"I'm afraid that these training troops who have come over are not of much use, and they must be reorganized first!" Zhao Dongyun said: "When it comes to the reorganization of the old army, there is only Brother Xiufeng in our third mixed association, you can rest assured!" ”

Zhao Dongyun said with a kind face, but Chen Guangyuan's face on the other side was not very good, when he heard the news that the upper authorities were going to send a training army to let the Third Mixed Association reorganize, Chen Guangyuan had already expected that the reorganization of the old army would probably fall on his head in the end.

Because in the hearts of Yuan Shikai, Duan Qirui and others, Zhao Dongyun was the first person in the Beiyang New Army to reorganize the old army, but in fact, Zhao Dongyun did not personally carry out the specific reorganization work of the old army, whether it was Su Yi's pro-army or the Yuanzi battalion infantry team, their reorganization work was actually completed by Chen Guangyuan.

Although Chen Guangyuan is not a member of Zhao Dongyun's faction, he is still a subordinate of Zhao Dongyun, so his credit has become Zhao Dongyun's credit.

This made Chen Guangyuan quite depressed!

Now that there is an old army that needs to be reorganized, then according to the past practice, this matter is also carried out by Chen Guangyuan!

However, unlike the previous two times, the last time Zhao Dongyun asked Chen Guangyuan to reorganize the old army, there was a strong bias factor, which means that Zhao Dongyun wanted to trap Chen Guangyuan. However, now, the reason why Zhao Dongyun asked Chen Guangyuan to carry out the third reorganization of the old army is because Chen Guangyuan has excellent experience and ability in the reorganization of the old army, which is no longer to trap him, but to explain the normal task.

Chen Guangyuan is not a stupid person, and he also knows that Zhao Dongyun was rectifying him in the first two times, but Chen Guangyuan played well in the first two times when he reorganized the old army, not only failed to let Zhao Dongyun find the slightest mistake, but even had to publicly say that Chen Guangyuan's work in reorganizing the old army was fruitful, and he was also forced to bring Chen Guangyuan's name when he showed his merits.

In other words, in the matter of reorganizing the old army, it is impossible for Zhao Dongyun to continue to trap him, but will give him the opportunity to make meritorious contributions.

However, even so, Zhao Dongyun still chose him to undertake the reorganization of the third batch of old troops, which made Chen Guangyuan a little puzzled, could it be that Zhao Dongyun was no longer suppressing him, but giving him the opportunity to make meritorious contributions?

Speaking of which, Chen Guangyuan has not been happy since he arrived at the Third Mixed Association, in order to carry out the task assigned to him by Wang Yingkai, Feng Guozhang and others to contain Zhao Dongyun, he went to the Third Mixed Association and tried his best to fight with Zhao Dongyun in the ring, dismantle each other with Zhao Dongyun, win people's hearts, and so on. As the commander of the fifth standard, he not only has to face a lot of pressure from his direct boss Zhao Dongyun, but also has to face the pressure of many subordinates in the fifth standard.

Those days are unbearable to look back on!

However, this situation began to change after the Third Mixed Association left Baoding!

When he was in Baoding, many officers of the Third Mixed Association, whether it was Zhao Dongyun or Chen Guangyuan or Meng Enyuan, and even the following pipe bands and team officers, could not avoid the factional battles within Beiyang, Zhao Dongyun and Chen Guangyuan needless to say, the first one was Duan Qirui, the other was Wang Yingkai and Feng Guozhang and others, because of the factional relationship, they were-for-tat, and they fought in the ring almost everywhere.

Even Meng Enyuan, who is a neutral faction, can't avoid it, because Meng Enyuan is the cavalry commander of the Third Mixed Association, and his status is actually equivalent to Chen Guangyuan, such a person can naturally affect the factional balance within the Third Mixed Association, so Zhao Dongyun and Chen Guangyuan will inevitably win him over and pay attention to him. So whether Meng Enyuan wants it or not, he has already participated in the factional battles within the Third Mixed Association, but most of the time he will not take an obvious position, wandering between the two sides, and whoever gives him benefits will fall to whomever he wants.

Although the pipe bands and team officers below could not have direct contact with Duan Qirui, Wang Yingkai and others, they inevitably participated in the factional struggle in the overall environment within the Third Mixed Association.

Therefore, the Third Mixed Association before May was almost full of the smell of Beiyang faction disputes from top to bottom, and the smell of gunpowder was still very strong.

It is worth noting, however, that the main reason for the fierce factional struggle within the Third Mixed Association was the dispute over the ownership of the right town of the Beiyang Standing Army.

At the beginning, Duan Qirui and Wang Shizhen, Feng Guozhang, Liu Yongqing, Wu Changchun and others fought fiercely for the ownership of the right town of the Beiyang Standing Army.

Therefore, the original Third Association was completely an eye of the storm, and all factions wanted to reach inside, and countless eyes were staring at it.

In this way, since the establishment of the original Third Association, it has been in a fierce factional dispute!

Fortunately, there is also an extremely strong Yuan Shikai above, which can force many factional battles to ensure the speed of the Third Association's army building, and Zhao Dongyun and Chen Guangyuan and others below are competing for it, but the main energy is still on the formation and training of the new army, so as to ensure that the Third Association will become an army.

At the beginning, the reason why there were many factions in the Third Association was because the bigwigs at the top competed for the ownership of the right town, but this situation began to change in May.

After May, due to the tense situation in the northeast, the Beiyang New Army was forced to send troops into Liaodong to prevent the Russian army from moving south, and at the same time, because of the shortage of troops, the director could only send Zhao Dongyun's Third Association to go.

And after Zhao Dongyun's Third Association left Baoding, it also represented the departure of the political storm center in Beiyang, although it would still be affected by factional disputes, but it would definitely not be as strict as when it was in Baoding.

After leaving Baoding, the internal struggle of the Third Association began to subside, and when Yuan Shikai established the first and second towns of the Beiyang Standing Army, and renamed Zhao Dongyun's Third Association as the Third Mixed Association of the Beiyang Standing Army, the internal factional strife of the Third Association instantly subsided.

Why?

Because at this time, the Third Mixed Association is no longer the key to determining the ownership of the right town of the Beiyang Standing Army, and it will not affect the ownership of many important positions in the second town of the Beiyang Standing Army that has just been established.

In addition, the bigwigs in Baoding throughout mid-to-late June, whether it was Duan Qirui, Feng Guozhang, Wang Yingkai and others, their goal of contention was to change to the newly established Beiyang Standing Army Second Town, especially the position of the second town, the position of the two co-commanders.

In fact, who won and who lost in their competition had nothing to do with the many officers in the Third Mixed Association, on the contrary, at that time, the officers in the Third Mixed Association began to pay more attention to their future and destination in the Third Mixed Association.

Because the Third Association was reorganized into the Third Mixed Association, the Third Mixed Association became an independent force, just like the first town and the second town, although the third mixed association was small in scale and did not have many people, but in terms of nature, it was not much different from the first and second towns.

And looking at the current speed of Beiyang's army expansion, it seems that the days when the third mixed association will become the third town will not take a few days, once the third mixed association becomes the third town, what does that mean? That represents more senior positions.

According to the establishment of the Beiyang Standing Army today, a town has jurisdiction over 22 battalions of infantry teams, 2 battalions, 4 battalions, 1 standard and 4 battalions of cavalry, 1 battalion of artillery regiments, 1 battalion of baggage brigades, 1 battalion of engineering teams, and 1 battalion of machine gun teams.

At that time, the addition of many arms in the third town will produce one town commander, two co-commanders, six standard commanders, and twenty-two battalion management belts.

According to the tradition in the Beiyang Army, generally speaking, the commanders of the expanded units are selected from the original units, and it is rare for officers to be transferred from outside units to take up posts.

That is to say, when the time comes, there is a great chance that the operation and management belt will be changed to the standard and the standard will be promoted to the co-leader, and the co-leader will be the town commander. , the probability is not 100%, but there is still a 70% chance.

The town command system has nothing to do with those middle and lower-level officers, if nothing else, Zhao Dongyun, the third mixed co-commander, is promoted, but the remaining co-commanders and standard commanders can compete for positions, and in the process of competing for these positions, Zhao Dongyun will exert a decisive influence, he may not be able to decide 100% who can be the commander, but he can definitely decide who can't be the commander.

Many of the officers of the Third Mixed Association are not stupid, and such an obvious thing can naturally be seen, although the expansion of the Third Mixed Association into a town has not yet become a reality, but considering the rapid pace of the expansion of the Beiyang Army, it is estimated that it will be a matter of a year and a half at most, and then his fate will be decided in the hands of Zhao Dongyun.

In terms of their own future, what faction and what bigwig have been left behind by them!

No matter how influential Wang Yingkai, Duan Qirui and others are, they can only affect the appointment of middle and low-level officers in the newly established army, but they cannot affect the many appointments of the Third Mixed Association that has been in the army for a long time after it was expanded into a town, and only Zhao Dongyun has this influence.

In fact, Zhao Dongyun's actual influence in Beiyang at this time was already comparable to Duan Qirui, Wang Yingkai, Feng Guozhang and others.

Zhao Dongyun, who controls the Third Mixed Association, has become one of the de facto high-level leaders in Beiyang, but no one has realized it yet, in the eyes of everyone, Zhao Dongyun is just climbing faster, and the limelight is also very big, but he is still just Duan Qirui's subordinate, and Wang Zhanyuan under Wang Yingkai is the same level of people, at most he is the first person in the second echelon, and he is still far away from the first echelon.

Not to mention that other people will have this habitual misunderstanding, in fact, Zhao Dongyun himself does not clearly realize how influential he is.