"Alas! Although the second son's own military merits are not as good as the eldest prince, he does not have as strong force as the Eastern Fan soldiers under him, and he has a naturalized wife to rely on. However, the potential strength of the second son's side is incomparable to that of the eldest son! ”

After being mixed in the Nanyue military system for a while, Huang Xigon watched coldly, and he was surprised to find that many state and county officials, village chiefs and town mayors were unusually affectionate when they saw Li Huabao, and they couldn't stop calling for "second brother!" ”

After a closer look, I learned that most of these people were orphans who had been raised under Yan Mei'er's knees since childhood, and Yan Mei'er raised these people single-handedly, provided them with food and clothing, and arranged for them to study. They were also arranged to serve in the army when they became adults, or to learn how to be a good village official in the government hall. For more than ten years, these orphans have long regarded Yan Mei'er as their biological mother, and Li Huabao, the son of Yan Mei'er, who almost grew up with them, is naturally their own brother!

Because of his status and identity, Huang Xigon is naturally inclined to the second son, Li Huabao. After thinking about it for a while, a guard waiting for the signing room outside the door passed the word in the courtyard.

"My lord, please come to the small council hall to discuss the matter!"

In the conference hall, Li Shouhan's face was as usual, and there was no trace of his anger just now.

"Tianhua, how is the army expansion plan that you have been ordered to prepare?"

Chen Tianhua, who took the lead in the preparation of the army expansion plan, immediately stood up from his chair, "My lord, we plan to recruit 100,000 mobilized troops in the first phase and organize them into 11 towns, and then transfer artillery teams, horse teams and other units from various departments to enrich these 11 towns. Make its personnel fully equipped......"

"Then these eleven towns, eight newly built Luying towns, two naval division Luying towns, Benjue's guards. There is also the upgrade of Wu Liuqi's first mixed brigade, so you plan to use these newly built teams to deal with things? How can such a unit go into battle? How to fight a tough battle, a bad battle?! ”

Thunder's Fury came. It seems that Li Shouhan's expression just now was as usual, but he was forcibly controlling his emotions, but. The plan proposed by Chen Tianhua was obviously very different from his ideas and did not achieve his expected goal. So, he was furious!

The new unit composed of mobilized soldiers is indeed unable to withstand the high-intensity battles of the Nanyue Army.

"Such a team is not as effective as the chaotic team of the Saurons! Waste people's lives in vain, waste money and food! Li Shouhan gave Chen Tianhua a very unkind evaluation of the plan.

The room was suddenly quiet, like a thousand-year-old abandoned ancient temple in the barren mountains and mountains.

"Tianhua, how many garrison brigades do we have now? Where are they stationed, and what is the combat effectiveness and weapon configuration? What is the staffing like? ”

A few questions came out of Li Shouhan's mouth. Breaking the deathly silence in the room.

Chen Tianhua's brain is also spinning very fast, following Li Shouhan for so many years, he also has a clear understanding of Li Shouhan's thinking, and when he heard Li Shouhan ask such a question, he immediately guessed that the lord was probably going to make a big fuss about those dozens of garrison brigades!!

"Our Nanyue Army has always been divided into three levels of armed forces, the first class is the guards brigade of each town and the lord, the naval division and land battalion, and the first mixed brigade of Wu Liuqi. It can be regarded as the main force of the first class. The second class is the garrison brigade, which is stationed from the mouth of the river in the north to Manraka in the south. In the east, Luzon and Taiwan, and in the west, Lingjiawei Island, Salian, and Yangon are such a huge area, as a role in suppressing local rebellions, crusading against various native rebellions, pacifying the localities, and maintaining law and order. The third type is the mass armed forces, as the lord often speaks. The most numerous. Most of them are armed by the watch teams and strong ding teams of various towns, prefectures and counties, and most of them are selected from the elite organizations of the trained Ding Zhuang to deal with all kinds of theft and robbery and maintain local law and order. ”

"In addition to this, there are various police systems that are subordinate to the Patrol Police. From the township stations, there are about 40,000 or 50,000 people. ”

"After years of painstaking cultivation, the prefectures and counties can pull up a reserve brigade within half a month, numbering about 8,000 to 9,000 people, and what is lacking is artillery, vehicles, and horses. However, from the point of view of his subordinates, the combat effectiveness of the reserve brigade is in no way inferior to that of the elite officers and men in the interior. If the officers and soldiers of the reserve brigade of a battalion meet the same number of family members, their subordinates can pat their chests and pack tickets, and no matter where the reservists are recruited, they can beat them to the ground and flee! ”

"The situation of the garrison brigade is important to talk about."

"Now, we have twenty-four garrison brigades. They all grew up from the reserve brigade in the midst of the riots that pacified the natives and the remnants of the former regime in various places. There have been a lot of big battles and small battles. Most of the personnel are less than 10,000, and the artillery is relatively complete, but unfortunately, most of them are small cannons of about eight pounds, and there are not many artillery pieces of about 12 pounds. ”

"What about the horses and the baggage wagons?" Li Shouhan didn't say much, but they all went straight to the point.

"Most of the garrison brigades have a sentry of horses, numbering about seventy or eighty horses, which are basically used for communication purposes. As for the baggage vehicles, most of them are based on the establishment of the Military Department and the Military and Political Division, although there is a slight loss, but it is not much the same. ”

"Twenty-four garrison brigades, twenty-four." Li Shouhan muttered to himself.

"What does the lord mean, is it to select these garrison brigades to form a new army?" Huang Xigon couldn't hold back the excitement in his heart, such a situation has also happened in various military towns on the nine sides. It's just that the original military household system was completely destroyed, and the young and strong and elite in the military household were directly incorporated into the battalion.

Moreover, Yuan Chonghuan, the Liao Governor of Jizhen that year, directly allocated the elite part of the soldiers and horses in Jizhen to the towns in Liaodong, so that the soldiers and horses in Jizhen became a new recruit supply station in Liaodong Military Town. Such a move directly led to the complete destruction of the military household system, which turned the Jiliao defense line into an empty shell with one heavy head and one light end, which made Huang Taiji see that it was cheap, and he entered the customs and plundered many times in the future, all from the direction of Jizhen and Xuanda.

However, Li Shouhan's way of doing it made him feel refreshed.

As a figure appointed by Chongzhen as a governor-level official, Huang Xigon was naturally very aware of the situation of various armed forces in the Ming Dynasty. In the Di Bao and Song Shu, in the contact with the generals of the border towns, he had some understanding of the thieves who crisscrossed the Jianghuai River and the Han Dynasty, and the military system of Jiannu, who had been suffering for a long time in Liaodong and the Mongolian tribes.

"During the battle, there are five thieves, and the hungry people are outside. The second foot soldier, the second horse army, and the second horseman, in the old camp at the entrance of the house, if the battle breaks its threefold, the horse rides to the death. If it is invincible. The thief horse army, the horse, the old battalion immediately escaped, the elite was not lost, and he went to fight elsewhere, and gathered tens of thousands of troops in a moment. ”

Among the peasant armies, the core part is the old battalion and the cavalry team, those foot soldiers, hungry soldiers. Thanks to the gifts of officials everywhere, there will be no shortage of them wherever they go. In addition to the old battalion and elite cavalry, there are horse teams, most of which are collected from those horse thieves and poles everywhere, and many of them are cavalry among the original officers and soldiers. and entered the old camp.

The same selection system also existed among the hungry people, and Luo Hu adopted such a method when he broke through Kaifeng. Those who perform well are immediately included in the income and enjoy the standard of two meals a day.

However, the Liaodong rebels who were far away in Shengjing adopted a so-called system of raising soldiers, unlike the cruel and natural elimination and selection method of the peasant army.

According to the establishment of the Eight Banners, the smallest unit is Niu Lu. Every 200 to 300 people are a cow, the father dies and the son succeeds, and the brother dies and the younger brother dies. Of course, it is not that a cow is two or three hundred people, but that each household produces a strong man. According to ancient parlance, "Ding" is an adult man between the ages of sixteen and sixty.

Generally speaking, there are several people in a household, and the number of dings in it varies, sometimes two or three, sometimes five or six, depending on the fertility of the men in each household. Therefore, there were 2 or 300 households per Niu Lu in the Qing Dynasty, generally ranging from 1,000 to 2,000 people.

In the Qing Dynasty, those who served as soldiers were called bannermen, and they were divided into armor banners and unarmored banners. Those who are not soldiers for the time being are called "Yu Ding" or "Idle", and they can also follow them into battle, as a kind of servitude, and their status is higher than that of those slaves.

Although theoretically, these people in each Niu Lu are all soldiers, but whether they can wear armor or not depends on the ability of each soldier. However, Qing men have practiced riding and archery since they were young. Often when a person was a child, his mother tied him to a horse with a rope so that he could learn to gallop on the horse and learn how to deal with horses. From the age of five, he began to practice small bows and short arrows, galloping in public, and from the age of ten, he took exams every three years, and when he reached the standard, he was a guard (foot armor), a military salary, and an armor, and then assessed to a horse armor, and a baya. In the future, as he grows up year by year, he will become a famous warrior and general in the Later Jin and Qing Kingdoms, using the sword and gun in his hand and the war horse under his crotch to win fame, wealth and wealth for himself and his family. Of course, there is also a high probability that he died on the battlefield. This is the standard life trajectory of a Manchurian man.

After all, as flag soldiers, adult soldiers, they are assessed from the age of ten, and they can't wear armor at the age of sixteen, eighteen, or twenty, and they are too embarrassed in the surrounding martial atmosphere. It will directly affect the social status and economic status of the family.

This is the so-called system of raising soldiers in the Eight Banners of Manchuria.

Fundamentally speaking, the supplementary selection system implemented by the peasant army and the anti-thieves in Liaodong still emphasized the level of the individual and did not take into account a single unit, and Li Shouhan's plan was to change this selection system and let him focus on the selection of the formed unit. Instead of emphasizing the role of a certain person!

"When there was a commotion in various parts of the South and Central Plains, I told the military horses everywhere that whichever one fought well could be upgraded to the main force. Now, it's time to make good on Benjue's promise! ”

Only then did everyone suddenly realize that the lord had already had an abacus in his heart!

At that moment, everyone began to count the combat exploits, stations, and personnel of each garrison brigade, and listed them one by one, which one could become the main force and be added to each town, or directly upgraded to a new military town.

"I will work with Wu Liuqi in Nanyang to quell the rebellions everywhere, and among the garrison brigades under his command, select the most capable brigade, and directly merge with the first mixed brigade, and wait for the iron beggar to choose the number, and this new town will be established. Flags, heavy artillery, horses, etc., you can plan separately. ”

The remaining eight towns were all completed in the form of transferring one brigade and supplementing one brigade, and the newly transferred soldiers and horses were merged with the selected garrison brigade to become their core force or serve as a guard force.

They transferred regiments and battalions, but supplemented them with a uniform garrison brigade. Not only was the shortfall filled, but there was also a slight surplus.

In this way, it will not take three months for the plan to double the entire size of the Nanyue Army to be completed, and the combat effectiveness will not be affected by too many new soldiers.

This one. It is the method and means that have been tested and proved to expand the army and ensure combat effectiveness by means of upgrading the local armed forces.

As for the vacancy of the original garrison brigade that has been vacant after the upgrade, the military department, together with the military administration department and the military order department, will select the elite from among the people's armed forces such as the watch teams in various places, and use veterans and soldiers from various towns and towns as the backbone at all levels, and officers from neighboring units to form a new garrison brigade.

"In addition, Wang Bao was ordered to form five garrison brigades of officers. All levels from brigade commanders to first division commanders should be available, and new recruits should be recruited in northern Guangdong, southern Hunan, Guangzhou, and southern Jiangxi, and training should be organized in these areas. ”

As long as there is time, when they go to Yizhang, Chenzhou, Daozhou, and Yongzhou, and to various parts of southern Jiangnan, they will only need to erect the banner of recruiting new recruits from the Nanyue Army. I think it's a flood of responders.

"My lord, the soldiers and horses from all over the south and central can be placed like this. So, how can your Guards Brigade be expanded? ”

"It's simple, too. A few days ago, I flipped through the books, and found that the number of officials and slaves in various places who had given them household registration or pardoned their status had reached more than 200,000, and there were not a few of these people who had their children to reproduce, and two or three thousand of them could be selected for intensive training. Meantime. Don't forget, Benjue was sworn by the Miao family. The remaining insufficient part was selected from among the children of the Miao family who had received military training and fought in battle! ”

It is because of this order that it is in the Southern Yue Army. Later, there were a few rather disrespectful nicknames for these uncles in Guard Town. "Guannu Town!" "Miaozi Town!" But he only shouted in private, but he didn't dare to mention it in front of the guards.

These young men from the official slave and Miao families are bent on improving the economic and social status of their families through military exploits, not to mention that Li Shouhan has long put forward such a principle: "Regardless of Han Yi, only ask the good and the bad!" ”

As long as we fight the war well and make military merits for the lord, who dares to laugh at the origin of Lao Tzu, it is a word waiting for them, "Fight!" ”

This is a later story, so I won't press the table for the time being.

"As for the soldiers and horses in Guangzhou, Fujian, Taiwan, Shandong, Heilongjiang and other places, they should be handled with reference to this law."

"My lord, the military horses in Liangguang, Fujian, Taiwan and other places are easier to handle, but these two places in Shandong and Heilongjiang are more tricky." Chen Tianhua is not taboo in front of Li Shouhan, just tell the truth.

"Tricky what?" Li Shouhan's eyes widened slightly, and he instantly returned to normal. It's a little habit of him, to show inadvertently before losing his temper.

"Is it because Li Huayu is in Shandong as that bullshit governor's envoy for military horses and food? If you find it tricky, I will transfer him back to Taiwan to do his military preparation, and someone else will do it, and you won't find it tricky! After saying this, Li Shouhan slapped the table suddenly, and there was a loud "bang", which made everyone tremble.

Li Huayu did not discuss with his Lao Tzu in advance, and the bad consequences of making decisions and initiating peace activities with the Liao thieves are now completely revealed!

"Tell me, how many soldiers and horses are there in Shandong and Denglai now? How many soldiers and horses are there in the northern region of Heilongjiang that belong to Long? ”

After a period of scrambling, everyone initially sorted out an outline.

"Under the command of the young marshal of Shandong, there were 3,000 soldiers from the original headquarters, and nearly 10,000 people from Liao Dongzhi's headquarters of the third brigade of the second town. Now, not counting the mobilized soldiers in the granges, our Nanyue army, which belongs to the control of the young marshal in Shandong and Denglai, should be about 40,000! The mainland officers and barracks are not among them! ”

In Shandong, in order to make up for the combat attrition, Li Huayu had to transfer some manpower from the mobilized troops in various Granges to supplement the shortage of the Nanyue Army. In addition, Gyeonggi is in the northeast of the mountain and Henan in the west, both of which are places of four wars, and they have to prepare for war. In a few years, the original three brigades plus the 3,000 Dongfan soldiers have grown to nearly 40,000 people.

"Huh! Sure enough, the soldiers are strong! Li Shouyu praised it in a very strange tone, and everyone present couldn't help but feel a little creepy.

"The order was sent to Shandong, and Liao Dongzhi, the commander of the Third Brigade, was ordered to lead the Third Brigade and the team directly under the Brigade Headquarters of the Seventh Garrison Brigade to go south to Shanghai, return to Nanzhong for rectification, prepare to receive new soldiers, and reorganize it into the Twelfth Town! The original 3rd Brigade and the 7th Garrison Brigade were reorganized into the 13th Town on the spot! The candidates for officers and commanders were immediately announced, and the shortage of weapons and horses was resolved by the royal government. ”

"Order Li Huayu to draw out the officers and soldiers of the two garrisons in Shandong and Denglai, who are originally from Shandong, Dengzhou, Laizhou, Qingzhou, and other places, form a separate team, and go to Laizhou Bay to concentrate on standby."

After hearing this, Huang Xigon's heart couldn't help but jump suddenly. The lord's means are so spicy!

Liao Dongzhi and other generals were transferred back to Nanzhong and reappointed as commanders. The centralized reorganization of their troops, but the fact that they did not say who the new official was, was clearly a small warning to Li Huayu.

However, why did those soldiers and horses from Shandong concentrate in Laizhou Bay?

"Order Li Peiting, within ten days after receiving the edict, hand over the affairs at hand to Lin Wenbing, and quickly go south, Benjue has something to look for him. The original guards under the jurisdiction of Long Shengxing were immediately reorganized into the Fourth Mixed Brigade and stationed on Temple Street. The brigade commander and the insufficient soldiers can be replenished from the Shandong soldiers and horses in Laizhou Bay! (To be continued......)