The Qing Dynasty

Chapter 74 Military Pay and Organization

Teng Yuzhao's "Five Kill Orders" was not only spoken in a cold tone, but also full of murderous intent.

Not only must rewards and punishments be clear in the army, but military discipline must also be strict. Without strict discipline, a hastily formed force like the Vanguard Army cannot become a strong and combat-ready army.

Afterwards, Li Yulin read out the military discipline of the Vanguard Army to the more than 7,000 new recruits and veterans in the audience, as well as the newly established pension and reward system for the Vanguard Army's fallen officers and soldiers and disabled soldiers.

The generous pension and reward system excited the hearts of more than 7,000 officers and soldiers. Even the instructors and students who had just arrived at the Kaiping Camp School opened their eyes wide. Many of them were already secretly thinking about how they could stay in the vanguard army in the future.

As for the overdue military pay, the Vanguard Army is not responsible for making up the payment. If anyone thinks this is unacceptable, he can quit the Vanguard Army now and ask for it himself. The Vanguard Army can only guarantee one thing, that is, the Vanguard Army will not default on military pay. Even if it is overdue for some time, the Vanguard Army will make up the payment in time.

The reason why Teng Yuzao specifically wanted Li Yulin to tell this was to reduce future troubles. He knew that not only the Green Camp and the Training Army were in arrears of wages, but also the Wuwei Army's wages were in arrears, it was just a matter of how much was owed.

As soon as this was said, it really caused a commotion among the Green Camp soldiers, but it soon died down because these Green Camp soldiers knew very well and knew how to do the math. As long as they could stay in the vanguard army, their unpaid wages would be repaid within a month.

If we insist on asking for it, not to mention whether we can get it back, there will no longer be any troops with such generous pay conditions as the Vanguard Army.

Li Yulin also gave a detailed explanation on the payment of the vanguard army’s salaries.

For all officers and soldiers below the rank of sentry, only half of the monthly salary is paid to them, and the rest is kept in the camp office, which then sends someone to deliver this half to the soldiers' homes every month.

This matter was personally presided over by Li Yulin, the general manager of the camp affairs office. Specifically, two committee members who were responsible for investigating the withholding of military pay were responsible for managing the distribution of the pay together with the people from the guard battalion.

In this regard, Teng Yuzao actually learned it from Yuan Shikai, who did the same thing in the Wuwei Right Army in order to prevent soldiers from gambling or spending their military pay on their own.

Although the Vanguard Army certainly prohibits gambling in the military, there are bound to be omissions. Teng Yuzhao is also taking precautions to nip it in the bud. Moreover, there is an advantage to doing so, which is that the Vanguard Army will get the support of their families and relatives.

I just don’t know whether Yuan Shikai had already started implementing this system in his Wuwei Right Army at this time.

Teng Yuzhao even thought that perhaps Yuan Shikai would learn from him in the future.

All of this, including the organization of the vanguard army, was discussed with his trusted officers last night after Teng Yuzhao led the entire army to Xigu overnight.

The current organization of the vanguard army is that each squad has twelve people, with one squad leader and one deputy squad leader;
Each platoon consists of four squads, with one platoon leader and one deputy platoon leader;
Each post consists of four infantry platoons and one fire support platoon. The fire support platoon is equipped with three Maxim heavy machine guns, a reconnaissance and communications squad and a cooking squad, one clerk and bugler, two medical workers, one chief sentry, two deputy chief sentries, and each chief and deputy chief sentry is equipped with a guard. There are a total of 284 people in the post.

The reason why Teng Yuzao set up four infantry platoons and one firepower platoon in the sentry post was to match the scale of a company of more than 200 people in the Western army of that era. He wanted to ensure that when his sentry faced a company of the Western powers, it would not only overwhelm the opponent in firepower, but also have an advantage in numbers. Teng Yuzao was now using the stupid method of using numbers and firepower to make up for the lack of combat experience.

There is no way. Training and combat experience both require time, and time is exactly what Teng Yuzhao lacks most right now.

Each battalion of the vanguard army is organized into three infantry sentries and one machine gun sentry. The machine gun sentry's artillery are all artillery pieces below 60 mm, generally equipped with four small-caliber artillery pieces and twelve Maxim heavy machine guns. There is also a reconnaissance platoon, a guard and communications platoon, a baggage platoon, and a cooking squad directly under the battalion headquarters, two staff officers, one clerk, three medical workers, two buglers, one captain, and two assistants. Each person is equipped with a guard, for a total of 1,312 people in the battalion.

The regiment has three infantry battalions and one artillery battalion, equipped with 18 75mm Krupp artillery pieces, as well as three baggage, guard and reconnaissance posts directly under the regiment headquarters, plus a communications platoon, a medical platoon, a cooking squad, three staff officers, two clerks, one regimental commander, two assistants, each with two guards, a total of 5,482 people.

However, Teng Yuzhao does not have so many qualified soldiers now. Liu Yuzhi's regiment now has only two battalions, with a platoon each for baggage, guards, reconnaissance, and communications, more than 2,800 people, and no artillery at all.

Although the vanguard army had enough artillery, Liu Changfa did not have enough people. His artillery regiment was still in intensive training, so there were no extra people to staff Liu Yuzhi's artillery battalion.

In addition, there is a temporary shortage of staff officers in each battalion and regiment. Both regiments have only one staff officer, and the vacancies will have to be filled by selecting students from the "Kaiping Camp School" later, which will have to be after this battle.

Regarding the camp and the establishment of staff, these were adjustments made by Teng Yuzhao based on actual conditions.

Infantry battalions in later generations only had a size of four or five hundred people, and a battalion commander and a deputy battalion commander were enough. But now his battalion had more than 1,300 people, which was exactly the size of a regiment in 20 or 30 years.

In addition, Teng Yuzhao actually wanted to make preparations in advance for the subsequent expansion of the troops. When the personnel and weapons are ready in the future, his battalion will be renamed a regiment, and officers will be given deputy positions as much as possible. Some positions will not only have one deputy, but two or three. This is also his consideration.

After a whole morning of personnel selection and troop organization, Li Xianzhe barely formed three understaffed battalions and ended with a strong smell of meat.

At this time, Master Qian, along with a group of the Governor-General Yu Lu's personal soldiers, arrived at the Xigu Vanguard Army camp with several heavy carts.

Master Qian came to deliver the money that Teng Yuzhao had asked for from Yu Lu. As Teng Yuzhao had won battle after battle, not only did Yu Lu feel relieved, but his pressure was also reduced a lot, so Yu Lu was not stingy with the money to give to the vanguard army.

This was especially true this time. Generally speaking, in order to stabilize the newly incorporated troops, some expression of gratitude had to be given, such as issuing appropriate rewards or making up for the wages owed to new personnel. These were all means of quickly stabilizing the morale of the army. Yu Lu knew very well that the officers and soldiers of the Green Camp were owed three months' wages.

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(End of this chapter)