"Let's talk about the New Han Army," Shi Shigege said. "The New Han Army can be said to be a team that the Han officials within the Qing Dynasty tried their best to form. The purpose can also be said to be to reconcile the Manchu and Mongolian Eight Banners.
It is not an exaggeration to say that it is a political armed force. The equipment of the New Han Army is also quite good. Although it lacks royal favoritism, it has the support of Han officials. The equipment they use
Although it is more complicated, the military discipline and style are better than those of the old Han army, and their combat effectiveness is much better.
"But it's only relatively better, and only at the soldier level. The officer system is also rotten. In the Battle of Nanjing a few years ago, in addition to the Eight Banners Division, the main force that faced our army was the New Han Army. And in that battle, the New Han Army
The army lost nearly ten divisions. The New Han Army's designation was originally planned to be from seventy-three to one hundred and twenty-two, but in fact only the ninety-seventh division was built, and the others only had designations but no troops. That is
It is said that the New Han Army plans to have fifty divisions, but only half of them are actually manned. The other half are only on paper."
"Next, there is the most important component of the Qing Army, the Old Han Army. The Old Han Army was a product of the era of military expansion during the European Wars, and its establishment numbers were so diverse that even the Qing Army itself had a headache to count. Estimating,
There should be nearly two hundred divisions. Some of these troops have some combat effectiveness, while others are basically just a mob.
"The equipment is even more uneven. Some companies have 150 or 60 people, two heavy machine guns, and several mortars; some troops have only dozens of people in a company, and they don't even have rifles. As for discipline.
Not to mention the training style. Although it is such a force, they have a huge number. Some of the troops in better condition have been arranged to the Yangtze River Basin to be used as cannon fodder in the battle against the Ming Dynasty.
"Behind the Han army was the Nationalities Division of the Qing Dynasty. The name Nationality Division was the name given by the Qing army to ethnic armed forces such as the Hui (Uyghurs) and Tibetans. After the reforms of the 1898 Reform Movement and several counterinsurgency wars, the new
The ethnic minorities in Xinjiang and Tibet basically submitted to the rule of the Qing Dynasty in the Central Plains. However, each ethnic group retained its own armed forces to some extent, and the government also recognized them and gave them titles. However, the actual control of these armed forces basically rested with the princes of each ethnic group.
In their hands, they are nominally the national army, but in fact they are private armed forces. As for how many people there are in the national division, even Beijing does not know this. And it is certain that when the Ming Dynasty fights against the Qing Dynasty, it will basically not encounter this force.
"After that is the garrison division. The garrison division can be said to be the oldest force in the Qing Dynasty. They are stationed at borders, coasts, transportation hubs and other places all year round, and they work on their own farming and reclamation. Now they are basically armed with guns.
Peasants. In some places far away from the emperor, the garrison troops there were also soldiers and bandits, and they simply engaged in the business of killing people and stealing goods. There were also many garrison divisions in remote places, and they formed many local warlords with some old Han troops.
Power relies on bribing local officials and the protective umbrella from above to dominate one party.
"The lowest-level troops of the Qing army, and the last type of troops, are the Jia Division and the National Division. It can be said that they are a pair of twins. The Jia Division is actually a military structure composed of officers, and soldiers are supplemented to form troops during wartime; while the National Division
The division is actually equivalent to the militia and Xiangyong. They only have soldiers and organizers but no officers. The reason why they are separated and given separate numbers is because of the consideration of governance. The number of Han troops is already large, and with the addition of the National Division
, then the number of Han armed forces would be too large, which would make the court uneasy. In this way, if the officers and soldiers were separated and combined during wartime, and dispersed in peacetime, there would be no danger of threatening the rule.
"From this point of view, although the Qing army is known as a thousand divisions, its actual combat effectiveness is only 24 Manchu Eight Banners divisions, 32 Mongolian Eight Banners divisions, 15-20 Han and New military divisions, and many of the 200 old Han military divisions.
to 100 divisions. The total combat divisions are about 170-180 divisions, and the number of combat personnel is about 3-4 million. The remaining more than 3 million troops are either unsightly bad soldiers, or the numbers on the books
and temporary peasant actors.
"Of these three to four million combat-effective troops, about one-third of them have gone to the north, and there are quite a few elite divisions among them. Based on this calculation, the number of troops that can actually fight the Ming army is only about 2 million.
Regular combat divisions. Even these troops, equipment, training, morale, and officer quality, etc., are far inferior to the Ming Army.
"To sum up, among the world's largest 'thousand-division army', the only ones that can compete with the Ming Dynasty's 36-type infantry division are the 56 Eight Banners Divisions of Manchuria and Mongolia, with less than one million people. And the entire Qing army
Among them, there are almost none that can compete with the armored divisions and infantry divisions of the Ming People's Guard alone."
…
After Shi Shigege finished speaking, he nodded to Xiang Xiaoqiang, then put down the command stick and stood aside.
Everyone below stared blankly at the Fourteenth Gege, unable to react for a moment. They did not expect that the Manchu Qing "Thousand Division Army" in their minds would actually be so in the mouth of this Manchu Qing Gege, a former spy leader.
She is extremely weak. She even said that "the number of troops that can actually fight the Ming army is only about 2 million." This is too shocking. The Ming army's existing strength is more than this number.
The Manchu Qing Dynasty was a weak giant. This concept was known to military officers and soldiers before Ming Dynasty. But no one could have expected that this giant was so weak.
Considering the original identity, status, and position of the Fourteenth Gege in the Manchu Qing Dynasty, no one dared to raise objections hastily. Analyzing the current situation of the Qing army, the Fourteenth Gege was the most authoritative person in the entire Ming Dynasty.
Xiang Xiaoqiang had already listened to Shi Shi Ge Ge's analysis. At that time, the analysis was about the Qing army that could fight the Ming army, which was about three million. Xiang Xiaoqiang was very satisfied with it at that time, so he asked Shi Shi Ge Ge to attend the meeting.
He said it again, and at the same time he said it more optimistically. But he didn't expect that the Fourteenth Gege would change so optimistically, from three million to two million.
Xiang Xiaoqiang coughed twice, took the command stick, tapped on the map, made gestures and said:
"So everyone, how big is our Ming Army? As we all know, there are 166 divisions and 2.6 million people. Not counting our People's Guard."
After he finished speaking, he looked around at everyone, but he was thinking: This is indeed a bit optimistic. Calculated in this way, the Ming army not only surpassed the Qing army in quality, but also surpassed the Qing army in quantity.
…
Li Gensheng couldn't hold it in any longer and said again:
"Sir, you can't calculate it like this. First of all, even if you completely follow Princess Liaoyang's calculation, the number of the Qing army's army is 400-500 divisions compared to our 166 divisions. It's just their relatively high-quality troops, and ours
The total strength is about the same. Among our 2.6 million troops, there are also low-quality troops."
Xiang Xiaoqiang said immediately:
"Yes, but it is definitely not as low as that of the Qing army. Our worst troops are much better than the best troops in their Han army. And the quality of our medium-sized mainstream troops is equal to their most elite Eight Banners Division.
"
Li Gensheng didn't refute after hearing this, he just nodded and said:
"Okay, your Excellency is right, our average quality is much higher than theirs. But their troops cannot be used to deal with us, and similarly, our troops cannot be used to deal with them. Even if we attack the Manchu Qing,
We can only use half of our troops at most. Because we certainly cannot attack along the entire Yangtze River defense line, we can only choose a small section. Then there will be a long defense line to defend. This requires troops.
"Also, we have to deploy some troops in Zhejiang and Fujian to prevent Japan from taking advantage of the situation. In addition, any war must have strategic reserves. So we have to keep enough strategic reserves in the rear. And then there are Nanyang,
We have just acquired Pachia Island, and we need to develop it, manage it, defend it, and possibly suppress the local indigenous people. This requires a large number of troops. So, sir, we are still at a huge numerical disadvantage. We cannot be so optimistic."
Xiang Xiaoqiang heard something fishy and squinted his eyes and said:
"Gensheng, that's not right. The garrison forces deployed in Zhejiang and Fujian can be completely the same thing as the strategic reserve force. They can serve as both strategic reserve force and defensive force. Why do we need to have two special forces in the area?
Where? Also, how many troops can be used in Nanyang? Pacia Island is currently in our hands and is basically not threatened by third countries. It is impossible for the Netherlands to take it back, and it is unlikely that the United Kingdom, France, and the United States will attack our Nanyang territory.
What we have to deal with is nothing more than the indigenous people who may cause trouble and some pirates. In that case, one division with 10,000 men is enough. We can use 100-120 divisions to attack, which is fine."
Li Gensheng was startled. He didn't expect that the little trick he played to take advantage of Mr. Xiang's unprofessionalism would be discovered.