In recent years, the Datang Army has continued to carry out reforms, and the army-level command structure has gradually increased, and the troops under its jurisdiction are not the same as in the early unified war, only limited to the front-line main combat forces.

So far, the Datang Army has set up a total of 16 armies throughout the country, which are stationed all over the country, and there are seven on the northern border, which are stationed on the borders of the five northern provinces, specifically one army in Gansu, one army in Shaanxi, one army in Shanxi, two armies in Hebei, one army in western Liaoning, and one army in eastern Liaodong.

There are two in the southwest region, namely the Sichuan army and the Yunnan-Guizhou army.

There are two coastal areas, namely Liangguang, Fujian and Zhejiang.

There is one in the Huguang area.

There is one in the Central Plains, and the defense area includes Henan, the southern part of Shanxi, and the southern part of Hebei.

There is one in Shandong, and the defense area is naturally Shandong, but Shandong in the Tang Empire does not include Liaodong, and Liaodong is a separate province.

Then there is a more special place, that is, the Goryeo Peninsula area, where there is also an army establishment, but it is said to be an army, but the actual strength is very small.

Then there is the Zhili area, this place is a key defense area!

The Zhili Defense Area does not include Jinling City and the surrounding areas, and the defense of Jinling City and the surrounding areas is solely responsible for the Guards, and has nothing to do with the Army, which is mainly responsible for the Zhili Four Provinces.

The army has deployed two armies here, although there are only two armies, but in fact there are many main forces, and in terms of overall strength, it is second only to the sum of the armies in the defense line of the Great Wall, and the first army deployed in Zhili is needless to say, the crown of the whole army, with the largest total strength and the best equipment, and the whole army currently has a total of 20 main infantry divisions, which should be allocated to a full 16 armies, but the first army occupies three of them, and it is also the three with the strongest combat effectiveness.

The First Army, in the public opinion of the people, also has another name, that is, the Zhili Army, which can be seen its status, the army's defense is relatively scattered, mainly deployed in Jiangbei Province, South Anhui Province, Jiangnan Province, North Anhui Province, its defense is handed over to the 16th Army.

The 16th Army is the latest achievements of the Army's construction in recent years, and the troops under its jurisdiction are only one main infantry division and two reserve divisions, and its main force is the 20th Infantry Division.

It can be seen from the number that this unit is the youngest main infantry division among the many front-line main forces of the Tang Army, which was built in the tenth year of Xuanping and has just been formed in the first half of this year!

However, this division is also very interesting, when it was built, it did not draw ready-made soldiers from other units, but directly recruited those retired veterans who had reached the age of service, so the average age of the soldiers in this unit was quite large, reaching 25 years old, and some veterans even reached 30 years old.

As for the other troops of the Tang Empire, regardless of whether they were the main force or the reserve division, the average age of the soldiers was only about twenty years old.

But is average age bad when it's old?

No, on the contrary, even if this unit has just formed an army and has not even experienced any baptism of war, it has already made other troops look sideways, because the soldiers in this infantry division are all veterans, and they are all veterans who participated in the reunification war back then.

The same is true for soldiers, and officers are also the most senior and experienced officers who have been transferred.

Such an army, although the number is new, no one will treat them as a new army!

The First Army and the Sixteenth Army together constituted the main force of the Zhili Defense Area, and the combined strength of these two armies was second only to the combined strength of the seven armies of the Great Wall Defense Line.

If you add the Guards Army, which has been expanded to three Guards Infantry Divisions, that is, the strength of the entire Zhili region, the Guards Army, the First Army, and the Sixteenth Army dare not say that it is enough to confront the seven armies in the direction of the Great Wall, but there is definitely no problem in fighting against more than half of them.

Therefore, in the entire empire, the place with the strongest troops is actually not in the Great Wall defense line, although this place is indeed the largest number of troops, but it is too scattered, hundreds of thousands of people scattered on the long northern border, which leads to the fact that there are not too many troops in each place.

But the Zhili region is different, and when necessary, these forces can be gathered.

If one day Li Xuan wants to personally conquer the grassland, the troops he brings will be some troops in the Guards, the First Army, and the Sixteenth Army, even if not all of them are transferred, but they can easily draw more than 100,000 main forces, not including those reserve divisions, if you add reserve divisions, there will be more than 100,000 people.

This is not after mobilization, but directly transfer active troops, if after mobilization, it will be even more difficult to say, the major military warehouses in the Zhili area have a large number of weapons and weapons in stock, and they can mobilize veterans at any time, recruit young and strong to form new troops, how many troops can be mobilized at that time, to be honest, Li Xuan himself has no bottom in his heart, according to the source of soldiers, it is possible to have a million people, but if you take into account all kinds of military materials, a million people will definitely not be able to maintain, But there will certainly be no problem in mobilizing another four or five hundred thousand people.

Of course, these improvised mobilized troops should not be expected to be able to go into battle without months of training.

The main strength of the Imperial Army is mainly concentrated in the Great Wall defense line and the Zhili area, in other places, it is not that there are not many troops, but the main force is not much, for example, in the central and southern regions of Jiangxi, there is not even a main infantry division stationed here, only a few reserve divisions are stationed.

There is no other reason, who let this place be inland, there is no foreign threat, and the surrounding area is also a place where heavy troops are gathered, and the troops deployed by the First Army in Anqing and Jiujiang can be killed at any time.

The units under the jurisdiction of each military are not fixed, and there is no unified standard, because these armies, strictly speaking, are not field armies in the strict sense of the word, but are more similar to theater command organs, which are responsible for the war in an entire region.

Therefore, the difference in the strength of each army is also very large, for example, the strength of the 12th Army stationed in Huguang is very poor, and there is only one main division in the troops under its jurisdiction, but the first army next door has three main infantry divisions, not only the main division, but even the gap between the reserve divisions is also very large.

There is a big gap in the strength of the various armies, and at the same time, they also take into account the responsibilities of the defense zone commands, but the headquarters of the various armies and the garrison commands of the provinces are still not the same concept, although the garrison commands of the provinces also have reserve divisions, but once a certain reserve division is directly placed under the jurisdiction of the armies, the garrison headquarters of the provinces will lose the command of this reserve division.

Generally speaking, the army will directly transfer some reserve divisions that are in relatively good condition and relatively strong in combat effectiveness to the command of various armies and use them as second-line field troops.

Although the main force is easy to use, it is seriously insufficient in number, and there is no money to build more main forces, so it can only be made up with cheap reserve divisions.

Of course, reserve divisions are reserve divisions after all, and they cannot always be on the front line, and they are often rotated at intervals of one and a half years.

And those reserve divisions that have not been rotated and have always been stationed locally, usually the weaker ones, have always been the responsibility of the provincial garrison commands.

The seven armies of the northern defense line almost accounted for more than one-third of the sixteen armies of the Tang Empire, and also accounted for more than half of the main field forces of the Tang Empire.

But the Tang Army, which is still dominated by infantry and guns, if it wants to go deep into the steppe to fight the Tatars, then it will be very difficult!

The strength of the Tatars is mainly cavalry, when I think of hundreds of thousands of cavalry, any general of the Tang Army will not despise it, sometimes just thinking about so many cavalry on the other side is elusive, my hair feels a little numb!

Although the guns of the Tang Army are awesome, they have to find the enemy to shoot.

But when the Tang Army went deep into the grassland, people were not stupid, after the stupid direct impact on the infantry phalanx in the past few years, in some armed conflicts between the Tang Army and the Tatars in recent years, these Tatars have never attacked the infantry phalanx of the Tang Army, not even once.

They are scared of being beaten!

So now, people don't fight you head-on at all, and when they meet your brigade of infantry, they just slap their horses and run away, do you chase or not?

Chasing, two legs can't run four legs, and people generally ride two horses alone, that is eight legs!

This chase, chasing, maybe as soon as you relax, people will kill a horse pistol!

If you don't chase it, then why are you coming to the grassland, looking at the scenery?

Whether to chase or not to chase this problem, it doesn't matter if you can't find the enemy, but the Tatars will also attack the grain route, the hoplites go deep into the grassland, and the grain and grass that need to be consumed is very huge, and the importance of logistics supply is undoubted.

If these Tatars don't play frontal combat with you, but the main force flees and attacks the grain road, the Tang Army doesn't have to fight, and it will have to collapse first!

When I couldn't stand it anymore, because the grain route was cut off, or to avoid the grain route being cut off, and I chose to retreat, the cavalry followed up again, and I wanted to go, how could it be so easy!

Hell if an infantry unit that has been cut off from the grain route can run away under the watchful eye of the enemy's cavalry!

People are looking at you from behind, and when you retreat, you can't maintain the formation a little, and they will kill you in minutes!