From the Franco-Prussian War to World War II, there have been three major changes in the tactical theory of the army, namely, artillery and infantry coordinated operations, interspersed operations, and tanfoot coordinated operations, the first two belong to World War I, and the latter belong to World War II.

In the actual war, artillery is first responsible for countering the opponent's artillery force, covering the enemy's defense and line of attack, striking at the enemy's fortifications, and providing a channel for the breakthrough of the infantry through the depth attack, penetrating the enemy's defense.

In the First World War, it is not an exaggeration to call artillery the soul of the army.

Even after the end of the Russo-Japanese War, the army was unable to truly effectively and thoroughly study and implement the theories and tactics of the army's artillery system in the early stage of World War I, while the Northeast Army had already completed the transformation of its surname at this stage.

Artillery and infantry coordinated operations are the first tactical theoretical scaffolding of the Northeast Army, and all tactical training is developed around this theoretical requirement.

If the Franco-Prussian War was a period in which the German theory of artillery and infantry coordinated operations emerged and was put into practice, then World War I was a stage in the development of interspersed operations in the army.

In German and English, the original meaning of the word is "attack in the side direction", and the term of the French army is "shortcut attack", and the actual meaning is more appropriate to translate as "avoiding the real and avoiding the virtual".

The theoretical principle of this tactic is to avoid the enemy's key defensive areas, find gaps in the enemy's defensive areas, infiltrate them with small elite troops, and carry out breakthrough and counterattack operations, so as to tear through the enemy's defenses with more skillful and precise force.

The reason why interspersed operations continued to develop and take shape in the middle and late stages of World War I, and gradually became the dominant tactic of the army's infantry offensive gradually depended on the continuous progress of the army's weapons and equipment, especially the large-scale emergence and improvement of light and heavy machine guns, automatic rifles, mortars, howitzers, and grenades.

As tanks, armored vehicles, and helicopters gradually replace infantry as the protagonists of the army in the post-World War II era, the interspersed combat of infantry has also become an irreversible trend.

At the same time as the large-scale installation of light machine guns and artillery artillery, the Northeast Army's theoretical research and practical exploration in the field of interspersed operations have been in continuous progress; unlike the Chinese Army, which was stagnant in the later stage of the Russian War, the Northeast Army has not only undergone rapid changes in equipment, but has already formed a generational gap between its operational theory and that of the Chinese Army.

Song Biao and General Martos talked for a long time in the middle of the night, based on their understanding of the army and the Northeast Army, about the upcoming war, they were very optimistic predicted that once the battle plan was successful, the army would be annihilated by three to four divisions very quickly, and all the costs paid by the Northeast Army would also be very amazing, in addition to the sacrifice and casualties, the consumption of ammunition would exceed the entire war of liberation.

They did a lot of arithmetic problems in the conference room, extracted the possible combat locations, intercepted the most probable section as the artillery engagement point of the two sides, and calculated the number of shells needed according to the artillery density and coverage rate they needed and the amount of individual artillery battles.

Two pencils and twenty blank sheets of paper were the basis of their main planning for this war.

There are more or less differences in the conclusions given by the calculations again and again, but there is one thing that will never change, that is, the Northeast Army's operational thinking needs the support of a large industrial country, and even if it gives the army a heavy blow in this war, it may not be able to maintain the war superiority of the Northeast Army for a long time.

Even if it wins this time, the premise is that it is based on the huge military expenditure of the Northeast Army, which is a bit unbelievable, and it is those large number of hidden expenditures and additional expenditures that the army is completely unaware of, and it is these expenditures that allow the Northeast Army to have the total amount of equipment and ammunition to suddenly annihilate the main force of the Japanese army, as well as abundant manpower and material resources.

…… War is part of politics, and politics is part of war.

Throughout the pre-World War II period, the Cabinet had been fighting for power and gain in the military, and this struggle was by no means a struggle between justice and militarism, but between moderate militarism and radical militarism.

At a time when the situation was becoming more and more tense, the political axe of the Samoto Cabinet headed by Katsura Taro, who was born in Choshu, did not break the connection with the political axe of the Imperial Chinese Cabinet, and after the Northeast Army continued to withdraw from the three eastern provinces, the Prime Minister of the Cabinet at this time, Katsura Taro, began to prefer to solve the problem through negotiations, considering that the basic goal of interrupting the pace of China's unification had been achieved.

On the very eve when the Central Military Department made a comprehensive readjustment in accordance with the new operational plan, Minister Ijiin Hikichi of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in China happened to come to meet with Premier Tang Shaoyi with the new order of the political axe, and after the two men held talks in the morning, Tang Shaoyi went to Tayuan in the afternoon to meet with him and report to the emperor on the results of the talks between the two sides.

Although Song Biao has no intention of talking about peace talks, he still has to control this information in real time.

After signing a secrecy order and arranging for the War Department to formally prepare for the establishment of the Zhili Patrol Army, Song Biao let Tang Shaoyi enter the office for an audience.

After many years of political career, Tang Shaoyi worked in the Tianjin Taxation Yamen for four years, served as the consul general in Korea for ten years, presided over the work of the Tianjin Customs Road, served as the Minister of the Plenipotentiary Agreement of Tibet Province under the pressure of the British and skillfully safeguarded the sovereignty of Tibet Province through talks, and then went through five years of experience in the New Deal in the position of Minister of Reclamation of the Three Eastern Provinces and Governor of Fengtian Province, and now he is the best candidate for the first prime minister of the Empire, because he has studied abroad at Columbia University in the United States. Foreign political axes and diplomatic circles in China also have extremely high expectations for it.

Because Foreign Minister Ouyang Geng has been actively persuading countries in Europe and the United States to reduce their support for Yuben, as well as recognizing the new Chinese Empire as soon as possible, Tang Shaoyi has always been personally responsible for the diplomatic work of Jingshi.

Accompanied by Jiang Zuobin, a first-class chamberlain, Tang Shaoyi, who was wearing a dark blue suit, hurriedly walked into the office, bowed to Emperor Song Biao at a distance of one zhang from the front of the steps, and said, "Prime Minister Tang Shaoyi has come to see the emperor. ”

Compared with the Qing Dynasty, the etiquette of monarchs and ministers in the imperial era was obviously weakened, and for Tang Shaoyi, a pseudo-revolutionary who was still more inclined to the American-style republic in essence, this was obviously a great progress in Chinese society.

Song Biao is continuing to look at himself last night and Artur. General Martos wrote a military manual that mentally double-counted the details of military operations to avoid omissions.

He didn't raise his head to look at Tang Shaoyi, but continued to turn the page of the manual, and then looked at the data on artillery statistics at the back, and said, "You came just in time, let's sit down and talk first." ”

Hearing this order, Jiang Zuobin, as a first-class chamberlain, personally moved a chair for Tang Shaoyi, the prime minister of the cabinet.

Tang Shaoyi's chair is made of wenge in mahogany, with black gold-painted yak leather upholstery and backrest, carved cut-outs, and generous armrests. Among the chairs provided to ministers and foreign envoys in the Inner Court, the presence or absence of armrests is an important parameter for the level of representation, and cabinet ministers and foreign ministers have armrests, and the chair with the widest armrests is only available to the Prime Minister and visiting foreign prime ministers.

In terms of etiquette, only the Prime Minister can sit in front of the Imperial Court without strictly abiding by the Cabinet Law, at least without his feet close together and his hands without strictly resting on his chest, which means that he is actually the only minister who can truly enjoy the armrests.

These are the special privileges of the Reich Chancellor.

As the first prime minister of the imperial cabinet, Tang Shaoyi has always been cautious and never to enjoy all this, after thanking the emperor's Longen, he sat down strictly according to the specifications of other cabinet ministers, his feet together, his sitting posture stiff, and his hands were cautiously interlaced in front of his chest, not daring to have the slightest slack.

It was only at this time that Song Biao put the military manual in his hand back on the table, raised his eyes to look at Tang Shaoyi, took a sip of tea casually, and asked Tang Shaoyi: "I heard that Minister Yueben has been negotiating with you for a few hours this morning, what's the matter, did Yueben put forward some new requirements?" ”

Tang Shaoyi cautiously replied: "Returning to Your Majesty, the two countries have now revised the previous proposal and put forward four new requirements, as long as our country agrees to these four conditions, the four divisions deployed in the north of Korea can be withdrawn, and China and the two countries will be at peace forever in the future, and there will be no war." ”

Song Biao leaned on the back of his chair, closed his eyes and thought for a moment, and said, "Let's talk about it." ”

Tang Shaoyi said: "First, this requires China to recognize that China has sole suzerainty over North Korea, and China retains the political power, and this promises that major policy adjustments of North Korea will be notified in advance of China's ratification, and the "China-South Korea Trade Treaty" will continue to be effective, and the previously agreed 25-year Korean tariffs should also be reduced to 15 years, starting from the first year of the first year; Second, the border disputes between China and South Korea have made concessions to each other, and China only needs to recognize that Yanjijian Island, Changbai Mountain Tianchi, and Yalu River Estuary Island Group belong to South Korea, and the rest of the disputes can be dealt with in a compromise. Third, Japan should publicly commit to the international community that the civil war has ended, so as to prevent the international community from continuing to worry about the deterioration of the situation in Asia and jeopardizing the economic and trade interests of the two countries. Fourth, China must promise to recognize the permanent validity of all previous treaties between China and foreign countries, and between China and the People's Republic of China, and there shall be no repudiation or prosecution. ”

Song Biao couldn't help but sneer after hearing these words, and said: "I think it is very beautiful, they conclude that it is impossible for me to accept anything, and force us to fight with them." ”

Tang Shaoyi's forehead quietly oozed a layer of cold sweat, and said: "What Your Majesty said is very true, and the ministers also think the same, however, Mr. Yijiyuan, the minister of this minister, also admitted that this is a request put forward by the military department, and the political axe has not really taken this as the bottom line at present, as long as the two countries continue to negotiate, theoretically they can continue to negotiate a more suitable condition to ensure that the two sides can avoid war." ”

Song Biao asked, "What do you think about this?" ”

Tang Shaoyi said: "I think that it is impossible for Russia and the United States to accept the first clause in the first place, and the introduction of foreign interference on this basis will definitely be able to make the political axe and the military back down, but the present side is also well aware of this, and deliberately put forward the fourth clause, hoping to tie up with this clause and force other countries to comply, so as to fulfill the argument at the expense of China's interests." Therefore, it is extremely passive to really introduce foreign interference, but I don't know if Your Majesty now thinks that if China says that there is a full-scale war, our country will have the possibility of victory? ”

Song Biao didn't want to answer this kind of question, but asked, "What do you think?" ”

Tang Shaoyi couldn't help but be embarrassed.

His embarrassment is probably only understood by himself.

Outsiders think that he is a well-rooted imperial party, and he has the opportunity to become the prime minister of the cabinet only if he has the trust of the emperor, but in fact, he knows very well in his heart that he is not a real imperial party, even if he is in the Restoration Society, he is actually the same as Song Jiaoren, Huang Xing and others do not absolutely support the constitutional monarchy, but the situation is stronger than people, now only Song Biao alone has the strength to stabilize and unify the country, Song Biao wants to be the president is the president, if he wants to read, he wants to be the emperor.

The so-called "imperial party" is by no means the faction of the Restoration Society and the people who support Song Biao's claim to be emperor, but the real cronies around the emperor, such as these people from the Secretariat and the Northeast Army, as well as business celebrities such as Rong Xingqiao, Cai Yuanpei, Zhang Binglin, and Wang Zhaoming in the Restoration Society.

Yan Fu was in the Restoration Society, advocating the imperial system very hard, Tao Chengzhang was the leader of the Restoration Society, and he had indelible contributions to the expansion of the Liberation Society in various provinces, Zhang Jian and Liang Qichao were also celebrities who advocated constitutional monarchy, and these were by no means imperialist parties.

Tang Shaoyi is actually not, outside the imperial party, even if he is sitting in the position of prime minister, he doesn't know how Song Biao planned at this time.

At such a shocking moment of national crisis, as the prime minister of the cabinet, Tang Shaoyi has no right to choose between war and peace, and he doesn't even know the specific news.

He could only figure out the emperor's mind in such pain, although it was not difficult to figure out, he knew that the emperor would never accept any of the terms, but he didn't know what the emperor was going to do.

In the palace in front of the palace, Tang Shaoyi was so hesitant.

Tang Shaoyi knew very well in his heart that although he was not an imperial party, he knew the emperor's surname and various rules very well, and immediately held on to the fear in his heart, and pretended to answer strongly: "Your Majesty, if our country still has a chance to win, please also ask Your Majesty to command the three armies and the army to fight for life and death. ”

Song Biao was silent.

He took a sip of the black tea that had become cold, and suddenly said: "Qimen black tea is really good, five years ago, I drank this tea, once I talked about this with Yu Qiaqing, and suggested that he and the Far Eastern Commercial Bank jointly set up a commercial bank specializing in silk tea, and now, they have changed the name of this commercial bank to Jiangnan Commercial Bank, and continue to specialize in tea and raw silk." The merchant warehouse has been open for five years, and it has not been operating smoothly, with a lot of investment and thin profits, as the prime minister, you probably understand the reason for this, right? ”

Tang Shaoyi was slightly surprised, and didn't know why Song Biao suddenly said this, but he immediately replied: "The minister has heard about this, as far as the minister knows, the Jiangnan Commercial Bank has a deep foundation in operating silk tea, and the reason why there is a lot of investment and thin profits is precisely because the Jiangnan silk tea trade has been shrinking, and the reason why the silk tea trade has shrunk is because the technology is gradually backward, and the second is because the provinces are endlessly exposed to gold and miscellaneous taxes, which are too much, and the third is that the cost of river and land freight is high. Among these three reasons, the problem of gold and miscellaneous taxes is the most serious, after the uprising in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, the two taxes on silk tea have been exempted for three years, as the prime minister of the cabinet, even if the country is newly established, the work is heavy, knowing that His Majesty is most concerned about agriculture and silk tea, etc., and has personally convened a number of political axe meetings to arrange various tasks, hoping to gradually restore the prosperity of China's silk tea foreign trade within three years. ”

Song Biao bowed slightly, and agreed: "I haven't talked to you about these things, just because you have done a good job, the prime minister has done a good job, what else do I, the emperor, say?" It's just that let's go back and take a look, don't look at the development of the industry is very smooth, but the country's largest export is raw silk, the second is coal, and the third is tea, which should be regarded as one of the five major tea exporters in the world. In this way, if China's foreign trade in silk tea returns to the level of the early years of Guangxu, how much share do you think there will be left in the export foreign trade? Do you calculate the development speed of our textile industry and coal industry? He knew very well in his heart that if we tossed around like this, its economy would completely stagnate and collapse within four or five years. Therefore, from the very beginning, he was determined to go to war with us with all his might, and its goal was not only to interrupt the unification of the empire, but to hope that our country would enter into a division, or some other situation that would satisfy them, and ensure that our economy would stagnate and not pose a threat to it. ”

Tang Shaoyi bowed his head and said: "Your Majesty's words, the ministers and other ignorant people, only now suddenly woke up, now it seems that war is indispensable, and all the cabinet can do is to do everything possible to support the military department to win this war." ”

Song Biao said: "I know in my heart how to choose, don't worry too much about the cabinet political axe, if there is no reason to win, I will probably let you take the initiative to sue for peace, and the result is nothing more than a new cabinet political axe, so that the country will not collapse." You must also understand in your heart that if you accept the terms of this article, you, the prime minister, will be able to do it, and there is no possibility of turning over in this life. Therefore, it is by no means a bad thing to be tough, but in this month, we should try our best to make a posture of peace talks, not accept all of them, adhere to principles and actively negotiate, and do not hesitate to allow foreign interference, and we must give the military department a month. As for the rest, everything is dominated by covert support for the work of the War Department and the Admiralty. ”

Tang Shaoyi really understood at this time that the emperor had already decided to fight.

He pondered for a while, and sighed: "Your Majesty, the ministers are actually not worried about the affairs of the Central Army and the Northeast Army, only the navy is really far weaker than the war, I am afraid that as soon as the war starts, the whole army will be annihilated, at that time, the captain of the warship will drive straight into Tianjin, Shanghai and other places to threaten the port, the impact on our country will be too great, if we cut off our foreign trade, I am afraid that the national economy will be further plunged into a crisis, and it will be difficult to get rid of last year's rubber turmoil and civil war crisis." ”

Song Biao said: "The key to surrendering the army without fighting is not 'non', but 'yielding', how to offset the superiority of the navy and not give the navy room to play, this not only needs to be considered by the military department, but also requires diplomatic efforts." Spend a little more propaganda funds and find foreign forces to publicize the influence of the Navy on cutting off China's foreign trade on the world. As for whether it will be so desperate after the final start of the war, I don't think it's very likely, but the cabinet must prepare for the worst. ”

"Yes!"

Tang Shaoyi nodded heavily, not daring to be the slightest slack.

Song Biao then said: "There is nothing else to advise, you go and get busy, since I support you as the prime minister, I naturally know your ability, how to do such a question at this time, you must have the answer in your heart." Since we are a constitutional monarchy, as the prime minister, you should have your own will and political opinions, but if you do not do a good job, you must also have the courage and consciousness to bear the blame and be blamed by the people, and even bear the bitter insults. ”

"Yes!"

Tang Shaoyi paused again, then got up to say goodbye, and said, "Please rest assured, Your Majesty, the minister has already had such an awareness." ”

After saying this, he bowed again, slowly faced Song Biao and took dozens of steps back, and then turned sideways and walked into the right corridor accompanied by the inner chamberlain, leaving the inner court with the principle that he must not face the emperor in the future.

Song Biao sat silently in the "dragon chair", thinking about something in his heart.

He originally wanted to ask Tang Shaoyi about the latest situation in various countries, but then he felt that it was in vain to ask, if there is a change, there will definitely be a report from the cabinet, and there is no clear report, presumably it is still similar to before.

The international community's initial tough judgment on the attitude of the Chinese people toward China after the demise of the Qing Dynasty was that "the Chinese people hoped to seize the opportunity to seize complete and all control over Korea." It was not until the situation of preparing for war between China and China was extremely obvious that all countries knew that a major war between China and China was indeed possible, and at this stage, except for Britain and Russia, which must clearly stand on both sides of China, all other countries have maintained neutrality as much as possible.

Among the neutral countries, the United States and France are actually relatively biased towards the Chinese Empire, the United States is out of consideration for balancing the influence of its navy in the Pacific, and France is based on the principle of the Russian-French alliance, and on the whole it basically maintains neutrality.

Britain is not the main supplier of the army industry to the capital, and at present it is mainly helping to increase a number of huge loans, while Russia is a country that has no money, and at this stage it is selling a large amount of arms and materials to China, and secretly increasing the army in Siberia and the Far East in case of contingencies.

The newly established Chinese Empire does not have a substantial equal alliance, and now it is unfortunate to borrow debts from foreign countries to fight wars, and no matter how you negotiate, you will suffer serious losses, but fortunately, the capital in Song Biao's hands is very sufficient. Vanderbilt also actively worked for him in the international financial market, settling a number of loans, and the newly appointed Foreign Minister Ouyang Geng also temporarily persuaded countries to suspend the repayment of Xin Chou through diplomatic negotiations to ensure that the cabinet political axe survived the current financial crisis.

(To be continued)