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The European countries are still as unfamiliar with the East as ever, but they also know that the overall strength of the ancient power of the East is not weak, and a single country is still far from being the opponent of the ancient country. But that's not the point, the two sides are too far apart, and it's hard to influence each other. However, this time Fujian's fleet of dozens of large ships should bring an unparalleled shock to the whole of Europe.

Although the entire size of the Mawei Army still maintains seven detachments, with a total of more than 40,000 troops, and the logistics personnel are only 50,000, the navy of these 50,000 people is not weaker than the fleets of the European maritime powers. At least it is more than half of the overall strength of the British Navy or the Dutch Navy, and it is stronger than the rest of Europe, at least at the moment the strength of the French Navy is weaker than Geng Jingzhong's Mawei Navy.

These comparisons are also compared in the number of warships and the number of navies, if you compare the combat awareness and comprehensive skills of the naval soldiers of several sides, the Mawei soldiers are confident that they do not belong to the European soldiers, but many commanders may not be as good as the captain-level commanders of the British, Dutch, and Spanish fleets who have experienced many large-scale naval battles. Although the Mawei Army still lacks some experience in war, it can be made up for in the configuration of warships. Although the Mawei naval warships were built on the basis of the style of British warships, they also combined the characteristics of the Chinese shipshape, and their performance was not only not weaker than the general European sail warships, but also slightly superior.

Let's talk about shipborne firepower. The number of cannons is simply not less than that of the warships of any country. And the power of the cannon is stronger than theirs. This is also the advantage brought by Geng Jingzhong, a traverser. Now the improved naval gun is much lighter in weight, but the performance is more stable, the range is longer, and the power is more powerful. Until this moment, the Mawei Navy had not replaced all the naval guns on all the naval warships, but the guns on the main third-class battleships and most of the fourth-class battleships had already been replaced. Especially the Fifth Squadron that was sent out this time, all the naval guns on the twenty large and small warships were replaced with brand new, if there was really an eye-opening expedition to ask for wildfire. They will regret it.

The navy and the Kunpeng caravan set off for Europe, accompanied by many children from Fujian, Guangdong, Jiangxi, Jiangsu, and Zhejiang, of course, all of whom were involved in maritime trade, and Geng Jingzhong also allowed them to send their own children to Europe to look for business opportunities, and more importantly, to obtain information on the recent situation in Europe and let their own children have an experience. In this trip, the task of the Fifth Squadron is only to escort the caravan, and the Kunpeng caravan is responsible for other matters, and the general person sent by Geng Jingzhong will go to meet the Dutch head with the people of Neskas, the Dutch governor of Batavia.

Things at sea basically stabilized, but Geng Jingzhong's mind was still on the mainland war. In the past six months, although there have been no super-large-scale battles. However, the number of casualties among the soldiers in each local battle was much higher, and a large part of this was caused by the artillery sold by the Mawei Army. Wu Sangui purchased 200 cannons of various types. Zhang Guozhu used a 50-meter red-coated cannon to take Nanchang City in a battle, causing heavy losses to the Qing court, and such a remarkable effect made both the Qing court and Zheng Jing very red.

Zheng Jing said that he and Geng Jingzhong were still allies at the moment, and Zheng Jing wanted to buy red-clothed cannons made in Fujian, of course, there was no reason not to sell them, so Shi Lang was ordered by Zheng Jing to spend one million taels of silver to transport a hundred red-coated cannons from Fuzhou. They had quite a few other light guns, but they didn't want any of them. The red-coated cannon sold by Geng Jingzhong is quite good in terms of performance, and the original preparation of making the barrel thinner or anything did not be done, but the weight of the Jiang cannon was increased and upgraded.

Taiwan is isolated overseas, but it is easy to contact Westerners, if Zheng Jing wants to buy red-coated cannons, it is not difficult, but if he wants to buy such a number of red-coated cannons at one time, it is impossible. Zheng Jing also bought eight British-made red-coated cannons from the Portuguese some time ago, each cannon was three meters in length, cast in fine iron, and the weight of each cannon reached more than two tons, that is, four thousand catties. It's also funny to say, this is still a British shipwreck salvaged by the Portuguese, and it belongs to the eighteen-pounder gun, and the power is still okay.

And Geng Jingzhong's recent cannon is different, there is not a single cannon that exceeds twelve pounds among all the cannons sold, and the largest one is a twelve-pound cannon, and the weight of each of these twelve cannons is higher than the cannon that Zheng Jing bought. In other words, the length of each cannon is still 3.1 meters, but they are all fat guys, and the weight reaches 2,500 kilograms. The barrel is quite thick, enough for a long time.

But the power of this cannon is not good, first of all, the barrel is not so smooth, it can meet the standard of use, and there will definitely be problems after a long time. In addition, this cannon is a twelve-pounder cannon, and the firing range is the same as that of the old-fashioned or the Qing court's imitation, and the effective range is only 600 meters. What's more, this cannon is too heavy, 2,500 kilograms, and it takes four horses to pull it away smoothly, once it rains on a cloudy day or something, and the ground is soft, it will be difficult to move this cannon. Therefore, this one is only suitable for defending the city, and if you want to use it for field warfare, hehe, it has to be able to move.

And if it is just to defend the city, then there is no threat to the Mawei Army, the Mawei Army's general cannon has a range of more than a kilometer, and the accuracy is high, and the power is huge, it can completely suppress this fat guy, even if this wide fat guy occupies the higher terrain of the city tower, it will not be able to hit the artillery camp position of the Mawei Army, it will definitely be a one-sided bombardment! Such a fat guy, Geng Jingzhong charged one million taels for a hundred red-clothed cannons, which is indeed really black enough. The cost of a real cannon is less than a thousand taels, and the profit of turning it over at once is tenfold, which is more than the profit of a running ship at sea!

As for the Mawei Army itself, it has not been idle for a moment in the past six months, with the first, second, and fifth divisions, plus one artillery division, and six battalions of the cavalry division, totaling 70,000 soldiers and horses, scattered within the three provinces of Fujian, Guangdong, and Jiangxi. The most elite 1st and 2nd Divisions each had six battalions and 10,000 troops in conjunction with the artillery division and the 4th Division, but the new army was stationed in Ji'an, Fuzhou, and Raozhou for most of the year, while the 3rd Division and the 4 battalions of the 1st Division, which were originally trained by the Guangdong army, were stationed in various parts of Guangdong, and the soldiers of the 5th Division were scattered and stationed in Jiangxi and the counties in southern Zhejiang. The Sixth Division was stationed in the Fujian base camp, and the elite four battalions of the Second Division plus Geng Jingzhong's personal guard battalion were always around Fuzhou and had been guarding the security of Fuzhou.

Of the 100,000 recruits recruited later, only the first batch of 50,000 recruits had some appearance, and in more than half a year, they had completely separated themselves from the category of ordinary people, learned the skills of killing the enemy on the battlefield, and at the same time learned discipline. The second batch of 50,000 recruits has only been trained for a month and a half at the moment, and it will take about half a year to form an army. In the past six months, Geng Jingzhong has been very nervous about the newly trained 50,000 new troops, and after the second batch of recruits were also put into training, his head became even bigger.

The expansion of the army is just a matter of one sentence, maybe this will be very simple for the Wu army or the Qing court and the Zheng army, practice and then each person will be issued a steel knife or each person will receive a spear and put on a battle jacket. But the Mawei Army is not good, if this is the distribution of cold weapons, it is simple, 100,000 pairs of knives and guns will not cost the military logistics department much trouble, anyway, during this period of time, businesses in Fujian have undertaken many orders from the Mawei Army Military Department, and have worked overtime to produce a lot of waist knives, spears and other weapons.

Although this is sold to Wu Jun and Zheng Jun, it can also be used at home. It was the officers and soldiers of the first division of the Mawei Army, and each of them was originally equipped with a waist knife, as long as this knife passed the acceptance of the logistics department, it would definitely be no problem. But does Geng Jingzhong want an army with broadswords and spears? Have a powerful rifle not to choose, let his soldiers go to bloody battles with broadswords and spears? That's certainly impossible. However, the firearms workshop could not produce so many guns for a while, and in the past six months, the scale has been repeatedly expanded, but only more than 24,000 guns have been manufactured, and half of the first batch of new troops cannot hold a single one in their hands.

In the past six months, the training of the new army has been as strict as ever, and the junior instructors have carried out the training with sufficient intensity. It seems that every veteran of the Mawei Army likes to do this job, training recruits is not only a task for them, but also a pleasure, shouting at a circle of people, let them go east to the east, let them go west to the west, I feel that I am no longer an ordinary soldier, twenty has become a squadron leader level officer.

It was originally planned when it was decided to recruit the new army, and the batch of instructors who trained the 30,000 new troops last year were still retained to continue to train the first batch of 50,000 people, and the number of instructors was not enough to be drawn from several detachments in the Mawei military port, and the naval soldiers were also trained in land combat skills, although they were not as powerful as the real army, but they were enough to train recruits who did not know anything. Among the officers and men of the Navy, those who were selected as instructors were really elated, and even many low-ranking officers took the initiative to sign up to participate in the selection of instructors. For more than a year, the navy has really been too idle, and if there is no war all day, it can only conduct routine training. (To be continued......)

PS: Next chapter right away