Chapter 666: The Military Council Makes a Decision
As the saying goes, "Three Stooges are better than Zhuge Liang." Before the Japanese army's movements are clear, the military meeting will discuss various problems in the army and then start discussions to properly handle trivial matters.
Officers learn to organize their thoughts and speak as concisely and clearly as possible during their speeches.
Li Guolou didn't speak much and was like a smiling Buddha listening to the officers' speeches.
After the internal affairs of the army were dealt with, Li Guolou put down his tea cup and stood up and said: "Now that you have talked about your problems, I will reiterate that there are many unexpected difficulties in a strange environment. It is necessary to overcome difficulties and solve them. Don't blame others and vent your anger to Please tell me what is the first priority of the Munitions Department when it goes to war."
"It's not easy to defeat the enemy," Li Yunkai replied loudly. It's too simple and doesn't need to use your brain.
Li Guolou shook his head and said: "When fighting in a strange environment, we must first maintain a healthy body. We fight on two legs. The willpower of the soldiers is the key to victory. Urgent march best reflects the fine traditions of our army, but the prerequisite is that the body can withstand extreme conditions." Marching with heavy load requires our army to have a strong body to ensure
So from now on, try not to sleep on the floor. Tropical rainforest areas are very humid. If you sleep on the ground for a few nights, the root of the disease will be there. If the war has not started, you will become a patient. We will defeat ourselves. In ancient times, many northern armies went to the south because of diseases. The lesson learned from the failure is that Feng Zicai's 30,000-strong army in Annan was not acclimated to the climate and climate, so he had to return home and give the fruits of victory to the people of Nan'an in vain. The soldiers' illness was your mistake as an officer. Details are the key to success or failure. You must keep this lesson in mind.
Sleeping and drinking water, these two small things are related to the combat effectiveness of our army. When you go back, take care of these two things first. Mountain warfare is difficult to fight. You must be prepared for a protracted war. Don't have any illusions about a quick victory."
The conscious officers took notes and wrote "eat" and "sleep" in their notebooks. These were the tasks assigned to them by Commander-in-Chief Li [
Li Guolou looked a little weird and stretched out two fingers to touch the corners of his mouth and said: "Then let me talk about the second thing. I repeatedly ask you to treat Taiwan's ethnic minorities well. You must pay for other people's things and trade fairly. People who live in ethnic minorities are not allowed to do so. Our family respects the customs of ethnic minorities, but there is one thing you must remember: we are here to fight, and you must keep your crotch in mind."
The whole audience roared with laughter. The officers had different expressions and started teasing each other.
Li Guolou frowned and slapped the table and shouted angrily: "Don't laugh. Is this funny? You won't be able to laugh until you die on my mother-in-law's belly."
Seeing Li Guolou's outburst, the entire audience was filled with cries of cries. The expressions of the officers became solemn again.
"People from ethnic minorities have adapted to the environment here. They are born with an antibody, but we northerners don't have such antibodies. Another way of spreading infectious diseases is from the crotch. Don't be seduced by beauty. Think about the consequences of beauty. What kind of consequences will it bring? When I go back, I will tell every soldier clearly that girls from ethnic minorities who are open-minded are cannibals."
"Hahahaha!" The scene that finally calmed down burst into laughter again. The officers spurted out the tea in their mouths.
Browning nodded frequently and said: "It makes sense, it makes sense, it makes so much sense. The ever-victorious army must not fall on the belly of the Bone Demon."
Li Guolou looked at the scene in front of him and couldn't help but smile and said loudly: "What I want to say is to sleep, eat, and crotch these three little things. Only by doing these three things can our army have combat effectiveness and you can ask me to fight. Please keep your troops high." If you don’t have the fighting spirit, don’t give me nonsense. If you can’t pull out the troops, how can you talk about fighting? I’ve finished. Next, let’s ask Bai Tongzhi to explain the use of revolutionary skirmish line tactics in Western military. We warmly welcome Bai Tongzhi’s speech.”
Li Guolou took the lead in applauding. The applause was thunderous. Browning stood up proudly and nodded slightly to greet the officers present. Li Guolou gave him too much face. In the first tactics class, he asked him to talk about whether the war will be fought or the victorious army will not accept Li Guolou.
"In the late 1960s, breech-loading rifled guns were widely used, and the lethality of the weapons was greatly improved. The column tactics used in dense formations were no longer suitable for combat needs. In the Franco-Prussian War, the Prussian army spread out to reduce casualties under the threat of French firepower.
The Prussian army fought in a skirmish line formation and succeeded. Prussia became a Western power. The skirmish line tactic was formed from then on.
The army of the Qing Dynasty began to imitate skirmisher line tactics by summarizing foreign combat modes and lessons learned from fighting with Western armies. The Ever-Victorious Army was the first in the Qing army to use skirmisher line tactics and developed them. It further improved the skirmisher line tactics.
Modern warfare is different from the past. When the two armies are fighting, the infantry always engages the enemy and spreads out to form a skirmish line within the range of the rifle. The soldiers are arranged in a line with a distance of 6 to 8 meters. They shoot while using the terrain to leap forward to carry out the impact;
The artillery shoots to kill the enemy before the infantry attacks; the cavalry makes a roundabout attack on the enemy's flank and expands the results. Breaking through a point and then expanding the results."
Browning drew patterns on the tactical board so that the officers could have an intuitive understanding and spoke clearly. He had reason to be proud that Li Guolou's tactical ideas were all plagiarized from his ideas. Li Guolou picked up people and made the Fang family laugh.
After Browning finished speaking, there was a constant buzz among the officers whispering to each other.
Huang Qiying raised his hand and spoke: "If the Baitong regime does not have artillery to open the gap, how will our army fight?"[
Browning nodded approvingly and said: "Huang Qiying, the question you raised is very good. I think many people have this concern. Different environments require different tactics to fight. It is impossible for our army to occupy the geographical advantage and the enemy is entrenched in natural dangers. We also have to defeat them."
When our army does not have the geographical advantage, we must avoid the enemy's artillery advantage. We can only rely on night fighting to get as close to the enemy's positions as possible so that the enemy cannot take advantage of the artillery. We use grenades to throw cannons and fight to the death with the enemy to promote our army's dedication."
"Oh, I understand." Huang Qiying listened to a tactics class and gained a new understanding of modern warfare. Human sea tactics also require attention to the distance between soldiers. If you charge in a swarm, you are seeking death.
"How can our army fight if there are many enemies?" Li Yunkai was full of superstitions about the British and believed that Browning was more powerful than his adoptive father Li Guolou.
Browning chuckled and said: "The enemy is strong and our army cannot attack the stone with an egg. When it is time to retreat, we must abandon the position and make tactical adjustments to regroup the army. We do not judge victory or defeat based on one battle. The larger the enemy's territory, the more dispersed the guard's troops will be. We must attack continuously."
The timeless military motto"
Li Guolou interjected: "You must remember that the tactics used by the Japanese army are exactly the same as when they invaded North Korea during the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty. First, they established a military port, and then built military fortresses one after another. Based on this defense system, they then developed in depth.
The first thing that the impatient commander thought of was to drive out the invaders and regain the lost territory.
Falling into the trap of the Japanese army, because this battlefield was designed by the Japanese army, the Korean army will be defeated again and again and finally be defeated. As a commander, you must not value the country more than anything else because of face problems. Sometimes, losing is to win and let the enemy in.
Putting the battlefield in a favorable position for us and destroying the enemy's effective forces is more important than liberating a city."
Browning did not expect Li Guolou to have such an opinion and said with a smile: "Commander Li, tell me what enlightenment the Korean War has on our Taiwan operations."
Li Guolou looked around at the officers present and said: "You are all officers. As long as you make military exploits, you will be promoted. In the future, you will lead many troops. We must have an overall view of the war and learn from history. The Korean War gave us many warnings. The Ming army sent troops and Korea was defeated." The Japanese invading army exerted national prestige, but at the same time caused the decline of the Ming Dynasty. The money from the national treasury was depleted, and the people were in poverty, unlike the British Empire. The more they invaded, the country became stronger and its financial resources became more and more abundant. This is why it is worthy of our reflection."
Li Guolou paused for a moment and pointed at his head and continued: "This is because we are bound by Confucianism and our heads are stiff and we don't understand the importance of war reparations to the country. We will not engage in the slave trade. Our heads are worthless and we can use the enemy's heads." Bring wealth to a country?
Now we understand a little bit, but after paying reparations to the victorious countries, we are still paying war reparations to this day. Feng Zicai defeated the French invaders for King Annan Side. We got nothing, and we forgot to ask the Annan people to pay for the war. In the end, we spent money. When fighting for a vassal state for free, don’t think that by canonizing a king, the vassal state treats the Qing Dynasty as its parents. Soldiers make war fortunes during the war but leave the treasury empty. This is wrong. We must learn from the British Empire and become a military power in war. To improve people’s lives is the true meaning of war.”
There was thunderous applause. The officers stood up and applauded. The soldiers all wanted to be crowned with titles and achieve unparalleled achievements. With such a commander leading the army, there was no need to worry about getting promoted and making a fortune. The officers fanatically worshiped Li Guolou, who wanted to use war to revive the Qing Dynasty.
Browning joked: "Commander Li, you are not from the Qing Dynasty, but you are British. You have the same ideas as us British."
Li Guolou waved his hand to silence the audience and said: "Don't get carried away and think that you can decide the outcome in a single battle with strong soldiers and horses. The Japanese army's tactical literacy is higher than ours, which means that our army can't defeat the Japanese in a one-on-one battle. We must realize that we are With the help of the traitors, the Japanese army has successfully landed and won the first stage of victory. We must have a clear understanding of the shortcomings of the traitors. There are many traitors, not only those from ethnic minorities, and we must be wary of them against the Taiwanese. It doesn’t make sense to talk about patriotism to such people when the blood of our ancestors is flowing with Japanese blood.”
"Commander Li, why do Taiwanese people have Japanese blood?" Browning didn't understand and thought Li Guolou said something wrong.
Li Guolou had no choice but to tell the historical truth. He coughed and said: "That is the bloodline left by Zheng Chenggong's subordinates. You must know that Zheng Chenggong was the leader of the Japanese pirates, and his mother was Japanese. Zheng Chenggong's bloodline is still half Japanese. Bloodline, so many of the Han people in Taiwan have Japanese ancestors. It is easy to find supporters of the Japanese army among the Taiwanese people. You must be careful not to be led into the Japanese ambush by so-called guides during the war."
Zheng Hengdan interjected: "Don't rush to deal with the traitors in Taiwan. Our staff department has already compiled a plan. I will give a special lesson on dealing with the traitors later. Drink more strong tea tonight." Have an all-night meeting”
Many officers drank strong tea and wrote furiously to take notes. The war was imminent. There was so much work to do, how could one feel sleepy?
Li Guolou continued in high spirits: "What the Japanese army wants to do most now is to eliminate the main force of our army. Building a fortress in Taiwan is not a temporary success. Even if the Japanese army works day and night, it is impossible to make Langqiao and Guishan indestructible. The Japanese army still can't." The short-legged Japanese who want to destroy our army in mobile warfare are good at mobile warfare.
Before the 25th, Liu Mingdeng, the commander-in-chief of Taiwan Town, led 3,000 troops and fought against the Japanese army once. The Jianwu Army suffered a lot and did not dare to fight with the Japanese army. After the war, Liu Mingdeng said that the Japanese army had tens of thousands of troops. According to the British intelligence, five At the beginning of the month, the Japanese army dispatched a total of 3,500 troops from Yokohama. If the British intelligence is correct, it means that Liu Mingdeng's Jianwu Army could not even defeat the 3,000 Japanese troops, but suffered more than 1,000 casualties. Liu Mingchuan was much smarter and the Taiwanese government has not moved its troops until now. Let the Japanese army not dare to act rashly. After our army enters Taiwan, its first task is to strengthen the defense of military towns and then move into ethnic minority areas to fight side by side with patriotic ethnic minority soldiers. You must learn to deal with ethnic minorities. Only by relying on the support of the Taiwanese people can we be in Taiwan. Defeat the Japanese Army”
Li Guolou's words were contradictory. Li Yunkai was dissatisfied and said: "Commander Li, what should I do with that traitor?"
Li Guolou said with a smile: "Don't worry. Traitors are also human beings. People like this will adapt to the situation. Our army's strategy to deal with traitors is to eliminate some, win over some, and reform some. Then there will be no more traitors."
Li Yunkai purred: "What you say is better than what you sing."
Li Guolou said sternly: "The duty of a soldier is to solve the enemy's tactics. The tactics are arranged by the staff. If there are difficulties, they must overcome them. The soldiers can only face the difficulties. Where is this nonsense?"
"I resolutely implement the commander's order." Li Yunkai stood up straight with his chest and belly raised.
Li Guolou gritted his teeth and said: "That's all I'll talk about tonight. Next, I'll let Adjutant Zheng talk about the traitor. The traitor who attracted the Japanese army is a descendant of the 'Beidong King' of the Beidong tribe who was canonized by Emperor Kangxi. Chieftain Luo Xingyan was dissatisfied with the title of chieftain and wanted to claim kingship and hegemony. He colluded with the Japanese army to kill Paiwan chief Ashlu and his son. Luo Xingying is not exempted. I want to skin Luo Xingying alive."
Browning said without hesitation: "Commander Li, leave this task to me."
Li Guolou rolled his eyes at Browning. The Taitung Plain, the territory of the Beidong tribe, is more than 500 miles away from the mountainous terrain. It is difficult for the Changsheng Army to fly over.