Chapter 552

The motif of this coat of arms is a dragon of the East, encircling the entire earth. Pen~Fun~Pavilion www.biquge.info is not just a certain country, the dragon that is not angry and arrogant surrounds the entire earth. And behind this earth there is an iron anchor wrapped around the anchor cable. The iron anchor behind this earth encompasses the entire earth along with the dragon - and this is the emblem of the Imperial Chinese Marine Corps.

As the coat of arms of the army, its pattern is obviously a little too complicated, there is a dragon representing China and an anchor representing the navy, but they are painted very small, and a lot of decorative lace, auspicious clouds, flowers and leaves are added to the snake, with the style of oriental ornate heraldry, gorgeous and complex, so that people will have a misunderstanding, but will ignore the meaning of the emblem itself.

And this emblem seems to indicate to the world that the goal of this army is that they will fight for the interests of the country around the world. They will always be the first to rush to the battlefield.

No one doubts this, and this is also the mission of the Marine Corps. The battlefields of the Marine Corps are cosmopolitan, and they can be anywhere in the globe whenever they need to, like in Panama, in Hawaii, in ...... Wherever they are needed in the Empire, this is the reason for the creation of the Marine Corps, and the fundamental reason why China maintains one of the largest Marines in the world.

The military cap with the emblem of the Marine Corps is worn on the head of Colonel Zhao Shulin, and unlike the civilian officials, who still maintain the nine-grade system, the military should be regarded as the most westernized place to some extent, and the Marine Corps is no exception, and its military rank is also modeled after the West. According to the rules of the army, as an officer of the combat unit, Zhao Shulin shaved his head, from the era of the righteous army to the present, the officers and soldiers of the combat unit from the general to the ordinary soldier, must shave their heads, which is not only for hygiene, but also to facilitate wound dressing.

Although he was only in his thirties, he had left the marks of time on his thin face. Like any officer, his uniform was always clean, his trousers straight, his leather shoes shiny, and the medals on his chest shone brightly. His movements are also meticulous, and his every move carries the imprint of Wuchang Lecture Martial Hall.

However, the imprint of war on his body is deeper. He had a handsome face and forehead, some scars, those war wounds, more on his body than his face, although he was an officer, but in fact, he was also a noble officer - a series of military exploits such as the capture of Kamchatka and the landing on the coast made him obtain the title of a low-class nobleman, although his nominal fief was in Kamchatka, which was located in the North Sea Special Province, and as for his 100,000 acres of Rongtian in Africa, as a noble officer with the title of "baron", he not only had to maintain the appearance of a soldier, It is also necessary to pay attention to maintaining the "status" of the nobility.

As the founding nobles of the empire, except for some civil officials who were born in scholarly disciples, most of the officers were born in ordinary families, and because of this, in the past few years, they need to learn the etiquette of the nobility, of course, in the army, no one will ask him whether he is a nobleman, in the army, the military rank is fundamental, the level of the military determines everything, but in the army, there are a large number of low-level nobles.

In fact, this is a way for His Majesty to govern the army, through the conferral of knighthoods to bind the interests of the soldiers to the empire, and the interests of these minor nobles are tightly tied to the colonies, and it is the army that has the strongest resistance in the negotiations in Africa, because the army has a large number of interests in Africa from the top down. Many of them may have never seen their fiefs, but that doesn't stop them from seeing them as a legacy for future generations.

Opposite him, sat a medium-sized rear admiral, his face tanned, short and fat, looking like a ball, yet he was known to be the chief of naval operations, with a stern and rough personality, and was feared by those around him. In front of him, cowardly people are eager to burrow into the cracks in the ground.

But of course, he is not a timid person, he has a relationship with superiors and subordinates, and more of a mutual respect between soldiers.

"Now that Your Majesty has made a decision, we will fight against Britain all over the world, and in this case, the Navy and the Marine Corps will be the core of this war, and the battle plan formulated by the General Staff Headquarters will be that in the next war, we will completely drive British forces out of the South Seas and the Pacific......

When mentioning the plan formulated by the General Staff Headquarters, the corners of Shen Ming's lips lifted slightly, and he knew very well what the core of this plan was when he personally participated in this plan.

"Drive British power out of the South Seas, from the Pacific Ocean?"

Zhao Shulin looked at the chief of naval operations in front of him in surprise, although the Marine Corps has the name of the Navy, it is actually not part of the Navy, the Marine Corps has its own command, under the direct command of His Majesty, and together with the army and navy, it constitutes the three major branches of the empire. However, compared to the first two, the Marine Corps is relatively small, until now it has only two divisions and a few independent regiments and battalions.

As the commander of the 1st Marine Division, Zhao Shulin naturally felt strange about this order, after all, the current opponent is Britain, and it is not ordinarily difficult to drive such a big country out of the South China Sea and the Pacific Ocean.

"What? Not confident? ”

Facing Zhao Shulin's surprise, Shen Ming smiled and took out a cigar from the cigar case in front of him and said.

"Actually, it's not a big deal, the British stronghold in the South Seas, one of the needs to dispatch the navy is the Straits Settlements, that is, Singapore, which can be regarded as the southern gate of China, and Malacca is also the throat of our communication with the African colonies, controlled in the hands of the British, the threat to our Chinese dynasty can be said to be fatal, so we have to take advantage of this war to fight there......"

Now that the war has broken out, the task for the army is no longer to control the scale of the war, but to win the war by all means.

As a senior officer in the Marine Corps, he knew very well what Singapore meant to China, especially for China, which intended to build a colonial empire in Africa, Malacca was controlled by the British, which was tantamount to handing over Africa's contact with the mainland to foreigners, and there was no way to solve this problem in the past, but now, during the war, this problem can be solved.

"There is no problem in beating Singapore."

Nodding affirmatively, Zhao Shulin's expression was extremely calm.

"From what I know about Singapore, the British defenders there have a maximum strength of more than 3,000 men, and they are no match for us at all, and I estimate that it only takes one separate regiment of marines to capture the entire Straits Settlements."

As a Marine Corps officer, Zhao Shulin, of course, had "planned" for some areas, which was the habit of the Imperial Army, and he even went to the Straits Settlements as a businessman for "overseas staff trips", "overseas staff trips" were compulsory for senior Marine Corps officers, and there were even "overseas staff trips" to countries such as Britain, France, and the United States, whether they could really come in handy or not, but for an enterprising country, through "overseas staff trips" Collecting information on potential enemy countries and formulating corresponding battle plans are indispensable, and it is natural to be very familiar with it.

"A regiment of marines?"

Shaking his head, Shen Ming looked at Zhao Shulin and said with a smile.

"The Marine Corps is the elite of our land forces, and it can't be wasted in those places, after all, good steel must be used on the blade, and the Straits Settlements and Lower Burma are all captured by the army units, otherwise, such a huge army can still be idle without being on the battlefield."

The army will not be willing to be silent in this war, not to mention that in the staff headquarters, the army itself has more right to speak, after all, the scale of the navy is not large now, and it does not have the ability to be equal to the army, for Shen Ming, he naturally hopes that the colony will expand, because in this case, the navy will continue to expand, so that the voice in the staff headquarters will become more and more important.

The army is naturally very aware of this, so they will not tolerate the decisive role of the navy in this war, but considering the reality of overseas operations, the army will decide to eliminate all difficulties and use Lower Burma as a breakthrough to seize Lower Burma, and then give the empire access to the sea in the southwest.

At the same time, the Army also made a plan to recruit ships from home and send troops to the overseas colonies, and it was certain that in the land battlefield, with its large number of more than 800,000 men and the ability to multiply its strength at any time, it was perfectly capable of leveling down any enemy, as long as they could transport troops over. They really doubted that the Army would have been able to achieve this goal before the Army's activities, and according to the information obtained by the Naval Intelligence Service, the Army had really gotten its hands on ships -- they had captured more than 100,000 tons of British merchant ships in Hong Kong, and these merchant ships captured by the Army had fundamentally solved the problem of transporting their troops.

It is precisely for this reason that the Naval Operations Department has made a targeted decision -- to fully cooperate with the Marine Corps, cooperate with them in carrying out overseas combat operations, and suppress the limelight of the Army through supporting the Marine Corps, so as to ensure the dominant position of the Navy's main force in this war, and sometimes the military is also inseparable from politics.

"Then we ......"

The words of the chief of naval operations made Zhao Shulin surprised, originally he thought that he was coming to cooperate with the navy to take Singapore, maybe it was not a fortress, but it was also a place suitable for naval attacks, especially suitable for marine attacks, and even he had planned everything for a long time and had a certain plan.

"The Marine Corps and Navy have more important areas!"

Shen Ming looked at Zhao Shulin in front of him, and then he walked to the map, pointed to a location on the map, and said.

"As for Britain's power in the Pacific, it is Australia and New Zealand, these two places are the core of Britain's power in the Pacific, so the plan of the General Staff is to seize these two areas during the war, and the minimum standard is to seize Australia!"

Australia!

The noun spit out of the mouth of the chief of naval operations made Zhao Shulin's whole body tremble, seize Australia!

This was completely beyond his expectations, and even beyond everyone's imagination.

How big is Australia?

Capture Australia!

Does this not mean that the war will continue to expand indefinitely?

And more importantly, if we seize Australia's benefits, what about future peace?

"Sir, although I am not a politician, we all know that this war between us and the British will eventually be resolved through negotiations, and if we take Australia, then when the time comes, once the two countries are at the negotiating table, shall we continue to occupy Australia or give up there?"

As a soldier, Zhao Shulin naturally hopes to expand the territory for the country, but he also knows very well that unless a country is completely defeated, or even occupies its own territory, the two countries will eventually solve the problem at the negotiating table, and at the negotiating table, is it possible for the British to give up Australia? Is it possible to abandon the Pacific?

"You are a soldier, as for diplomatic issues, let's leave it to the diplomats to consider!"

Shaking his head, Shen Ming looked at the commander of the 1st Marine Division in front of him,

Said in a solemn tone.

"As soldiers, we all know very well that our duty is to obey orders, maybe we are in Australia, in any battlefield, we will pay a relatively heavy price, our soldiers will die in battle, the land there may be stained red, like the Crimea, and in the end, the British and the French will not withdraw from there? But ......"

After a slight pause, Shen Ming looked at Australia on the map, his expression becoming more and more solemn.

"But even so, we still have to fight, because only through such continuous blows can we force Britain to face the reality and force them to return to the negotiating table, otherwise, if we propose negotiations now, then we are undoubtedly showing weakness, and if we can't give them a heavy blow, on the sea, on land, in any corner of the world, to deal them with heavy damage, the British will still treat us arrogantly, we will not be able to achieve a favorable position at the negotiating table, and ......"

Staring at a location on the map, Shen Ming finally set his sights on Europe.

"Moreover, for the world, the British colonial empire is full of temptation for many countries, for us, for other countries, the same is true, some countries see us eating meat, believe me, they will not be able to control themselves!"

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