At this time, Lin Mailan, the commander of the Guards Division, also said: "It is necessary to reinforce Shanghai, but I don't agree to transfer the Guards Division to Shanghai, my Guards Division shoulders the important task of guarding the Beijing Division and encircling the royal family, how can it be easily transferred!" ”

Lin Mailan is not a soldier in the traditional sense, although he was also born in the battalion academy, and he is also the first batch of cadets, but he rarely served in the field army, he has been in the military headquarters before and after graduation, has served in the quartermaster department, ordnance department, staff department, before being transferred to the commander of the Guards Division, he was the director of the General Affairs Department of the General Command.

He had been in the army for several years, except in 1855, when he served as a regiment commander for three months because of the need to accumulate qualifications, he did not lead a soldier.

And such a fairly standard civilian officer can sit in the position of commander of the Guards Division, which is naturally related to his identity background.

Just look at his surname, his surname is Lin, and like Lin Anfei, he is also a member of the Yuyao Lin family, and in terms of generational relationship, he is closer to Lin Zhe than Lin Anfei.

Since Lin Zhe has no brothers-in-law, and there is only one cousin Lin Lan within three generations, when it comes to the Lin family, in fact, most of the Lin family members are still those who are separated by four or five generations.

Lin Mailan is one of them, when Lin Zhe engaged in the Yongying camp in Yuyao County, there were quite a lot of Lin family members who also followed him in the army, some were directly transferred from the Lin family firm to help, and some were half-baked people who studied and came to try to win a reputation. More members of the Lin family went to take refuge in him.

In this case, one person has ascended to heaven, and Lin Zhe has developed, so naturally there are many relatives of all kinds who come to the door. There are not only members of the Lin family, but also Lin Zhe's wife, who is Chen Jing's maiden family, and Lin Zhe's mother's mother's Fang family also came to defect to a lot.

For these people who came to him, Lin Zhe did not turn them all away, nor did he say that he would reward one if he came, if the person who came was an outstanding person, then he would not be stingy with his reuse. If the person who comes is just an ordinary person. Then just arrange an idle job for him, and what happens in the future depends on his own creation, if the person who comes is lazy. Then Lin Zhe will let him get out of here!

But Lin Mailan is the same as Lin Anfei, they are not clansmen who went to Lin Zhe later, they are old people who followed Lin Zhe to fight the world from the beginning, and their qualifications are well-known.

With an identity background. I also have enough qualifications. In addition, although Lin Mailan said that the ability to lead troops to fight is unknown, but he has been in the army for many years, he has never seen killing pigs, but he has always seen pigs run, and some basic things should always be able to mix in the army for so many years.

In addition, in the continuous large-scale expansion of the Chinese army, those veteran generals above the rank of major general are all valuable talents, and although the Guards Division seems to be very important on the surface, in fact, there is no chance to go to the battlefield on weekdays. It is impossible for Lin Zhe to take Du Yongtao. Xu Peng'an, Shi Qingxuan, these backbone generals were placed in the guard division and had nothing to do.

In addition, the most important thing for officers such as division commanders and regiment commanders of the Guards Division is not ability. It's loyalty!

Speaking of combat effectiveness, the current training army on the Manqin side and the Jianghuai that have been destroyed are even more combative, but the Qing court did not let these new troops serve as compliments to the royal family, but has always used the new army of the Eight Banners, which is not useful, and even the old armies such as the green battalion and the Mongolian cavalry dare not use it.

Although the Chinese Empire is not so extreme, it is somewhat similar overall.

Lin Mailan, as the commander of the Guards Division, his first consideration is not the gains and losses or wins or losses in Shanghai, but the safety of Lin Zhe and the royal family, if the Guards Division is transferred to Shanghai, who will be responsible for the safety of Lin Zhe and the royal family?

Lin Mailan raised objections, the navy also had opinions, and other generals also had opinions to a greater or lesser extent, in fact, everyone was not in agreement in the morning.

Now for the details, the opinions are even greater!

For a while, the huge conference room of the headquarters was like a vegetable market with constant quarrels!

However, there will always be an end to the controversy, for example, the navy is opposed to conducting a closed operation, and is unwilling to let the few warships of the navy sink themselves in Jiangyin.

In this regard, Shi Qingxuan, who has the most prestige and seniority among many senior generals, said unceremoniously: "Our army understands the concerns of the navy, but what we need to face is not the Qing army or the Taiping army, but the Anglo-French alliance, their fleet strength is far superior to our navy, even if your navy does its best to fight at the mouth of the Yangtze River, but are you sure to stop them outside the mouth of the Yangtze River?" ”

When Lin Dabiao heard this, his face was extremely complicated, and he wanted to say that he could, but reason told him that he couldn't say so, so he could only stubbornly say: "For Your Majesty, for the sake of the empire, our naval officers and men will regard death as home, and will never take half a step back!" ”

Shi Qingxuan snorted coldly: "What if you don't take half a step back, you can't stop the other fleet anyway, it's better to keep the battleship in Jiangyin, so that at least you can block the westward advance of the enemy's fleet!" ”

As he spoke, he softened his tone slightly and continued: "Once this battle breaks out, it will be the biggest threat to our army since it became an army, and the rise and fall of the empire is in this move, and our army is already ready to sacrifice a lot, is it that the navy is reluctant to even have a few warships?" ”

Lin Dabiao listened to it and wanted to open his mouth to refute something, but in the end he still didn't say it!

He also knew that in order to deal with this battle, the army was already prepared for a large number of casualties, otherwise it would not have urgently prepared more than 50,000 recruits, which were all prepared to make up for the casualties on the front line.

The army is like this, and their navy naturally can't avoid fighting for the sake of their own honor and the idea of preserving their strength, and in the end they can only sigh and say: "Even so, but just a few warships of our navy may not be able to completely block the Yangtze River waterway, although the Jiangyin channel is narrower than other waterways, but the river is still very wide, and now our navy only has three thousand-ton warships, and there are only a few other warships of hundreds of tons." Even if all of them sink in Jiangyin, they can't effectively cut off the Yangtze River channel in Jiangyin! ”

At this time, Qi Xuanhao, the chief of the quartermaster department, said: "If there are not enough ships in the closed operation. Our Quartermaster Department also has a few hired foreign merchant ships to transport supplies to Fujian and Guangdong, and if necessary, they can also join the navy's blockade operations, and there are also a large number of ships in the port of Shanghai, and we should spend a lot of money to buy and requisition the ships of Chinese merchants, and we should make up some in a short time. ”

Although the navy was reluctant, it also had to accept the overall situation. Lin Dabiao finally said that the navy could accept the blockade operation, but demanded that the blockade operation must be carried out at the last moment, that is, when the British and French forces hit Jiangyin. The defenders of Shanghai and the Jiangyin fortress can't stand it, and their navy will make a last-ditch fight to carry out a blockade operation!

However, the issue of the Guards Division's transfer to Shanghai to participate in the war was due to the resolute opposition of Lin Mailan, commander of the Guards Division, who even unceremoniously accused the Operations Department of the General Staff of having ill intentions in proposing to transfer the Guards Division to Shanghai to participate in the war.

It involves the personal safety of Lin Zhe, the emperor of the empire, and the royal family. And the Guards Division and the Royal Army are not the same system. Therefore, even Chen Yuntao and Shi Qingxuan are not reluctant, if they insist on deploying the Guards Division to Shanghai to participate in the war, it is estimated that Lin Mailan and others will be accused of plotting against each other.

The other arrangements are noisy, but they can always compromise with each other!

When the meeting lasted until about eight o'clock in the evening, the main matters were finally decided!

First of all, the most important thing is to urgently recruit troops in Zhejiang, Jiangsu, and southern Anhui, and 50,000 people must be recruited within a month, and after recruiting soldiers, they will be placed in Shanghai, Jiangyin, and Zhenjiang for recruit training, if the British and French troops come early. These recruits who have not completed their training will also have to be directly replenished into the front-line combat units, if the Anglo-French forces come late. If you come after three or four months or even half a year, then it will be much more relaxed.

Secondly, the Second Army ended the Anhui war ahead of schedule and was transferred back to Nanjing, where it would shoulder the strategic garrison task of Nanjing together with the Guards Division.

The war on the Anhui side will all be handed over to the Fourth Army, which means that the follow-up Fourth Army will only rely on the strength of a Royal Army infantry division and several auxiliary defense divisions to be responsible for the defense of the northern Jiangxi region east of the Jiujiang River, southern Anhui, and the northern Anhui region near Hubei.

Even when the situation was unclear, the Fourth Army was allowed to withdraw from the northern Jiangxi region, as long as it held both sides of the Yangtze River in Anqing.

The Third Army, which had already marched into Canton, urgently ordered them to speed up their entry into the Canton area, striving to capture Canton before the British and French troops landed, and then defend the city. In view of the fact that the sea communication between Guangdong and Jiangsu will be cut off at that time, and the land routes will be far away and supply will be difficult, the Third Army will be given a certain degree of strategic autonomy and will be allowed to choose whether to collect or retreat according to the development of the situation.

At the same time, in order to replenish the combat materials and personnel of the Third Army on the spot, and at the same time, in consideration of the fact that the field troops cannot recruit soldiers for training and pay salaries on their own, all departments of the High Command, especially the Quartermaster Department and the Military Training Department, will dispatch senior officers to Guangdong in advance to take charge of the replenishment and logistical supply of the Third Army on the spot.

In terms of the Fifth Army and the First Army in the north, the Fifth Infantry Division and the Fifth Cavalry Regiment of the Fifth Army will urgently go south to reinforce, and the original auxiliary division units of the Fifth Army will be assigned to the First Army.

The follow-up war in North China will be fully handed over to the First Army, and the return of the Fifth Army means that the winter offensive that Shen Chiyun had just formulated and planned was postponed indefinitely.

Because it will be difficult for the First Army to support the combat materials from the rear in southern Jiangsu in the future, everything can only rely on existing reserves and a small amount of supplies, and in this case, there is naturally no way to continue to launch large-scale fortifications.

Without the Fifth Army and without the support of war materials, the First Army's fighting in the North China direction would become extremely difficult, and the timetable for the advance to Henan was postponed, and the timetable for the arrival of Jinan was also postponed.

Among the existing troops in southern Jiangsu and Zhejiang, the Sixth Division and the Seventh Division in the Shanghai area will form a provisional Seventh Army, with the commander of the Seventh Division concurrently serving as the commander of the Seventh Army, and at the same time, the Seventh Army will also have the Fifth Auxiliary Defense Division and the Sixth Auxiliary Defense Division stationed in Songjiang Fucheng and Taicang Prefecture, and at the same time, the Navy's Wusong Fortress Force will have about 3,000 people, that is, the Navy's First Coastal Defense Regiment and the Navy's First Coastal Defense Artillery Regiment will also be temporarily incorporated into the Seventh Army's command.

The Sixth Army, which has not yet been formed and currently has only empty shelves, is stationed in Jiangyin, and Shi Qingxuan and other officers arrive in advance, and when the recruited recruits arrive, the Eighth Infantry Division and the Ninth Infantry Division will be formed on the spot and then trained, and whether they can catch up with the war depends on when the British and French forces come to Shanghai.

The Second Army and the Fifth Army, which were drawn back from the peripheral front, did not come back with the auxiliary division, but only returned with the Royal Army, and the specific arrangement also depends on the time of their return and the time of the Anglo-French attack.

If they are in time, they will go to Shanghai or Jiangyin to participate in the war, if they can't catch up, they will go to Zhenjiang, or stay in Nanjing, and how to arrange it depends on the actual situation.

If everything goes well, then in three months, the Chinese army will assemble more than five main divisions in Shanghai and Jiangyin, as well as two new infantry divisions and at least 30,000 replacement recruits, and a total strength of at least 80,000 or 90,000 troops!

The Chinese army will rely on them to meet the British and French forces after receiving reinforcements, which may be 10,000 people, or 20,000 or more!

While the Chinese army was preparing for war, Song Guanqian, the co-minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Shanghai, received a secret edict from Lin Zhe, asking him to delay for at least three months in any case.

If he can delay the Anglo-French alliance for more than three months, then Lin Zhe will personally confer on him a baronial title, if he can delay the Anglo-French alliance for more than half a year, then Lin Zhe will give him a viscount, if he can rely on diplomatic means to extinguish this war in advance without harming the interests of the empire, then the earl or even the marquis is not a problem!

After Song Guanqian got Lin Zhe's secret edict, he showed a look of embarrassment!

The knighthood is exciting, but it's really not easy to do! (To be continued......)