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"The trees want to be quiet but the wind doesn't stop!"
Mei Dongxing received intelligence from Liu Wu and Zhang Zhenxun in one day. He said in an uneasy tone, "Before the escort fleet left, some ghosts and monsters jumped out and prepared to attack the fleet. General Wang, the Nanyang Army Corps
Your burden is not light!"
"There are only 5,000 regular troops of the Nanyang Army, and they are stationed in Annan, Songkhla, and Natuna Islands. The military strength is scattered, and it is inevitable that interested people will find flaws."
Wang Dashan shook his head and said.
"If there was a fight with those foreign bastards, what is the chance that General Wang would win?"
"It is not difficult to defeat the many Chinese Kapitan forces in Nanyang, but it is easy to defeat them. It is very difficult to eliminate them all."
"The total number of Chinese militiamen in Annan, Natuna Islands, and Songkhla is seven to eight thousand. Before the war begins, if we gather together the Taiping Association members scattered across Southeast Asia, our armed strength should be more than four times that of the Chinese Kapitan
, can’t we defeat them with such strength?”
"The outcome of the war is not determined this way." Wang Dashan smiled bitterly and explained, "The Chinese Kapitans who planned to attack the transport fleet had the support of the Dutch, and maybe the British also had a hand in it.
If we cannot severely damage or wipe out all of them in the sea battle, the Chinese Kapitan who escaped will definitely rely more on the Dutch, and in that case it will be difficult for us to launch attacks on them again."
The Taiping Society is the largest underground force in Nanyang, but the power of the Taiping Society can only extend to areas where the Dutch have a vacuum or weak control. For areas controlled by the Dutch and the Chinese Kapitan who obey the orders of the Dutch, the Taiping Society
He has been secretly infiltrating in a cautious manner, trying his best to maintain a semblance of peace with the Chinese Kapitan forces in the Dutch-controlled areas.
The Taiping Society was under the command of Wang Dashan during the war, but Wang Dashan did not have great confidence in the combat effectiveness of the Taiping Society's subordinate congregations.
"The Governor has stayed in the mainland for a period of time. He should have seen the training situation of the local troops of the National Defense Force?"
Wang Dashan paused for a while, then asked about the situation of the local troops of the National Defense Forces.
"Yes, I have accompanied His Highness on two inspections of the army."
"What does Lord Mei think of the strength comparison between the Nanyang Army and the local army?"
"The Nanyang Army is an elite division compared with the French and Dutch colonial armies, but there is still a slight gap compared with the local troops."
Mei Dongxing seeks truth from facts.
"The colonial army is a second-rate force, inferior to the regular armies of France and the Netherlands. The Nanyang Army is of little significance compared with them."
Wang Dashan waved his hand indifferently and continued, "The weapons and equipment of the Nanyang Legion are distributed according to the standards of the regular troops of the National Defense Forces. However, because Nanyang is too far away from the mainland and the transportation costs are expensive, the live-fire training intensity of the soldiers of the Nanyang Legion is only as intense as that in China."
60% of the troops, and the Nanyang Legion troops lack combat experience with white countries, and there is a big gap between them and the local troops in terms of actual combat capabilities."
"Although the Nanyang Army is a regular army, ordinary soldiers and grassroots officers are mainly selected from Annan, the East Indies and other places. The proportion of veterans is much lower than that of the domestic army. It is understandable that the comprehensive combat capability is slightly weaker."
"Before Lord Mei served His Highness the King of Han, he managed eight to nine hundred men in Australia. Lord Mei should be aware of the difficulty of maintaining an armed force.
Take the 5,000 regular troops of the Nanyang Army as an example. Your Highness allocates two million Chinese yuan for military expenses every year, which is equivalent to 1.07 million taels of silver.
Excluding basic expenses such as military pay, weapons maintenance costs, and basic expenses such as food, clothing, housing, and transportation for soldiers, if the army conducts another medium-sized live-fire exercise, the military pay will be almost used.
The National Defense Force is a firearms-based force, and the lack of frequency of live-fire training and tactical exercises greatly affects the combat effectiveness of the troops. In regular combat, the Nanyang Army should be able to cope with foreign colonial armies of the same size to three times the size, but those equipped with old-fashioned obsolete muskets
The militia troops and Taiping Association members were brought to the battlefield, but it was difficult to exert satisfactory combat effectiveness.
Therefore, Mr. Mei, it is okay for the Taiping Association to deal with the indigenous armed forces and civilian Chinese armed forces equipped with cold weapons, but it is very unwise to send them to the front line to fight against the Chinese Kapitan and the Dutch colonial army supported by the Dutch."
"The domestic war is imminent. In order to reserve war supplies and prepare for emergencies, His Highness is raising funds from various sources. At this time, it is impossible to increase military expenditures for the Nanyang Army."
The ability of modern armies to swallow gold is not the same as that of troops equipped with cold weapons.
Since the Han Dynasty occupied southern Argentina, the population has soared to more than 5 million, and the number of men of working age has reached 1.5 million. However, compared with the relatively large number of men of working age, the number of Han national defense forces has remained the same for seven or eight years.
With the size of four divisions and three brigades, it was not until the beginning of 1878 that, in order to meet the needs of the Argentine War, the establishment of seven main forces of the fourth division, three brigades, was completed.
What is the annual military expenditure for the nearly 100,000 regular National Defense Forces troops, including the fourth division and three brigades?
Based on the cost of a Han-made rifle of fifteen taels of silver, a Gatling gun of two hundred taels of silver, and a 75mm field gun of three hundred taels of silver, excluding the consumption of shells, a full division of 1.2 is established.
For an army of 10,000 people, the purchase of weapons alone will cost at least 2.5 million taels of silver, and for a 90,000-thousand National Defense Army Army unit, more than 18 million taels of silver will be needed.
Compared with the army, the navy's military expenditure will only be more, not less.
Ten years after Li Mingyuan was reborn, he laid out the rubber industry and improved the basic industrial development of Han Dynasty. He also tried his best. However, every time a piece of white and green money was spent in pounds, it was immediately spent like water, and the result was
The result is that for the development of the country, the Han government, including Li Mingyuan, not only did not save much balance, but also owed a lot of national debt.
There are countless aspects that require capital investment. For the sake of the overall situation, the Han government can only limit the military expenditure of the Nanyang Corps. However, Li Mingyuan's effect of borrowing money to develop the country is also very significant. The most obvious one is the state-owned companies under the government's name, Hanguo Ocean Ocean
Shipping company, Xinjing Machinery Manufacturing Factory, Hanguo Iron and Steel Company, Xinjing Military Shipyard...
Including the Hanguo Mining Company, which was newly established less than two years ago, any company can be sold for millions or even tens of millions of taels of silver.
Mei Dongxing agreed with the development strategy implemented by the Han State from a civilian perspective, while Wang Dashan had been guarding Li Mingyuan since he was a child. He was loyal to Li Mingyuan and would not disobey the orders of the Han government. Therefore, Wang Dashan took the difficulties faced by the Nanyang Army into account.
After raising them one by one, we gave out ways to deal with the challenges faced by the Chinese Kapitan.
"After the Chinese Kapitans fled back to the land, our army was unable to effectively attack them. Therefore, if we want to eliminate them all, we have to find a way from the sea."
As he spoke, Wang Dashan spread out the map, took out the ruler and measured it, then said, "It is about 6,000 kilometers from Kismayo, Somalia, to the sea off Malacca in the South China Sea. Calculating the sailing speed of the navy led by Mr. Hu and General Li, it will take about three days.
And those Chinese Kapitans are planning to attack the fleet transporting boatmen in half a month, so we can notify Mr. Hu and General Li in advance and ask them to postpone their departure, and wait until more than ten days later to gather the main force of the navy and sneak to the sea off Malacca to cooperate with us.
The army destroyed many Chinese Kapitan and Dutch-supported pirate fleets."
"It is indeed feasible to ask General Li's fleet to cooperate in the operation, but we still don't know the background of the foreign devil Kirby mentioned by Zhang Zhenxun. Will a hasty attack offend the British?"
Mei Dongxing was a little worried considering Kirby's British identity.
"Master Mei, don't worry about this issue. Director of the Military Intelligence Department Liang Xing has provided a piece of information about Kirby. Master Mei can read it first."
After Wang Dashan finished speaking, he gave some instructions to his adjutant. More than ten minutes later, the adjutant walked into the conference room holding a notepad with dozens of pages.
"Kirby, a British national, owns more than 20 large and small companies such as Kobe Iron Works, Kobe Steel Works, and Shipyards. Due to excessive business expansion, he owes the British HSBC Bank 800,000 pounds and Jardine Matheson & Co. 200,000 pounds...
…”
After carefully reading the intelligence introduction about the foreign devil Kirby, Mei Dongxing breathed a sigh of relief and said with a smile, "I thought Kirby was some great figure in the UK, but now I know he is just a bumbling paper tiger, but a low-status British worker.
I’ve gotten to this point, but it’s also admirable.”
"Mr. Mei may not have dealt with Kirby, a foreign devil. Seventeen years ago, when I was in Changzhou, Zhejiang, I met Kirby several times."
Wang Dashan recalled, "At that time, Kirby was working as a security guard in the concession. After His Royal Highness occupied Changzhou, Kirby brought a rifle with more than ten rounds of bullets and claimed to help the Heavenly Kingdom brothers fight against the Qing army. After His Royal Highness heard the reports from the brothers below,
Shang bought Kirby more than a hundred taels of silver and placed him in the foreign army. Later, Kirby left the foreign army on the pretext of being injured, and then started working in Changzhou City with the help of the reputation of the Kingdom of Heaven and the silver rewarded by the king.
In the raw silk business, I made ten thousand taels of silver in less than a year. After the king left Changzhou, I didn’t hear anything from him. It wasn’t until Director Liang mentioned that there was a foreigner spying on the shipwrights of the Jiangnan Shipyard that I recognized him again.
He is a foreign devil."
"Haha, look at General Wang and Kirby are still old friends."
Mei Dongxing smiled.
"Master Mei, you are kidding. The foreign devil Kirby only has money in his eyes. In order to obtain huge profits, he dared to risk his life and cooperate with the Dutch and Chinese pirates to gain more than 200 Jiangnan shipyard shipyards. Such a person cannot be raised."
A familiar wolf will never have friends."
"That's not necessarily true. Since Kirby was able to profit from the Kingdom of Heaven, Japan, and the Manchu Qing government, it shows that he is indeed exceptional.
The country is in a period of development and needs all kinds of talents. If Kirby can serve the Han Dynasty, the government will not be stingy in giving him the remuneration he deserves."
Mei Dongxing is a government official who considers more practical interests when dealing with problems. As long as Kirby can bring benefits to Han, Mei Dongxing doesn't care how bad Kirby's personal conduct is.
"Since Master Mei plans to keep Kirby, if I capture this man in half a month, I will definitely hand him over to Master Mei alive."
"In that case, thank you General Wang for taking the trouble."