Guangzhou gradually became hotter before and after the Qingming Festival, and dozens of revolutionary party fathers and Guangdong magnates stood on the review stand of the north school field, and the surrounding school was crowded with officers and soldiers of various units of the Guangdong Army and the surrounding people, and tens of thousands of pairs of eager and envious eyes were all staring at the 500 officers and men of the model battalion of the revolutionary army guard brigade who were sweating like rain on the field.

The neat formation, the standardized movements full of masculinity, and the high-pitched and loud shouts of killing of the officers and men during the drill won the earth-shattering applause of the military and people in Guangzhou from time to time.

In the tide of applause and cheers, Sun Yat-sen, who was standing in the center of the front of the review stand, nodded frequently, his ruddy face was full of satisfaction and pride, looking at the strong officers and soldiers in the audience, who were neatly moving and acting like one person, he couldn't help but turn around and ask the young general standing in the back of the side:

"Zicheng, what method did you use to train an army to be prohibited, like one person?"

"Sir, the officers ......and men of our guard brigade have today's performance, thanks to the first three months of rigorous training and 58 days of long-distance training, and one-third of the 5,000 officers and men are veterans of more than three years of military experience, and most of the battalion and company commanders graduated from the Sichuan Army Military Academy.

Sun Yat-sen was quite surprised when he heard this, he inspected this revolutionary force on foot from Sichuan on more than one occasion, and he was always proud that he had this revolutionary force with advanced equipment and strong combat effectiveness, and he always thought that this unit loyal to him was definitely the strongest army in the country.

This was a force with a firm revolutionary belief, and on the way from Sichuan to Guangzhou, it was coveted by warlords and local armed forces from all walks of life, and countless powerful people along the way were enthusiastic about the sophisticated equipment of this passing army, and they were constantly secretly planning attacks and disarming operations.

However, the strict military discipline and military quality displayed by this strong army shocked everyone, and during the march of more than 50 days, the alert Liu Bingxian held two simulated combat exercises.

In the end, Zhao Hengti Division of the Beiyang Army, who quietly launched the encirclement, and Chen Eunshi, who was a two-headed fisherman, changed color, and after repeatedly weighing the pros and cons, the two largest warlords in Hunan had to stop all military blocking actions.

Sun Yat-sen looked suspiciously at the five hundred officers and soldiers who were carrying out the assassination performance in the audience, and after a while, he turned his head again and asked in a low voice:

"Zicheng, I think that the officers and soldiers have reached a very high level in terms of mental outlook and military technology, and they are far superior to the Zhejiang army and the local Guangdong army in all aspects.

Liu Zicheng secretly took a breath, thought about it, and finally replied frankly:

What Mr. said is extremely that the reason why the students are dissatisfied is not because they are pretending to be modest, let alone arrogant, but because they feel that there is indeed a big gap between the headquarters and the Sichuan Army, and it is not as good as the directly subordinate guard brigade under the command of Xiao Yimin, the commander-in-chief of the Sichuan Army, which is rarely known.

"Weapons and equipment aside, it is difficult for us to match the military quality and combat experience of officers and soldiers, just as General Xiao Yimin commented, we still have a long way to go if we want to train into a truly strong army...... This is not the student's personal opinion, and Brother Kai-shek also thinks so. ”

Chiang Kai-shek, who was standing beside Liu Bingxian, saw Sun Yat-sen looking over, hurriedly took half a step forward, and said in a low voice:

"What Zicheng said is extremely that we are indeed inferior to the Sichuan army, and it is difficult to surpass them in at least five years, and the Sichuan army has defeated the Yunnan army, the Beiyang army, and the Yunnan-Guizhou coalition army for many years, and has cultivated batch after batch of military talents, and has its own military school and arsenal, looking at the whole country, all the armies are far behind the Sichuan army."

Sun Yat-sen frowned, thought for a while, and commanded in a low voice: "I remember that you have submitted reports on army construction one after another, so let's do it, after the dinner, the two of you will come to my place, and we will discuss it." ”

Chiang Kai-shek and Liu Bingxian whispered yes, looked at each other and looked ahead, and the 500 officers and soldiers in the rising dust and smoke had just finished their performances, and the audience once again burst into warm applause and praise.

The careful Chiang Kai-shek saw very clearly that the expressions of the generals and colonels Chen Jiongming, Xu Chongzhi, and Li Jishen standing in the front row were extremely complicated, especially Chen Jiongming, who had just been appointed by Sun Yat-sen as commander-in-chief of the Guangdong army, his smile was as far-fetched as his applause, and the look of surprise in his eyes was mixed with worry, and he seemed to be quite scruples about the elite troops under the stage who had been stationed in Guangzhou for less than two or three months and were deeply trusted by the revolutionary leader Sun Yat-sen.

Liu Bingxian was not as careful as Chiang Kai-shek, and this conscientious young general who was determined to make a great career became more and more mature and steady. In the past few months, he and his 5,000 officers and men have been squeezed out by local forces, and if it were not for Mr. Sun's efforts to defy public opinion, Liu Bingxian and his 5,000 brothers would have been driven to northern Guangdong by the "revolutionary armed forces" such as the Cantonese army, the Yunnan army, and the Hunan army, which had gathered in and around Guangzhou.

As the time spent in Guangzhou became longer, the passionate Liu Bingxian became more and more aware of the position of his third brother Xiao Yimin, and in the past three months, Liu Bingxian was extremely disappointed by everything that the various units of the revolutionary army had shown.

Today, Chen Jiongming's family, which occupies Chaoshan, Huizhou, and half of Guangzhou, is dominant, and not only controls half of Guangdong's civil affairs, taxation administration, and army, but also faintly becomes the agent of the landlord class and the local wealthy merchant group.

The civil officials gathered around Mr. Sun Yat-sen were even more unbearable, opening their mouths to be the country and the nation, and closing their mouths were violent revolutions, either wandering around Hong Kong, Macao, Beijing, and Shanghai to launch revolutions, or they were keen to organize one large-scale speech after another, but in the end there was no clear strategy for the stage of the surname, let alone a set of effective concrete implementation plans, and even the political axe structure in Guangzhou could not be built, let alone the extravagant hope that they would go deep into the people to listen to their voices.

In this regard, Sun Yat-sen, as the leader of the revolution, had no choice, for the sake of the lofty revolutionary goals and the political situation of unity and progress, Sun Yat-sen had to tolerate all kinds of shortcomings of various forces within the party, and in order to ensure the imminent war to protect the law, Sun Yat-sen had to rely on the various military forces that had the guns in their hands.

It is precisely because of this that Liu Bingxian, who firmly followed Sun Yat-sen, could only bury all the pain deep in his heart and train his army more actively, he knew very well that as long as he firmly grasped this deterrent armed force in his hands, it was the greatest support for Mr. Sun Yat-sen, that is, the greatest contribution to the revolution, and he was convinced that all difficulties would be overcome, and although the road of revolution was bumpy, the future was incomparably bright.

At the end of the military exercise with the surname of debriefing and deterrence, the military and political dignitaries of the revolutionary party left one after another, and the tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians who were onlookers also dispersed, and the Liu Bingxian Guard Brigade, with the vigorous support of Mr. Sun, was finally able to sit firmly in the north school field, and finally declared its existence to the various forces entrenched in the revolutionary base camp in Guangzhou through the display of military appearance and military level.

The 5,000 officers and men began normal military training again, and the officers and men of the model battalion, who had just completed the exercise, continued to train the five newly recruited recruit companies.

Chiang Kai-shek, who had just been appointed chief of staff of the Eastern Route Army of the Revolutionary Army, did not leave with the military and political officials, but walked side by side with Liu Bingxian on the edge of the school grounds, looking at the thousands of sweaty officers and soldiers in the field and talking in a low voice, and the main content of the discussion was the upcoming war to protect the law, when Liu Bingxian's garrison brigade would follow Mr. Zhongshan on the Northern Expedition.

The two of them walked along the edge of the wide field, and while talking, before they knew it, the sun had turned west, and the officers of the various departments who had completed the training sounded the assembly whistle, but the two war horses were galloping at this time.

The officer on the horse came to the two men and raised their hands in salute, and then sent a notice to the two to immediately rush to the Generalissimo's Mansion of the Shimin Soil Factory.

Chiang Kai-shek and Liu Bingxian were very surprised, asked a few words about the visitor, and immediately ordered the adjutant to prepare the horses and follow the herald out of the camp together.

In the lobby of the Generalissimo's Palace, the atmosphere was heavy.

In the afternoon, more than 10 civil and military officials, including Chen Jiongming, Xu Chongzhi, Secretary General Yang Shukan, Minister of Communications Ma Junwu, and Hu Hanmin, who had just returned from Guangxi, gathered together.

After reading the telegram, Sun Yat-sen saw Chiang Kai-shek and Liu Bingxian hurrying in, motioned for the two to sit down, and then said:

"Ladies and gentlemen, according to the information we have received, it is estimated that the First Army of the Sichuan Army has completely occupied Yichang at this moment, and the sad thing is that the Western Hubei Protector Revolutionary Army was attacked by the Sichuan Army and the Beiyang Army Wang Zhanyuan Department in just three days after the revolution, 5,000 officers and soldiers! It was suppressed in this way, and now I don't know whether Zhan Dabei and the others who went to contact us on behalf of our headquarters are evil or lucky. ”

Xu Chongzhi stood up and asked anxiously: "Sir, didn't Zhang Fang's department go south to oppress Wang Zhanyuan's department, and echo each other with Yichang?" How's the situation with Zhang Fangbu? ”

"I don't know! I'm afraid there will be news tonight or tomorrow. Sun Yat-sen shook his head again and again.

Chen Jiongming shook his head regretfully: "It's still too hasty, too early, you should wait patiently for the opportunity, I can't help but say that this is a big mistake of our special team, three days ago, Yichang just sent out a telegram, and on the same day, Duan Qirui ordered a crusade, which gave the Sichuan army this opportunity, and there were only three days before and after!"

"You might as well think about it, if the Sichuan army hadn't been prepared, how could it have attacked Yichang so quickly? The first army of Wang Lingji of the Sichuan army must have been premeditated, and I boldly speculated that the Sichuan army must have coveted Yichang, the throat of the Yangtze River, for a long time, and it was bound to win, otherwise this result would not have happened.

"Please note that this is another military expansion of the Sichuan army after sending troops to occupy Hanzhong, and the next step of the Sichuan army is likely to be to intervene strongly in the national political situation, and we have to deal with it carefully!"

Everyone was taken aback, if the Sichuan army was really as Chen Jiongming analyzed, the whole situation would become extremely complicated, if the strong Sichuan army defected to Duan Qirui's faction, it would definitely be a huge blow to the Kuomintang, and the Northern Expedition protector, which was intensively preparing, was likely to be stillborn.

Chiang Kai-shek and Liu Bingxian, who had just sat down, suddenly broke out in a cold sweat, and the two looked at each other, both of them finding the look of shock in each other's eyes.

(To be continued)