Before coming to this era, Yan Guang always thought that although China was lagging behind in all aspects, it still had a certain financial advantage. After all, no matter how you look at it, China is much bigger than this.

Just like what Yan Guang once learned in textbooks, China in history is definitely stronger than the original one, and it is only because of the incompetence of the Qing political axe, coupled with all kinds of "gardens", and does not pay attention to the development of science and technology and armaments, so it will be bullied by the foreign powers.

However, when Yan Guang came to this era and began to pay attention to the long-cherished enemy of Yuben, he realized that not only in military power and industry, but also in terms of finance, he had surpassed China.

Of course, we all know that later it was definitely much stronger than China, but Yan Guang always thought that it was a war, or something after the end of World War I. At the outbreak of the European War, he took advantage of this shareholder trend to directly change from a debtor country to a debtor country, and it was also at that time that he surpassed China financially.

Until then, it had been very close to China at best.

Pity...

The reality is very cruel, and the gap between agricultural and industrial countries is also very large.

Of course, China still far exceeds the capital in terms of economic aggregate, but this is the same as the Panzhihua iron mine in Sichuan. It's not enough to just have it, you have to develop it. If you can't develop, what's the difference between that and nothing?

And now Yan Guang's task is to transform China from an agricultural country to an industrial country...

At the same time, China's existing tax system will be changed to increase the fiscal revenue of the government without increasing the burden on the people. After all, only if the political axe has the money can carry out some very expensive projects.

In fact, so far, these efforts have begun to bear fruit.

After the local government began to obediently transfer the fiscal and tax revenues to the central government, instead of withholding them privately, according to the Ministry of Finance's projections, this year's fiscal revenue will reach the level of 600 million to 700 million silver dollars. And with the disappearance of the gold and the rapid development of domestic commerce, by the end of the year, it is not impossible to exceed 700 million.

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Finances are important, but the most important thing at the moment is the war in Shandong.

On August 20, Lieutenant General Mitsutomi Kamio and Yoshiko Akiyama led the 18th and 17th Divisions to launch a fierce attack on Laiyang, in order to defeat the defenders at Laiyang and boost the morale of the defenders who had been somewhat reduced by the defeat at Longkou Bay.

However, when the army arrived in Laiyang, Cai Ye had been preparing for a long time in Laiyang...

On 21 August, after making preparations, a brigade under the 17th Division took the lead in launching a fierce attack on the defensive line deployed in the suburbs of Laiyang.

Although the Wehrmacht in Laiyang was equipped with a large number of light and heavy machine guns, the army still stormed the Laiyang defense line for a day, leaving behind more than 1,000 corpses, and did not stop the onslaught until it was backward.

Although in the normal confrontation, the Wehrmacht did not fall behind, and because of the large amount of heavy firepower, the Wehrmacht still had a certain advantage. However, the ferocity shown by the army during the offensive still left a deep impression on the officers and men of the Wehrmacht at the front.

At the same time, after the end of the first onslaught, looking at the attacking troops Kamio Mitsutomi and Akiyama Yoshiko, who had suffered heavy casualties, also had blood in their hearts.

This time, the expeditionary force of the army only had two divisions and one brigade, and the total number of troops was only more than 50,000. One of the brigades had to stay at Longkou in Huangxian County, so as not to be intercepted by others on the back road. So now, there are only more than 40,000 people who can use Kamio Mitsutomi and Akiyama Yoshiko.

And now, just in the first day, the expeditionary force has suffered nearly 4,000 casualties, and if this kind of fight continues, I am afraid that it will not be long before the expeditionary force will not have many people.

"Your Excellency, please rest assured, we have enough medicine here, and we will definitely be able to give the soldiers the best treatment..."

Inside the field hospital, the director of the field hospital nodded to Mitsutomi Kamio and Yoshiko Akiyama.

Hearing the dean's assurance, Mitsutomi Kamio and Akiyama Yoshiko also nodded.

"Then please..."

Saying that, the two of them walked out of the dean's office, but when they passed by the simple open-air ward, looking at the soldiers who were screaming bitterly in the ward, the faces of Mitsutomi Kamio and Akiyama Yoshiko were quite ugly.

"I didn't expect these people to be so difficult to deal with..."

After avoiding a few medical personnel carrying stretchers, he looked at the wounded man with blood on the stretcher, and said hatefully.

Listening to Mitsutomi Kamio's words, Akiyama Yoshiko also nodded.

"Yes, it's true that I underestimate these Chinese..."

The whole battle was indeed beyond the expectations of Kamio Mitsutomi and Akiyama Yoshiko—————— of course, the suppression of the artillery group was not beyond the expectations of the two. Because according to the information provided by the Black Dragon Society and the military headquarters of the Yue Army, they have learned that the Wehrmacht is stronger than the Yue Army in terms of heavy firepower.

What really surprised the two was the tenacity of the Wehrmacht.

In the early days of the war, the Wehrmacht's artillery fire was indeed fierce, but it was not yet to the extent that it completely suppressed the artillery fire.

Although the Wehrmacht's machine-gun array caused great casualties to the rushing Wehrmacht, under the cover of the Wehrmacht's artillery group, the Wehrmacht finally rushed to the Wehrmacht's position.

It's just that to the shock of Kamio Mitsutomi and Akiyama Yoko, the first line of defense in Laiyang was actually held by the Wehrmacht, and those who rushed up were also driven down...

"I thought that these people would be like the Qing War, as long as one charge can kill a piece of armor without leaving a piece of armor, I didn't expect them to be so tenacious..."

Although it was Akiyama Yoshiko's division that rushed up, Mitsutomi Kamio was well aware of the strength of the 17th Division, known as "Tsuki", the unit managed by his colleagues.

The troops who had already rushed up would actually be driven down, and they didn't even have time to go up to reinforce the reinforcements. This certainly could not be because the 17th Division was too weak, but because the Wehrmacht on the ground was too stubborn in its resistance.

And after listening to Kamio Mitsutomi's words, Akiyama Yoshiko also nodded.

Akiyama was too old-fashioned to despise his opponents like his colleagues, but even so he had considerable confidence in his troops. When the troops rushed to the position, of course, he did not naively think that he could take the position with a single charge, but the troops who rushed up were driven down so easily...

"Kamio-kun, I have a hunch that maybe this war won't be so easy..."

While speaking, Akiyama Yoshiko and Mitsutomi Kamio had already walked out of the field hospital.

Hearing Akiyama's words, Kamio Mitsutomi was also a little distressed, but he still smiled easily.

"Isn't that bad? Wouldn't it be too boring if the whole battle was too easy?! ”

Looking at the "simple" appearance of his colleagues, Akiyama shook his head with a wry smile.

"Maybe it's because of this that he can be better than himself in the military department..."

Thinking so, Akiyama said.

"I won't mention your statement for the time being, but now it's only the first day that more than 1,000 people have been lost, and there are more than 1,000 injuries that can't be used for the time being...... Kamio-kun, I think I should send a telegram back to Tokyo and ask Tokyo to send more reinforcements..."

"So..."

Kamio Mitsutomi frowned.

It should be said that at this time, the vast majority of the officers of the military department were looking at the Wehrmacht with the old eyes of the Qing Dynasty. In particular, after learning about the equipment and intelligence of the Wehrmacht, we looked at the Wehrmacht with a strict light that looked at the "reproduction" of the Qing Army.

Even with the Beiyang Army, which was originally rated well, the evaluation has also been lowered a lot.

Now, however, there is no mention of the "situation" reported by those subordinates who returned alive.

The light and heavy firepower of the Wehrmacht alone is obviously not something that can be easily dealt with.

In particular, the light and heavy machine guns equipped by the Wehrmacht, although the distance at that time was a little far, but through the telescope Akiyama Yoshigu can still see clearly. The machine guns that inflicted the greatest casualties on the whole attack were the spitting out of the evil fiery snakes.

The casualties inflicted by these machine guns on the Wehrmacht were even higher than the light and heavy artillery of the Wehrmacht.

"But it's really strange that such an industrially poor country would equip the army with so much heavy equipment..."

It's no wonder that Akiyama is strange, after all, it is also a country with weak national strength, and it also has to take care of both the navy and the army. Unlike Yan Guang, there was only the army at the beginning, so naturally he could only give priority to the army, and by the time the navy was such a big money-swallowing household, the more combat-effective units in the national defense force were almost equipped...

In this regard, the army did not have the same good luck as the Wehrmacht, especially after the end of the European war, the 17th and 18th divisions and other divisions were actually abolished, while the navy continued to grow...

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Mitsutomi Kamio and Yoshiko Akiyama naturally did not know the sad fate of the 17th and 18th Divisions a few years later. At this time, after listening to Akiyama Yoshiko's words, Kamio Mitsutomi nodded in the end, although he was somewhat depressed in his heart.

"You're right, if the future battles are like today, our two divisions alone and the 29th Brigade sent by the 3rd Division to help will definitely not be enough......... Well, I'll send you a telegram in a moment, asking for a few more divisions to come over..."

Listening to Kamio Mitsutomi's words, Akiyama nodded his head.

"That's fine, it's just—" Akiyama said with a little worry. The navy has just suffered a crushing defeat at Longkou Bay, and I don't know if they are willing to take on the task of escorting..."

"This is not something we can control, I just hope that the people in the country have already figured out a way to deal with the air attack of the Chinese people..."

Thinking like this, a few worries also rose in the bottom of Kamio Mitsutomi's heart.

After all, if a troop carrier sent by the country to carry an army division was sunk by the Chinese Air Force outside Longkou Bay as it did against an expeditionary fleet, it would be completely lively.

However, Kamio Mitsutomi and Akiyama Yoshiko obviously underestimated the wisdom of those people in the military headquarters, and in fact, after the tragic losses in Longkou Bay, the military headquarters was already thinking about how to deal with the air threat from China.

At this time, the remnants of the expeditionary fleet had also returned to the port of Arthur. After returning to Lushun, Lieutenant General Yuzaburo Kato proposed several precautions based on his own personal experience.

One of the most important is to equip all ships with anti-aircraft firepower.

Of course, considering that there is no such weapon as an "anti-aircraft gun" yet, the best anti-aircraft equipment is only the Hatch Chase heavy machine gun. Fortunately, the planes at this time were still quite rudimentary, and the range of torpedoes and other weapons in this era was also very short, so the air force had to be quite close to the target when attacking, so the Hatch Chase heavy machine gun equipped with the army was enough to deal with possible air threats.

After submitting several of his own precautions to the Ministry of Military Affairs, the Okuma cabinet quickly agreed to the measures proposed by Yuzaburo Kato. In addition, several army divisions stationed in Korea and Northeast China were asked to hand over all the Hatch Kaisi heavy machine guns equipped in the divisions to the expeditionary fleet.

Up to now, almost all of the capital ships in the expeditionary fleet are armed like hedgehogs.

Even if the Wehrmacht Air Force launches another air attack on the expeditionary fleet at this time, I am afraid it will not have much effect.

When Yuzaburo Kato's anti-aircraft firepower on the expeditionary fleet was strengthened, a joint telegram from Mitsutomi Kamio and Yoshiko Akiyama had also been sent back to Tokyo.

After receiving the joint telegram from the two, Okuma Shigenobu did not hesitate to be surprised by the casualties of the army, and after calling the telegram to Okaichi Nosuke, he had already decided to send three more divisions to support Kamio Mitsutomi—————— of course, strictly speaking, it can also be said to be two and a half divisions, because half of the divisions are the third division, and at this time on the Shandong Peninsula, the third division happened to have a twenty-ninth brigade under the jurisdiction of Kamio Mitsutomi...

At present, the army already has two divisions and one brigade in Shandong, and even if the more than 2,000 people who fell in Laiyang are subtracted, there are still 50,000 troops. After counting the two and a half divisions that were reinforced in the future, the strength of the army in Shandong will reach more than 100,000.

This is also said that Ben has already completed the initial mobilization of several divisions, otherwise...

However, although the troops are easy to mobilize, there is still a question that has to be raised, that is, who should lead the five divisions in Shandong. Although the more than 50,000 expeditionary forces in Shandong are now led by Mitsutomi Kamio, in fact, these more than 50,000 people are two divisions plus a brigade, and the brigade commander naturally plays wherever he wants, and the rest of the matter is solved by the two division commanders.

But now it is not good to arrange five divisions in Shandong at once, and it is not good to let Kamio Mitsutomi be in charge, after all, Kamio Mitsutomi is only a lieutenant general, and the division commanders of the remaining four divisions, each of which is a lieutenant general...

With one lieutenant general commanding four lieutenant generals, even if Okuma is willing to appoint them, those four lieutenant generals may not listen...

So now Okuma's biggest concern is not which troops to send to Shandong, but who should command them...

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"According to the information obtained by the Military Intelligence Agency in the Tokyo Branch, this time the army will send at least three divisions to reinforce the 17th and 18th divisions in Shandong, but now the Okuma cabinet is considering who should be the commander of this expeditionary force, and the most vocal commander at present is General Masaki Terauchi..."

"Masaki Terauchi?"

Yan Guang interrupted the words of the director of the military intelligence bureau and said with a slight doubt.

"What does this guy do?"

Yao Wenqing replied after thinking about it.

"This person served as Minister of War in the Kryataro Cabinet, and remained in the Seonji Cabinet and the Second Kettaro Cabinet, and was also the first Governor General of North Korea, with the current rank of Army General..."

In fact, if nothing else, in 1916, Terauchi Masashi will be promoted to the rank of marshal and serve as Prime Minister...

"So..."

Yan Guang nodded, then looked at Wang Yaowu and Jiang Baili, who had already returned to Yanjing...

"Three divisions, do you say that Songpa can resist in Shandong?"

Although the relationship between Wang Yaowu and Cai Ye is good, they have not been together for a long time, and they do not have a very deep understanding of Cai Ye, so they did not speak.

However, Jiang Baili and Cai Ye have a good relationship, and they once studied abroad together in Yueben, so they opened their mouths to analyze for Yan Guang.

"Today, in Shandong, our army has a total of eight infantry divisions and two artillery brigades. In terms of numbers, our army is not at a disadvantage, but our army must remain one or two infantry divisions in the Qingdao fortress, and in Weifang and Jinan, it must also remain in the strength of one infantry brigade to one infantry division. In addition to leaving the necessary garrison troops in Longkou Bay, the rest of the army can be ignored at all, so Songpo still suffers a relatively loss in terms of troops..."

Yan Guang nodded, he understood what Jiang Baili meant.

With the current strength of the National Defense Force in Shandong, no matter how powerful Cai Yi is, it is very difficult to win the battle, not to mention that the temple is not like a fish belly no matter how you look at it...

But...

Yan Guang was also very worried that if his losses in Shandong were too large, he would probably go crazy in the end, and at that time, I was afraid that the entire coast would be within the scope of his attack.

As for the guarantee that Zhu Erdian proposed at the beginning? At the beginning, the British regarded themselves as weakling, and those guarantees were all obstacles set up to prevent them from expanding their interests in China...

And now? No matter how you look at it, it is said that my own losses are relatively heavy, and at this time, it is really difficult to say whether the protection of the British is still useful.

"In this case, then transfer one division from the Yanjing Military Region and the Nanjing Military Region to Shandong, and at the same time transfer two divisions from Sichuan to Yanjing and Nanjing..."

In Sichuan, there are still nearly ten divisions of reserves, although these reserves cannot be compared with the main force of the original National Social Army, but if you look at the combat effectiveness alone, they are definitely stronger than those miscellaneous divisions in the local area. So at this time, Yan Guang's confidence in them is still relatively sufficient.

As for the local troops?

Let's continue to let them suppress the bandits and bandits...

For Yan Guang, as long as they don't disturb the people, it's already thankful.

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The news that the military headquarters had decided to send three divisions to reinforce the expeditionary force soon reached Cai Yi's hands. Along with this news to Cai Yi, there was also the news that Yan Guang had decided to send two infantry divisions for reinforcements...

At the same time that the news reached Cai Yi's hands, Cai Ye had already clashed with the opposite Kamio Mitsutomi and Akiyama Yoshiko several times.

Of course, this time is different from yesterday, yesterday was just a simple attack and defense, Cai Yi's purpose in doing this is to see how effective the army is.

Now that the combat effectiveness of the Yue army has been tested, Cai Ye naturally does not need to continue to defend it. After all, defense alone can't defeat him, the most important thing is offense...

Therefore, in the second day, the two sides have dealings.

And with equipment far stronger than that of the Japanese army, and the quality of individual soldiers, the Wehrmacht has a great advantage. In particular, on several occasions, the Wehrmacht even took two lines of defense against the Japanese army. It's just that in the end, they were all recaptured by the army without fear of death, and in the process of fighting, the army suffered great casualties, and the same was true of the Wehrmacht.

After all, when it comes to white-knuckle combat, unless everyone in the Wehrmacht is equipped with a piece of gold silk armor, it is impossible for all of them to be invulnerable.

As for the pistols ...

The rate of armament of pistols in the Wehrmacht is quite high, which is among the best in the world. However, in the Wehrmacht, only those main divisions of the former National Social Army will be equipped with pistols to the squad level, and the rest, such as the Beiyang Army, which is newly surrendered, are all only equipped to the platoon level...

Yan Guang is also helpless, after all, now that the Wehrmacht has a big business, no matter how rich Yan Guang is, it is impossible for every soldier to be equipped with a pistol.

You must know that even in later generations, the United States, which claims to be the richest, did not equip each of its soldiers with a pistol—————— because in later generations, the pistols equipped by ordinary soldiers were bought with their own money...

Therefore, when the day's bloody battle was over, the army suffered nearly 5,000 casualties, of which more than 2,000 were killed on the spot, and the Wehrmacht also lost more than 1,000 casualties. After all, no matter how good the equipment is, it is not invulnerable, at most, you can drag one before you die.

However, the heavy casualties are not without benefits, at least after fighting for two consecutive days, both of which were greater losses of the Yue army, the psychological fear of the tens of thousands of national defense troops in Laiyang for the Yue army has been eliminated a lot. And after two bloody battles, the soldiers of the National Defense Force also understood that in fact, although the opposite person himself has the title of a great power, he is also like them with two arms and one head, and he will not have three heads and six arms like Nezha in his mind...

Later, after Cai Yi commended several troops for their outstanding performance on the battlefield, the morale of the national defense force in Laiyang increased a lot.

On the contrary, the army on the opposite side did not advance an inch because of the heavy casualties in two consecutive days, and the tragedy in Longkou Bay was witnessed with his own eyes, so the morale was reduced a lot. But even so, after going to the battlefield, these soldiers still looked quite fierce. Not only to be ruthless to the enemy, but also to oneself...

Especially during the offensive and defensive battles, many soldiers of the Chinese army would pull grenades and die with the soldiers of the Wehrmacht when they were in a desperate situation...

That ruthlessness is really a little creepy.

(To be continued)