For two years, exactly two years, the officers and soldiers of the Special First Battalion of the First Army under Lu Xiangsheng have been living in dire straits. They are all backbones drawn from various units, and their training is usually the most intense. People run in the morning
If they go five miles, they have to run eight miles; there are five people carrying a load of wood, and there are three of them! Other troops are bombed up to twice a month and have emergency gatherings at night, but they have to sleep with their eyes open.
Eyes. And they are also a thorn in the eyes and flesh of other comrades! This is the main reason for the pain and happiness of the soldiers of the Special First Battalion.
The current First Army is no longer the group of stragglers who had no fighting spirit and no fighting spirit when they first arrived. After a long period of rigorous training, they have been able to obey orders and prohibitions, and they exude a strong sense of majesty.
The ideological education that is required every day allows them to know why they want to be soldiers and who they will fight for in the future. What they lack now is the weapons at hand and the smell of blood on the battlefield.
If the First Army is a young tiger waiting to be fed, then the First Battalion is an adult hungry wolf. Other comrades are still practicing their skills with wooden guns and water bottles. They were equipped with such equipment a year ago.
It is called an old sleeve, well, an old sleeve! The quality of the steel is not yet up to standard. As a precaution, Zhu Youcong chose this most conservative new musket. Other troops just received a few grenades.
When they were excited, they had already begun to learn to use mortars. What excited them most was that the army commander accidentally revealed that they would probably form the young general's personal army.
"Jiandou, what are you doing today, young general?" Ever since the first battalion changed its uniform, especially after the late emperor came to Luoyang, Sun Chengzong deeply lamented that he was born at the wrong time. I never expected that the combination of the two people would be so good.
With such great power, I never thought that war could be fought like this. If only I had been born a few years later, I could lead such an army and gallop around the world!
"I heard that we are going to test new weapons!" Lu Xiangsheng has not been having a good time this year. He is now so busy that he even spends meal time with Sun Chengzong, who was appointed chief of staff, to study new tactics. But that research institute
But he kept causing trouble for them. Often the tactics were formulated only a few days ago and were quickly eliminated with the arrival of new equipment. Today, he received another inexplicable order and ran here with Sun Chengzong early in the morning.
We are waiting at the gate of the camp.
"Come again?" Sun Chengzong almost collapsed. The thing that looked like a tiger squatting cannon was also sent by the young general himself! I never thought that one person could carry such a small cannon that was running around, and the shooting range was very fast.
It has caught up with the French cannon, and the firing speed is simply indescribable; the new type of explosive bomb is even more terrifying, and it explodes into a large area! In order to cooperate with such a small thing, he and Lu Xiangsheng spent nearly two months.
Time to improve training and combat methods. Now you are here to deliver new equipment in person? Doesn’t this make people alive? Can’t the little fat man just stop for a while?
"Hey...Mr. Kaiyang, first ask someone to make ginseng soup and buy tea!" Lu Xiangsheng also remembered the situation last time. They were not prepared that time, and they were almost exhausted by the time they got home from work.
"Military order—military order—" Just as the two of them were lamenting, a flying cavalry galloped from a distance!
"The Ming Dynasty Zhenguo General issued an order: The entire army shall be fully armed and rush to Liujiapo forty miles away within two hours! Violation of military law will be punished!" The person who came had a colorful "Xian" embroidered on his arm, and he handed it over without dismounting.
A token, and after the two verified its authenticity, they read out the order.
"General, take the order!" Without hesitation, Lu and Sun took the military order at the same time.
There are also people like this in their army. These guys who always have a straight face and wander around the military camp when they have nothing to do are called military police. They are responsible for supervising military discipline. And these colorful sleeve military police were given the title of "military police" by Zhu Youcong.
The highest authority, when they perform their tasks, everyone, including Commander Lu Xiangsheng, must listen to them; of course, they have no right to dictate normal military operations...
"Assemble! Assemble! Emergency assembly! Forced march in full force! The target is Liujiapo, which is forty miles away!"
As the order was passed on, the entire military camp became busy. No matter what they were doing, they dropped what they were doing and ran back to their tents as fast as possible, taking all the equipment with them and carrying a heavy bag on their backs.
Large backpacks weighing thirty kilograms quickly gathered in the center of the camp.
The first to set off was the cavalry division composed of 10,000 Guanning cavalry. According to regulations, in military training, they cannot ride horses during forced marches of less than 150 miles; but these guys stubbornly believe that cavalry is cavalry, even if they are dismounted
Horses should also run faster than infantry! The special battalion is closely followed, not because they move slowly, but because they have more equipment.
"Brothers, run faster, don't let those four-legged donkeys take the lead!" As soon as they left the camp, the officers of the first special battalion stopped working. One by one, they ran in front, especially
To overtake the cavalry troops.
"Brothers, hurry up, if we surpass the Special First Battalion, we will be a model army!" Other troops who set off one after another also held their breaths. Everyone eats the same food and gets the same pay, why can't we be as good as the Special First Battalion?
"Damn it, everyone knows how to please me when they eat, but they don't recognize anyone when they leave the house!" The cooking team in charge of logistics was even more angry. These bastards are so unscrupulous and don't know who we are.
Do you have a lot of odds and ends on the stove? Let me tell you, if we don’t let you run ahead today, I’ll make rice with raw material for you to eat!
The long-term rigorous training showed its effect at this time. A total of 50,000 people marched out of the military camp. Everyone was chasing after each other with all their strength, but the entire team was not scattered at all.
"Complete the team, hurry up!" The commander of the Special First Battalion has a bad temper and is one-eyed. But no one is unconvinced by him, because he takes the lead in every training, and his achievements are obvious to all. Now the Special First Battalion is
Under his leadership, they rushed to the front again. Although they were not ahead by much, they were still number one, which did not disgrace their title. As for the other troops who were depressed over there, it was none of their business!
"Report to the general! Our first army has been assembled! Please give instructions!" Lu Xiangsheng was very proud. From the time he received the order to the time when the whole army arrived at the destination and sorted out their formation, it was a quarter of an hour earlier than required. Looking at the entire Ming Dynasty
,No, even if you look at the entire world that Xiyi said, you will not be able to find such a well-trained army!
"Very good!" Zhu Youcong nodded, raised the metal loudspeaker in his hand and shouted: "Thank you for your hard work, everyone!"
"Defend our people! Promote the prestige of our country!"
Fifty thousand people shouted in unison. These simple eight words have been firmly remembered in their hearts and deeply engraved in their bones.
"Rest where you are, and the first battalion will go out!" Zhu Youcong always chooses to do bad things in the winter, firstly because the whole of Luoyang is too busy in other seasons, and he is afraid of disturbing the lives of the people; secondly, it is cold and freezing
Everyone who is fine is staying at home, and it is convenient to keep it secret. Today he suddenly summoned the entire army just to test the new equipment and check the training results.
"Mr. Kaiyang, what are those things that the dean is tinkering with? Why do some of them look so ugly?" Lu Xiangsheng had never been on the battlefield and didn't know enough about artillery. He could only ask Sun Chengzong beside him for advice.
"I haven't seen it before! It should be a new type of artillery!" Compared with the thing next to it, which is obviously a cannon at a glance, that thing is still a bit ugly.
Fortunately, Zhu Youcong helped his eldest cousin, otherwise he would have been so angry that he vomited blood and died after hearing this conversation between the two. The thing they despised so much should be called an infantry artillery, and it was Zhu Youcong who prepared it.
The small howitzer used to equip the battalion level only weighs more than 500 kilograms. The reason why a few more were built was mainly to test the power of the shells in different ratios.
Recently, Zhu Youcong feels like his head is about to be hollowed out. Needless to say about mechanics, his eldest cousin didn't leave him much private goods; Sun Yuanhua is not a fuel-efficient lamp either. He specializes in explosives and can get it from him later.
A lot of good stuff. The production of frying oil and mercury fulminate has become very proficient. Even the troublesome nitrocellulose can now be guaranteed to be more than 90% strong cotton. A few days ago, toluene was obtained by retorting coal.
, began trial production of dinitrotoluene—what is now named nitrate coal by Old Man Sun.
As for the new, larger artillery piece, it is the latest work of the mechanical genius Zhu Qiji. It has a caliber of more than three inches, which is equivalent to a 105mm divisional mountain howitzer. I brought it here today to test the design and see.
Is there anything that needs improvement?
"Do you understand everything?" Zhu Qiji patiently explained to the officers and soldiers of the Special First Battalion how to use the new equipment.
Regarding this genius who fell from the sky, no one asked about his origins. Those guys were very mysterious anyway. It would be uneconomical to be arrested by the gendarmerie for such a little gossip!