Late Yuan Dynasty: I am the true emperor

Chapter 211: Reorganization

"Congratulations, Marshal, on your triumphant return!"

When Lu Jin returned to Luzhou, Li Shanchang immediately led a group of officials from the Marshal's Office to greet him, and everyone's face was filled with excitement.

Seeing this, Lu Jin immediately asked, "But what's the good news? It's just a triumphant return, I'm afraid it won't make you so happy, right?"

"The Marshal is really a master of strategy. A few days ago, a war report was sent from the south, saying that on the day the Marshal conquered Anqing, victory news also came from Dingyuan. The Dingyuan salt well that the Marshal had dug finally produced salt. There are 20 salt pots that work day and night, producing nearly 7,000 kilograms of salt every day. I heard that the output is still increasing."

When other people heard about this, they couldn't help but smile. The Dingyuan Salt Well had production, which meant that they had a stable source of funds to maintain the operation of the Marshal's Mansion. Their makeshift team would become more stable. This was definitely a huge happy event that was no less than winning a battle.

Lu Jin was stunned when he heard this. He had no doubt that there was salt underground in Dingyuan, but he was still surprised that a well could produce more than three tons a day.

The main reason is that Lu Jin had never paid attention to this industry before and did not know about the output of well salt. In fact, during the Sui and Tang Dynasties in history, a single well in Sichuan could produce more than three tons of salt. The tax from one well accounted for 20% of the total tax in Sichuan, which is also exaggerated.

By the Qing Dynasty, the most famous deep well in China, the Shenhai Well, which was over one thousand meters deep, could produce 14 tons per day. Compared with those salt wells, the Dingyuan well only produced a little over three tons per day, which is actually not that high.

But Lu Jin didn't know all this. He even thought that with such backward technology, producing three tons a day was actually quite a lot.

"Dingyuan has reported back, asking the Marshal to give the salt well a name." Li Shanchang reminded Lu Jin immediately when he saw him stunned.

Lu Jin immediately came to his senses and said speechlessly, "Why give a salt well a name? We are not just digging one well. We will dig hundreds of wells in the future. Do we need to give each one a name? Let's call it Luqiao No. 1 Well."

"Uh" Li Shanchang was speechless for a moment. Was this for the purpose of bestowing a name? It was just for the people below to please him and ask for a reward at the same time.

Of course, Lu Jin also understood this, so he immediately said, "But since we have dug a well, we should still give rewards. Sir, please see if there is any cloth in the treasury, and give the salt workers some cloth, iron pots, and cattle and sheep as rewards."

"Yes." Now that the salt wells have production, although the finances are not yet rich, there is at least a stable income, and Li Shanchang is willing to spend these rewards.

But he immediately suggested, "General, this is a memorial I wrote recently, please take a look at it."

"A memorial?" Lu Jin took it curiously. If it was an urgent matter, Li Shanchang should have sent someone to deliver it to the front line. Since it was not sent there, it was not an urgent matter. Sure enough, when Lu Jin opened it, he saw that it contained a memorial suggesting the issuance of salt permits.

Lu Jin only glanced at it, then closed the memorial and said, "Let's talk about it when we get back to the palace. We'll discuss the matter of Kaizhong later. The most urgent task is to reorganize the army. We've expanded the army a lot this time, and added a new defense zone in Anqing Road. We still need to adjust how to deploy the defense in the future."

"Yes." Li Shanchang became serious as soon as he heard it was about military affairs. Now it was time to conquer the world, and military affairs were the top priority.

So when they arrived at the Marshal's Mansion, Lu Jin first called Bao Yu and the newly recruited Yang Heng over and introduced them to Li Shanchang and others.

"This is Yang Heng, the former Zhaomo of Anqing Road. He surrendered to me this time and made great contributions to our army in recruiting the defenders of Susong to surrender. He will temporarily serve as the head of the Logistics Department of the Wuyuan, in charge of the transportation of the army's supplies."

"Thank you for the appointment, Marshal. I hope you will help me in the future."

"No problem." Bao Yu and Li Shanchang both bowed in greeting, but Li Shanchang immediately gave a reminder.

"General, the staff of the Liberal Arts Academy is complete, but the Armament Department and Military Education Department of the Martial Arts Academy are still vacant and no one has been appointed. I don't know why this is the case."

Lu Jin explained, "The Armament Department is for future preparations. In fact, the Armament Department should be responsible for the research and development of new weapons, such as artillery, firearms, armor, warships, etc. Who can take this position now? The Military Education Department is responsible for military propaganda, and there is no suitable candidate at the moment, so it can only be left vacant for the time being. It is better to have nothing than to have someone who is not qualified."

Li Shanchang nodded to show that he understood, and then he brought the topic to the point, "Then the Marshal said that the defense areas and organization would be adjusted this time. How will they be adjusted?"

Lu Jin asked Bao Yu to get the map and explained it to them.

"This is the adjustment I made on Anqing Road. Six regiments are now deployed on the southern line, organized into the 35th Army, which has two divisions, the 101st and 104th, with three regiments in each division. The defense area is Susong, Taihu, Leichi, Wangjiang, Qianshan, Anqing, and Tongcheng, which is the entire territory of the original Anqing Road.

"I want to adjust the troops in other places in the same way, divide their respective defense zones, and prepare for long-term garrison after crossing the river. This adjustment is also to prepare for the crossing of the river. We will form a river crossing corps in advance to strengthen targeted training and the preparation of equipment and supplies."

Yang Heng, who was listening nearby, thought to himself that it was just as expected. Lu Jin had no intention of attacking Jiangxi at this time, but was preparing to launch a full-scale attack on Jiangnan.

After hearing this, several people immediately became excited. Bao Yu asked, "If the commander wants to lead the troops across the river in person, who should be in charge of guarding Luzhou?"

Lu Jin said immediately, "I plan to transfer Zhao Yong's 11th Regiment to Lu'an, and transfer the 105nd Regiment in Lu'an back to Luzhou. Add a cavalry regiment, and make a total of three regiments to form the th Division. The defense area will be Lu'an, Luzhou, Shucheng, and Liangxian."

Although Yang Heng is new, he has roughly understood the current situation of the Shengwu Army in the past few days. The regiment is the basic tactical unit and the division is the battle unit. Every time a war is launched, there must be a commander-in-chief to lead several regiments and tens of thousands of people in battle, such as the four regiments that attacked Anqing this time.

However, according to the current situation, it seems that the one who will lead a separate route in the future will have to be at least a general at the level of a military commander. There are only a handful of such generals in the entire Shengwu Army, and they are all capable generals who can stand on their own.

He also knew about Yu Tingyu. He heard that he was from the Chaohu Navy and had the longest seniority. Although he did not have many military achievements, he was trusted by Lu Jin. There should be no problem in using him to guard Luzhou. However, it seemed inappropriate to leave a cavalry regiment behind as well.

Yang Heng had already obtained the organization chart of the Shengwu Army and knew that Lu Jin only had two cavalry regiments, one of which was with Lu Jin and was part of the imperial guards, and the other was in Haozhou to deal with the counterattack of the Yuan court. So when he heard that Lu Jin was going to incorporate a cavalry regiment into the 105th Division to guard Luzhou, Yang Heng immediately advised against it.

"General, our army currently only has two cavalry units. Is it inappropriate to leave such a powerful force in the rear area of ​​Luzhou?

"Besides, the Marshal just said that this is an adjustment for the future crossing of the river. Doesn't the Marshal need a cavalry to stay with him after crossing the river in the future?"

Of course, Lu Jin also knew this situation, and he explained immediately, "The cavalry regiment is staying in Luzhou to temporarily fill the organization. A division must have at least three regiments. Besides, although the 105th Division's defense zone only has four counties, it is very large. It also has to defend the pass in the Dabie Mountains and block Xu Song from going north. Only two regiments are not enough. If we can organize another infantry regiment before crossing the river, we can replace the cavalry regiment."

Yang Heng suddenly realized, "Since the Marshal has already made a plan, that's good. Although Jiangdong is full of rivers, it's better to have a cavalry than nothing."

Lu Jin nodded and continued.

"Then there is the Northern Route Army. I am going to organize a new 36th Army, which will have the 102nd and 106th Divisions under it. Each division will have three regiments, and the defense areas will be the four cities of Haozhou, Dingyuan, Lai'an, and Chuzhou.

“Although the Northern Army only has four cities, it has to face the Yuan army directly and also prepare for the future advance to Yangzhou Road, so it needs to deploy heavy troops.

"I plan to expand another regiment on the northern front. Liao Yongzhong will be promoted to the commander of the 18th Regiment. The remaining surrendered generals will be assigned to him and also assigned to the 36th Army. In this way, there will be six regiments on the northern front, namely the 5th, 7th, 10th, 14th, 18th, and 2nd Cavalry Regiment.

"Finally, the Eastern Front is organized into the 37th Army, which is composed of the 103rd and 107th Divisions. The 103rd Division has the 4th, 9th, and 13th Regiments, and the 107th Division has the 6th Regiment, the 1st and 2nd Marine Regiments. The defense area is Quanjiao, Wujiang, Hexian, Hanshan, Chaoxian, and Wuwei, a total of six counties."

Several people listened and took notes. Li Shanchang was not very good at military affairs. He just remembered that Yang Heng had just arrived. Although he knew the organization of the Shengwu Army, he was not familiar with the characteristics of the generals of each unit. So when Lu Jin finished talking about this adjustment, only Bao Yu could give his opinion.

"The reorganization of the north and east lines is good. There were some problems with the previous deployment of Lai'an and Chuzhou. Lai'an and Chuzhou are actually one entity. The two cities are less than 50 miles apart, but Lai'an was assigned to the north line and Chuzhou was assigned to the east line. The troops of the two cities belonged to two divisions, which was not conducive to coordinated operations. Now it is much better after this change.

“There is no problem with the division of forces. Each army has two divisions and six regiments, and the number of troops is similar. It’s just that the Marshal just said that this division is to prepare the troops for crossing the river.

"But with the Marshal's arrangement, each army has its own defense zone, and only the Marshal's Royal Guards have no defense mission. It can't be that there is only one regiment of the Marshal when we cross the river, right?"

"Of course not." Lu Jin shook his head and pointed at the map. "You can look at the defense zone of the 37th Army on the eastern front. After the Chuzhou defense zone was assigned to the northern front, the eastern front only had the cities from Quanjiao to Wuwei. Chaoxian and Hanshan were in the rear. The only two cities along the river that needed to be focused on were Hexian and Wuwei.

"Let the navy defend these two cities. When we cross the river, we can temporarily transfer a regiment from the north to Hezhou and a regiment from the south to Wuwei. This way, when we cross the river, we can free up all the troops on the east route to fight across the river.

"So, the army crossing the river has at least four regiments on the eastern front, plus my 10,000 imperial guards, nearly 30,000 people, who are capable of landing and fighting. The two naval regiments are mainly used to transport troops and provide support, and to fight against the Yuan Dynasty navy.

"Thirty thousand men, after crossing the river, we will first capture a city and gain a foothold. This will be enough. Once we have a firm foothold on the east bank, we can continue to expand the army, and then proceed step by step. We can transfer the new recruits back to the north bank for training and transfer the old troops to cross the river to attack."

Bao Yu studied the map and found that what Lu Jin said was really feasible. This was mainly due to the terrain on the eastern front. Even if the enemy wanted to attack, there were only two ports where they could go ashore. So as long as they defended Hexian and Wuwei, and then transferred two regiments from the north and south to temporarily strengthen the defense, that would be enough.

Moreover, the most important factor in the defense of the riverside defense line is not the infantry guarding the city, but whether the navy can fight. If the Yuan army's navy can be defeated in the river, then the cities along the river can be left empty. Can the enemy army swim across the Yangtze River to launch a landing battle?
In addition, based on the intelligence Bao Yu had, he knew that Lu Jin's first target after crossing the river would probably be Dangtu, and the garrison in Dangtu was probably around 30,000, and these 30,000 people were stationed in three directions. If Lu Jin concentrated all his efforts and attacked steadily one by one, it would not be impossible for him to take it down.

Bao Yu was the first to speak up, "Since the Marshal has made arrangements, then I have no problem. With 30,000 elite troops, it shouldn't be difficult to capture a foothold."

Li Shanchang also said, "If the commander-in-chief has decided that the number of troops to cross the river is 30,000, then we must start preparing supplies, food, wages, weapons, armor, and ships from now on."

Lu Jin nodded, "Then let's start preparing. There is one more thing that we need to do during this reorganization."

"What's the matter?" the three of them asked curiously.

"Let's also introduce the military rank system to facilitate future military expansion, promotions and command." Lu Jin said immediately.

"Military rank?"

"Yes, it is the rank of military officers. But it is somewhat different from the Nine-Rank System for civil officials. This is what I wrote before. You can take a look." Lu Jin took out a list of military ranks and the three of them immediately passed it around to look at it.

I saw that the military officer ranks were divided into five categories. The lowest level was called non-commissioned officers. Above the non-commissioned officers were officers, which were divided into three levels: lieutenant, colonel, and general. Each of these three levels of officers was further divided into four levels: junior, middle, senior, and major. These three levels added up to a total of 12 levels.

Above the general level, there is the rank of marshal, which is divided into three levels: junior marshal, section marshal, and marshal, which add up to 15 levels.

Also written below are descriptions of the ranks at each level and the authority granted.

The squad leader is a non-commissioned officer, the company and platoon leaders are at the lieutenant level, the battalion, regiment and brigade are at the colonel level, the division, army and group army are at the general level, and the field level is at the marshal level.

However, according to the current organization and strength, if a division has three regiments, then the division will have a strength of about 14,000 people. If an army has two to three divisions, that would be 30,000 to 50,000 people, and the army group would have 150,000 people.

In this era, if we fought a war to annihilate a country, if we didn't count the civilians who transported food, and only counted the combat soldiers, it would probably be a maximum of 150,000.

A front army, later called a group army in the West, is also called a field army in China. A field army must have at least two group armies, which means at least 300,000 soldiers. Only such a large force is worthy of the rank of general. However, Lu Jin estimated that he would not be able to use it within two hundred years because there would be no such strong opponents.
(End of this chapter)