Hearing that Meng Enyuan had already taken over Shanhaiguan from the fourth town, this made Zhao Dongyun, who was still on the westward train, feel a lot more relieved, although he knew that there could be no problems on Shanhaiguan's side, Duan Qirui was temporarily allied with himself, and Feng Guozhang and Wang Shizhen's troops were still far away in the Jingshi area, so it was impossible to threaten Shanhaiguan.

But Shanhaiguan and other strategic places are not in control of a day, he Zhao Dongyun can't sleep well for a day, if an army suddenly emerges to seize Shanhaiguan, then he Zhao Dongyun will not be able to enter the customs?

Now that Meng Enyuan has taken over Shanhaiguan from the Fourth Town, it means that he has cleared the last obstacle for his army to march into Beijing, and the rest is naturally to rush to the periphery outside the country to join Duan Qirui and Wang Yingkai, and then destroy Feng Guozhang and Wang Shizhen, the two Beiyang traitors, well, and send the Manchu Dynasty into the garbage heap of history.

"Send a telegram to General Meng, ask him to leave a garrison at Shanhaiguan, and then continue south to the Tangshan area, so that it is important to protect the Yuanji!" Zhao Dongyun has already had a plan for the next strategic move.

Although he could not have predicted the possible tactical details after the outbreak of the war, he was still able to grasp it slightly strategically, for his own Wang Duan and Zhao coalition army, because of the advantage of troops, there was no need to panic like Feng and Wang of the Beijing Division, and he could deploy steadily, gather the three armies and conquer the Beijing Division in one go.

This is also the reason why Wang Yingkai's first town and Duan Qirui's fourth town have been lingering in recent days, not because they dare not attack, but to wait for the opportunity for a joint attack, otherwise the three armies will be scattered and it will be easy to form a gradual refueling tactic, and then lead to be broken by each one.

Although Wang Duan and the two of them are not as famous as Zhao Dongyun for being 'proficient in Chinese and foreign military affairs' inside and outside Beiyang, they are old qualified modern military generals, and they still have the necessary strategic vision.

So even if he shouted loudly, he hadn't moved half a step in the past five or six days, just waiting for Zhao Dongyun's Fengjun to come.

Because the tripartite alliance of Wang Duan and Zhao agreed on a relatively conservative strategy, and did not say that there were plans such as imaginative and thousands of miles to attack the Beijing division and capture Cixi alive, Zhao Dongyun also put stability first, first guarded Shanhaiguan, and then sent troops to Tangshan, if nothing else, just to protect the Fuyuan machine Qì factory.

During the war, it is needless to say how important an arsenal that can mass-produce all kinds of ordnance is to oneself, and now Zhao Dongyun, Duan Qirui and Wang Yingkai, their opinions are similar, that is, let the Fuyuan Machine Qì Factory continue to produce a large number of ordnance.

Since the assassination of Yuan Shikai, under the pressure of all parties, the Fuyuan Machinery Factory has been forced to start working day and night regardless of the cost, and the output of rifles in a single day has exceeded 300, more than double the usual normal output, and in recent days, these guns and ammunition produced have naturally been unceremoniously purchased by Duan Qirui, and even Zhao Dongyun has not been able to share a single bullet.

As for the large amount of ordnance that the Fuyuan Machinery Factory had stockpiled before, it was urgently requisitioned by the Qing War Department in the days of No. 6 and No. 7, including eight 75-mm barreled mountain guns and more than 2,000 Type 88 rifles, as well as hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition and thousands of shells, which were originally ordered by various towns of the Beiyang Army and other provinces in China.

However, the war is imminent, and the court can't care who these guns are, if it weren't for the fact that the Fuyuan Machinery Factory was too involved, and the shareholders behind it almost represented the entire northern industrial and commercial class, I am afraid that the Qing court would not want to give money and pull it away directly, and finally under the pressure and intervention of all parties, it was forced to agree to buy it at the market price.

Although Zhao Dongyun's Fuyuan Company owns more than 30 percent of the shares of the factory, it still does not have an actual controlling stake, and this factory actually belongs to the entire northern interest class. As a super-large enterprise with a financing of more than 10 million taels of silver, it has integrated a large number of northern assets into it, and even in addition to the industrial and commercial class, even the Manchu nobles have people who own shares in it, well, for example, Yixuan has several percentage points of shares in it.

And the entanglement of interests of many parties is also to avoid the fate of being destroyed and forcibly expropriated in the recent turbulent situation! It's just that he lost the right to sell independently, and when the Qing court controlled Tangshan, he forcibly bought all the ordnance, and Duan Qirui also forcibly bought all the ordnance when he controlled Tangshan, but he didn't dare not give money!

Now he sent Meng Enyuan to lead his troops to Tangshan, mainly to remind Duan Qirui that this Fuyuan Machine Qì Factory is not your Duan someone's personal arsenal, but the entire Beiyang Arsenal, and it is impossible for you to monopolize the ordnance produced, otherwise don't blame me Zhao for turning his face.

After Meng Enyuan, who was far away in Shanhaiguan, received Zhao Dongyun's telegram, he immediately ordered Hua Zhenji to lead his troops to garrison Shanhaiguan and wait for Zhao Dongyun's main force to come, while he continued to lead four cavalry battalions south and went straight to Tangshan.

At the same time, in Tangshan, Duan Qirui also received a telegram from Zhao Dongyun, and Zhao Dongyun's telegram this time not only talked about the military, but also said that Fengtian was short of ammunition and medicine, and urgently needed to purchase a batch of bullets and shells from the Fuyuan Machinery Factory, and told Brother Zhiquan about the Fuchang factory.

Lei Zhenchun, who was standing next to Duan Qirui, also read the telegram, and then looked dissatisfied: "He Zhao Ziyang has a good appetite, he wants 500,000 rounds of bullets and 5,000 shells in one mouth, and we haven't gotten so much!" ”

Zhang Yongcheng on the side also said: "I think this is indeed excessive, even if they want to share the ammunition of the Runfu Factory, they can't take everything away with one mouth!" ”

"Hmph, I know that this Zhao Ziyang is not a kind person, he regards us as allies here, and he clearly treats us as his subordinates!" Lu Yongxiang on the side was also full of dissatisfaction.

Duan Qirui didn't speak, but glanced at the people in the room, and these were the main generals of the Fourth Town, that is, his Duan Qirui's team, Lei Zhenchun, the leader of the Seventh Association, Zhang Yongcheng, the leader of the Eighth Association, and Lu Yongxiang, the leader of the Fifteenth Standard.

Looking at them, Duan Qirui couldn't help but compare with Wang Yingkai and Zhao Dongyun, and compared with the two of them, Duan Qirui was much inferior in attracting talents.

Needless to say, Wang Yingkai used to be the first person in the first echelon of Beiyang, and Yuan Shikai regarded himself as the heir of Beiyang as soon as he died, and even Xu Shichang, Tang Shaoyi, Zhao Bingjun and other Yuan Shikai's staff members also chose to be loyal to him one after another, and more middle and senior generals in Beiyang also obeyed his orders.

It can be said that since Yuan Shikai's death, Wang Yingkai has accepted most of Yuan Shikai's political legacy, and if the Qing court does not engage in the trick of dividing and co-opting and suppressing, it is very likely that he, as Yuan Shikai's heir, will become the governor of Zhili and become the leader of the new generation of Beiyang.

Even if the Qing court suppressed Wang Yingkai by dividing and suppressing it, but his prestige within Beiyang is still the strongest, if it weren't for Zhang Huaizhi being co-opted by the Qing court and betraying Wang Yingkai, then Wang Yingkai could completely hold the two towns and his huge prestige and then complete the great cause of unifying Beiyang.

Such Wang Yingkai is a priority allegiance for many Beiyang people, especially the neutral Beiyang people.

As for Zhao Dongyun, don't look at his prestige and qualifications, but he is very prestigious among the younger generation in Beiyang, and the advanced training class of the Fengtian Military Academy sponsored by him, and the dozens of modern military books compiled by him and guided by the Third Town Supervision and Training Office are the must-see military theory books for every Beiyang officer.

The book "Trench Theory" written by Zhao Dongyun himself was highly praised by the Japanese and Russian armies during the Russo-Japanese War and was called the most contributing military work of our time.

It can even be said that during the Russo-Japanese War, the officers of Japan and Russia fought with Zhao Dongyun's 'trench theory' in their hands, and the war was not over yet, this book has been translated into many versions of English, Japanese, German, Russian, French, etc., and has even become a must-read book for military cadets in various countries.

This book is the second Chinese military work to be widely translated and adopted by other countries since the Art of War.

In the eyes of many foreign military officers, if there is a military strategist in contemporary China, it is definitely not Yuan Shikai or even Li Hongzhang, but Zhao Dongyun!

The Berlin Military Academy in Germany called Zhao Dongyun an outstanding achievement in the school's teaching!

Even when domestic students study military affairs in Japan and Germany, they will find that Zhao Dongyun's trench theory is in the content they study.

And after they return to China, their first choice is often to defect to Zhao Dongyun, even if they can't go to Fengtian for the time being, but they often regard themselves as the domestic Shaozhuang faction, and who is the leader of the Shaozhuang faction? Isn't that Zhao Dongyun!

Therefore, although Zhao Dongyun's prestige and qualifications are slightly shallow, it is difficult to attract those backbone generals in Beiyang, such as a large number of co-commanders and standard commanders, but it is very attractive to the younger generation, especially those young officers who have only graduated in recent years.

After the recent tense situation, many people even resigned from their original army and went to Jinzhou to join Zhao Dongyun's army.

Combining Wang Yingkai and Zhao Dongyun, it can be found that Wang Yingkai has a relatively large appeal to the middle and high-level personnel in the Beiyang system, while Zhao Dongyun has a relatively large appeal to the younger generation in the middle and lower classes.

And what about him Duan Qirui himself? It is much more embarrassing, it is a typical upper and lower level, and the attraction to middle and high-level talents is not as good as Wang Yingkai, and the attraction to middle- and lower-level talents is not as good as Zhao Dongyun.