The Russian aristocratic cavalry corps led by General Menderov, plus a shooting corps of the Russian Empire, nearly 50,000 soldiers formed the main force of the Russian Imperial Expeditionary Force, this kind of strength is not strong, and the Russian Empire is really out of the Kiev region this time!

Although the number of the archery corps was less than 20,000, it consisted of citizen archery corps from various regions of the Russian Empire, and only a small number of elite Moscow archery corps served as the guards of a few high-ranking officers, but they were all equipped with muskets and had received unified military training, so that they maintained a good fighting morale.

The shooting corps of the Russian Empire was first formed during the reign of Ivan the Terrible, and made great contributions to Ivan the Terrible's southern conquest and northern war, and the archery corps has since taken on the coat of the regular army of the Russian Empire.

However, the Russian Empire in this era did not have a clear division between field troops and local security forces, and almost all the soldiers of the shooting army came from the citizens of the towns.

They were in charge of the local security police on weekdays, and at the same time obeyed the local government to assist the executive branch in 'violent law enforcement', and in wartime they responded to the requisition of the Moscow capital to go to the assembly points to form wartime regiments.

Due to the different degrees of affluence and the courage of the people in the various provinces and regions of the Russian Empire, the 'quality' of the shooting corps in each place varied greatly, and even in the same region, there were differences between the capable soldiers and the militia.

They are all called shooting armies, but the difference in combat effectiveness is very large.

In this respect, the rulers of Moscow naturally knew this, so the local shooting corps drawn during the foreign war would deliberately send people to screen soldiers who could really fight, instead of looking for a group of mud legs who did not even have the right weapons.

If it weren't for the fact that the Russian Tsar, in order to protect his throne, deliberately left all the main forces of the Moscow Shooting Corps, which were loyal to him, in Moscow, the quality of this expeditionary force would have risen to a higher level.

It's just that the Russian Tsar's practice of transferring a large number of local citizens to the elite of the archer army is bound to reduce the overall combat effectiveness of the shooter army in the area where it is transferred, especially the Smolensk territory, the Verkhov territory, the Novgorod territory and other local cities that are very close to the Kiev region.

In addition to the nearly 20,000 marksmen army, the rest are the Russian noble cavalry and many militia units.

These militia units did not have their own separate formations, and they either followed the archery army and the cavalry of the Russian nobility to do some chores that only second-tier troops would do in later generations, or they were simply used as cannon fodder in the war and put in necessary positions.

Of course, there is no shortage of mercenaries in this type of militia who work for their lives.

The reason why these units are called militias is not because they are scum in combat, but because they are not part of the corps of the Russian Imperial military system, they are marginalized armed groups, and after the war they receive a reward and a pension to go home to find their mothers......

Because of this, these militia units, which were not much less in number than the Marksman Army, did not have the slightest qualification to enter the high chain of command, and their fate was left to the commanders of the Marksmen Army and the generals of the Russian noble cavalry.

Andrei's position in this expeditionary force is relatively special, his original position was the secret intelligence chief of the Russian Empire, the direct chief of the Moscow Janissaries, but in the expeditionary force, he was just the inspector of the archery army, and even the Russian noble cavalry had no right to interfere......

That's why Andrei needed to go and talk to General Menderov.

Fortunately, the commander of the shooting corps was a person from the Russian Tsar, and he was interested in Andrei, the Russian Tsar's public celebrity, and would not influence Andrei's opinion.

The Russian tsar could have placed Andrei directly in the position of the supreme commander of the archer corps loyal to Moscow, and he did not do so just to prevent accidents.

In case this expedition fails, the commander of the shooting corps and the supreme commander of the Russian aristocratic cavalry, as the direct supreme commander, will inevitably become the first target to be liquidated, Andrei must not fall in the eyes of the Russian tsar, and he has to balance the large Russian aristocratic cavalry in the expeditionary force, so he has to put Andrei in an inconspicuous position of inspector general.

In the Russian Empire, the wartime supervision position of the military inspector is not very powerful, compared to the exaggerated power of the Eastern country's prison army, the Russian prison is at most a small person who can make small reports.

The reason is very simple, even if the small report can be successfully delivered to the former Grand Duke of Moscow, he will not be able to order the removal of the front-line aristocratic generals who are not guilty of defeat, and in terms of centralization, the Westerners have not done enough.

Here, the so-called supervising army is more used to prevent signs of rebellion among front-line generals, and interestingly, aristocratic generals who really want to rebel will often get rid of this kind of supervising army with little real power at the first time easily and without pressure......

Therefore, Andrei's identity as the chief inspector is nothing in the expeditionary force, and the only reason why he can point fingers at the expeditionary force is his weight at the side of the Russian tsar!

The Russian tsar was the one who really made the Duma nobles jealous.

After receiving that the Taiping army would soon settle the uprising and rebellion created by the Christian Brotherhood, and it was very likely that he would send troops south to support the city of Kyiv, Andrei immediately approached General Menderov to discuss the next battle plan.

Whatever the contradictions between the forces of the Russian tsar and the opposition nobles of the Duma, at least the goal of seizing Kiev was identical, and Andrei consulted with General Menderov in the interests of the Russian Empire, and the result was naturally much smoother.

As long as the Kiev region is taken, the strength of the Russian tsar and the big nobles of the Duma parliament can be richly rewarded, and the common interests can naturally suppress the long-term contradictions for a short time.

As a result, the Russian Imperial Expeditionary Force took the lead in launching a strong attack on the defense line on the periphery of Kyiv when the heavy siege artillery in the rear had not yet arrived, and the Battle of Kiev was in the battle plan of the Russian Empire, more than a month ahead of schedule!