In addition to ordinary soldiers and grass-roots officers, the personnel needed by an army naturally need middle-level officers and senior generals!

It is naturally impossible for officers above the middle level to be trained in a short period of time, but the gap is large, although there is a group of advanced trainees on top, but although the group of advanced students is famous, but the actual number is not much, the number of advanced students who have graduated and served is now only more than 200 people, and the next batch of advanced students will be supplemented next year, but the 08 students who will graduate next year are only about 60 people, and the total number will not exceed 300.

The reason why this group is special and famous, in addition to the fact that they claim to be Zhao Dongyun's students, the descendants of the lineage, is also related to the fact that they generally hold various important positions, and they randomly pull out a trainee, and at the most is also a major battalion commander, most of them are lieutenant colonels and colonels, and generally serve as regiment commanders, division and brigade chief of staff, army headquarters, section chiefs of various sections of the General Headquarters, operational staff officers, etc., such as Shi Yanglin, who is a major general in the combat department.

However, fame is famous, among so many officers in the Feng Army, in fact, trainees only account for a very small group, most of the officers are directly promoted from grass-roots officers of various backgrounds, although those non-trainees are generally inferior to trainees except for a very few, but there is no way, after all, the army needs so many regiment commanders, battalion commanders, you can't do without it, so it doesn't matter if it's good or bad.

As for the senior generals, there are actually only a few high-ranking generals in the Feng army, but there are only so many positions of senior generals in the Feng army now, and they barely rely on the team formed in the early years to get together the required brigade commanders and division commanders.

It's just that the qualifications of these people are generally sufficient, but their personal abilities are very different from each other, there are excellent people such as Gu Lanyu, and mediocre people such as Lin Yongquan, these few dozens of people cannot be unified.

In order to solve the shortage of officers required by the 14th and 15th Divisions, Zhao Dongyun is not only transferring the backbone officers of the existing troops, but also preparing to appoint a large number of military cadets who have just graduated.

For the time being, Zhao Dongyun is planning to put up the shelves, if the front-line battle situation is critical, even if there are no heavy weapons now, they will be transferred to be cannon fodder, if the front-line war is relaxed, then train for a few months, and wait for the weapons to be in place, once the training is a few months and then equipped with heavy weapons, then by next year there will be two main divisions.

In China in these years, the definition of the main division can be said to be very simple, one is that the number of soldiers is full, weapons, especially heavy weapons are in place, and then after three or five months of training, and then maintain sufficient logistics supply, then such a force is basically regarded as the main division.

Well, to put it mildly, in fact, this kind of army can already fight with the Fourth Division under Duan Qirui, the Third, Ninth and Tenth Divisions under Zhao Dongyun, if it goes through one or two more battles, well, provided that it is not defeated and collapsed like the Eleventh and Twelfth Divisions under Wang Yingkai, then this army can quickly grow into an elite main force in the hands of major warlords.

Therefore, Zhao Dongyun made two preparations for the two newly formed divisions, on the one hand, he used them as cannon fodder troops when the situation was economical, and on the other hand, if he had the opportunity, he still hoped that they could be organized into the main division.

Therefore, in this case, although it is impossible for all kinds of ordnance to be in place in a short period of time, all kinds of weapons must be allocated first, so that the troops can train first, which is the so-called equipment of people.

In addition to the 3rd, 9th, and 10th divisions, as well as the 4th Mixed Brigade, the 5th Mixed Brigade, and the 7th Mixed Brigade, which were formed before entering the customs, the other 1st Division, the 8th Division, the 11th Division, the 13th Division, the 1st Mixed Brigade, the 9th Mixed Brigade, and the 10th Mixed Brigade were all unable to fully complete the artillery regiments and battalions to which they belonged.

Most of these missing units include the 13th Division, which has two and a half artillery battalions and more than 30 artillery pieces, the 1st and 11th Divisions, which have only two battalions and 32 artillery pieces, and the 8th Division, which has only one battalion and 16 guns.

And many of the above-mentioned artillery pieces have been all the belongings accumulated by the Soviet Union from Fuchang and imports over the past years, and in addition, they are still on the scale of the artillery that they have only after collecting and capturing many artillery pieces of the Zhi, Lu, and Yu armies.

As for the increase in the number of artillery now, there are two ways, one is to rely on the production of Fuchang, but the output of Fuchang is actually limited, and the situation of the mountain cannon is better, and the 1905 model of the Fuchang 75 mm tube over the mountain cannon has been able to produce 15 guns per month in the case of day and night shifts. As for the field artillery, it is much less, and the Fuchang factory only began a small number of trial production of anti-German 75-mm field guns this year, although the process of expanding production has been accelerated during the war, but in fact the monthly output is only seven or eight, and the total number of artillery produced by the Fuchang factory per month is only more than 20 guns.

If you want to rely entirely on self-production, it is actually difficult to meet the huge artillery needs of the Feng army, especially field artillery, relying on the current output of Fuchang.

In addition, because the output of field artillery in Fuchang is too low, and the output of mountain artillery is more than half of that of mountain artillery, there are already more mountain artillery than field artillery in many units of the Feng army, especially those mixed brigades are all mountain artillery.

In addition to self-production, it can only rely on imports, and there are many import channels, although the Japanese side is unwilling to sell artillery to Zhao Dongyun, but there are still Germans, as well as French, British and even Russians, only have money, basically it is not difficult to buy artillery. But here's the problem, Zhao Dongyun has no money!

After a period of concentrated large-scale outsourcing from 1906 to mid-1907, the real money that could be used in the Ministry of Finance was basically spent, and foreigners did not recognize paper money.

In this case, if you want to import on a large scale, you can really only use the gold and silver reserves of the Bank of China, you must know that these gold and silver reserves are not fiscal revenue, they are all depositors' money, if you use it, it is not a question of trustworthiness or dishonesty, but a naked and direct robbery of the money of the people in the ruling area, if this kind of thing is really done, it is to dig a grave for yourself and jump down, and then fill in the soil for yourself.

As for some of the funds raised through the recent issuance of patriotic bonds, although some of them are also expected to be used for imports, this import is used to purchase various raw materials, and there are also many raw materials and parts that cannot be produced by Fuchang's self-produced weapons. In terms of raw materials, there are various high-performance alloy steels, such as seamless steel pipes used to make mortars, which have actually been dependent on imports, well, in the name of imported water pipes.

There are high-precision optical instruments on the parts: artillery mirrors used by artillery, not to mention the Fuchang The entire Far East, including China and Japan, could not produce their own products, and Japan had to import them from Germany before and after World War I, and China did not begin to try to imitate military optical instruments until the end of World War II.

There are also seemingly simple parts, such as springs and even high-strength screws, which cannot be manufactured according to the capacity of China's current industrial base.

Contemporary China, including the historical development of China's industrial development has a characteristic, that is, it has the ability to assemble finished products, and even the ability to imitate high-end weapons, but it lacks the research and development and production capacity of basic materials, you see that China in the late Qing Dynasty could build thousands of tons of warships on its own, large-caliber naval guns with a caliber of more than 12 inches, and other heavy machine guns and field guns can also be imitated, but they are extremely lacking in basic industrial capabilities.

For example, the Fuyuan Machinery Factory, which was able to imitate the MG01 heavy machine gun and the Krupp 1905 75mm hydraulic spring field gun, which were considered the most advanced in modern times, were unable to produce the high-performance springs required for the guns themselves.

Whether it is Fuchang or other domestic manufacturers, in fact, it is said that it has made some advanced mechanical products, but many of the raw materials and parts are imported.

Although this kind of import of key parts and components is much cheaper than the direct import of the whole artillery, it adds up to a lot, and foreign foreign companies don't care what your situation is, they have to deliver the goods with one hand and pay the money with the other, and they have to pay real money.

Therefore, the limited gold and silver under Zhao Dongyun's hands need to be retained for these key things, and even if there is a surplus, it will be used to purchase large-caliber cannons and howitzers that cannot be produced domestically, and cannot be wasted on field guns and mountain artillery.

In this case, if the newly formed 14th and 15th divisions want to have a complete artillery regiment, it is estimated that they will have to wait for the Fuchang to slowly produce equipment next year or dozens of artillery pieces will fall directly from the sky.

Despite facing many difficulties, but at Zhao Dongyun's insistence, the formation plan of the 14th and 15th divisions was quickly pushed forward.

And with the formation of these two divisions on the agenda, Zhao Dongyun also increased troops on the Xuzhou front line again, but this time it was not the regular troops that were reinforced, and now Zhao Dongyun can't squeeze out any regular army troops on hand, he can't leave a single army in the three eastern provinces and the Gyeonggi region!

So this time he transferred to the front line to reinforce the patrol force!

In early October, Zhao Dongyun transferred three patrol regiments from Fengjun and Zhili provinces that were in relatively good condition, namely the Fengtian Fifth Patrol Police Regiment, which was originally stationed in Shanhaiguan, the Fengtian Eighth Patrol Police Regiment, which was originally stationed in Jinzhou, and the Zhili Second Patrol Police Regiment, which was incorporated into the Zhili Provincial Army. These three patrol regiments are in relatively good condition among the dozens of patrol regiments in the Feng army.

Among them, the Fifth Patrol Police Regiment and the Eighth Patrol Police Regiment of Fengtian are the earliest patrol police regiments formed by the Feng Army, and these two patrol police regiments are stationed in important places, so the soldiers' Su zhì is not bad, they have also participated in the battle of entering the pass, although they are responsible for the rear cover logistics line, important garrisons and other tasks, but they have also fought with small units of the direct army, which is in the hands of other warlords, and it can be regarded as a provincial army unit that can fight.

The reason why they were transferred was not only that they were in a better situation, but also that they had rich experience in garrisoning in the rear and protecting logistics and transportation lines; after all, after they were transferred south, their main task was to protect the logistics and transportation lines in the rear, and it was not their task to fight a tough battle with the Anhui army.

After the three patrol regiments were replenished with personnel and guns, the three patrol regiments finally had the same number of infantry as the regular infantry regiments, of course, they were limited to infantry and rifles, and there were no other heavy machine guns, mortars, and light machine guns, that is, additional hand grenades were issued before departure.

Then the three patrol regiments took rented ships from Huludao and Tianjin, and then landed in Haizhou under the escort of several warships sent by the navy, and then they were to be stationed in various parts of northern Jiangsu to take up the task of garrisoning the rear, so that the main force of the front line could get rid of the secondary tasks such as logistics and transportation and rear patrols.

This reinforcement operation was also the first attempt of the Feng army to transport troops by sea on a large scale, but fortunately, there was no expected or unexpected incident, and the more than 6,000 patrol soldiers finally landed on the land of Haizhou safe and sound after a bumpy sea.

The soldiers of these patrol units are dressed differently from the regular field army units in the Feng Army, and although the color of their uniforms follows the standard blue-gray of the Feng Army, the style of the military uniforms is more inclined to the police.

This is not surprising, because these patrol forces have been in the name of police from the beginning, and their status has always been between the army and the police, and the patrol police force is also under the dual leadership of the police department and the high command, so the patrol police units under the Fengjun system are all wearing police uniforms at the beginning, and the initial uniforms are still black. In the first half of this year, the color of the military uniform was slowly changed to blue-gray, but the style of the uniform is still the style of the police uniform, but the color is different.

Not to mention military uniforms, even the military rank is different from the regular field army of the Feng Army, the patrol police force has a unique military rank system, called the patrol police rank, specifically in the general military rank of the army to add the patrol police prefix, such as patrol police first class, patrol police second-class soldier, patrol sergeant, patrol lieutenant, patrol lieutenant colonel, etc.

It's just that at present, there are no divisional and brigade-level military ranks in the patrol police force, and at the same time, there is no such organization as the patrol police headquarters, and the command and transfer on weekdays are under the jurisdiction of the command, so there is no patrol colonel or above in the patrol force for the time being, let alone a patrol major general, and at present, the patrol colonel is already the highest.

With the three patrol regiments taking up the tasks of garrisoning and covering logistics and transportation lines in the rear areas of northern Jiangsu, especially in the Haizhou area, the troops under the command of the 10th Division and the 1st Mixed Brigade, which had previously served these tasks, were able to once again devote themselves to the front line in a timely manner.

The reinforcement of the patrol force is not limited to the Haizhou area in northern Jiangsu, in Henan, northern Shandong, with the name of Zhao Dongyun, all localities are required to dispatch effective patrol troops to vigorously participate in logistics and transportation, key points stationed and other tasks, so as to free up more main forces to participate in the war in northern Jiangsu.

You must know that although these people were also in the northern Jiangsu region before, they were all other messy tasks before, and did not actually participate in various front-line battles, and now after these troops are withdrawn, although the total field strength of the Feng army on the northern Jiangsu front line has not changed, the number of combatants available for combat is more than 10,000 people.

After receiving reinforcements from these troops, the Feng army once again increased its offensive against Xuzhou!