When he heard that the British and French representatives had begun to quarrel at the joint meeting in New Orleans, that is, they refused to send troops to meet in Memphis, Li Yongji just smashed his mouth and did not give any instructions, but Sun Xiangbing, the chief of staff, came over responsibly to inquire about countermeasures after receiving the news.

"Countermeasure? What countermeasures can there be, since they want to delay, then they want to delay. Li Yongji said with a smile.

"But then, our original plan will not be carried out anytime soon?" Sun Xiangbing said.

"The original plan, you mean the Plan B." Li Yongji shook his head, "That's just an additional plan, it's good to succeed, but it's not a big loss to us." Now since people are not fooled, they can't be forced to do it, right? It's okay to push the boat down the river, but it's not good to leave traces. ”

The so-called Plan B is actually a plan to lure the British and the French into a big fight with the United States of America as soon as possible, and the original intention was to let the three parties completely form a deep hatred and not let the Chinese concentrate on the United States.

Speaking of which, in the process of intervening in the American Civil War, among outsiders, the Chinese are considered to have contributed the most, and after several successive big victories, they have completely formed a feud with the people of the United States.

After the Chinese Expeditionary Force annihilated the Grant Regiment at Vicksburg, Lincoln made a public speech strongly condemning the violent intervention of the Chinese, while also officially declaring war on China.

At the same time as the declaration of war, Lincoln signed an order calling for the compulsory confiscation of all assets of a Chinese in the United States, the expulsion of the Chinese embassy, and the withdrawal of the US ambassador to China, and the severance of public or non-public exchanges between the two sides.

Although these things did not pose a real threat to China at this time, after all, the United States of America at this time could no longer help the Chinese Empire. But they shouted and shouted at China to kill them, but they still maintained their original restraint attitude towards Britain and France, which also declared war, which made Li Yongji quite unhappy.

Therefore, Li Yongji took the opportunity of the four-nation alliance to meet and jointly establish a joint command, and discussed with the representatives of the alliance countries in advance, asking them to take the initiative to raise the name of the host, and asked the British and French forces to go north to attack Nashville, which was not a lot of defenders.

Let the coalition forces attack Nashville. It's not because Nashville is difficult to fight and embarrass the Anglo-French coalition army, in fact, Li Yongji didn't expect Nashville to recover its strength in a short period of time and become a fortress.

At first, the 30,000 British and French troops from Cuba were sent to Nashville, just to get the two armies to officially engage the troops of the United States of America, so that they could no longer just shout and shout like before, and they would also be dragged into the water.

Sun Xiangbing and other staff officers believed that as long as the British and French armies officially engaged the armies of the United States. Then there will be enmity with the United States, and when the time comes, the United States will officially declare war on Britain and France, and everyone will be on the same starting line again.

Once the two sides are officially at war. Then Britain and France can't just verbally shout and declare war like before, and then happily play soy sauce on the side, but must take action in person. At the very least, let their fleet move and really carry out the duty of blockading the coast of the United States of America, not as it is now. Just send a fleet to deter and intimidate, but the real battle is not at all!

Britain and France did not take it seriously, and the United States forbearably restrained itself, with the result that all three sides were verbally shouting for a declaration of war, but as a result, they did not really enter a state of belligerence.

On the contrary, the Chinese, now that they have fought with the United States of America, both sides have completely entered a state of war, and have torn off all pretenses, so why can Britain and France continue to watch the excitement on the side? Aren't they part of the Alliance?

Therefore, Sun Xiangbing and others formulated this B plan, so that they all started to fight thoroughly, as long as everyone has a hot war, Britain and France will no longer be able to continue to play soy sauce next to watch the excitement, and the United States of America has no reason to continue to exercise restraint and deceive themselves not to declare war on them.

Sun Xiangbing and others had a good purpose in making this plan, but Li Yongji believed that the British and the French were not fools, and they might not be willing to obey obediently, especially if they wanted them to stay away from the port of New Orleans and come to the inland city of Memphis, and then attack Nashville...... Li Yongji didn't know what the British and French commanders would think, anyway, if he was the commander of the British and French forces, he would definitely not be obedient to do such a thing.

After all, this plan is not reliable no matter how you look at it, because if you go deep into Memphis, the logistics supply line will be stretched, and it will be a little difficult to rely solely on the supply capacity of the British and French forces. In addition, the main force of the Chinese is here, and the Confederate State also has three armies in Memphis with a total of more than 30,000 troops, and their total of 30,000 Anglo-French troops have passed, that is, the vulnerable group, and it is likely to listen to the words of the Chinese and the Confederate people, which they absolutely cannot tolerate.

What's more, attacking Nashville is not beneficial to the British and French forces, and they do not see any strategic or tactical value in that place, at least for the British and the French, on the contrary, after taking there, it will only cheapen the Chinese and the Confederate people, after all, that place originally belonged to the Confederate State, so once the attack is successful, is it not to be handed over in the end?

Even if you don't take those into account, Nashville's intelligence makes the Anglo-French commanders not act rashly, after all, there are still 20,000 troops there, plus full defense, sufficient ordnance and materials, perfect fortifications, and it is said that a large number of reinforcements from the United States of America are rushing over, in this case, it is definitely not a good idea to storm Nashville, which is fully prepared and has been fortified.

Therefore, not to mention considerations such as international politics, purely from the perspective of military strategy and tactics, Li Yongji does not think that the British and French forces will obediently obey orders, if that is the case, Li Yongji does not mind pitting this group of fools.

In other words, Li Yongji didn't think much of the so-called Plan B, because the success rate was too small, but after all, this plan was painstakingly made up by his staff officers, and he always had to encourage it, so they encouraged it, and solemnly praised them, saying that this plan was very useful and so on.

But in fact, Li Yongji didn't expect this opportunity to come to fruition at all, or rather, it was good to be able to do so. Even if it fails, it will not affect Li Yongji's established policy.

Because in Li Yongji's view, at present, it is not a good idea for the North to completely defeat the South or the South to completely defeat the North, and the best way is to continue to maintain the balance between the North and the South, so that the two sides can continue to maintain the stage of strategic stalemate, so as to maximize the benefits for China.

Think about it. If the North defeats the South, it will be the reunification of the North and the South, and if the Southern Alliance completely defeats the North, it will certainly increase their ambitions, and they will no longer be satisfied with independent statehood, but will completely annex the North and reunify the North and the South.

On the contrary, it is now. Both the North and the South could not help each other and could not defeat each other completely, so the two sides could only continue to consume each other in the form of trench warfare, so that the end of the war was far away.

So. The two sides will continue to bleed, continue to consume, and will become weaker and weaker, and such a form of mutual consumption will be carried out. Originally, it was in line with the basic will of the Union to demand independence, and when the Union could no longer hold on, or when their people were really impatient. After the patriotic fervor has been exhausted, the existence of the Union State will be truly recognized, and when the time comes, there will be an armistice.

When they are tired of fighting and can no longer fight, the United States of America will agree to China's blackmail, no, it is to rationalize the construction of China, cede a large amount of territory in the west to China, and give up the fruits of the Mexican-American War.

Once successful, with the number of Chinese, immigration ability, and management ability, over time, when all the western part of North America is dyed yellow and all become Chinese-speaking areas, it will be extremely difficult for Americans to go west.

At that time, the Pacific Ocean will truly become China's inland sea, and from then on, no matter how the world changes in the future, China can establish world hegemony for at least two centuries.

It was precisely because of this idea that Lee Yong-gil only hit Memphis and then stagnated and stopped attacking. That is not what outsiders think, it is that the Chinese's logistical support is not good, and they have reached the maximum border, so they stopped the attack, but Li Yongji took the initiative to stop the attack for strategic purposes, and his purpose is to let the North and South of the United States continue to maintain a balance.

Otherwise, with Li Yongji's golden finger ability, even if he leads his troops all the way to Washington, or even to Canada, he will not have any logistical problems.

Therefore, the so-called rumor that the Chinese are not logistically good is actually spread by Li Yongji, which is done to appease the allies, but also to appease others and make them ignore the advanced weapons of the Chinese.

Needless to say, to pacify the allied countries, the Chinese have won big victories one after another, and now they are suddenly stagnant, there is no justifiable reason, absolutely cannot pass the pass, and because of the strong combat effectiveness of the Chinese, it seems that there is only one reason for insufficient logistics to be used as a reason.

In addition, the Chinese's previous battles were too rebellious, and almost all of them annihilated the elite corps of the United States of America one after another with zero casualties, which not only surprised both the north and south of the United States, but also surprised Britain and France and other powers.

At this time, China is actually still relatively weak, and it still needs time to grow, and if we tell them how powerful our weapons are at this time, it will be a curse rather than a blessing.

Therefore, Li Yongji will strengthen the secrecy of weapons and equipment on the one hand, only show others the skin, and at the same time exaggerate the shortcomings of Chinese weapons and equipment.

For example, Li Yongji made people publicize, saying that the equipment of the Dream Division is super expensive, don't look at the rate of fire of a gun can top one or two ordinary infantry companies, but the price can equip a company, especially ammunition, death is expensive, ten bullets will be sold for one Chinese dollar, that is, 2 US dollars or 1.5 Spanish silver dollars!

Moreover, Li Yongji also made people publicize that the Chinese Expeditionary Force, that is, the Dream Division's style of play, seems to be clean and neat, but in fact, it is smashed out with money, and if the materials consumed in a battle are exchanged for money, it can be completely equipped with ordinary weapons and 300,000 people, and once there are really 300,000 troops to fight, then these 30,000 people are not to worry, so this dream division is a small-scale army that bullies and bullies and does not know how to prevent it.

Moreover, such troops have too strict logistical requirements, and they cannot advance or fight without adequate logistical support, so the Dream Division has to fight along the Mississippi River, just to take advantage of convenient water transportation, and at the same time they will not leave when they reach Memphis, entirely because their logistical support capabilities have been achieved to the extreme and cannot continue.

Li Yongji tried his best to convince people that China's dream master is the largest elite at present, and that it cannot be expanded again, otherwise the finances will collapse. And although the combat effectiveness of this army is very terrifying, the requirements for logistics are too harsh, and the conditions for use are also very restrictive, such as can only fight in the plains, etc., so it can only be regarded as a scarce class of troops like heavy cavalry in the Middle Ages.

Not to mention, Li Yongji's rhetoric is quite effective, at least foreigners who can come into contact with these weapons. All believed.

The reason is very simple, that is, Li Yongji did not deliberately distort or reduce the effectiveness of his own troops or weapons, but generously let them personally test the performance of the weapons of the Chinese Dream Division, so that they could personally experience the advantages and disadvantages of this weapon.

After they have personally experienced the weapons of the Dream Master, no matter what the purpose, most of them will put forward their own evaluations, such as the rate of fire of these weapons is too high, it affects the accuracy, the cost performance is too low, and so on.

This time. The Chinese representative will tell them that what you said is right, and even the disadvantages are greater than you think, that is, these weapons. Assault rifles, small rapid-fire mortars (mortars) and other weapons are all super ammunition hungry and simply a result of a battle that is piled up with money. So the firepower is wasted.

If it is replaced by ordinary soldiers, the number of soldiers is increased, and single-shot rifles are issued. Then to destroy the same enemy, the funds consumed by your own side will be reduced by more than ten times, and the cost performance is much higher.

Also, increase the number of soldiers, once the weapon is out of bullets, you can still charge with a white blade, and you still have the power to fight, and if you use this rapid-fire weapon, once you run out of bullets, it is not as good as a stick, so it is a loss-making deal in general, because the cost of using this rapid-fire weapon to destroy a hundred enemies may be several times that of those hundred enemies.

As for the combat vehicles that make the British, French and Allied people hungry, such as paratrooper assault vehicles, military trucks, armored vehicles, etc., in addition to the armored vehicles, the Chinese are not allowed to see, assault vehicles and military trucks are allowed to visit, but at the same time, they exaggerate the difficulty of production, the price of production and the complexity of maintenance.

In the mouth of the Chinese, these combat vehicles are experimental objects, not to look majestic, and they can run faster than horses, but they are actually very fragile.

The Chinese representative will tell you that these vehicles have to stop and replace parts after a short walk, and the energy consumed is a special kerosene carefully refined from coal, called diesel.

The extraction of diesel fuel is quite complicated and uneconomical, because a ton of high-quality coal can only refine less than a liter of diesel, and this liter of diesel fuel is not enough for a paratrooper assault vehicle to go ten kilometers!

Among them, if you add the consumption in the extraction process, in fact, refining a liter of diesel fuel requires the consumption of 1.5 tons of high-quality coal, and with this 1.5 tons of coal, if you use a steam engine to run, it is not only ten kilometers, but more than a hundred kilometers.

Therefore, this kind of combat vehicle only has tactical value, if it is a long-distance attack, it is absolutely impossible to do, because more than half of it will be broken halfway through, so if it is a strategic long-distance attack, it is still inferior to the cavalry, at most it has a tactical advantage, which is equivalent to the ancient heavy cavalry.

There are also those artillery, which are indeed sharp, but the skills are complicated, and it takes more than 30 technicians to work continuously for seven days to make a high-explosive shell, and the materials are very exquisite, so the price is expensive, if you want to compare, there are at least 10,000 ordinary solid shells, and it is not safe, and there are many restrictions.

In short, Li Yongji's approach is not to hide it, but to let them experience the performance of these weapons and vehicles in person, but secretly do something.

For example, the firearm used in the test was deliberately damaged, so that there were frequent small failures when using it. Another example is to do things on car parts, so that the drive is very bumpy, and you have to stop after walking for a while, and then let people pretend to change parts or something.

Anyway, Li Yongji made people engage in so many small actions, just to make others believe that the weapons of the Chinese are terrifying, but they are also delicate, expensive, and extremely cost-effective things, that is, a bunch of high-priced toys that are still in the experimental stage, and if any country has a large amount of equipment, it will definitely collapse its finances.

Those officers who came to experience Chinese weapons for themselves were all experienced without exception, but it was precisely because of their experience and many inherent conservative concepts that they believed in the foolery of the Chinese very lightly.

For example, the 21st century is an industrial society with a highly developed industry and a high emphasis on human rights, and the price of human life is much higher than the price of equipment, so they are all pursuing firepower and rate of fire. Reduce the number of users.

But in this era, everyone still pursues precision and frugality, and the value of many industrial products, especially weapons, is much higher than human life, which makes soldiers become consumables, and many times they would rather fight with human lives than spend more shells.

Therefore, an assault rifle with such a high rate of fire and such a rapid consumption of ammunition has become a chicken rib in the eyes of many. Because in their opinion, if the price of a gun is higher than the price of a Sharps rifle armed with two companies, and the price of a bullet is twenty times that of an ordinary bullet, then it is completely unnecessary.

Because if you use this money to arm two Sharps rifle companies, it is still very easy to defeat a person who uses this assault rifle, and the cost performance is better.

Even, to defeat the person who used this high-priced assault rifle. You don't even need two companies, one company, no, just one platoon. If the tactics are right, you can also defeat the opponent lightly.

In other words, Li Yongji did not deliberately conceal the superiority of his own weapons, on the contrary. He did not hide the advantages of his own weapons, but he magnified the disadvantages of these weapons, and his magnification of them. From the perspective and viewpoint of people in this era, they will take it for granted.

In short, during the meeting of the armies of the four countries in New Orleans, Li Yongji Tongguò initiated an interactive exchange activity between the armies of the four countries, allowing people to take the opportunity of the exchange activity to personally come over and experience the advantages and disadvantages of a Chinese weapon, which not only reduced their curiosity, did not demonize the weapons of the Chinese, but also eliminated their worries.

Because after a series of personal tests, coupled with the Chinese's ulterior motives, the officers of other countries involved in the Chinese weapons test unanimously concluded that these weapons used by the Chinese were purely some high-end toys, that is, the local tycoons burned money to show off, and the actual value was the same thing, and even they immediately came up with a bunch of weapons to pay attention to against the Chinese.

Of course, not everyone does not take Chinese weapons seriously, and many people are interested in Chinese weapons and see the future of the development of these weapons, so they have asked separately whether they can buy these weapons, or whether the Chinese can sell them.

In this regard, the Chinese representative in charge of the commentary nodded very boldly, saying that in addition to the armored vehicles that are still in the experimental stage, we can sell other things, including military trucks, paratrooper assault vehicles, and even mortars, assault rifles, etc., as long as you can afford the price.

As a result, after the anxious French first began to ask the price, everyone immediately took a deep breath, for no other reason, the price of these weapons is too expensive, this expensive, not only reflected in the price of weapons, but also in the way of trading, because these weapons Chinese only accept gold!

Take a Type 81-1 assault rifle as an example, an assault rifle used by the Chinese, and the asking price is 100 grams of gold.

If converted into currency, then it is equivalent to about 33.3 Chinese dollars (the gold content of 1 Chinese dollar silver coin is the officially designated 3 grams of pure gold, this gold-silver ratio is directly linked, the purpose is naturally to hedge the world's gold), 71.43 US dollars (1 US dollar at this time gold content is about 1.4 grams of gold), 13.66 pounds (at this time, 1 pound contains 7.322 grams of pure gold, a veritable big gold coin!) or 344.83 gold francs (1 gold franc contains 0.29 grams of pure gold).

In fact, a gun costs $71, which is not expensive from the perspective of this era, after all, at this time, a locally produced Sharps rifle in the United States costs $42, a front-loading Springfield rifle costs $12, and some exquisite revolvers in Britain are about the same price.

Therefore, this kind of repeating rifle is about equivalent to the price of two Sharps rifles, which is very fair in everyone's opinion, even if people only need pure gold to settle, and the purity of pure gold must also be in accordance with Chinese standards, that is, it refers to the standard of 24K pure gold with a gold content of 99.6%!

Everyone thought about it, even if it is a strict standard, at most it is more than a dollar of loss, and $71 becomes $72, which is not a high price.

However, they didn't know that Li Yongji himself had made a lot of money at this price, because in modern society, gold is hard currency, and one gram of gold is worth 240 yuan, so 100 grams of gold is 24,000 yuan!

And what about the actual purchase price of Li Yongji? Since it is a stock directly given by the Chinese government, it was originally processed, so the price is cheap, and a second-hand Type 81-1 assault rifle only costs 500 yuan. Even if it is a new gun newly produced, the cost is actually no more than 600 yuan!

As soon as this gun is handed over, the price difference is 23,500 yuan, excluding various operating costs, the net profit will definitely not be less than 23,000, so if others are really willing to buy it with 100 grams of pure gold, that is, 24,000 yuan, then Li Yongji will definitely be willing to sell it, and the more the better.

Moreover, this price is just the price of buying a gun. If you don't count the bullets, the bullets have to be bought at an additional cost, and as for the price of the bullets...... Well, it's not a price, 30 rounds of ammunition sell for 10 grams of pure gold, the first time you buy, you get a free magazine!

As for the 60-mm mortar, that price directly increased tenfold, that is, 1000 grams of pure gold for a gun. The cannonball is 100 grams of pure gold for one cannonball!

The best thing is that these shells and bullets can only be provided by Li Yongji, and they can't make them even if they buy them. Because they lack the necessary technology, especially gunpowder technology!

Of course, if they use the strength of a country to exert great efforts, it is possible to replicate bullets and shells. But the power is definitely far behind, and with R&D and manufacturing, the total price may not be less.

Maybe it's because it's too expensive. Therefore, there were not many people who bought, and the most were the wealthy British, who bought 500 Bayi assault rifles and 50 60mm mortars at one time, while the French only had 100 Bayi assault rifles and 30 60mm mortars, and the Allied countries only bought 50 Bayi and 10 60mm mortars.

Obviously, they buy these weapons not to use them, but to take them back for study, or even to imitate them.

However, Li Yongji is not worried about this at all, because whether it is a gun or a cannon, there is no big problem in terms of design, and they can learn it secretly, because the key to these weapons is not the design, but the material.

Without modern cannon steel and military seamless steel pipes, without corresponding machine tools and assembly lines, even if they use the same design, they will not be able to replicate similar weapons, at most produce a weakened version, if there is no yellow fire. medicine, then the bullets and shells are even worse. And if it is purely made by hand, the cost may be higher than the price of buying directly from Li Yongji!

Once the cost of their own production is much higher than the cost of buying Li Yongji's place, and the power and reliability are ridiculously poor, or even directly unusable, then they will continue to buy it from themselves sooner or later.

This is the technological advantage, once the generation gap of two centuries is formed, it is definitely not so easy to catch up quickly.

"In short, that's what happened to the English and the French." In the end, Li Yongji said to the sullen Sun Xiangbing, "Anyway, our strategic goal has been achieved, and the confrontation between the United States and the Allied States has been formed, and no one can help anyone in the short term." As for the British and the French, since they have seen through our plan, they don't want to come, so they don't come, anyway, if they just want the British and French to work against the United States, there are many ways. ”

"There are many ways?" Sun Xiangbing blinked, "Chief, are you saying that you still have a backup plan?" ”

"Back-up plan? Hehe, almost. Li Yongji smiled, "Instead of letting us go to great lengths to get the British and the French to come and fight the Americans, so that the British and French people have a grudge against us, it is better to let the people of the United States of America take the initiative to provoke the two countries and take the initiative to attack them, so that they will have more intention to interfere, right?" ”

"That being said, but now that the people of the United States of America are very restrained, how can they take the initiative to attack the British and the French?"

Hearing Sun Xiangbing's doubts, Li Yongji smiled strangely: "Things in this world, but I can't say for sure, the so-called nothing difficult in the world, I'm afraid of people with hearts...... Keep waiting and seeing, and soon you will know that something big is going to happen, and that it is absolutely impossible for the British and the French to continue to watch from the sidelines. So now, let's not do anything, let them make trouble. ”

"So, there's really a backup plan, right?" Sun Xiangbing's eyes widened, "What kind of plan is it, can the chief reveal a little bit to me?" Even if it's a secret operation that we can't know, even if it's just the name of the plan. ”

"Uh, the name of the backup plan." Li Yongji nodded, "That's, well, Plan C." (To be continued......)