Episode 192 Hiding from the world

Emperor Guangwu sat in the chair, glanced at the two commanders-in-chief and the officer at the sticky pole in front of him, and set up Erlang's legs.

"You mean, the Ming army transferred troops because of ......"

He asked thoughtfully.

The Minister of War and Commander-in-Chief, Reemin, immediately said:

"Your Majesty, the view of the servants, this is because Nanming is afraid of my Qing Tianwei and is afraid of it, so he has transferred troops to the Yangtze River defense line to guard the country!"

Guangwu stared at the report and nodded slowly. After a while, he himself said:

"Well, yes, that's the only way it makes sense."

"The Emperor Shengming!"

Guangwu hesitated for a moment, hesitating, and a thought lingered in his mind. He was considering whether or not to tell the courtiers. When he faced his courtiers and minions, he had never hesitated so much. However, this idea was indeed a bit absurd, and he didn't know if saying it would make the minions secretly laugh.

…… That is: Is it impossible for Nanming to take the initiative to attack the Qing Dynasty?

Guangwu looked at the few minions who were bowing their heads, they really couldn't open their mouths, hesitated several times, and just said:

"Remin."

"The minions are here."

"You tell me about the comparison between the main forces of the Qing army and the Southern Ming army."

Limin was stunned:

"Your Majesty, are you the army that the Ming Army gathered to the north, and the army that is in front of me in the Qing Dynasty?"

"No," Guangwu said lightly, waving his hand, taking a cup of tea, "the overall comparison of all the armies." ”

"Oh! Oh! Remin's face was sweating, and his throat was dry, "The slave is stupid!" Let the minions think about it......"

Guangwu raised his eyes and said lightly:

"Why, you're the commander-in-chief of the army, aren't these numbers in your head at all times?"

"No, no," Limin said in a panic as sweat rained down, "Your Majesty...... These numbers are true in the minions' heads, but they are rough numbers and not exact...... Because the exact numbers change every day......"

Guangwu said impatiently:

"I don't want to be exact, just say the rough."

Reemin relaxed, his face regained some blood, secretly wiped a handful of sweat, carefully recalled, and fabricated and said:

"Your Majesty, at present, there are nearly 700 divisions of our Qing Army...... Oh, and the actual number is 695, about 11 million people. Among them, the most elite, tank-equipped, fully manned, that is, the most combat-ready division, is about 350 or so...... At present, the Nanming Army has only 150 divisions and about 2 million people, which is only one-fifth to one-sixth of our Qing Dynasty. Among these 130 divisions, only half of them are equipped with tanks and are relatively elite, and the remaining half are usually guarding the rear of the southwest in Guangdong, Fujian, and Yunnan, Guichuan, and so on...... The ones that were really deployed behind the Yangtze River defense line were the seventy or eighty divisions. In other words, the total ratio of our army to the enemy is 5.5:1, and the ratio of the elite part is also 5:1......

"Your Majesty, this is just in terms of numbers. As for equipment, the gap between friend and foe is equally large...... The first is artillery. The Qing Dynasty Army has about 120,000 artillery pieces of various calibers and purposes. The total number of artillery pieces of the Southern Ming Army, according to the latest intelligence analysis, is about 30,000 to 35,000. The comparison between our and enemy artillery is about 3.5:1. …… Your Majesty, and tanks. At present, the total number of tanks equipped by our Qing Army is about 4,000, while the tanks of the Southern Ming Army are only about 1,500. That's not all, most of them are light Lightning 1 and 2 types, with thin armor and weak firepower, which can't be compared with my Qing tanks at all......"

Guangwu nodded slowly, waited for a moment, and asked:

"Well, anything else?"

"Nope."

"What about airplanes?"

"Oh, the slave should die," Reemin quickly apologized, and it seemed that he had not fooled the past, so he had to continue, "Your Majesty...... This one...... Needless to say, Nanming's plane is a little more than ours. There are about 2,500 combat planes in the Southern Ming Dynasty, while the combat planes of our army are about 1,800, which is about seventy percent of the Ming army......"

Guangwu nodded, turned his face and asked the commander-in-chief of the Air Force:

"Fuxiang, the numbers are right?"

Bai Jia-Fuxiang bowed down and replied carefully:

"Back to the emperor, it's probably this ratio."

Guangwu stood up with satisfaction and paced slowly. He also knew in advance the approximate proportion of the military strength of the Ming and Qing dynasties, but that was a month ago. And these figures, especially those of the enemy, are always changing as intelligence comes back one after another. The current comparison of military strength between the Ming and Qing dynasties still makes him very satisfied. The Qing army adhered to its consistent overwhelming superiority over the Ming army.

Strength: Qing army 11 million - Ming army 2 million;

Artillery: 120,000 Qing troops - 35,000 Ming troops;

Tanks: 4,000 Qing troops - 1,500 Ming troops;

Aircraft: 1,800 in the Qing army - 2,500 in the Ming army.

……

Except for a slight disadvantage in the number of aircraft, all other figures formed an overwhelming advantage for the Ming army. In this case, unless Nanming is a group of crazy people in power, it is absolutely impossible for him to be crazy enough to take the initiative to attack the Qing Dynasty. What's more, the population of the Qing Dynasty is 4 times that of Nanming, and the number of men is 14 times that of Nanming. This means that the Qing Dynasty has almost unlimited war potential, and even if the existing 11 million people are exhausted, the second 11 million and the third 11 million can be recruited. And Nanming's 2 million is probably close to its conscription limit. After the light, a maximum of 1 million people will be recruited, and it will never be able to be recruited again. Unless they send women to war as well.

Of course, the equipment and quality of the Qing army are inferior to the Ming army, and this Guangwu still has a number. Moreover, when counting the soldiers, they used false enrichment to eat empty salaries, and even lied about their numbers, which is also true. However, in Guangwu's view, these situations basically only appear in those local miscellaneous divisions, garrison divisions, and militia groups, and the regular army of the Qing Dynasty is basically reliable. Even if the 3 million imaginary heads are removed, the Qing army still has 8 million real troops. The 2 million of the Ming army is still an overwhelming advantage.

Therefore, the only realistic explanation for the transfer of troops in the Southern Ming Dynasty this time can only be that they were afraid, and mobilized heavy troops to defend the country in the north to prevent the Qing Dynasty from using this as an excuse to invade the south again through a large-scale exercise.

Emperor Guangwu found that he had a false alarm, and his mood was slightly better, and he ordered:

"Continue to collect information on the movements of the Ming army, and be careful. If you come up with any new results, don't forget to show them to me. ”

"Huh! Minions obey! ”

……

But what Emperor Guangwu didn't know was that in a country like the Qing Dynasty, the unimaginable corruption and inefficiency of the army and government system, the deep-rooted tradition of reporting good news and not bad news, as an emperor, his own eyes were blinded far from being able to imagine sitting in the imperial palace in Beijing. Even for a clear-headed emperor like Guangwu, even if he went down to inspect it a hundred times a year, what he could see was only the tip of the iceberg. Because even if he is the dictator of this country, he is facing a vast web of 10 million privileged bureaucrats with common interests. In front of this big net, even Emperor Guangwu is insignificant.

What Emperor Guangwu didn't know was that the four data of troops, artillery, tanks, and planes that he heard while sitting in the palace now were far from the real ones. Among them, the total strength is the farthest behind.

Now it can be said that on both sides of the Ming and Qing dynasties, the one who knows the real situation of the Qing army best, except for the fourteen grids, can't find a second person.

And the real situation is just like the last analysis of Fourteen Gege: the Qing army does not have 700 divisions and 11 million people at all. In fact, there are only about 450-500 divisions and 600-7 million people. Among them, there are only more than 200 divisions and 3 million to 4 million people with strong combat effectiveness. The rest of the more than three million troops are either rotten soldiers who don't look like them, or they are numbers on the books and temporary peasant actors.

On the contrary, the Ming army did not have only 2 million people. In the general mobilization stage before the Ming and Qing wars at the beginning of the year, the Southern Ming Dynasty had already conscripted 2.2 million soldiers. After eight months of low-key expansion, the total strength of the Ming Army is now 210 divisions and 3.1 million people.

The most important thing is that the Ming army is not like the Qing army, the strength of the Ming army is real, how much is how much, and it can be accurate to a fraction.

In addition, because the Northern Qing underestimated 60 divisions of the Ming army, and the average artillery level of each division of the Ming army was also greatly underestimated, the real total number of artillery pieces of the Ming army was not 35,000, but 60,000.

Also underestimated, there are also tanks of the Ming army. The number that Limin reported to Emperor Guangwu was 1,500. Actually, this is only the approximate number of tanks of the People's Guard 5 armored divisions plus 5 mechanized infantry divisions. In addition, the Ming army had 44 motorized rifle divisions, each with 1 tank battalion and 32 tanks. That is, in addition to about 1500 tanks of the People's Guard, the army motorized infantry division has about 1500 tanks. The number of tanks in the Ming army was not 1,500, but twice as many as three.

As for combat aircraft, it is indeed the only one in which the Ming army has more than the Qing army. Not only more than the Qing army, but also much more than the Qing army estimated. Not 2500, but 3200.

If Emperor Guangwu could not be deceived, or as little as possible, he would have obtained a completely different comparison of strength:

Strength: 7 million Qing troops - 3.1 million Ming troops;

Artillery: 120,000 Qing troops - 60,000 Ming troops;

Tanks: 4,000 Qing troops - 3,000 Ming troops;

Aircraft: 1,800 in the Qing army - 3,200 in the Ming army.

……

On September 20, the "Great Exercise of the Century" of the Northern Qing Dynasty began. The number of Qing troops participating in the exercise reached 120, and all the elite units of the Qing army were engaged in this exercise.

At eight o'clock in the morning, at the exercise site in the far suburbs of Beijing, with the announcement of Emperor Guangwu at the scene, 20,000 cannons made a loud noise at the same time.

For a time, the smoke of gunpowder covered the sky and the sun, and the explosion shook the mountains. The common people in the city of Beijing clearly felt that the earth was trembling, and they all felt the power of the Qing Empire and the powerful power of His Majesty the Emperor.

At the same time, the Daqing Radio began to give impassioned commentary on the exercises to the world.

This large-scale exercise, unprecedented in the history of mankind, will last for three months, and will span more than 1,000 kilometers in geographical scope, from the suburbs of Beijing all the way to the "victory point" on the north side of the Dabie Mountain, and like a dagger, it will approach the Xiangfan fortress of the Yangtze River defense line in the Southern Ming Dynasty.

Although Emperor Guangwu had no intention of using the drill to invade the south, this series of aggressive arrangements would definitely make Nanming unable to sleep in the past three months, and he was extremely nervous.

Let Nan Ming know how high the sky is and how thick it is, which is also one of Guangwu's purposes.

……

The tense atmosphere spread throughout Daming. All the media were hotly discussing the possibility of a southward invasion by the Qing army. Especially in several cities along the Yangtze River defense line, the atmosphere has gone beyond the level of "tension". The atmosphere of panic at the end of last year, when the pre-war general mobilization was mobilized, seems to have quietly reappeared.

At the same time, on the north-south highways of the Southern Ming Dynasty, military vehicles lined up one after another in a long line, and there was no end in sight. Behind each vehicle were artillery towed, covered with gun jackets.

On many railways, military trains are also shuttling day and night. Division by division, army by army, from the southern provinces to the north, assembled on the south side of the Yangtze River defense line. The military column was written in white lacquer with an uplifting slogan:

"Swear to defend the mountains and rivers of Daming to the death!"

"The Yangtze River defense line, because we are stronger!"

"Defend the line! Defend your wife and children! Defend your brothers and sisters! ”

"Defend the country! Make a difference! ”

"Don't teach Huma to cross Yin Mountain!"

……

The military trains running on the railway during the day are mainly troop carriers, and the passenger cars are mainly attached to them. But at night, the railroad was running on a different kind of military train—all flatbed cars.

On these flatbeds, underneath the thick canvas and held in place with steel cables, were thousands of weapons for attacking in great depth: tanks, armored vehicles, self-propelled guns......