Late Ming Dynasty: Special Forces in 1645

After capturing and looting the mountain stronghold, the assault team began to inventory the supplies.

When the top leader, the second leader, and their cronies fled, they had already taken all the money with them.

The amount of grain seized was less than the last time, only enough to feed these thousand people for seven or eight days.

For the captured bandits, interrogate them separately, and drag those with blood on their hands outright and behead them.

Those who have not committed serious crimes but are still useful should be incorporated into the new army, and the rest should be driven away.

In the end, 36 people met the requirements to be incorporated into the new army.

Li Chengming calculated that the last time he had seized 142 taels of silver and 37 strings of copper coins, and finally decided to use all of this money to buy grain.

This valley has a wide open terrain, and the ground is covered with gravel, making it unsuitable for growing crops, but suitable for training troops.

Therefore, Li Chengming decided to stay here for half a month and first conduct some simple military training on the young men he brought!

Managing these thousand people for just one day left the assault team members physically and mentally exhausted, and their morale severely damaged.

Language barriers, misinterpretation of orders, insubordination, poor discipline, and lack of initiative...

Often, an order had to be given to every individual and explained multiple times before it could be reluctantly carried out, which nearly drove Li Chengming and his comrades to the brink of collapse.

Today's defeat has made Li Chengming and his comrades no longer dare to underestimate this contemporary hero.

You laugh at Li Zicheng for not being able to control his subordinates, but Li Zicheng laughs at you for not being able to command a hundred men.

Therefore, Li Chengming no longer wanted to go through this kind of trouble every day and urgently needed to conduct military training for these people.

Regardless of combat effectiveness, at the very least, orders must be effectively communicated.

At night, Li Chengming drank a pot of turbid wine alone in a place far away from the campfire and the crowd.

"Captain, you seem quite interested." Commando Liang Zicheng walked over and sat down to the side.

Li Chengming smiled and said, "Yes, it's not easy to have this much free time, so let's make the most of it and enjoy it."

"Captain, do you have a plan for tomorrow's military training?"

Liang Zicheng reached for the wine pot, but Li Chengming slapped his hand away.

Li Chengming: "If you want to drink, go get some yourself. There's still plenty of wine in the warehouse."

Then he answered Liang Zicheng's question, saying, "Training soldiers is a science, and training soldiers of this era is an even greater science. I heard that the elite troops at the end of the Ming Dynasty all referred to Qi Jiguang's training methods when they were training their troops. Unfortunately, I don't know much about Qi Jiguang's training methods either."

Liang Zicheng felt a pang of regret upon hearing this, saying, "The sources of soldiers in ancient times are completely different from those in modern times. It would be best if we had ancient methods of training soldiers."

Li Chengming added, "Although I don't know Qi Jiguang's methods of training soldiers, I do know Yuan Shikai's methods. The source of soldiers for the Beiyang Army is not much different from that of soldiers in ancient times. Yuan Shikai's methods of training soldiers may be more suitable for us."

Let me organize my thoughts first, and then I'll call the other team members over for a meeting!

......

The next day, the commandos reiterated the issue of military organization:

Ten able-bodied young men form a class, with a class leader and a deputy class leader.

The three classes form a platoon, with a platoon leader and a deputy platoon leader.

The three platoons were formed into a company, with the assault team members temporarily serving as company commanders.

The 822 available soldiers were divided into eight companies, and the remaining children under the age of 14 were organized into two scout companies.

Li Chengming appointed himself as battalion commander and concurrently took charge of a company.

Then, an incentive mechanism was announced:

After half a month of training, the pay will be calculated, two taels of silver per month, recorded first and paid later!

Each person is given a fixed amount of food, three meals a day. If someone disobeys orders or fails to complete the training as planned, their food intake will be halved, or they may even be deprived of their right to eat and go hungry. If they perform well, they can get more extra food.

The most direct and effective incentive for these young and strong men is food distribution. They are all young and strong men, and seeing the white rice and the oily vegetables, everyone wants to eat more.

Instead, they didn't care much about the unattainable salary; they couldn't even see it yet. What mattered most was getting it into their hands and eating it.

After the teams were assigned to different units, each member of the assault team was responsible for training a company.

The first thing was training them to stand in formation and distinguish between front, back, left, and right. These two small tasks took a whole day.

The distinction between front, back, left, and right seems simple to modern people, but it was not easy in the late Ming Dynasty. First of all, many people did not know the concept of left and right, and then if you taught them, they would forget it as soon as they turned around.

When asked to turn left, they immediately descended into chaos, with some standing still while others turned left, right, and forwards.

The fact that he couldn't get it no matter how many times he was taught was a major headache for Li Chengming and his comrades.

Finally, Li Chengming instructed that a straw be tied to each person's right arm before slowly resolving the problem.

It took them two whole days to develop a conditioned reflex to distinguish left from right.

The training content for the first five days was monotonous, but also the most crucial. It involved distinguishing front from back, left from right, east from west, and then formations and drills. These are the most basic elements that test the training level of an army.

For the past five days, the training has focused solely on drills. The assault team members didn't find it unusual, as they were used to it, but their subordinates were starting to complain:

"Company commander, I joined the army to kill corrupt officials and Tartars. What's the point of training like this every day?"

"Yes, we didn't have this much trouble with the Da Shun army. They just gave us a spear to practice with, and when it came to battle, we just followed orders from above!"

"Company Commander, when are you going to teach us marksmanship and knife skills? Those are the real skills!"

"I don't want to train anymore. This training is tiring and useless. Why don't you just lead us out to fight a battle?"

Hearing numerous complaints, Li Cheng decided to summon all the new soldiers and give them a speech.

The blazing sun high in the sky was as hot and scorching as a fireball, making everyone sweat profusely.

Li Chengming and his assault team stood on a makeshift wooden platform, facing the new army, also enduring the scorching sun. However, each of the assault team members was tall and strong, with an upright posture.

Li Chengming and the assault team members stood motionless and silent like wooden stakes. Although the people below were not standing as upright and their formation was not as neat, no one dared to speak or move at this moment.

The crowd was unsure of what Li Chengming and his men were planning to do. They wanted to ask, but seeing that the company commanders were all standing, they swallowed their questions.

Although he was impatient, the power of example was strong. Seeing that the company commander was standing there with everyone in the sun, he could only grit his teeth and continue standing.

It wasn't until fifteen minutes later that Li Chengming began his address:

"Everyone did a great job. Some people asked me what the use of the training over the past five days was. Well, I'll tell you right now: this is the effect!"

Think back to five days ago, if I asked you to stand here, could you have kept quiet for even fifteen minutes?

Yes, you can't do it. You can't even do the most basic thing like keeping your mouths shut, let alone stand at attention for fifteen minutes under this scorching sun.

What do you think a powerful army is like? Is it one where everyone is incredibly strong, possesses extraordinary skills, and can take on ten opponents at once?

I'm telling you, that wasn't a powerful army!

A powerful army must be disciplined, obey orders without question, and be perfectly unified; these are the most basic requirements!

Even if you are strong on your own, can you defeat ten people?

If ten people exert their efforts in ten different places, they might be easily defeated by five people.

If ten people exert force in one direction, those ten people can easily defeat twenty people...

Li Chengming tried to use simple reasoning to make everyone understand that this kind of training is meaningful.

To make it easier for everyone to understand, he slowed down his speech and gave relatable examples.

After talking until his throat was dry, Li Chengming still didn't know if these people had actually listened to him or not.

But it wasn't without effect; finally, someone spoke up: "The battalion commander and his men feed us white rice every day, and they put so much oil in our stir-fries. If we still don't appreciate it, wouldn't we be animals?"

"Yes, yes, when we trained, the battalion commander and company commander trained with us and basked in the sun with us. I believe the battalion commander wouldn't lie to us!"

"I'm a rough guy, and I don't understand the grand principles the battalion commander talks about, but I remember how good the battalion commander and company commander are to me!"

Hearing the feedback below, Li Chengming felt like he wanted to vomit blood: He thought he had said something very simple and easy to understand, but you said you couldn't understand it?

But the result was good, and everyone expressed their willingness to accept this kind of training.

Therefore, Li Chengming decided to train the formations and drills for another five days!