After careful calculation, Li Hongzhang can be regarded as having fought with the Chinese army for half a year, but today is the first time to feel the strict military discipline of the Chinese army on the other side.

Although the mass shooting of deserters may sound inhumane or cruel, war itself is a brutal affair!

When the 21st and 22nd Auxiliary Divisions launched an attack, although they were killed and wounded by hundreds of people each, they did not retreat without permission as the previous 23rd Division, but insisted on retreating until the retreat order from the rear generals.

Why?

Because if you continue to attack, you may lose a lot of casualties, but if you retreat without permission, you will definitely die more than if you attack!

Besides, Shi Qingxuan and other senior generals are not all brave and resourceless people, although they use the soldiers of the auxiliary defense division as cannon fodder, but cannon fodder is also a resource, if they can't get back a certain result, Shi Qingxuan will not let the soldiers of the auxiliary defense division die in vain.

So when he really can't attack, Shi Qingxuan will still let the troops of the Auxiliary Defense Division retreat, so as not to make the soldiers of the Auxiliary Defense Army die worthless.

Li Hongzhang supported three armies in Taoyuan County, of which more than 10,000 were new troops, and they could not hold on, which made Shi Qingxuan's offensive progress very slow.

On the one hand, Shi Qingxuan was unwilling to fight hard with the soldiers of the Royal Army, and he couldn't fight by relying on the auxiliary defense army alone, so he could only imitate the previous Yangzhou and Lu'an battles and prepare for a long-term siege. Build fortifications on the outskirts of the city!

For example, build a raised fort outside the city and carry all the heavy artillery on it. Then they better fought the enemy forces inside the city, and dug breastwalls and trenches outside the city.

The breastwork was used as a starting position and to prevent a counteroffensive by the Qing army in the city. The trench is used as a secret passage, and if you walk through the trench, you can effectively avoid the long-distance fire of the Qing army, and allow the soldiers to approach the Qing army's breastwork under the city wall, and directly engage in hand-to-hand combat with the Qing army!

Naturally, the participants in hand-to-hand combat are the auxiliary defense forces, which are dominated by sword and shield soldiers!

Then it was to dig tunnels, ready to use the old method to break the city, that is, dig tunnels and bury a large number of explosives to blast the city walls!

Although such measures are relatively safe, Shi Qingxuan is also sure that he can take Taoyuan County with fewer casualties. But it takes a lot more time!

Compared with the steady and slow progress on the Taoyuan County side, the progress of the Fifth Army on the Huai'an side is much smoother!

Since Li Hongzhang took the Jianghuai New Army to Taoyuan County in the north, there are only 30,000 old troops of Zhang Guoliang in Huai'an City today, all of which are trained by some green battalions, eight banners and local township brave regiments, and their combat effectiveness is very worrying.

The only ones who can be used as the main force are the more than a thousand Jianghuai New Army left by Li Hongzhang!

In the past few days, in the face of the fierce attack of the Fifth Army, Zhang Guoliang defended Huai'an very hard, almost lost all the peripheral positions and strongholds outside the city, and even the head of the city was beaten up for a time!

Huai'an in early November has cooled down significantly. Zhang Guoliang put on his coat and looked at the Chinese army outside the city!

The tents of the Chinese army outside the city spread for several miles, and the tents to the foot of the city wall were covered with numerous trenches. And under the invisible underground, there must also be tunnels dug by the Chinese army.

Looking at the Chinese army outside the city, Zhang Guoliang was full of sadness!

As for whether Huai'an can be held. Zhang Guoliang does not have any confidence!

If it was only for him to contain the Fifth Army of the Chinese Army in Huai'an for three to five days, then it would not be a big problem. In fact, he had now blocked the Fifth Army for at least seven or eight days.

But these seven or eight days are already the limit, in the previous defensive operations. The old army under Zhang Guoliang suffered more than 4,000 casualties, and the two battalions of the Jianghuai New Army left by Li Hongzhang also suffered nearly 200 casualties.

What's more, the morale of the defenders in the city is extremely low, and now even ordinary soldiers already know that it is impossible for Huai'an to get reinforcements from the north.

With no reinforcements outside and no strong army inside, Zhang Guoliang couldn't think of any possibility that he could hold Huai'an!

The wind on the head of the city was a little strong, and the cool breeze blew in late autumn, which made Zhang Guoliang can't help but tighten his coat!

Perhaps, it's time for you to go!

At the same time, in the barracks tent of the Fifth Army outside the city, Shen Chiyun and the senior generals under his command sat together, they did not sit on the rectangular table during the usual combat meeting, but sat around casually, and Colonel Pei Jianjie, the chief of staff of the Fifth Division, who was the most junior among the people, was boiling water to make tea with charcoal fire.

Next to him was Major General Du Yongtao, commander of the Fifth Division, and sitting opposite him were Major General Song Xiangtang, chief of staff of the Fifth Army, and Shen Chiyun, commander of the Fifth Army and deputy commander of Jiangbei Military Affairs.

These four people here are the most important generals of the Fifth Army!

Song Xiangtang took a sip of the tea in the teacup in his hand and put it down, and then said: "Now the enemy army in the city is already at the end of the crossbow, in the first battle yesterday, although the 12th Auxiliary Defense Division boarded the city and was driven down, but at that time it was still not fully prepared, tomorrow we will work harder, we will definitely be able to take down the city!" ”

"If you attack the city tomorrow, you will have to change the 10th Auxiliary Defense Division, the 12th Auxiliary Defense Division has suffered a lot of losses in the past few years, and I am afraid it will be difficult to continue to be strong!" Major General Du Yongtao, the commander of the Fifth Division, also spoke:

"When the time comes, my fifth division will also press on and strive to cut down!"

Listening to everyone's words, Shen Chiyun showed a satisfied look on his face: "In this way, I will ask a few more people in the battle tomorrow, and after taking down this Huai'an City, I, Shen, will personally ask for credit to the Holy Lord for the monarchs!" ”

Although he said that he was asking for credit for others, Shen Chiyun was also very much looking forward to it in his heart, whether he could be promoted to lieutenant general at the end of the year depended on this battle.

At present, in the Chinese Army, there is only one lieutenant general in the army, Shi Qingxuan, and the other army commanders are still just major generals like those division commanders.

However, there has been a rumor from the Nanjing Command that at the end of the year, the Son of Heaven will make a big feud on the vassals, and at that time the meritorious civil and military officials will be knighted. And the knighthood. There will also be a number of promotions to lieutenant generals.

I heard that the Son of Heaven was going to promote several people to the rank of lieutenant general at the end of the year, except for Shi Qingxuan, which of the other military generals was not eager to wear it!

Those who are eligible to participate in the competition are the heads of the departments of the High Command. Among them, Shi Langyi of the Joint Staff is the most likely, and the other four army commanders are also possible. Even a few Royal Army division commanders and major generals who performed very well are promising, such as Xu Peng'an, the commander of the first division.

But it can be expected that this time the Son of Heaven will definitely not promote all those who are qualified to lieutenant generals, otherwise from the time of the establishment of several military-level command organs, Shen Chiyun and others would be uniformly promoted to lieutenant generals, but the Son of Heaven did not.

It was not until Shi Qingxuan made great achievements that Shi Qingxuan was promoted to lieutenant general, and the others were still in the rank of major general.

At present, the ranks of many officers of the Chinese Army are actually not regular compared to their positions. And it is generally a low-rank and high-level system.

In the Royal Army, the standard rank of deputy commander of an infantry company is second lieutenant, that is, those rookies who have just graduated from military school, and in special cases, they can also be held by junior lieutenants. The standard rank of infantry company commander is senior lieutenant, and a small number of junior captains will continue to serve as the commander of the infantry company when there is no suitable position to transfer.

The battalion commander of the infantry battalion is mainly a major, and there are also cases where a junior lieutenant colonel still serves as the battalion commander, and the deputy battalion commander is mainly a senior captain, and there are also senior lieutenants under special circumstances.

The commander of the infantry regiment is mainly a senior lieutenant colonel. In special cases, there are also junior colonels, and the deputy regimental commander is generally a newly promoted major.

The division commander is mainly a major general, and there is no lieutenant general or colonel division commander, and the division chief of staff is generally a colonel or lieutenant colonel.

The above positions and ranks are commensurate. Generally, there is only one baseline, but in practice there will be some errors, such as the captain serving as the battalion commander. There will also be cases where a second lieutenant serves as a company commander.

At the same time, it is worth mentioning that although the military's promotion system has a situation where the deputy company commander of the second lieutenant can be directly promoted to the rank of lieutenant and company commander. However, it is very rare that a lieutenant or captain company commander is directly promoted to a major battalion commander, and the same major battalion commander is rarely directly promoted to lieutenant colonel regiment commander.

In the past, the Chinese army was extremely short of officers, and it was rare for such large-scale appointments to occur by leaps and bounds. Generally speaking, after accumulating enough qualifications, the second lieutenant deputy company commander will be promoted to lieutenant, and a few outstanding ones will directly serve as the commander of the infantry company, but most of them will be transferred to the regiment and battalion as a staff officer.

After accumulating for a period of time, he was transferred to serve as the commander of an infantry company, and then slowly accumulated, and after being promoted to captain, he was generally transferred to the deputy battalion commander, or to the division level, the army level, or even returned to the headquarters to serve as a staff officer.

Then it is logical to be promoted to major, and at this time to go back to be the commander of the infantry battalion!

After accumulating combat merits, when it is time to be promoted, unless you are extremely outstanding or the battle situation is very urgent, you will not be directly promoted to the regiment commander, but will be transferred to the deputy regiment commander or to serve in the staff body.

Only then can you be transferred to an infantry regiment as a regimental commander.

And this is often the road to promotion for the excellent, and it is even more difficult for the mediocre to get promoted!

However, this situation has been broken in the last year, because the expansion of the Chinese army is too fast, and this expansion is not only the Royal Army, but also the auxiliary defense force and the local garrison force, which require a large number of officers.

So there are many exceptions, and many officers are on a winning streak of several ranks in a year!

For example, when the armies were first established, the five army commanders were still major generals, and the subordinate army chiefs only had the rank of lieutenant colonel or colonel, which means that the command structure at the division level was almost the same.

However, later on, the military successively promoted the ranks of various personnel of military-level institutions, for example, three of the current chiefs of staff of the five armies have the rank of major general, and the remaining two are the rank of colonel, and the section chiefs of various sections under the jurisdiction of the army, such as the section chief of the logistics section of the Fifth Army, whose military rank was originally captain, but now it has become a lieutenant colonel.

All the subordinate personnel have been promoted, but a few army commanders have not been promoted except for Shi Qingxuan, Xu Yanqing, Lin Anfei, Chen Yuntao, and Shen Chiyun are still major generals.

This situation naturally can't continue like this, Lin Zhe must definitely raise the rank of army commander to lieutenant general, otherwise it will not be good to command the troops, but who to mention first, and who not to mention is to be particular.

Lin Zhe didn't plan to say that he had to promote the existing four army commanders to lieutenant generals as army commanders, if any of the four army commanders below did not do well, Lin Zhe would not hesitate to remove them, and then select people from other outstanding major generals to serve as army commanders.

Although Shen Chiyun thinks that he can fight well in northern Jiangsu, compared with Shi Qingxuan's sweeping of northern Anhui and northern Jiangsu, his performance after leading the Fifth Army is very ordinary.

In this case, Shen Chiyun also has to worry that he will be marginalized, once this promotion fails to keep up in time, then he will be like Shi Langyi in the early years, quickly fall from the first echelon of the military, let alone compare with Shi Qingxuan, it is estimated that even Chen Yuntao, a junior, will not be able to compare.

He needs merit, he needs promotion!

With the desire for military merit, Shen Chiyun launched the largest general attack on Huai'an on November 6, not only investing two auxiliary defense divisions, but also sending the fifth division out to attack in total, and at the same time saving face, personally asking the first gunboat detachment of the navy to provide naval artillery fire support for the fifth army.

On the day of the attack, Shen Chiyun, who had not been in battle in person for a long time, rode a high-headed horse, brandished a saber and personally commanded the troops to attack!

The Qing army in the city also resisted desperately, and led a certain number of casualties to the Fifth Army on the way to the charge in the early and middle periods, especially the 10th Auxiliary Defense Division that rushed to the front suffered heavy losses, and finally had to send the 12th Auxiliary Defense Division, which was already seriously injured, to reinforce it, so that it was able to climb to the top of the city under the fire of the Qing army.

After the sword and shield soldiers of these two auxiliary defense divisions climbed to the top of the city, the Royal Army did not wait for them to stabilize the position of the city head as before, but climbed to the head of the city themselves, launched hand-to-hand combat with the bayonets in their hands, and stabilized and expanded the position of the city head together with the sword and shield soldiers of the auxiliary defense army.

In the case of the Chinese army, there may be a defeat or even collapse due to excessive losses on the way to the charge, but there is no precedent for the soldiers of the Royal Army to climb the enemy's walls.

Although Shen Chiyun's ability in all aspects is not the top one among the many senior generals of the Chinese army, he will not overturn the mistakes that others will not make, so when he sent the Fifth Division of the Royal Army to conduct a battle in the city, although the soldiers of the Fifth Division were once counterattacked by the Qing army and caused certain casualties, they firmly held and expanded the position at the head of the city.

And once they stabilize the position at the head of the city, then more Chinese soldiers will be able to rush to the head of the city in the future.

Shen Chiyun watched as the hundreds of soldiers of the Fifth Division in front advanced to the south city gate, and then it didn't take long for the tattered city gate that had been bombarded by artillery shells to turn into ruins and be directly blown up by the explosives bags carried by the attacking troops.

The soldiers of the 14th Infantry Regiment, who were waiting outside the city, immediately marched to the gate of the city, which was still full of gunsmoke, under the command of the officers, and still lined up in many rows to the beat of drums.

"Finally took it!" When Shen Chiyun watched his soldiers insert the army period into the city gate tower, he finally smiled nervously!

Under the smoke of gunpowder, his military flag was unfurled in the wind at the city gate tower, and Shen Chiyun seemed to see the rank of lieutenant general beckoning to him! (To be continued......)