The strategic plan for 1858 should be strictly speaking the strategic plan from the end of 1857 to 1858, and the time point is the demarcation point of the Chinese army's conquest of Suqian.

In the strategic plan, in the long run, it is to go to Guangdong, go north to Shandong, and enter Henan to approach Zhili, but in order to realize these strategic plans, then several preconditions must be solved first.

For example, Anqing, for example, to exterminate the remnants of the Qing army's recalcitrant resistance in the southern region of Fujian, and more importantly, to take down Taoyuan County and Huai'an City first!

In order to ensure the smooth implementation of the strategic plan for 1858, the departments of the General Headquarters once again increased their support for the First Army and the Fifth Army in northern Jiangsu.

The First and Fifth Armies, supported by new recruits and large quantities of war materiel, began a large-scale offensive against Huai'an and Taoyuan County in early November!

Among them, the First Army is responsible for Taoyuan County, and the Fifth Army is responsible for Huai'an City!

The First Army, which was responsible for attacking Taoyuan County, was huge, with two Royal Army divisions under its jurisdiction, and a large number of auxiliary defense forces that could be driven to use as cannon fodder, but in fact, the First Army's attack on Taoyuan County was not very smooth.

Why?

Because the Qing army in Taoyuan County is no longer the original 10,000 people, but has received more than 10,000 Qing troops from Muyang, including 1,000 Shandong training troops, and 8,000 people from Li Hongzhang's department reinforced from Huai'an.

After Li Hongzhang was stationed in Taoyuan County, he relied on his status as the governor of Jiangsu and the minister of military affairs in the north and south of the Yangtze River to forcibly incorporate the 1,000 Shandong training troops from Muyang and the 1,000 Henan training troops originally stationed in Taoyuan County, and then dismantled and supplemented the more than 2,000 training troops into his own Jianghuai New Army.

Then it was the integration of Muyang and the old army that originally garrisoned nearly 20,000 green battalions and eight banners in Taoyuan!

All of a sudden, it became a guest-oriented. From reinforcements to landlords, he also recruited more than 2,000 training troops that the Qing court had worked so hard to train!

Li Hongzhang was able to pull up a new Jianghuai army of more than 10,000 people. And after losing the direct military support of the Qing court's household department last year, it only relied on local self-financing to meet its own maintenance needs. On the contrary, there is still extra money to expand the army.

Although the Jianghuai New Army suffered a crushing defeat in Yangzhou, it was an organized strategic retreat when it finally broke through, and from a single point of view, Li Hongzhang's ability is worthy of recognition.

After Li Hongzhang took over the defense of Taoyuan County, he rectified the Qing army, and then mobilized the young and strong people in the city to build various fortifications, and waited for Shi Qingxuan to take the main force of the First Army from Suqian to the south and arrived outside Taoyuan City.

Li Hongzhang has already led 10,000 new troops, and more than 20,000 old troops are waiting for Taoyuan County, and a large number of breastworks have been dug outside the city wall. In the trenches, many horses and wooden stakes were erected on the chest walls, and some of the trenches were buried with sharp logs, which were covered with wooden planks.

On the first day of the siege, Shi Qingxuan was still captured, but he didn't expect that the 23rd Auxiliary Defense Division, which was the first batch of attackers, was careless and lost nearly 1,000 people.

Even Shi Qingxuan, who didn't care much about the losses of the Auxiliary Defense Army, couldn't help frowning when he saw this situation.

This 23rd Auxiliary Defense Division was trained by prisoners during the great victory in Suqian some time ago. At present, the number of the Chinese Army can be regarded as the latest assistant defense division.

The soldiers of the 23rd Auxiliary Defense Division were not many years ago in the Qing army, but now they were all shaved or inched, whether they wanted to or not, and then they were driven to fight for their lives with their former compatriots with swords and guns.

These soldiers must be reluctant in their hearts. There are also many deserters, and there are also those who do not obey discipline, and do not obey orders when they are in battle. There are also those who are afraid of the enemy.

For these captured soldiers who had just surrendered, the methods of the Chinese army had always been simple and crisp. Once the deserter is caught, he will be shot directly. If you deliberately disobey military orders and are unwilling to train, you will basically be beaten to death, and in serious cases, you will be shot.

As for those who do not obey orders in battle, they are afraid of the enemy, and there is no other way, they are basically shot on the spot!

When fighting, the rear of the Auxiliary Defense Force is usually the line infantry of the Royal Army, lined up in a neat formation, what are they used for?

It's used to war!

As long as the auxiliary defense forces in front retreat or collapse without orders, then they will pull the trigger in their hands in time!

As a result, in fact, the auxiliary defense forces often rush forward to fight hard, although there will be casualties, but this kind of casualties is definitely not comparable to the number of people who were shot by the Royal Army after retreating without authorization!

These captive soldiers of the 23rd Auxiliary Defense Division have only been in the Chinese Army for about a week, and their feelings about the Chinese Army are that the records are too strict, and then the food is very good!

Just like those soldiers of the Auxiliary Defense Army in the past, after they joined the Chinese Army, the first thing they did was to eat desperately, and these soldiers who had never eaten a full meal in their lives saw Bai Huahua's steamed buns and rice, all of which were eaten bowl after bowl, and there were even examples of captured soldiers who had just surrendered and were overeaten and strangled to death.

But they have not been on the battlefield under the command of the Chinese army, so they naturally don't know how much military discipline in the Chinese army is.

On that day, when the 23rd Auxiliary Defense Division was driven to attack, it was fine at first, but when it reached the distance of six or seven hundred meters to the head of the city, it showed some signs of collapse after being killed and wounded by the Qing artillery at the head of the city, and when the officers of the Royal Army tried their best to continue to drive these auxiliary defense soldiers forward, when they were about four hundred meters away from the city wall, they were hit intensively by the muskets of the Qing army from the chest wall outside the city.

Then, when the attack continued, they were again hit by some traps laid by the Qing army, and after five or six minutes, the more than 4,000 people just didn't know who started, and then they fled backwards in a swarm, no matter how much the officers on horseback shouted, they could not be stopped.

At this time, the Royal Army officers of the 23rd Auxiliary Division also gave up persuasion one by one, and began to leave their units, and then more than 20 officers jumped out of the chaotic deserters on horseback and quickly ran to the front of the Royal Army supervising the battle in the rear.

I saw a lieutenant colonel headed by him, that is, the division commander of the 23rd Auxiliary Defense Division, holding his command knife high, looking at the soldiers running in front of him, and commanding the command knife without hesitation: "Fire!" ”

As a battalion of Royal Infantry's hundreds of muskets fired, the captured soldiers of the 23rd Auxiliary Division who had escaped immediately fell a few hundred, and then the Royal Army soldiers continued to reload, firing a second volley after more than twenty seconds.

After the two volleys passed, the soldiers of the 23rd Auxiliary Defense Division who fled were all stunned, these were all veterans of the Qing army, and it was not that they had never seen other generals kill deserters in front of the formation.

But at most, people just kill a small part of the leader, and play a role of killing chickens and setting an example for monkeys.

But I have never seen my own defeated army as an enemy, as if they were all going to be annihilated on the spot!

Of the 4,500 men, no more than 200 were lost during the charge, but when they broke down and fled, more than 600 were killed on the spot by the Royal Army, which oversaw the battle.

Not only were the surviving soldiers of the 23rd Auxiliary Defense Division stunned, but even the soldiers of several other Auxiliary Divisions on the side were also stunned, and if they were sent to charge later, if the enemy retreated, it was estimated that they would also be slaughtered by these Royal Army soldiers!

The Chinese army has always had a zero-tolerance attitude towards retreating without a fight, being defeated in battle, and so on!

Watching the Chinese army outside the city raise their guns and artillery to massacre their own soldiers, Li Hongzhang at the head of the city was also stunned!

"I've heard of the strict military law against the army for a long time, but I've seen it today!" Li Hongzhang said as he sighed, he did not do much to kill the generals or kill the deserters before this battle.

But it has never been like the Chinese army outside the city, directly raising guns to fire a volley at the friendly troops who have retreated from the enemy.

If Li Hongzhang came, he asked himself if he had the courage!

Several other people standing in Li Hongzhang also echoed: "The military law of this rebel army is stricter than that of the pre-Qin period, I heard that there are 38 articles of military law in the rebel army, and all of them are killed!" ”

"Generals should treat soldiers like sons, and they can let the soldiers fight with their hearts, and this rebel army has power and no grace, such as the rebel army, even if it is as strong as a moment, but it is just a castle in the air, and it will fall in a blink of an eye!"

Li Hongzhang listened to the staff under his hand comment on the Chinese army outside the city to kill a large number of deserters, but he himself did not agree with the words of the staff.

The longer he spent training the Jianghuai New Army, the more he felt that military discipline was more important to combat effectiveness!

What is a modern army? What sustains the combat effectiveness of modern armies?

As far as the officer class is concerned, it is the awakening of the consciousness of the state and the nation, the professionalization of military command technology, that is, the professionalization of officers, who have graduated from specialized military academies and universities and joined the army for a long time.

These officers do not mention their abilities, but they already have the most basic sense of the state and the nation, which enables them to have more dedication to the country and the nation, and at the same time they are able to pass on this spirit to ordinary soldiers.

As for the soldier class, there is not much difference between ancient soldiers and modern soldiers, they are all composed of farmers and illiterates, and they do not understand what the state and nation are. Modern soldiers can initially have a sense of national consciousness by accepting the influence of officers, and another important point is record.

In the nineteenth century, any compliant modern army should be able to brave the enemy's artillery and rifle volleys and steadily advance the army.

And what does it depend on to do this?

It relies on strict military discipline!

In terms of form, in addition to the substandard quality of its officers, the Jianghuai New Army can barely be regarded as a modern army, and it is the new army that is closest to the Chinese Army in terms of training and equipment among the many new armies in China.

Naturally, such a Jianghuai New Army also attaches great importance to military discipline!

But even so, Li Hongzhang still can't imagine hitting his thousands of troops as targets and watching nearly a thousand people die and be wounded, is this still military law? (To be continued......)