao told him that plague and disease are the scythes of death, which was somewhat beyond his knowledge.
"have!"
Li Xiao nodded heavily, and listed some data and the memoirs of veterans in detail, which immediately brought back Dmitri's memory - the plague was indeed widely spread among the army, resulting in a large number of non-combat attrition.
But these impressions were overshadowed by the glorious victory over Turkey, so much so that Dmitri almost forgot those painful memories.
"Then how can we reduce the outbreak of the plague you mentioned?" Dmitri asked humbly.
"It's very simple." Li Xiao breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that he could listen to his opinions. He explained in detail the importance of good hygiene work, and then suggested: "Soldiers must be forced to develop good hygiene habits and eliminate
Kill rats and other pests, and it is strictly forbidden to drink raw water...After my experiments in Wallachia, this has a significant effect!"