At present, in addition to the Chinese Empire, Germany, and Norway, which are equipped with breech-loading rifles in batches, Britain, France, and Russia, their guns are still mainly front-loading Mini rifles, and only a very small number of rear-loading rifles are mixed.

However, at present, Lin Zhe did not know that since the Second Opium War in 1858, after the British and French forces using Mini rifles were defeated by the Chinese army equipped with rear-loading rifles, Britain and even France have begun to pay attention to and develop rear-loading rifles.

However, it takes a certain amount of time for a rifle to be designed and then put into mass service, especially in mature countries such as Britain and France, which cannot be the same as the current Chinese Empire, because Lin Zhe will fully replace the breech-loading rifle with his words.

However, although the new gun is not in service, the United Kingdom has taken the lead in modifying the existing Mini rifle to achieve rear reloading, as a transition before the newly designed rear-loading rifle enters service in series.

Of course, this is also to reduce military spending, after all, there are hundreds of thousands of Minnie rifles in service in the British military, and they are all new guns in service in recent years.

This mode of converting the front-loading Mini rifle into a rear-loading rifle was also the common mode of the armies of Western countries throughout the sixties, although the detailed way of modification was different, but the effect was indeed similar. 、

Even in the Chinese army, a batch of Mini rifles have been modified as rear-loading rifles in the past two years, but due to the limitations of technical capabilities, the effect of modification is quite poor, and the cost of modification is also high, on average, it takes ten yuan to modify an 1856 Mini rifle, which is difficult for the Chinese army to accept.

In addition, with the gradual increase in production of Linde Machinery Factory in the past two years, Jinling Arsenal has matured. The production of the 1858 Linde rifle has already made a great breakthrough, reaching the scale of 10,000 pieces per month, the production quantity is large, the cost is further shared, so the procurement cost is also further.

In addition, there is another thing that makes the military a little repulsed is that the modified 1856 Linde rear model is in caliber. The ammunition was even reloaded in a very different way from the existing 1858 Linde rifles, which necessitated the supply of rifle bullets of two calibers at the same time, 14.6 mm and 11 mm.

It can be said that the modified 1856 Linde rifle and the 1858 Linde rifle are two completely different products, and this gap is not about performance, but about the difference in supply and operation mode, which will greatly increase the burden on the army.

Therefore, the modification of the 1856 Linde rifle continued only in 1858, and only about 10,000 were refitted before and after, and then the modification was stopped at all. Instead, he chose to fully replace the 1858 Linde rifle, but it took too long to fully reload, fortunately, the Chinese army has no one to worry about, only in the northwest, Sichuan and Heilongjiang and other places There are wars breaking out, and there are not many participating troops in these places, and the pressure is not great if they are given priority to equip them with rear-loading rifles, as for other domestic troops, it will have to wait for two or three years.

The Chinese army has been equipped with breech-loading rifles since 1858, and it will take five or six years to fully replace them. Even if this is faster in other countries, it will take a few years. Not to mention that they still have to design, test, and produce time.

So if the breech-loading rifle becomes widespread around the world, it will be four or five years at the earliest.

Under the background of this kind of firearm upgrading, the Mini rifles that Zhonghua reloaded were originally intended to be equipped with the garrison troops first and directly sealed in the later stage, but now there is Lin Chengting's purchase demand. Lin Zhe treated Lin Chengting as a rag and directly sold him the retired 1856 Linde rifle.

In addition to the 5,000 Linde rifles of the 1856 model, eighteen front-loading smoothbore guns were sold to Lin Chengting, as well as matching shells, bullets, etc.

These guns and artillery are actually the active ordnance of the troops stationed in Yunnan. In addition, there are some Anglo-French mini rifles and artillery captured from the Zhenhu army.

In addition to the captured, the others are the active equipment of the 4th Division!

At present, the Fourth Division has entered a comprehensive rearmament, and began to be equipped with 1858 rear-loading rifles and front-loading rifled guns, and in addition to some of the retired firearms purchased for Lin Chengting, the other part was given to the local garrison in Yunnan.

In addition, the Fourth Army stationed in Yunnan is currently in a semi-disbanded load, the Second Division has been transferred back to the operational sequence of the Second Army, and the First Guards Mixed Brigade has also returned to defend southern Anhui.

Due to the heavy losses of the 17th Division, the remaining 4,000 people also returned to Wuzhou, Guangxi Province to rest and recuperate, and were assigned to the Third Army, which was responsible for the defense of Guangxi and Guangzhou.

The guns of the 1st Guards Mixed Brigade and the 2nd Division were accepted by the 4th Division, and the guns of the 2nd Division were accepted by the local garrison. As for the 1st Guards Mixed Brigade and the 2nd Division, they were ready to receive new ordnance after returning bare-handed.

This is also a microcosm of the current large-scale refitting of the Chinese army, many of the main forces are directly retired from the original Mini rifles, and then equipped with local garrisons, and they themselves are receiving new equipment such as rear-loading rifles.

As for some of the older flintlock pistols and arquebuses, they are basically destroyed and remelted.

The entire refitting process will last about three years, including field troops and local garrison units, will be newly equipped with at least 300,000 new rifles, and front-loading rifles will be completely eliminated in combat units!

And these obsolete about 100,000 Mini rifles can only be exported in addition to being mothballed.

If they can be priced at 15 yuan, these old guns can also be bought for more than 1 million yuan, which is also a large military subsidy for the military.

After selling these ordnance to Lin Chengting, Lin Zhe will not care about the Burmese side for the time being, anyway, there are deep mountains and old forests over there, as long as Lin Chengting is not stupid or the British are stupid, the war between them will not be won or lost in two or three years.

What Lin Zhe has to do these times is to sell some ordnance to Lin Chengting from time to time, and after solving his ordnance worries, it depends on the will of God as to what Lin Chengting can become.

In July 1860, Wang Lüyun, who had led the troops in Mongolia for more than a year, returned to Beijing to report on his work, but this time he was different from many generals who returned to Beijing from foreign expeditions.

Wang Luyun was unable to solve the problem of the rebellion of the princes in Mongolia for a long time, and the front foot had just suppressed and recovered a rebellious prince, but there were other princely rebellions on the back foot, resulting in the Chinese army coming and going on the huge Mongolian steppe, killing and wounding more than 2,000 Chinese army officers and soldiers, and spending countless military funds.

This time he returned to Beijing to report on his work, in fact, he was impeached by the Inspectorate and forced to return to Beijing, of course, it is not enough to rely on the impeachment of the Inspectorate, in fact, the military is also quite dissatisfied with Wang Luyun's inaction in the past year, many people are complaining that he occupies the pit and does not, and now with the capture of Yunnan by the Chinese army, Sichuan has also taken Chengdu, Shi Dakai can only lead the remnants of the army to continue to flee west, and it is no longer possible to turn over the storm.

Outside the Xing'an Mountains is always a small fight anyway, the only one that continues to carry out a large-scale war is only in the northwest and Mongolian directions, although Bian Chengxun on the Xinjiang side is relatively slow, but this is a problem of supply difficulties in the northwest region, but even so Bian Chengxun's Sixth Army has now entered the hinterland of Xinjiang, but unfortunately Agubai's cavalry troops are quite large, and there are many troops, so Bian Chengxun's Sixth Army can only advance steadily.

However, in the long run, the Sixth Army will not have the slightest problem in completely recovering Xinjiang.

Only this Mongolian region, this is not a foreign invasion, although Russia supports the Mongolian princes, but it does not say that it openly sent tens of thousands of troops into the Mongolian region, and the rebels and resists are the local Mongolian princes, and the combat effectiveness of these Mongolian princes is naturally not good, and they can win any fight.

However, even so, Wang Lüyun was unable to solve the Mongol war for a long time.

In this way, he was criticized within the military, and attracted the impeachment of the Inspectorate, saying that he was derelict in his duties and spent countless imperial military funds without making an inch.

Looking at Wang Luyun, whose face was much older than a few years ago, and his hair had begun to turn white, Lin Zhe also sighed in his heart, this Wang Luyun couldn't keep up with his pace after all, and he couldn't keep up with the pace of the times!

He can also know from the battle report that Wang Luyun still maintained his previous brave style when he led the army to fight, and even personally led the cavalry to charge into battle many times, and he was able to win every time he engaged the Mongol rebels.

At the beginning of the year, a cavalry regiment under his command pursued the enemy in depth until it reached the southern shore of Lake Baihail (Lake Belga), and in the end only half of the cavalry returned, and the losses were not caused by the enemy, but because the supply in the steppe was not smooth, they ate the horses after eating the food, and then it was difficult to return on foot, but still half of the cavalry was starved to death on the way!

The cavalry of the Chinese army did not die on the way to charge, but starved to death on the way home, and this battle directly detonated the serious dissatisfaction of other generals of the military with Wang Luyun, because it was Wang Luyun who issued the order to pursue the enemy army and completely annihilate the enemy, and the commander of the cavalry regiment who led the troops to attack was strictly ordered to wipe out the enemy even if he chased him to the ends of the earth.

The commander of the cavalry regiment faithfully carried out Wang Luyun's orders, and even once chased close to the territory of Russia!

After the cavalry regiment only had more than 300 hungry cavalry and bones left on foot, it was not long before Lin Zhe issued an edict to recall Wang Lüyun from Mongolia to Nanjing. (To be continued.) )