As night fell, the marching procession formed into a blue procession and quickly crossed two pontoon bridges laid with marching boats. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 The harsh glow of the info butter torches dyed the river red. Reflecting the procession marching on the pontoon.

A few years ago, it was almost unthinkable that troops could quickly build bridges while marching, but now the sappers in the foreign guns can open roads in the mountains and build pontoon bridges for troops to pass through.

Under the training of hundreds of American foreigners, and more importantly, the foreign gun team built by the emperor Tongzhi in the face of the current crisis has now become the last reliance of the Qing Dynasty.

On the other side of the river is a rolling forest that looks dark and mysterious at night. After the troops crossed the river, Li Jia'an could look towards the rolling woods, and in his studies, he believed that it was the most dangerous place, where there was a high probability that the enemy was lurking.

However, everything was uneventful, and when they arrived at a campsite, the exhausted warriors fell asleep in the fields. After a few hours of sleep, they were dragged out of bed again and headed along a narrow dirt road.

The march continued so much that everyone felt so tired that they began to count how many miles they had walked on their fingers. Everyone was feeling exhausted.

"The soles of your feet are almost gone!"

"My legs are sore, and I don't have enough fucking food."

"Don't worry, the troops won't starve you."

There were constant complaints in the marching procession. Although it was not hot, but. Everyone was still very quick and sweaty. But despite this, no one dared to leave their luggage. After all, these luggage are necessary for marching and fighting.

In fact, they did not have much material on them, only the necessary clothes, blankets, dry food, lunch boxes, as well as guns and bullets. A few other miscellaneous items are also needed.

"I don't know when the railway will be built here! That way, you don't have to walk like that anymore! ”

"Beautiful you! The road still has to go! ”

"Like, otherwise what do you think a pair of boots are for?"

Despite their constant complaints, the troops were still marching south, and complaining was just a way for them to vent their exhaustion.

After all, even veterans of many battles will use similar methods to relieve their physical exhaustion. In fact, for them, such a march is nothing at all. Because, in the past training, marching in full gear was an indispensable training subject. And once a month there is a long march.

Habit doesn't mean people won't complain, in fact, it's a habit that has been developed in past training, so that time flies quickly, and even people forget the discomfort of marching and walking with the hard-soled military boots under their feet.

Standing in the queue, Li Jia'an just followed the march of the crowd, and his past training told him that if he fell, he would be trampled by the people who rushed up from behind. He is only a component of this group.

The ranks surrounded it, and on all sides were iron and ruthless military discipline. It's as if everyone is in a box that only moves. Escaping this team is absolutely impossible. In fact, even if he escapes, he is likely to be caught by the government as a deserter.

The clothes worn by the foreign guns are different from the uniforms, and it is this blue cloth foreign military uniform that ensures that he has no way to escape.

"Looks like we're going to go south!"

Li Jia'an thought so in his heart.

Why did the troops go south?

The reason couldn't be simpler, the Han army in the south went on a northern expedition. Weiyuan Town didn't even hold up a face-to-face effort, of course, in the mouths of the adults, it was because there were many Han soldiers. Therefore, they are going to assemble south and prepare for a decisive battle with the Han army!

When crossing a river again. As soon as he crossed the river, the sound of artillery was heard, and Li Jia'an did not expect to witness the battle here.

In front of the field, there were several black skirmishers, and people shot at them, and in the sunlight, a blue line was formed on the field. A military flag fluttered in the wind, and under the military flag, groups of officers and soldiers lined up and fired at the straggler line, and the artillery on the side kept firing.

The other battalions were also coming ashore, and the whole town formed two horizontal columns, and soon began to slowly move through the woods behind the skirmishers.

Li Jia'an looked at the fighting queue over there, looking very curious.

"Don't look at it, you must have encountered a small force of the Han army."

The head of the shed said with a grin.

"These Han soldiers are different from the long-haired ones we fought in the past. There's a good chance they'll ambush us, said those who survived Weiyuan Town. Not only are they powerful, but they will also appear behind you like ghosts. Weiyuan Town, that's how it was defeated! ”

As the captain's words fell, they heard the gunfire on the other side become sparse. Then they came across another corpse, staring at the sky on its back, a blue uniform covered in blood, and a bullet piercing his chest.

Maybe he just died...... When you pass by this corpse again. Li Guoan silently thought that now he was even more afraid, he was afraid that the same fate was waiting for him.

This absurd thought tightly controlled him at once, making his whole person feel a fear that he had never felt before, and he was so frightened in his heart that a cold sweat broke out on his back, and when he was blown by the wind, the whole person couldn't stop trembling, and his legs were even a little stiff.

He listened to the sound of guns behind him, and despite fear, he continued to march forward, and after marching for more than an hour, he saw a huge camp, tents, occupying the fields, and military flags fluttering between the tents.

"My God, this, this, shouldn't all the soldiers of the Great Qing Kingdom come here......"

It was not the whole Qing Dynasty, but the fifteen towns of the sixteen towns of the foreign gun team commanded by Duobi'a, all of them came here and came to Xinji, which was the last field force of the Great Qing Kingdom and the last hope of the Great Qing Kingdom.

In the wilderness, thousands of tents were scattered across a dozen square kilometers of land, and groups of Mongol cavalry, who were also the last cavalry of the Qing Dynasty, walked through the tents, and after entering the camp, Li Jia'an even saw several huge 24-pounder cannons on the earthen ramparts.

In the camp, 12-pounder cannons were neatly arranged, and in this moment, his fear disappeared, and he seemed to be no longer worried, because he saw a powerful army.

Indeed, this is indeed an extremely powerful force -- a foreign gun team of nearly 50,000 people is not only equipped with the world's first-class front-loading rifled guns in this era, but also equipped with nearly 300 12-pounder cannons and more than 60 24-pounder cannons.

"Even Napoleon never commanded such a large force!"

Ulysses? Simpson? Grant looked at the army in front of him with surprise, even though he had been in China for three years and personally participated in the training of this foreign gun team, it was still difficult for him to imagine that this army would be so powerful when he gathered his own strength.

Even the United States cannot compare with it, at least not the United States now has such a large standing army.

"The problem is, they're not French!"

Sisleti shrugged his shoulders and said.

"I heard that just a few days ago, the rebel army almost wiped out their army of three thousand in just a few hours, major, you have trained these people, you should know, they ......"

Sisleti shook his head and said in a contemptuous tone.

"Maybe you can buy the best weapons in the world, and they do the same, but that doesn't mean they have the most powerful army in the world, they can shoot, but it's hard to bear the casualties of the battle, and in last year's battle, if it wasn't for the general who routed the rebels from the flank, I'm afraid, their capital would have been occupied by the rebels now."

"My friend, in this army, there are people who are Confucians, but there are people who are very brave. They are two completely different people. “

"Of course, according to them, one is the banner people, the other is the Han people, although the former is nominally a soldier, but in fact, they do not have any qualities that a soldier should have, not even courage."

Syltis said sarcastically in a tone of utter contempt.

"And the most puzzling thing is that those who do not have the courage occupy the position of officers. Because they don't believe in Han Chinese at all. ”

Shrugging helplessly, Sirtis continued.

"100 sheep led by one lion can defeat a hundred lions led by one sheep! Unfortunately, tens of thousands of brave people are led by hundreds of sheep. ”

"That's why you don't have any confidence in the battle you're going to fight?"

Grant asked rhetorically.

"It's not that there is no confidence, but I believe that this battle will be one-sided."

Syltis looked south and said,

"Maybe I don't know much about the rebels in the South. But one thing is for sure, they are the rebels we fought before. is very different through these several skirmishes. I believe that their defeat of our Far Eastern Fleet in naval battles was not an accident. ”

Although Congress rejected the proposal to send a fleet to China to expand the war, the war led to the United States turning to support the Qing government, and these retired officers from the U.S. Army came to China under the introduction of the U.S. minister to China, became foreign members of the foreign rifle team, helped train the foreign gun team, and assisted them in fighting.

And now this relationship has affected the future of the two countries. In Siltis's view, the United States has mistakenly sided with the losers.

"Now we are like the Indians in the Revolutionary War, who sided with the British. And now we're on the side of the losers, too. ”

"But you see, besides us, there are also Russians. Didn't the Russians also take their side? ”

Grant, pointing to some Russians in the distance, said that it was a battalion of Cossacks. It was also part of Russia's aid to the Qing State.

"Grant, so the old empires of Europe will always be the old empires, and the Russians only need such a small number of people. In exchange for millions of square kilometers of land, the 100,000 reinforcements they promised would never reach China, and I can use my reputation as a guarantee for that. ”

Sirtis knew more about diplomacy than with Grant, knew Russia better, and understood that they would not be able to send 100,000 troops to Asia at any cost for the sake of the Qing state.

"Of course, we all know it's impossible. But, as military personnel, we don't have a way to influence U.S. foreign policy. It's like they ......."

Looking at the Russian soldiers, Grant said,

"Even if they knew that Russia would never be able to send reinforcements, they still had to fight under the command of the Qing people."

In contrast, as foreigners, they do not need to shed blood for this doomed war.

"Major, it seems that you are also right, there is no hope for this war?"

"No!"

Shaking his head, Grant replied.

"I hope that through this battle, I can see the gap between us and the Chinese, after all, the Qing army was trained by us, and maybe their soldiers are not as brave as American soldiers." And the officers were also incompetent. But at least through this large-scale campaign. Go get some intel......"

This is the biggest difference between Grant and Sirtis, who sees the United States on the wrong side. But on the side that is doomed. In the future, U.S. diplomacy, as well as the economy, are likely to be affected by this choice.

But as a soldier, Grant values this battle more because it can give him many answers.

"Our knowledge of the Chinese army is too limited, we only know that it is a European-style army, and we know that there are also officers from Europe in his army to help them train, but what is this army like? How effective is he? These are all things we don't know! ”

Looking at those Qing troops whose military uniforms are not much different from the American army, if it weren't for the color of their skin, it might make people mistakenly think that they were American troops.

"The Battle of the Pearl River Estuary, their victory, may not be accidental. But what is certain is that the way they treat the United States is unacceptable, including their behavior in Japan, all of which will inevitably lead to a conflict with China in the future, or even a war, and if we still know nothing about them until then, the outcome of the war will undoubtedly be catastrophic. ”

As a soldier, Grant even thought about it a long time later, thinking that China was likely to break out into a new conflict with the United States. Because of this, he hoped to learn about the Chinese army through this battle.

"So I hope they can last a little longer. Only then will we have more opportunities to get to know these Chinese, and if war is inevitable, at least we can understand our opponents in advance. ”

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