"You should immediately hand over combat duty to Mr. O'Connor's troops. Pen %Fun %Cabinet www.biquge.info "William. R. Schafft lay on the marching bed, his eyes fixed on the telegram sent to him by the War Department, motionless, as if thinking about something. But in reality, the major general did not think about anything, just sulked.

Mercenaries, mercenaries, damned mercenaries! He cursed, lamented and indignant at the imminent loss of victories and honors - and the politicians and bureaucrats in Washington! Why did the War Department put Sean. O'Connor and his troops sent to Cuba? In God's name, they should go to the Philippines, where there are already fourteen thousand mercenaries, and three and a half thousand more will not be a problem; They shouldn't be in Cuba, it's a mistake!

A bug that shouldn't exist! And, instead of being properly addressed, it's getting worse and worse. The mercenaries and the politicians who supported it finally succeeded, what a **** hell.

Furious enough to jump out of the camp bed and kick O'Connor's ass in his tent.

Of course, he couldn't actually do any of these things - whether it was kicking O'Connor in the ass or jumping out of bed. As everyone knows, the Major General is sixty-three years old, weighs more than three hundred pounds, and even if everything is normal, there is no way to perform the simple action of "jumping" on his own, not to mention that he is sick - fever. Although the military doctor had diagnosed it as typhoid fever, there was nothing they could do about it, so he could only continue to lie down.

So, though extremely reluctant and feeling that it had little effect, and that his bad mood had not improved, Shaft could only vent his anger and resentment in his stomach.

Luckily, there is another person who can persuade him.

"You should look in a good direction, William." Leonard. Wood comforted his partner, "Anyway, you are the supreme commander of the ground forces, and the mercenary victory is also your victory." As long as you defeat the Spaniards, Washington will still award you a medal in the end, and the people will cheer for you. ”

"I know, Leonard. I knew it was going to be like that. But," Schaffert sighed, "emotionally, it was difficult for me to accept a mercenary army to represent the US Army in battle. ”

Wood shook his head slowly. "I also don't like to represent the U.S. Army with a mercenary army. But the situation has reached a point where we have to accept that fact. You should know that our troops have basically lost their combat capability, and only mercenaries can continue to fight. ”

What he said was true, and Schaft knew it all too well - the inferior beef and canned luncheon meat made by unscrupulous merchants seriously weakened the morale and combat effectiveness of the troops; Then there is the hot and humid jungle of Cuba, where more than 5,000 officers and soldiers have so far contracted typhoid fever or heat stroke, and most of them have to lie in bed like him, and the rest cannot take part in the fighting. Compared to the disease, the Spaniards cannot even be called "trouble".

But O'Connor's mercenaries were unaffected by food and the jungle - almost less than a hundred mercenaries were hors de combat due to disease or other causes, and while the officers and soldiers of the Army and the Volunteers suffered from both food and the jungle, they still had the energy and the mood to hunt wild animals as a necessary supplement to the generous gift of their canned luncheon meat.

In this damn jungle, these mercenaries are like fish in water.

Shafter didn't understand why, maybe Umbrella had special training for its soldiers, maybe Chinese was indeed better suited to survive in the jungle than the Americans, maybe there were other mysterious reasons that were not well known...... But whatever the reason, he could only admit that the mercenaries were the only fighting force, and that it was the only logical option if they wanted to occupy San Juan Mountain.

It's just that the major general of the army is not willing to accept this fact, there is no other reason, just feelings cannot be accepted.

And feelings are always a rather complex issue. Sometimes it's so slight that it's not worth mentioning at all, but other times, it becomes so important that it affects a person's normal judgment and makes him make bad decisions.

Just like now.

"Tomorrow, I'll let the troops make one last attempt." "Throw in a regiment and all the artillery," Shaft said. If it still fails, then the mercenaries can take over the battle. ”

"This is not a wise decision, William ......" the face of the Major General made Wood give up his prepared speech and replace it with a new paragraph, "but we really can't let the mercenaries take over the battle easily, otherwise those guys will think that the United States cannot win a battle without them." ”

"That's what I'm worried about, Leonard, we can't make those mercenaries too proud." Schaffert took the opportunity to step down, but his posture was not very good.

Wood shook his head to himself. If tomorrow's fighting is as bad as it used to be, if not worse, the mercenaries will become even more proud than they are now expected - unfortunately, it is almost a certainty. However, it can't be done so much anymore.

"Hopefully, the cans from the mercenaries will restore some of our soldiers' combat effectiveness." He made a cross on his chest.

"I hope so. May God bless us. ”

As a devout Christian, Schaft rightly hoped that God would bless him, but God was not a rotten good man who could do whatever he wanted, and the Spaniards prayed to him. At such a time, the balance of forces between the two armies would outweigh the role of God, so that the last offensive organized by the major general turned into another defeat without any suspense.

Major Roosevelt of O'Connor, Harrington, and the Volunteer Cavalry Regiment witnessed this defeat firsthand: early in the morning, under the cover of scattered artillery fire, more than 2,000 American soldiers selected from various infantry companies who could fight formed a dense formation and marched in a neat march towards San Juan Hill, only to be knocked down by Maxim machine guns and Mauser rifles before they could get close to the first line of Spanish defense, and then the soldiers retreated.

O'Connor had seen and heard of such a scenario: in Abyssinia, the mercenaries under his command had taught the Italian colonial forces a harsh lesson in the same way, and in Vietnam and the Philippines, the Vietnamese rebels and the Spanish troops were in an equally miserable situation against machine guns. Interestingly, the same tragedy happened to the US Army not to surprise O'Connor, who had already expected such a thing when he heard that the Spanish army had prepared machine guns for the American army, and the battle that had just ended only allowed him to confirm his judgment.

It's funny, "the Americans, who were best at fighting with machine guns, were taught a lesson by the Spanish Army with machine guns", and the Italians and Vietnamese must have been glad to hear this; And the Spaniards, if they knew what was going on in Manila.

Of course, Qin Lang can't be forgotten. The fight undoubtedly had his favorite flavor of dark humor, and he was sure to laugh out loud at it, happier than he would have seen any joke.

In fact, the same is true of O'Connor.

"It looks like our federal army hasn't learned anything from history." He commented sarcastically.

"Mr. O'Connor, the only thing we learn from history is that we learn nothing." Roosevelt shrugged nonchalantly, indicating that he didn't want to say anything more about it—as a former deputy secretary of the Admiralty, he didn't have much affection for the Army, but that didn't mean he would laugh at the Army's failures.

Roosevelt changed the subject. "Now, now that your forces are about to take over the attack, I'm curious to know how you're going to capture our target. San Juan Hill seems like a conundrum, right? ”

"Not really, Mr. Roosevelt. My plan was simple, the artillery destroyed, the infantry occupied. O'Connor replied.

Conquering San Juan Hill is just a small meaning. Perhaps the army thought it was a strong fortress, but in the eyes of the mercenaries it was not the same: the Spaniards dug trenches as dense as spider webs, but the trenches were only effective against cannon and howitzer fire, and were ineffective against mortars with curved ballistics. Moreover, those trenches almost always had large straight sections, and the fragments of the shells swept in both directions without any hindrance, and a single hit would cause serious casualties - so modern trenches are dug into complex zigzag shapes.

The Spanish cobwebbed trenches could not stop the mercenaries with a large number of mortars, and their machine guns were not enough to suppress the mercenaries, on the contrary, the mercenaries with more automatic fire could suppress all the Spanish soldiers in the trenches and then blast them all into the sky with mortars.

Very simple.

"That's the tactic I'm going to use, Mr. Roosevelt." "Tomorrow you can see the flag flying over San Juan Hill," O'Connor said. ”

"I look forward to seeing your success, Mr. O'Connor." Roosevelt surprisingly didn't ask any questions, and O'Connor and Harrington had expected him to ask some questions to satisfy his, Wood, and Shuffle's curiosity; He seemed genuinely confident that the next battle would be as simple as O'Connor had said, and although it would be so, that trust seemed a little abrupt. Everyone knew that Major Roosevelt was not the kind of person to be easily dismissed.

O'Connor and Harrington were confused and couldn't guess what Roosevelt was thinking. However, they were soon freed from their confusion. Now there is only one thing they care about: get all the mercenaries who are hunting in the jungle back, and then organize a nice attack as soon as possible. (To be continued, if you want to know what will happen next, please log in to the www.qidian.com, more chapters, support the author, support genuine reading!) (To be continued.) )