Although Chen Yuntao has highlighted the changes in the past two or three months, Lin Chengting, Zeng Guofan, and Shi Dakai, and said that this change will have a great negative impact on the empire's future westward expansion strategy.

But it did not attract the attention of most generals in the military, even Lin Zhe.

At the imperial strategic meeting, Chen Yuntao's strategy of entering Jiangxi ahead of schedule was dismissed.

The reason for this situation is not that Lin Zhe and most of the senior generals of the Chinese army underestimate the enemy, but because the current empire's Northern Expedition plan has reached the most critical moment, Shi Qingxuan's Sixth Army is already grinding its fists in Texas, once the supply of ammunition and other logistics materials is sufficient, and when the main force of the first division arrives, then Shi Qingxuan will lead the army to carry out the most critical plan of the Northern Expedition plan, that is, to conquer Beiping.

Shi Qingxuan had already made a promise to Lin Zhe in a suggestive tone on the secret fold sent back at the beginning of the month, and the secret fold said that the ministry was looking forward to the Spring Festival state banquet.

The implication is that he wants to come back to attend the Spring Festival state banquet, and if he wants to attend the Spring Festival state banquet, he must take Beiping before the Spring Festival, end the main Northern Expedition, and finally return with honors.

Not only Shi Qingxuan made a lot of preparations for this, but other departments of the military, such as the various departments of the General Headquarters, also focused on the Northern Expedition, and all kinds of combat materials were given priority to supply the Northern Expedition troops.

Even the navy has drawn up relevant plans, planning to send the navy's only small fleet north along the coast, preparing to provide naval artillery fire support for the army when the army attacks Tianjin, and at the same time, the navy wants to further increase the navy's weight in the high command. Reinforcing the importance of the Navy in His Majesty's mind, he offered to propose that the Navy organize a large-scale replenishment by sea. All kinds of supplies were transported for the Northern Expeditionary Force by sea.

The navy itself has to be emboldened, and at this time, the military's logistics department is also trapped in the lack of capacity of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal and strives for other modes of transportation. Because after the diversion of the Yellow River in 1855, the water depth of the Shandong section of the canal has dropped significantly, which has caused the Chinese army, which relies on the canal transportation, to encounter relatively big problems in logistics and supply transportation.

The Admiralty wanted to show itself, and the Logistics Department had realistic needs, so the two departments hit it off, with the Navy providing warship escorts and some naval transport ships, and the Logistics Department hired more than 20 transport ships of Chinese and foreign businessmen, starting the first large-scale long-distance sea supply and transportation mission in the history of the Chinese Army.

The Navy and the Logistics Department's implementation of maritime transportation tasks also directly illustrates that the Northern Expedition plan has now reached the most critical moment. The military of the Chinese Empire focused most of its energy on this, and the war in other directions could only continue to drag on.

However, although the Chinese army vetoed the plan to send troops to Jiangxi in advance, it does not mean that they did not react to the changes of Lin Chengting, Zeng Guofan, and Shi Dakai.

In addition to the inability to provide sufficient support in terms of war materials, the high command still made corresponding military arrangements, such as issuing orders to the Second Army in Guangdong, asking them to pay close attention to the Zhenhu Army in the direction of Jiangxi, and if the other side showed flaws, the Second Army could launch an attack on its own.

At the same time, he also issued an order to the 1st Mixed Brigade in Fujian to start transferring troops. An independent mixed regiment was formed to garrison the direction of Shaowu for standby, ready to enter Jiangxi at any time.

In the direction of southern Anhui and northern Jiangxi, Shi Langyi, the commander of the Fourth Army, was asked to pay close attention to the battle between the Taiping army and the Zhenhu army in the direction of Jiujiang, and allowed Shi Langyi to intervene in the war between the two sides when the time was right. If necessary, and with certainty, you can directly capture Jiujiang.

At the same time, in order to solve the problem of insufficient strength of the Chinese army in southern Anhui and northern Jiangxi. The General Headquarters has ordered the Fifth Division, which was originally stationed in Zhenjiang and Yangzhou, to break away from the Fifth Army and move west to reinforce the Fourth Army.

At the same time, the 6th and 7th Divisions of the Seventh Army stationed in Shanghai each transferred an infantry regiment, an artillery company, and a number of baggage troops. It was used for the formation of the 3rd Mixed Brigade, which was formed directly from the use of ready-made units. Therefore, there was no run-in problem, and on the day of its formation, it boarded a naval transport ship in Shanghai, preparing to directly reinforce the southern Anhui direction by river transport.

In addition, Lin Zhe specially ordered the First Guards Division and the Second Guards Division to transfer elite units to form a mixed unit with independent combat capability, and transfer it to Dangtu in southern Anhui under the temporary number of the mixed brigade of the Guards Division, and then reinforce the front line according to the development of the war situation.

The Fifth Army, which had been withdrawn, owed a division from which it was transferred, was moved into the newly formed 13th Division, so that the Chinese Army continued to maintain two divisions of garrison strength on the Zhenjiang, Yangzhou, and Jiangyin lines to control and defend Gyeonggi.

The two divisions of the Seventh Army stationed in Shanghai were each transferred one regiment, but there were no existing troops to replenish, so they could only be supplemented by two new regiments to restore the full strength of the above two divisions.

Originally, some generals of the Guards Division opposed the transfer of the Guards Division to the front line, because in their opinion, their task was to defend Lin Zhe, and leaving Lin Zhe to fight on the front line was not putting the cart before the horse?

But when Lin Zhe heard this, he said to Lin Mailan, the commander of the First Guards Division, with a black face: "Since the Guards Division was formed and trained last year, not a single shot has been fired, and not a single blood has been left, so can the Guards Division protect me and protect the safety of the royal family?" ”

Hearing this, Lin Mailan realized that his insistence on refusing to send the Guards Division to the front line in the past year or so was not recognized by Lin Zhe!

When Lin Zhe first organized and trained the Guards Division, his purpose was very clear, that is, to surround himself and the safety of his family, and make the Guards Division his most loyal and reliable troops.

And Lin Zhe did exactly that, in the past year or so, from the formation of the First Guards Division to the current formation of the Second Guards Division, the first priority is the issue of loyalty.

First of all, the soldiers, following the 1st and 10th Divisions, the 1st Guards Division also began to accept the soldiers of the so-called Longxing Land, that is, Shaoxing Mansion. In the second half of 1857, that is, after the fixed capital, the Chinese army has broken the previous model of fixed conscription places, and the recruits are often supplemented nearby, for example, the first division that is now fighting in the north, the original soldiers of the department are all soldiers of Shaoxing Mansion, but now they have all gone to Zhili to fight, and they can't always kill or wound one and go all the way from Shaoxing Mansion to supplement one is not.

At present, the strength of the First Division is mainly recruited from northern Jiangsu and northern Anhui, recruited by the Military Training Department, and directly supplemented after training.

And this is also the current replenishment mode of most units of the Chinese army, and the shortage of soldiers is mainly replenished nearby.

But this is not the case with the Guards Division, the First Guards Division at the beginning of the training, its soldiers were limited to Shaoxing Prefecture, but considering that the Chinese Army has been recruiting soldiers in Shaoxing for many years, and recruiting quite a lot of soldiers every year, since 1853, more than 20,000 people have joined the Chinese Army in eight counties in Shaoxing, this proportion can be said to be quite high, so the source of troops in Shaoxing Mansion is close to exhaustion.

Therefore, after the 1st Guards Division only recruited 3,000 people in Shaoxing, the remaining part of the soldiers were recruited from southern Zhejiang, why did they recruit from southern Zhejiang?

Because southern Zhejiang is a poor place in this year, there is no field to be had, there is no water to be water, in addition to the mountains or mountains, and the poor mountains and bad waters produce good soldiers, whether it is the Chinese army or the Qing army or the Hunan army, when everyone trains the new army to recruit soldiers, they all have a very unified preference, that is, they all like to recruit soldiers in remote and poor areas, Xiang Yong, Li Hongzhang's Huai Yong is actually a group of bitter haha.

When the Second Guards Division was training, the preferred source of soldiers was also Shaoxing Mansion, and due to the lack of recruited soldiers, the Guards Division also went to Yuyao County, his hometown, to make an announcement, calling on the children of the county to actively participate and defend His Majesty.

Therefore, for more than a year, although there are not many soldiers in Shaoxing Prefecture, there are still some school-age children who join the army, and generally only go to the Guards Division, and no longer serve in ordinary troops.

The other soldiers of the 2nd Guards Division, like the 1st Guards Division, were also recruited in southern Zhejiang.

In addition to the large-scale use of soldiers from Shaoxing Prefecture, the officers are often mostly relatives and friends, in the early years, many soldiers and officers from the Lin Mansion Nursing Yuan were transferred to serve in the Guards Division, and some officers who were related to the royal family were also transferred to the Guards Division.

Almost half of the officers of the two Guards Divisions were directly or indirectly related to the Imperial Family, and the rest were generally elite officers drawn from various units.

However, although Lin Zhe used various connections to control the personnel and maintain the generous treatment of the Guards Division in order to maintain the loyalty of the Guards Division, these means could only strengthen their loyalty, but they could not strengthen their combat effectiveness.

Just like the Eight Banners of the Manchu Dynasty, when it comes to loyalty to the Manchu Qing, they must be the most loyal, but their loyalty to the Manchu does not mean that they can fight!

Lin Zhe didn't want the Guards Division to evolve into an army like the Eight Banners, which should be stationed in Nanjing to protect himself, but he couldn't stay still all year round, if this army didn't move, what was the use of rust? Do you use it to see?

In order to allow the Guards Division to gain actual combat experience and enhance its combat effectiveness, Lin Zhe personally ordered the Guards Division to draw out part of its troops, and then form a temporary mixed force to participate in the battle.

Considering that the war of domestic unification would not be fought for a while and a half, Lin Zhe even thought of adopting a rotation system and sending each regiment and battalion in the two guards divisions one by one.

For Lin Zhe's personal decision, Lin Mailan and other officers of the Guards Division did not dare to oppose it even if they did not understand it, so in accordance with Lin Zhe's edict, they transferred troops from the First Guards Division and the Second Guards Division, and then formed a mixed brigade to prepare to be sent to fight in northern Jiangxi. (To be continued......)