Feng Yuxiang looked at the tall horses in the adjacent camp with some greed, nearly a thousand war horses gathered together, which was quite visually impactful, especially when these horses were completely different from the Mongolian horses in China, and they looked so tall and mighty, Feng Yuxiang was even more greedy.

A thought began to rise irrepressibly in his heart, if he also had such a majestic cavalry, he would probably be invincible in the country, right?

"Maozi's horses are better than ours!"

Ma Zhanshan on the other side is also very greedy, and he has more direct contact than Feng Yuxiang, because the Northeast Army has taken in many White Russian "remnants" and has seen Maozi's cavalry.

Ma Zhanshan said enviously: "I heard that the red haired man defeated the white haired son by relying on the cavalry to sweep thousands of miles!" ”

"Didn't the little devil suffer a loss this time?" Feng Yuxiang said with a smile.

Ma Zhanshan nodded, and wiped out the four squadrons of the devil in one go, including two cavalry squadrons, such a record is indeed very strong. Whether it is for the Northeast Army or the Northwest Army, the devils of the four squadrons are already very strong, and it is not easy for their troops to face these devils, and it is not easy to fight hard, and even guarantee a draw. Ermaozi ate all these devils in one go, even Ma Zhanshan, who has always had no good impression of Russian Maozi, had to admit that Maozi's combat effectiveness was indeed much stronger than them.

"Look at the guns used by people, they are much stronger than our Yangluo!" Feng Yuxiang sighed again.

In fact, the Northeast Anti-Japanese Allied Army did not have the slightest complaint about weapons before, whether it was G98 or Type 38, it was a little stronger than the old sleeve in China, and even many warlord troops in China could not even use the old sleeve, so they could only make do with broadswords and shuttles.

When I first accepted gifts from the Russians. Feng Yuxiang and Ma Zhanshan, that Le'a. Even these weapons are used second-hand. But they are still very satisfied. I even thought the equipment was very good at one point. With a rifle for each platoon, and even mortars and infantry artillery for the Allies, ammunition was sufficient, which was already considered a top-notch match for the Chinese warlords.

But it was better not to know, than to be frightened, when Feng Yuxiang and Ma Zhanshan were still happy to have a few heavy machine guns and a few infantry guns. What is the configuration of Maozi's army? Not to mention comparing with the Red Army, compared with the border guards of Maozi's Ministry of Internal Affairs, it is all heaven and earth.

What kind of equipment is used in the NKVD? The Mosin Nagan 30 rifle may not be outstanding, but it is no worse than the G98 and Type 38, and even the accuracy of the Mosin Nagan 30 has an advantage. Each infantry squad has a DP light machine gun, a copycat of the American Imperialists' M79 grenade launcher (RG-1), 60mm mortar support at the company level and 82mm mortars at the battalion level.

Compared to the bulky Maxim machine gun, the DP light machine gun weighs just over 9 kg empty without a cartridge disc and less than 12 kg with a 47-round cartridge. It's easy to carry, and the firepower is not bad. If Feng Yuxiang is allowed to choose, he will directly throw away the bulky Makqin.

There may be comrades who want to ask. Haven't the PK and PKS of NORINCO already been chosen by the Red Army? Why did the NKVD use a DP machine gun with much inferior performance?

The reason is simple, this is the care of the Tula plant, as well as the problem of face. Some of the senior leaders of the upper echelons of the Red Army felt disgraced and humiliated by the Red Army's adoption of a machine gun designed by a capitalist country, but they were unwilling to give up the PK series with better performance, so they had no choice but to let the NKVD use the DP machine gun of pure Russian origin. Anyway, for the border guards, the DP machine gun is enough.

And the regular Red Army troops chose the PK and PKS series, thanks to Feng Yuxiang and Ma Zhanshan did not find the PK series, otherwise the saliva would have flowed all over the place. Even so, Feng Yuxiang and Ma Zhanshan's expressions and movements all fell in the eyes of Ren Fuchen and Zhang Furong, and they felt ashamed. Because they are insiders, they know that the cavalry units of the Red Army are really not well equipped, and if they really have to look at the equipment, then they have to look at the GRU.

The GRU represents the trend, when the NKVD is still using the Mosinagan 30, when the ordinary Red Army has only got the SKS20 (SKS41, using 7.62×54R shells) and SVT-30 (an early birth version of the SVT-38), when the Red Army mechanized infantry has just fully promoted the SKS30 (that is, SKS45, using M43 shells), The GRU has already fully popularized the AS-30 automatic rifle (AS stands for AvtomatSperosky, or Sbelowsky automatic rifle).

The GRU not only used the AS-30 assault rifle with intermediate-power ammunition, but also the squad armament was fully gun-oriented, and the squad machine gun was the RPS-30 (Ruchnoi Pulemet Sperosky, which means Sbelowsky light machine gun). In fact, this RPS is the way of Maozi RPK, to put it bluntly, it is the AS-30 that uses a bipod, a heavy thickened barrel and a reinforced bolt.

The RPS can be fed with either a 40-round magazine or a 75-round drum, and the GRU prefers to use a 40-round magazine in actual combat because the 75-round drum is reliable and easy to jam. It wasn't until 1936 that the drum structure and production process were improved, and the drum became widespread.

In addition, the naming of this Sbelowsky gun family is also allusive, because the chief designer of the gun family is Federov in official documents, and according to the traditional naming rules, the gun family should be called Federov. Automatic rifles should also be called AF-30, and light machine guns should be called RPF-30. But the old designer Federov was very ethical, believing that the most important reason for the birth of the gun family was our protagonist, that someone provided the core automata design of the gun family, and stubbornly believed that he personally only perfected the design, so the gun family should be called the Sbelsky gun family.

So at Federov's insistence and the joy of the Bolshevik upper echelons, the gun clan was named so. However, the original models of the gun family were supposed to be AS-19 and RPS-20, which were originally produced to some extent, mainly due to Russia's backward industrial base. After tens of thousands of AS-19 and RPS-20 were produced intermittently, Simon Love and Deegarev further refined the design with the introduction of machine tools from the United States in 1929. This was the birth of the AS-30 and RPS-30.

From 1930 onwards. AS-30 and RPS-30 went into mass production. Mainly supplied to the GRU and other special operations units of the Red Army. By 1935, the production process was fully completed, and mass production of the AS-30 and RPS-30 began. In accordance with the equipment program of the Red Army, there will be a complete replacement of mechanized troops, as well as the Navy and Air Force. As for the rest of the infantry units of the Red Army, they still have to honestly use SKS and SVT, and there are even a huge number of Mosinagan that need to be eliminated.

If Feng Yuxiang and Ma Zhanshan knew that Mosinagan was among the eliminated in the Soviet Union, they would probably be envious, jealous and hateful. And this is also the key reason why Ren Fuchen and Zhang Furong feel that these two are very dirty.

Because in the eyes of Ren Fuchen and Zhang Furong, envying the cavalry units of the Red Army is simply nonsensical, no matter how majestic the tall horses are, with tanks and armored vehicles to be fierce? If you want to see it, you have to look at the mechanized units of the Red Army. That is the key direction of the Red Army's construction.

Yesterday they saw how the Red Army's tanks crushed the devil's cavalry into pulp, although the devil's cavalry was indeed inferior to Mao's cavalry, but even if there was a gap, how far could it be. In the same way, let Maozi's cavalry face the tank, and the same only part will be crushed.

Of course, Ren Fuchen and Zhang Furong didn't know that in yesterday's battle, the most brilliant performance was neither the cavalry of the Red Army nor the mechanized troops of the Red Army, in fact, the most powerful of the Red Army that eliminated the devils yesterday was the air power of the Red Army, especially those S11 that were temporarily transformed into "armed helicopters", their performance was eye-catching!

Yes. The performance of the S11 helicopters was so beautiful, they swept the Japanese ranks with direct, accurate and sustained fire. Under the instructions of the ground forces, at least 20 fire support points were knocked out, and when the Devil's cavalry tried to escape, they also stopped it with a fire net, laying the foundation for the later artillery and air force units to be powerful.

Even Blyukher, who was watching the battle, was shocked by this, because he was not particularly optimistic about this kind of iron bamboo dragonfly before, and if it weren't for Li Xiaofeng's face, he would probably "return". When the helicopters showed accurate accompanying firepower, Blyukhel had the idea that helicopters seemed to work much better than the infantry tanks that Tukhachevsky admired, that they were more maneuverable than tanks, that they were in the air, that they had better visibility than tanks, and that they were completely unrestricted by the terrain, and that they seemed to be better than tanks in opening the way for infantry.

What Blyukhel was able to realize, Rokossovsky, who specialized in mechanization, naturally also realized that compared with fixed-wing aircraft that relied heavily on airfields, helicopters that could take off and land vertically and had better low-altitude performance seemed to be better used than traditional attack aircraft and attack aircraft, and it seemed very interesting to use them to strike fixed fire points and accompany infantry assaults.

Almost immediately, Rokossovsky came up with the idea that if his First Mechanized Infantry Army could have a helicopter regiment under its jurisdiction, then the large-depth assault operations would be more three-dimensional!

"Konstantin asked to give his troops helicopters?"

When Li Xiaofeng learned the news, he was also a little surprised, because even if it is the US imperialism, the use of its army aviation helicopters has gone through a long period of accumulation, from the end of World War II to the Vietnam War to gradually mature, Mao Zi has no reason to develop by leaps and bounds, right?

After reading Rokossovsky's report, Li Xiaofeng understood what was going on, and felt that what Rokossovsky really wanted was a helicopter gunship, and he was going to use the helicopter as an aerial artillery unit for mechanized troops.

Come to think of it, this is also very normal, Tukhachevsky was ready to use the Air Force as a flying artilleryman, and Rokossovsky found that the helicopter was a better accompanying platform, and it was normal for it to replace the traditional front-line aviation. After all, helicopters are more flexible and their support firepower is more accurate.

Of course, Li Xiaofeng also knows that there are many problems with this kind of thinking, mainly because the performance of the helicopter in this year is too improvised, such as the S11 helicopter, after bringing a PK machine gun and thousands of bullets, it can no longer fit one more person, if two 18-shot rocket nests are hung, even the co-pilot has to be reduced. This kind of temporary modification measure is really very copycat and very improvised.

Even the weapon is not the most critical problem, the more critical problem is the lack of protection of the S11 helicopter, and most of the fuselage is made of light alloy and composite plates, which cannot even withstand rifle bullets. That is, the helicopter has just appeared on the battlefield, and the big guy is frightened by this big iron bird just like he did when he first encountered a tank. As soon as the enemy comes to his senses. Not to mention anti-aircraft guns and anti-aircraft machine guns. An ordinary rifle is enough for a helicopter to drink a pot.

So is Li Xiaofeng ready to negate Rokossovsky's proposal?

Of course not. Helicopters are indeed a lot of problems, but in the long run, they are promising. A helicopter hovering at a height of a tree is more suitable for anti-armor missions than a fixed-wing attack aircraft. As long as the performance of the helicopter is improved, it is not impossible to get these terrible armored killers into the battlefield in advance.

And compared with anti-armor missions, general-purpose helicopters are also promising in the fields of anti-submarine, battlefield rescue, and raids behind enemy lines. For example, Tukhachevsky strongly demanded the great development of the airborne troops, and Li Xiaofeng believed that helicopter landing was much more promising than parachute landing, and that it would completely tilt the airborne troops toward this field.

But. There is a basic premise for all this, that is, helicopters must be greatly developed, and it is completely impossible for existing models to meet the needs. This is also an important reason why the army, navy and air force of the Red Army were not optimistic about helicopters before, thinking that this is a large toy, which is an iron bamboo dragonfly. Now that Rokossovsky and Blyukherr are demanding more helicopters at the same time, this is the best chance to change the discrimination between the army, navy and air force.

"Inform Sikorsky that the situation has changed. Not only to speed up the development of the S12, but also to launch a two-seat armed model of the S12, well, you can also immediately have a model with a stronger carrying capacity! ”

I thought about it. Li Xiaofeng added: "Also, S11 can also produce another batch. I'm sure both Rokossovsky and Blyukhel will be willing to pay! ”

Those two are really willing to pay, and they are even ready to buy all the S11 helicopters owned by EO in one go. At their strong request, the General Armament Department of the Red Army issued an order for 50 S11 helicopters to Sikorsky's company in one go, and even retained the right to continue to purchase 50 more helicopters.

This is very happy for Sikorsky, let's put it this way, Sikorsky's factory did not produce a total of 50 helicopters in the first ten years, and he got ten years of work in one go, which made Sikorsky, who has always been called a money-losing goods by Victoria, feel a sense of pride.

However, before he could finish spitting out, Sikorsky held back, because Li Xiaofeng's request made him very difficult. Because the S12 was not done, the two prototypes produced exposed a large number of problems during the test flight, which were enough for Sikorsky to have a headache for a whole year, which means that the S12 was able to enter pre-production in 1936, thank God.

And now, someone is asking him to build an armed version of the S12, and a model with a larger carrying capacity, in Sikorsky's words: "You kill me!" ”

"Recruit! The whole world is going to recruit technical experts, and I will make a list for you, no matter what the cost, I will poach people! ”

Don't look at what Li Xiaofeng said, in fact, there are few names on that list, and even the last people who were dug up were two people, one is the American Lawrence. Bell, the other is Mikhail Brown, who just graduated from the Novocherkassk Aviation Institute and was assigned to the Central Research Institute of Fluid Dynamics to work on rotors. Leontievich. Miri.

And the poaching method of these two people is also relatively special, the former belongs to cooperation, North Industry and Lawrence. Bell co-founded Bell Aircraft Co., Ltd., headquartered in Forworth, Texas, USA, with its first factory in Vyborg, Finland.

As for Miri, this kid can't poach at all, who made him a citizen of the USSR. In desperation, Li Xiaofeng could only seconded this person to Sikorsky. Later, after Miri finished Sikorsky's work, he returned to China and established the famous Miri Design Bureau. The helicopters produced became a formidable competitor to Sikorsky.

According to Li Xiaofeng's division of labor, Sikorsky and Miri went to work on the S12 project and the S13 project, that is, utility helicopters and armed helicopters. Bell, on the other hand, took over the heavy helicopter project and was responsible for a B1 project capable of transporting at least 20 heavily armed soldiers.

Later, the results of these three projects were all adopted by the Soviet Red Army, such as the S12, the most widely used utility helicopter in World War II, the West-2, with more than 1,000 units purchased. The S13 became the first armed helicopter of the Red Army, named the West-3, and the number of production exceeded 300 units, which were widely equipped with mechanized synthetic forces. The Red Army purchased nearly 200 of the B1 project of the Hubel company, and even the US military widely adopted it, achieving unprecedented success!

And while Li Xiaofeng was campaigning for the helicopter issue, the conflicts on the Haraha River were becoming more frequent and bloody. The attacks and counter-attacks on both sides have reached an unprecedented peak.

In March alone, more than 15 armed clashes broke out, with more than 500 casualties on both sides! As for the clashes in April, they broke out almost every day, and the cumulative casualties exceeded 1,500!

The two sides are not only fighting a hot war on the Haraha River, but also in the international arena, with both sides claiming that the other side was the aggressor who first provoked the conflict. However, what is more interesting this time is that the Soviet Union, which was isolated throughout the twenties, unexpectedly gained sympathy this time, whether it was the United States, Britain or France, all of them were explicitly or implicitly on the side of the Soviet Union in this international cannon. The British, in particular, spoke well of the Soviet Union with a clear attitude.

Of course, anyone with a modicum of political common sense knows that this is a devil who has a great interest in China, Britain, the United States, and France, who have joined forces to squeeze out the growing appetite and become more and more rampant. I'm afraid that these people wish that the savage polar bears and the despicable little devils would die together.

The verbal artillery of both sides continued to fight until the end of April, when the entire international community was feeling news fatigue about the conflict between the Soviet Union and Japan, and on May 1, the day when the Soviet Union held a military parade on Red Square on May Day, a large-scale self-defense counterattack operation suddenly broke out! (To be continued......)

PS: Bow and thank you for the second kill of potatoes, the wind fluttering shadow, the ashes of the sycamore, hzwangdd, lzc880210 and comrade Juventus!