"Speaking of the Air Force, I suddenly remembered one thing, what about the military strength of the United Group that you have collected?"

"The other side is very strict about this area, and it is difficult for us to perceive the full picture, only some fragmentary data ......," Agnelli Jr. carefully recalled, "The bathtub ship is said to have more than 100 pilots in training, and there are more than 500 crew members; His motorized black paratroopers were retired from the army, about 300 people before and after - maybe more than 200 people stayed, those pilots and ground crews of United Aviation, about a dozen batches of retired from the Italian Army, more than 800 people, and then he introduced a batch from Germany, which is expected to be between 400-600 people, and at the same time trained more than 300 people himself, counting the people who have left one after another in recent years, maybe the core team is about 1300-1400 people, which can't tell whether it is military or civilian, you can use it anyway. ”

Little Agnelli's grasp of the situation is not bad, but it is slightly smaller than the actual number, because many of them entered other channels after retirement, and then were reabsorbed by the armed forces of the United Group, this part of the force he could not master, in fact, in addition to the first batch of 24 people, the carrier-based aircraft aviation team controlled by Goering was 106 new personnel, in addition to 58 in Germany, 48 in Italy itself - except for a very few, the rest are almost all aviation preparatory students recruited from schools, and now United Aviation has been trained, And then they were sent here.

The total number of paratroopers was more than 300 people, in addition to more than 120 members of the reconstituted SS commandos.

In addition to these personnel, there are more than 4,000 echelon personnel including mechanics, engineers, and pilots, who provide services at United Airlines, regardless of nationality and ethnic background, and are distributed in 17 major airports across the country - the outside world cannot grasp the whole picture. The total number of aircraft remained at more than 600 as when it was first formed, but the miscellaneous and classic aircraft of various countries bought back from the Italian Army have almost been eliminated, and even if the old model is retained, it has been replaced with new engines, and the United Aircraft Factory has successively provided more than 300 aircraft.

In 1926, the order for F1 fighters alone reached 175, plus the needs of other models and improvements and upgrades, the newly integrated United Aircraft Factory needed to provide at least 300 aircraft, precisely because the demand from within was already so huge, so they couldn't take care of the Air Force's small orders of 3 or 5, and all of them were left to Fiat to execute.

The same is true for the rejection of the order for 20 tanks, the United Combat Vehicle Company (including tanks and armored vehicles) is renovating the production line, most of the technical forces are working on the new Christie suspension tank, and the rest of the technical forces are used to produce the Sand wheeled armored assault vehicle, which will be equipped with Browning large-caliber heavy machine guns, and this order is 200 units at a time - who cares about those small tanks of Fiat?

Perhaps only United Motorcycle is sincerely taking orders, the previous Fast and Furious series has broken through the 10,000 mark, and now according to Contini's opinion to launch a mid-term facelift, not only continues to sell well in Italy, but also entered France, Austria, Greece, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and other 9 countries in Western Europe, even better than the original design factory BMW, plus the design improvement and early debut, there are rumors that BMW's products are knockoffs - so that the latter is so depressed that he vomits blood.

After the Italian Army ordered 1,000 units, the gendarme, the King's Guard and the police system all ordered 200 units, and the oil guard system also ordered 600 units, and the orders were full, and there was no spare time at all, so everyone was optimistic that the United Motorcycle could become a Class A enterprise in 1926.

"The largest number of soldiers were the oil guards, and I was told that many German officers had come to serve in Italy, and on the surface they all seemed to have gone through the formalities of retirement and were sincerely becoming mercenaries, but as far as I know, Sickert kept this group under strict control, and all procedures, management, systems and regulations were regularized, and they were no different from active duty."

Old Agnelli was taken aback: "Britain and France don't care? ”

"Don't be lazy to care, isn't it normal to overrun 1-2 thousand people? Besides, as far as the current performance of the German Wehrmacht is concerned, the military circles are laughing at them, and only little Ziano treats them as treasures. ”

"Why didn't he hire Italian officers?"

"Hire, but there are only more than 400 people, because no one wants to ......suffer," little Agnelli shrugged, "Everyone just wants to go to little Ziano to gild and make some money, who wants to suffer?" If you are willing to suffer, why not send troops to Libya? There, too, they have to go to North Africa, but if they do a good job, they can be promoted, and little Ziano can't give them a promotion! According to the information I have, after he organized the Volunteer Army into more than 1,000 people, there are now about 4,000-4,500 oil guards. ”

Little Agnelli had no idea that Contini would swell his personnel to more than 7,000 men, nor did he understand that what he didn't see was that the ununiformed guards were taking up a lot of the staff. In the past few days, according to Contini's deployment, more than 40 F1 fighters have been deployed to the front line of Tripoli, in addition to pilots and ground crew, the first batch of oil guards composed of veterans, a total of a battalion, has also been deployed to the port of Tripoli.

They were dressed in full black uniforms, which was easy to distinguish, but in addition to the black uniforms throughout the port, there were also many people who did not wear black uniforms for the oil guards. What Agnelli Jr. doesn't see is that the pipeline is now being laid intensively, and the coalition is using the upside-down method, starting from the port and then following the Libyan desert to the border between Libya and Algeria — a stretch of about 500 kilometers, which Contini estimates will not be until at least August, when his troops will be fully armed, and the Algerian oil wells will be equipped with oil extraction measures, and there will be a solid basis for a showdown with the French.

"Keep an eye on his troops, I'm sure Mussolini won't turn a blind eye to this, and little Ziano's ambition to take over the military seems to be a little too urgent."

"Urgent?" Little Agnelli was puzzled, "Isn't it just a guard?" ”

"You think so, politicians don't think so, even if Mussolini doesn't think so, won't his subordinates think crookedly—those few generals have been fighting with you." Old Agnelli smiled faintly, "I can't do little Ziano with this, but adding a little trouble to him can save us other troubles, he always chatters with us about the wage system, the welfare system and the social security system, and I feel very tired of it—come and not be rude!" ”

"I think so, too."

Old Agnelli finally added: "But building houses and developing real estate can be learned, and it seems that it is also a way to make money......"