Seeing the ship drift away, the people on the dock began to shout.

Some people are calling their husbands, some are calling their brothers, and some are calling their sons, and tens of thousands of names are mixed together, forming a huge wave...

Although the ship carrying the soldiers had sailed a considerable distance away by this time, the officers and men on deck could still hear the sounds. Even if the voices could be heard at this time, no one could hear what they were calling, but the officers and men on the deck responded to them as best they could, until they were completely gone...

Looking at the fleet that was completely invisible, Yan Shao took a deep breath, and then exhaled slowly.

Sending an expeditionary force to Europe to help the Allies win the war, and thus gain a huge advantage over China, was a plan that had been drawn up for a long time.

As long as these Entente countries have promised benefits, China's future development path will be extremely smooth, and it will be worth paying some costs for this, which can be said to be the unanimous agreement of most of the high-level officials of the national government who know the inside story.

If this were not the case, even if Yan Shao really insisted on going his own way, things would not have gone so smoothly. After all, even a dictator needs subordinates who are willing to obey orders.

It's just that he is very aware of the tragedy of the war in Europe, and no one knows how many of the Wehrmacht officers and soldiers who set out for the first time will come back alive after the end of the war. Yan Shao's heart felt a little depressed.

That's right, Yan Shao has always believed that this path is the right one, even if it comes at a price. Even if it is likely that tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of people will pay for their lives for this decision, if these costs can be exchanged for the opportunity to change the fate of hundreds of millions of people, then this is the right one...

But this does not mean that Yan Shao does not feel it at all, after all, his decision is likely to cause many people who should not have died in a foreign land. It has also made many people lose their fathers, husbands and sons, as long as they think of this, Yan Shao feels a little guilty and uncomfortable...

Moreover, this war is a war of Europeans, as many opponents of the country say. Nothing to do with them...

If this is a war against aggression like the war more than 20 years later, then there will naturally be nothing wrong with Yan Shao in his heart. But this is not after all, even if the sacrifices of these people can be exchanged for making the country strong. An opportunity to make people rich. Yan Shao is still some...

"Forget it..."Yan Shao shook his head, shook off the little bit of wrongness in his heart, and then saw that Eleno and they were all staring at the direction of the fleet, and said with a wry smile in his heart. The expeditionary force has already set off, and now even if it is useless to talk about this, it is better to find a way to make good use of these opportunities, and don't let their sacrifices go to waste............... What's more, if you don't seize this opportunity, you will even spend more than ten times the price of this time in the future. I'm afraid it may not be possible..."

Yan Shao was not a person with the heart of a 'Holy Mother', not to mention that he had experienced more than ten years in this world. Although just think that many people will die because of his order. He felt a little guilty, but it didn't take long for him to shake off the emotion, because he knew that he had made the right decision, even if many people would die because of it.

Because if you don't seize this opportunity, then there is a high chance that you will pay more in the future for not seizing this opportunity.

Rather than that, it would be better to decide.

Taking a deep breath again, Yan Shao felt that his mood had recovered a lot, and then followed the expressions of Elaline and the others, and looked in the direction where the fleet had left, although there was nothing to see on the dock at this time...

In November 1915, with the departure of the expeditionary force, China officially entered the war that had shaken the world, becoming the latest member of the many countries involved in this war.

And after more than two years of fighting, this war may not be called the last one, but the word 'unprecedented' is fully deserved.

————————————————————

Yan Shao and the others did not stay at the dock for too long, and after the fleet completely disappeared, Yan Shao and the high-level government officials who saw them off left the dock, leaving only the relatives of those officers and soldiers still standing on the dock, praying for the safe return of their relatives...

"You guys get in the car first..."Walking outside the port, Yan Shao didn't get into the car immediately, but said to Elano and the others first.

Although they didn't know what Yan Shao was going to do, after hearing his words, Elano and the others still nodded. "Then let's go up first...", the four of them got into the car together, and Yan Shao walked towards Fu Xiuming.

At this time, Fu Xiuming was talking to someone, and when he saw Yan Shao coming over, several people, including Fu Xiuming, stopped one after another, and then looked at Yan Shao.

"I have something to say to Minister Fu..."

Hearing Yan Shao's words, there was no need for him to continue, the others had already stepped aside, after all, the meaning of Yan Shao's words was already very clear, and he didn't want anyone to hear the conversation between him and Fu Xiuming.

And after everyone retreated, Yan Shao directly opened his mouth to deal with Xiu Ming Dao.

"You should already know the details, you are responsible for the affairs of the armored forces first, and you must get the troops out of Songpa before they arrive in Europe..."

"Don't worry, president..."Fu Xiuming nodded, just now he saw Yan Shao coming over, and he had already guessed that what he was going to talk about would be this matter. I have already urged the people below to speed up their training, and strive to train them before the end of the year, but..."Speaking of this, Fu Xiuming said hesitantly. "If you are human, there is no problem, although the number of combat vehicles and armored vehicles in the armored forces is not very large, but if you take turns to train, it is still enough, but if you want to form a real mechanized force............... I'm afraid the number of tanks there is now..."

"Don't worry about this, I'm also urging below, I believe before January. It should be possible to get all the vehicles needed by the troops, and when the time comes, as long as the people are also trained, this group of people can follow the second group of expeditionary forces. Take a direct boat ride to Europe...... On Songpa's side, they will need to undergo some adaptation training and other training after arriving in Europe, and I believe that they will not be involved in the war at the beginning of the year, but their performance in Europe is related to the status of the expeditionary force and our country among the Entente..."

Speaking of this, Yan Shao took a deep breath, and then looked at Zhu Erdian and the others on the side.

"We all know very well that those people in the Entente simply want to use us as cannon fodder. It was completely for them to fill in the trenches of the Germans, and now that I have reached an agreement with Britain and France, I don't have to worry about this for the time being. But if Songpa can't play well in their first battle in Europe..."

Hearing Yan Shao's words, Fu Xiuming nodded, he was also very aware of this matter.

Similarly, as one of the few high-level members of the government who is aware of the 'tank' project. And the top management who is directly responsible for this. Fu Xiuming also knows very well how strong the combat capability of this equipment is.

If it is really possible to form a mechanized force for the expeditionary force, even if the scale is only a hundred vehicles, it can play a huge role in itself. And in the absence of such weapons in Europe, with the expeditionary force, it may be able to play a miraculous effect.

As long as they can perform well in the European theater, then both the expeditionary force and China itself can be recognized by the Entente, and thus become the third most powerful force on the Western Front after Britain and France—————— although China has a Shandong campaign. But compared to the huge battles that took place in Europe on a scale of more than a million, the Battle of Shandong is really not worth mentioning.

Although the Wehrmacht defeated the Japanese in Shandong. It has even hit Japan hard, so that for many years, Japan will not be able to threaten China.

The problem is...

Compared to the European powers, Japan was a little too insignificant.

Whether it is Britain, France, Russia or Germany, it is absolutely impossible for Japan to contend with.

China's ability to defeat Japan was a surprise to the Great Powers, but it was nothing more than that...

In fact, there are still many people in Europe who do not believe in China's strength, and even because of racial discrimination, even Japan, which won the Russo-Japanese War—————— does not believe it...

This is one of the reasons why many people in Europe regard the Chinese expeditionary force as cannon fodder, and if China wants to get rid of this status, it must be recognized...

This recognition must be obtained from the battlefield...

————————————————————

Long before the departure of the expeditionary force, the second expeditionary force had already begun to prepare.

It's just that unlike the first expeditionary force, the second expeditionary force is not as eager as the first group, so they have significantly more time.

The first expeditionary forces, due to their establishment, were organized into one army.

That is, the First Army of the Chinese Expeditionary Force, which can also be called the First Expeditionary Force—————— but the previous one is relatively formal.

And the second batch, which is also the establishment of three infantry divisions, like the first army, is also a main division plus two B divisions. Division B is also temporarily selected from the reserves, so it takes a long time to train. And the main forces are taking advantage of this time to familiarize themselves with the new equipment ...

At this time, a year has passed since the Shandong Campaign, and the mortars, which were originally only equipped by a few units in the National Defense Force, have now begun to equip the main forces in large quantities, and another new equipment that has officially entered the army after the Shandong Campaign has also begun to be mass-produced...

Shotgun...

In later generations, this thing was also called a shotgun...

It's all the same thing anyway...

Shotguns are firearms that are not rifled (smoothbore) and mainly fire shotguns (written as "scattered" in Japanese), which are generally similar in appearance and size to semi-automatic rifles, but obviously have a larger caliber and a thick barrel respectively, and some models have no crosshairs or rulers, and the caliber generally reaches 18.2 mm. The shotgun has a thicker barrel, a thick bullet, a loud sound when firing, a large firepower, and a wide killing surface, making it an efficient weapon in close combat, and the object hit is like a honeycomb.

Historically, during the First World War, the rate of fire of hand rifles was too slow for trench warfare compared to pistols of the same period, and the army needed a firearm that could hold a charge or defend a position, and it had to be able to drop multiple bullets in a very short time. As a result, the shotgun became one of the most common weapons used by individual soldiers in World War I.

Historically, the M1917 shotgun equipped by the Americans was once called a 'trench sweeper' by the French, which shows how powerful this weapon really is.

After the Battle of Shandong, the Wehrmacht quickly understood that in the future positional warfare would become the mainstream of warfare—————— when they were completely unaware of the existence of tanks.

And because of that. Creating equipment that can fight positional warfare has become the most important thing at present.

In the past, the Wehrmacht's equipment consisted mainly of grenades and mortars, both of which had a certain effect on the enemy in the trenches. In addition, there is a large number of equipped Madsen machine guns, the lighter Madsen machine guns can be used with a wooden handle, or even attack with the stormtroopers.

And the firepower is swift. Also an absolute nightmare for all enemies...

But the cost of the Madsen machine gun is too high, so a low-cost alternative has become inevitable.

The earliest replacement was the shotgun proposed by Yan Shao. But Yan Shao didn't know the principle of the shotgun at all, so he just came up with one based on the shotgun that came up with the latter.

Later, several arsenals came up with their own equipment for the Ministry of Defense to choose, and the Ministry of Defense selected a new type of shotgun designed by the Anhui Arsenal.

It's just that the firepower of this shotgun is good, though. But after all, it is still a little worse than the needs of the Wehrmacht. However, in the absence of other options, the Wehrmacht can only choose such a product, and requires the major arsenals to produce according to this weapon—————— other arsenals have of course also received some orders, but they need to pay a part of the cost to the Anhui Arsenal, and each shotgun needs to pay some, so the income is much less than that of the Anhui Arsenal.

It's just that not long after the arsenal has just started production, the Anhui Arsenal actually came up with a pump-action shotgun in June today.

Pump-action is a type of gun operation. It refers to a handguard that can be moved through a single handguard. The operation of the firing cycle is completed by connecting the bolt movement of the bolt directly driven by the shooter to the front and rear movement of the gun by a transmission rod. When using a pump-action gun. You should pull the trigger first, and after the gun is fired, pull the handguard to the end in the direction of the trigger, see the cartridge case thrown and hear a "click" sound, and then push the handguard to the end in the direction of the muzzle, you can complete the loading and prepare to fire again.

The historical Winchester M1917 shotgun was called the 'trench sweeper' because of the pump-driven design, and became a kind of mass killer in the trench warfare of World War I...

————————————————————

The difference between the power of the new shotgun and the original one can be basically distinguished as long as you have seen it with your own eyes.

After the advent of this new type of shotgun, the Nationalist government immediately included this rifle in the ranks of weapons and equipment prohibited from being sold, together with grenades, light and heavy machine guns, because the power of this weapon is too great, and if it is transferred to the people, even the Nationalist government does not know what will happen—————— because the former Qing Dynasty and the Beiyang government both allow the sale of firearms, so the Nationalist government cannot issue an order to ban guns in a short period of time, and can only temporarily issue a ban on some powerful weapons.

Naturally, it also includes grenades, light and heavy machine guns and mortars and other equipment—————— don't think this is a bit exaggerated, in history heavy equipment like Makqin has really flowed into the people, and there are even records of tragedies, to put it simply, adults are irresponsible, let children operate machine guns, and then hit another child...

In addition, there were still a large number of foreign companies in the concession at this time, and if the government did not issue a ban, it would be almost 100% for these firearms to enter the market.

Today's Guoshe government does not need to earn taxes by selling guns like the Beiyang government, and it is also eager to ban guns earlier, so it naturally needs to take some measures. And the shotgun, even if it is ordinary, this kind of pumping, if it falls into the hands of ordinary people, what will happen is unimaginable, and it is naturally included in the ranks of the ban on purchase...

————————————————————

Although the pump-action shotgun was regarded as a great enemy by the Nationalist government, the Wehrmacht took a fancy to this equipment.

And compared to this equipment, the original shotgun is somewhat...

So the Wehrmacht quickly made a new decision, that is, to purchase new shotguns, as for the original equipment, when the new weapons were put into service, they were transferred to the militia or reserves...

The problem is that this weapon was produced in June, and it was clearly too late for temporary production, so there were not many in the Wehrmacht that were armed with such shotguns. And in the expeditionary force, only the A division is equipped with this weapon, and the B division is just an ordinary Mauser...

However, at present, most of the domestic arsenals have begun to take shape, although some of the production capacity is still relatively small, and can only produce firearms, but it is enough. So by the time the second expeditionary force departs, the three infantry divisions should be able to set off with new equipment...

If necessary, it is even possible to transport it with the equipment of the First Army...

Incidentally, this kind of equipment is also considered highly secret in the Wehrmacht, although Yan Shao decided to let the expeditionary army use, but before 1917, Yan Shao did not intend to disclose this weapon to the Entente countries.

After all, his purpose is not just to make profits, but also to hope that the blood of the European powers will be shed...

Only this will it be possible for China to rise smoothly without restrictions... (To be continued......)