Although the Seven-Day War in Smithland was over, because the snow on the roads was still thick and the rivers were still frozen, Li Yongji could only continue to stay in Smithland unless he didn't want those equipment.

In view of the fact that the previous battle was too dangerous, there were still many American prisoners on hand, and there was a large James River regiment in the nearby city of Evansville that could threaten him, Li Yongji strengthened his vigilance, purchased military supplies on a large scale and built barracks on a large scale, and at the same time, he also began to rectify military discipline in the whole army.

In the previous battle, Li Yongji's ground artillery unit suffered heavy losses, because they had been captured by the US sneak attack force, and the US army had used these captured artillery and personnel to inflict great damage on the expeditionary force. Later, in order to prevent the U.S. military from using these artillery to cause further damage to the expeditionary force, Mo Haiwen took the opportunity to destroy these artillery pieces with naval guns.

Li Yongji was also quite in favor of Mo Haiwen's behavior, the situation at that time was not the time to feel sorry for the artillery, if it was delayed any longer, maybe the whole line would collapse.

In addition, before and after the loss of artillery, comparing the charge effect of the US army, this shows that in the course of the war, the deterrent effect of artillery is stronger than that of rapid-fire light weapons such as machine guns and submachine guns, and they are indispensable things in both offensive and defensive warfare.

Therefore, after this time, Li Yongji began to pay attention to artillery, urging Zhang Xinda to quickly get a batch of new artillery, preferably large-caliber artillery.

It's a pity that because he was too anxious, Zhang Xinda didn't have large-caliber artillery on hand, so he couldn't provide it to Li Yongji, but he also had a way, and quickly found his peers to exchange a batch of Type 63 107mm light towed rocket launchers, which were all to be sold to a certain African warlord, and the total number was not too much. There were only 48 guns, equipped with 5,760 rocket shells.

In addition, there is a batch of Type 69 rocket launchers, with a total of 200 pieces and 1,000 rockets.

In addition, Zhang Xinda also provided Li Yongji with a batch of barbed wire, grenades, mines and other things in a timely manner, especially landmines, Zhang Xinda has a friend. There happened to be a batch of American-made M18A1 broadsword mines, a large number, a full 3,000 pieces, all of which were given to Li Yongji.

Zhang Xinda also said that if it is used well, he will contact China and prepare to import a batch of Type 66 directional mines, which are much cheaper than broadsword mines, but the effect is not bad at all.

As for Li Yongji's preferred mortars, as well as large-caliber artillery. It will take time, and it will not be possible in a while.

In any case, after Zhang Xinda's many efforts, he finally got another batch of artillery for Li Yongji's expeditionary force. Although there are only rocket launchers and bazookas at the moment, the effect is still very good when combined with naval artillery.

At the same time as purchasing weapons, Li Yongji began a large-scale purge of military discipline. Among them, a number of dereliction of duty were publicly executed in order to deter the whole army and set an example.

In fact. This method of public execution was really effective, and it was more effective than any kind of political agitation, and Li Yongji did not need to say anything more after that, and the mental outlook of the troops immediately took on a new look, and the efficiency of execution was greatly improved.

This also made Li Yongji understand that for the Chinese people at that time, you gave them too many benefits and explained too many big truths, but in fact, the effect was very limited, and even if you came up with all kinds of supervision measures, such as the Military Judge Advocate General's Department and the Gendarmerie, but before there was no substantive severe punishment and strict law, the effect was still limited, and they seemed to have an instinct that could automatically and spontaneously erode any department and drag everyone into the water.

Just like this incident, that is, the reason why Li Fei's army defending the port dared to hide and sleep during the war was that this battalion was corroded from top to bottom, including not only the ordinary soldiers, but even the supervising gendarmerie was also corrupted and degenerate, so they turned a blind eye to these things and did not report them at all.

To put it bluntly, this group of people at this time belongs to the punishment type, if you don't give them some color, they will not be serious and obedient, and good treatment will accelerate this corruption and depravity.

In the final analysis, the level of these officers and soldiers is too low, and most of them have no ambitions, so once the guards are loosened, they will immediately spontaneously be lazy and slippery.

After understanding this reason, Li Yongji, in addition to publicly executing a large number of people involved and warning everyone with bloody heads, also reformed the existing discipline inspection organs and implemented the discipline inspection staff officer.

In the past, when Li Yongji trained this dream army, many things were copied from the Praetorian Guard, including discipline issues.

In the Praetorian Guard, there are two departments responsible for military discipline in the army, one is the Judge Advocate General's Office, and the other is the gendarmerie.

Among them, the Judge Advocate Corps is similar to a court, which only hears cases and does not care about arresting people, while the gendarmerie only arrests people, but has no right to try cases and convict you.

Due to the special nature of the army and the fact that it was relatively hasty before, there was no jury in the military court, only the so-called observation group, and this observation group was composed of senior military staff officers, which in essence replaced the jury.

The reason for this is that the staff officers are relatively more educated, so it is better to let them go out to jury.

But now it seems that there are many disadvantages of doing this, the most critical point is that the efficiency is too low, especially after the gendarmerie has caught people, they have to send them to the military justice department to try the case, which is quite time-consuming, and it is okay in the people, if the army drags on like this, many things will not be clear.

It is precisely because of this system of separating the military police from the military police that many members of the military police are not happy to arrest people, because if they are caught and do not say anything, they may not be able to convict you, and it is easy to offend people, and it is thankless.

So over time, the young gendarmerie were quickly corrupted, and when they discovered the lawlessness in the army, they usually collected some money, said a few words of attention, and then turned a blind eye.

As for the Judge Advocate General's Office, they are also happy to do this, because if the gendarmerie does not send people over, they can be more leisurely, and they don't have to be busy, anyway, when the Military Judge Advocate General's Department is trying the case, there are too many people staring, and they can't receive any benefits at all, so they just have to be idle.

Or don't say it. Rules are dead, people are alive, in the current situation, no matter how advanced the system is Li Yongji, if you don't play a little ruthless, the people below will soon be able to make your excellent system full of holes, and it will not be smooth at all.

This time, Li Yongji not only used a large number of people to fiercely intimidate the people below, but also decided to merge the two departments of the Judge Advocate General and the Gendarmerie and put them under the command of the General Staff.

Other words. Both the Judge Advocate General and the Gendarmerie are subordinate departments of the General Staff, and the General Staff is responsible for all issues of military discipline and political agitation. The gendarmerie became an independent discipline inspection force, under the direct responsibility of the General Staff and under the direct control of the staff officers at all levels.

In addition, in order to better control the troops, the policy of establishing staff officers at the company level was implemented, that is, in the company-level troops. A staff section must be established, with a company staff officer, plus a group of direct gendarmes.

In peacetime, the company staff officer is not only responsible for helping the company commander to counsel military affairs. It is also necessary to be responsible for the examination of the appearance and discipline of the troops, and in addition, it is also necessary to strengthen the control of the ideological aspects of the officers and men of the troops, such as asking for warmth in the cold. The practice of going deep into the grassroots is standard.

In this way, the General Staff will be able to strengthen its control over the grassroots troops. It is no longer like in the past, when you can only be a military advisor or a supervisor of the army, but you have more power.

To put it bluntly, as soon as this is done, the chiefs of staff of the units at all levels have suddenly changed from their original high-ranking posts to high-ranking positions, almost only a little lower than the commanders of the units at all levels, and higher than the deputy commanders, and have become the actual second-in-command of the troops at all levels.

In other words, as a result of such reforms, the troika has become a troika in which the head of the unit is responsible for making combat decisions, the staff officer of the unit is responsible for the day-to-day work of the army, and the adjutant can only be a replacement.

For example, in a company, the company commander is still the number one leader, responsible for the marching operations of the troops, and the company chief of staff not only helps the company commander formulate the battle plan, but also is responsible for the daily life of the troops, becoming the second-in-command; As for the original second-in-command deputy company commander, he could only be used as a substitute, and before the company commander hung up, he could say at most two sentences, and he was strict in terms of status and power, which was lower than the company staff officer, and became the third-in-command.

Most of the original staff officers of the army were young scholars, and most of them did not have much military experience, but they were more literate and literate.

Although this does not guarantee that it will be as clean as water, at least after such a change, it can ensure efficiency in the short term, and as for the long-term problem, it is a long construction.

Anyway, Li Yongji can see that even if you use the policies of the later US imperialists, this group of Chinese soldiers can play a trick for you, so instead of playing any democracy and fairness, it may be better to have a more centralized dictatorship.

Moreover, there are many departments and power is decentralized, which is not a good thing, and there is no fairness at all, but efficiency is sacrificed, and many people do not act because of this, and they blame each other when something happens. On the contrary, by uniting multiple departments, it can enhance efficiency and make it impossible to shirk responsibility.

It's like now, if something goes wrong with discipline, you don't have to look for a lot of people, just go directly to the chief of staff, this is the so-called responsible person system. Once the person in charge is clear, then these people will not be able to shirk it, for the sake of their official hats and small lives, at least in the short term, they will not dare to mess around.

In fact, this is to streamline the administration of the troops, that is, to dismantle and merge some redundant departments, so as to obtain higher efficiency, so as to strengthen the combat effectiveness of the troops and avoid the recurrence of heavy losses due to negligence.

While doing this, Li Yongji also began to escort healthy American prisoners to the rear in batches, in addition to reducing his own burden, he was also afraid that these people would make trouble, especially if an enemy attacked, it would not be a joke for these people to make trouble again.

For this reason, Li Yongji took a very strict look at the US prisoner camp, set up heavy troops, and explained in advance to the commander in charge of the guarding unit that once the enemy attacked, these prisoners must be killed as soon as possible.

Although there were many of these captives, more than 100,000 of them, because they were all unarmed, it would be quite easy to carry out the massacre in an organized manner, which was a decisive difference from the previous organization in which they rushed and beat with weapons.

Therefore, if you prepare in advance, if something is wrong, such as the James River Legion, Li Yongji will not play any benevolence and righteousness with them, and will definitely kill these captives as soon as possible.

In order to provide himself with a greater buffer, Li Yongji continued to send the Snow Leopard Commando out to conduct reconnaissance on a larger scale, and the reconnaissance range was even expanded to 50 kilometers away to prevent being caught off guard again.

Just as Li Yongji was in the midst of the battle, he soon heard the news that the James River Army in Evansville did not continue to stay in Evansville, but burned Evansville with a fire, and then continued to withdraw to Louisville in the rear.

It turned out that after Benjamin parted ways with the New Virginia Regiment in Bernside with the James River Corps, he did not advance towards Evansville, but stayed in place and sent three reconnaissance units to follow the New Virginia Corps.

The reason is not complicated, that is, Benjamin wants to see if the New Virginia Army can achieve its goal and defeat the Chinese.

If he felt that Bernesey could succeed and defeat the Chinese, he would take his troops back so that he could get a piece of the pie, and if he felt that it was not possible, then he continued to retreat.

Before, Bernside's army and Li Yongji's expeditionary force were in full swing, and Benjamin was also quite hot, if it wasn't for the lack of food in the troops (when they parted ways, he gave a large amount of food to Bernside), maybe Benjamin would immediately lead his troops back and attack Bernside's troops in turn!

In short, just when Bernside's troops were fighting to the death with Li Yongji's troops, Benjamin had already arrived in Evansville with his troops, but because of the return of the horses, Benjamin thought that he might win this time, so he quickly collected food, and then prepared to lead his troops to support Bernside, in essence, to grab credit.

Who knows, Benjamin had just prepared and left Evansville with his troops, horses, food and grass to support Bournside, when he heard the news that the New Virginia Legion had been annihilated!

This startled Benjamin, who did not dare to continue the attack, immediately turned around, threw down his baggage, and then quickly ran back to Evansville.

After that, Benjamin fiercely looted a large amount of grain, grass, gold, silver and jewelry in Evansville, and then in order to block the possible pursuit of the Chinese, but also to destroy the evidence of the crime, he simply burned Evansville, and no matter what the local people thought, he led the troops and ran away.

The soldiers of the James River Regiment were all outsiders, not natives of Evansville, so they were not resistant to looting.

In fact, in this era, when Americans attacked cities, they also burned and looted, even for their own compatriots. At the beginning of the war, the reason why the Southern Army fought so fiercely was because it was afraid of burning, killing and looting after the Northern Army invaded its homeland.

Therefore, it is not an incomprehensible thing to feel that the situation is wrong, and in the name of Jianbi Qingye, it is not an incomprehensible thing to search the local area and then run away, not to mention Benjamin, even other Federation generals, such things are not less.

Just like Grant at the beginning, when he led his troops to invade Tennessee, he also looted the local wealth, if he hadn't looted the local wealth, his troops would not have enough soldiers, you must know that simply relying on rear transportation is absolutely not enough.

In any case, after hearing that the James River Army ran away, it also relieved Li Yongji, at least in the short term, he will not be attacked again, and the longer the time drags on, the stronger his combat effectiveness will be, so he is not afraid of delaying time. (To be continued......)