Dragon Sea Empire

"...The army is called a battalion, and it is also controlled by a battalion officer. After entering the field and firing the cannon, the soldiers only obey the order and act. From the moment the cannon is raised, they will hold the conch. Hundreds of soldiers move and stop in the same way. The battalion sees the color of the military flag, which battalion is waiting. Wherever it is pointed, it is also pointed to its own direction. According to the direction of the battalion flag, the three divisions are aligned, and each road has a flag and three teams. Parallel, the three parts are three parallel lines, the Chinese army is in the middle, walk to the teaching field, listen to the conch horn in the middle, all stand at attention, blow the turn around horn, turn up, the battalion officers pass the order, blow the conch horn, each at their feet Sit down and rest, the flag bearer raises the flag, as if a thief is coming, raises the conch horn and the sound of the gong, the soldiers stand up, and the thousands of people are like one person, facing the enemy, each holding a gun. The Ministry is on the right, with the first team in the front and the second team in the back, forming a double stack, the flags and drums are in the middle, the sound of the golden drum stops, and the conch trumpet blows the order, and each team is a line, and each team is connected to each other. , divided by one zhang in the middle, the sound of Jin, the sound of the conch, the officers each issued an order, and sat down, "

This is the infantry drill of the Chinese Army recorded by Yuan Chonghuan in his report to the Ministry of War in the capital. "Records of Military Training" also..."

Zhang Ye said in a secret report inside the Jinyiwei: "The naval bandits have strict military discipline, and the footsteps and movements are more in line with the art of war..."

In the first battalion, the first battalion carried out a formation change drill, which opened the eyes of civilian officials such as Xu Guangqi and Sheng Yihong. From the perspective of Zhang Ye, who came from a family of generals, and Yuan Chonghuan, who thought he "knew soldiers", this battalion of Chinese troops was indeed elite and strong. However, given time, under the premise of strict military discipline and strict selection of soldiers, some units in the Ming army will be able to drill to this level. Moreover, they believe that this unit must be specially selected to demonstrate formation change drills. It is impossible for all troops to be like this.

Then the battalion of the Fourth Division of the Chinese Army practiced infantry confrontation, firing "paper bullets" with flintlock muskets for live ammunition exercises.

Xu Guangqi and other civil servants were stunned by this ruthless method of queuing up and shooting. The two Chinese armies walked towards each other, stood at attention and shot at each other, and at the same time approached each other step by step. Position, continue to stand at attention and shoot, the two sides shoot at each other, there is no dodge, death is like home, and death is endless. In the mind of the imperial envoy of the Ming Dynasty, it is impossible for this kind of fighting method to exist in the world.

In fact, this kind of queuing and shooting tactics is rarely used by the Chinese army on the domestic battlefield, because they have no corresponding opponents: no Ming army can start a musket battle with them, this is not just weapon technology There are many factors such as troop establishment and tactical training. The most important thing is that the Ming army lacks a tactical way of thinking suitable for firearms warfare due to its backward technology.

"Everyone obeys orders, it is as important as life, death is death, dare not disobey... This is a first-class strong army, but this kind of warfare is stupid and rigid, how many people in this world can really see death as home, come on Can soldiers really fight like this if they are in a battle formation," Sheng Yihong said while shaking his head.

Yuan Chonghuan worked in the Ministry of War, and he had heard some legends about the Chinese army at that time: "Not necessarily, it is rumored that the pirates fought with the Ganla people on Luzon Island, and that is how they fought,"

Before the imperial envoys of the Ming Dynasty had time to recover from their surprise, the battle on the playground was over, and both sides basically died together. When the soldiers were regrouping, Guo Huaiyi was explaining the exercise: "This battle simulates two technical Between troops with the same tactics, simply using musket fire to determine the outcome, on the actual battlefield, there should not be such a scene.”

Zhang Ye and Zhou Xiang, who had experienced battles, were very interested in the flintlock muskets of the Chinese Army, and they couldn't wait to ask Guo Huaiyi to have a look at these muskets.

Guo Huai squinted at Luo Quanxiu who was standing aside, then at Zeng Yue, seeing that they both nodded indifferently, he immediately called a soldier and asked him to hand over the flintlock gun to Jin Yiwei Qianhu Zhang Ye.

Zhang Ye and Zhou Xiang almost rushed to see the flintlock gun, but Guo Huai let them grope for the gun body for a while, and then took the gun away. Zhang Ye looked at the gun almost reluctantly. Flintlock, knowing that the other party will never give him the gun, otherwise he will definitely ask for it.

"It can be fired once in more than ten breaths, and the reload speed is twice as fast as that of the Jingshi Firearms Camp, no, at least three times," Zhou Xiang whispered to Zhang Ye: "I saw their bullets The projectiles are packaged together with the propellant, and the firing seems to be more stable than the newly made self-made firebirds made by the firearms battalion."

Zhang Ye also said in a low voice: "It's best to get a gun like this,..."

Zhou Xiang shook his head: "The firebird blunderbuss of the Jingshi Firearms Battalion was imitated according to their guns, but you know the level of the craftsmen in the Jingshi. If you pull the trigger ten times, it will be great if you can fire five times."

"How do you know this, oh, by the way, your brother-in-law is from the Jingshi Firearms Battalion, there is no way, it is rumored that the craftsmanship is excellent, and there is no one in the world that surpasses the Taiwanese pirates,"

……

At noon, the imperial envoys of the Ming Dynasty were stunned by the meals of the soldiers of the Chinese Army. At this time, the common people of the Ming Dynasty usually had two meals a day, and only three meals a day during the busy farming season. Among the Ming army, The generals will only let their own servants and private soldiers eat and drink enough, and it would be good if the rest of the soldiers are half-fed.

But the soldiers of the Chinese army here, everyone has the standard of food for the private soldiers of the generals of the Ming army, and the standard is not low. Only eggs, this standard of food is beyond the reach of ordinary small officials in the capital.

Moreover, the soldiers of the Chinese Army pay attention to discipline and efficiency when they eat: all the soldiers sit down without moving their hands or making a sound. Only when the officers give the order "start" do they pick up the chopsticks and start eating together. When the officers finish eating, they order to stand at attention. Regardless of whether the soldiers have finished their portion of the meal, they must stop immediately and stand at attention.

Therefore, the imperial envoys of the Ming Dynasty accompanied these soldiers to eat lunch together very depressedly, but as a result, everyone was not full.

In the afternoon, the First Battalion of the Second Regiment of the Fourth Division of the Chinese Army began normal training.

At this time, Zhang Ye, who originally thought it was too wasteful to provide such food every day, had to admit: According to the training level of the Chinese army, such food must be provided, otherwise the people would not be able to bear it.

The regular training content of the Chinese Army focuses on weapon training, physical fitness training, garrison training, and field training. Generally, the training is divided into sentry teams, running, shooting, and obstacle running, followed by shooting, bombing, and geotechnical training. In the homework training, all of them ran ten laps around the playground at the end, running for a total of about twenty miles, and then ended the day's training.

Whether it is civil officials like Xu Guangqi and Sheng Yihong, or military officials like Zhang Ye and Zhou Xiang, they are all intimidated by the amount of training, especially when Guo Huaiyi said: This kind of training has to be done every day, and it takes ten days. On a holiday, both Zhang Ye and Zhou Xiang gasped. They probably wouldn't be able to last even a day with such training.

"It's no wonder their food is so good, otherwise how can they train like this every day,"

"Excuse me, if it's windy and rainy, do you still have to train?" Zhou Xiang couldn't help asking.

Guo Huai raised his brows, apparently surprised by Zhou Xiang's question: "Of course, the weather is bad, so we don't want to fight. We sweat more in normal times and bleed less in war. The owner of the ship said: We train soldiers to fight well on the battlefield. Besides, training soldiers to exhaustion every day can also make them less troublesome. You are right, right?"

Zhang Ye and Zhou Xiang laughed wryly when they heard the words, and they discussed in private. They felt that if the soldiers of the Ming army practiced like this, they could also train a strong army. , For today's Ming army, it is necessary to completely overthrow and reform the entire system, so the two had no choice but to look up to the sky and sigh.

In the evening, the visitors, several senior officers and Zeng Yue ate together in the big cafeteria, accompanied by a whole battalion of soldiers from the Chinese Army. Luo Quanxiu ate the dinner very quickly. Eat it right away.

This dinner, the envoys of Ming Dynasty were not able to eat enough.

In the evening, before Xu Guangqi and others left the barracks, they discovered another thing that surprised them.

Groups of soldiers sat in the cafeteria, divided into several classes, and under the light of torches and oil lamps, they were taking literacy and arithmetic classes.

The teachers were some non-commissioned officers and officers of the Chinese Army, all of whom were very young, but all the soldiers of the Chinese Army were able to read and write. All the memorials to the imperial court had to be written by the staff.

"Do you have to be literate to be a soldier?" Zhou Xiang couldn't help it again, and asked Guo Huai, "What's the use of asking them to do arithmetic?"

Guo Huaiyi forcibly concealed his contempt and disdain, and said with a sneer: "Every soldier has the potential to become a general. Our army requires officers at all levels to write reports in person, and orders must also be filed in written form. At the same time, we The military discipline and military regulations of the army are all printed and issued to each soldier. They are illiterate, how can they still observe discipline? As for learning arithmetic, it is very simple: if you face the enemy, you can clearly calculate The range of the musket, or the ability to quickly count the number of enemies, then it will be easier to win the battle, right?"

Zhou Xiang grinned bitterly: "According to your standards, I, a veteran of more than ten years, can't be counted as a soldier at all,"

When the imperial envoys of the Ming Dynasty left the barracks, groups of soldiers of the Chinese Army sang songs to end their cultural studies and left the cafeteria. Their voices were loud and powerful, and they were full of confidence.