Girls und War

Feng Zheng nodded and spoke clearly, "The competition is indeed divided into individual and team events, and the two are incompatible. So we generally prioritize individual events."

"In other words, those who qualify for the individual competition cannot participate in the team competition. This is because the two competitions are held simultaneously."

506. Details of the Sniper Competition

"Perhaps from the perspective of the military's top brass, group honor is more important than individual honor.

"But from the perspective of individual soldiers, the amount of honors we earn is the key to success in the military. Therefore, the individual competitions in the annual competitions are the most intense and prestigious.

"The quality of team competitions is often affected by the lack of elite players and the lack of spectator enthusiasm – resulting in them being less exciting and popular than the previous ones."

Feng Kite made this opening statement, took a sip of water, and then added, "Of course, because there aren't many elite elites, the team competition places greater emphasis on the overall strength of the battle zone. Small battle zones with insufficient strength can't even muster a team, let alone win medals."

Xia Shu nodded in agreement.

It is for this reason that all the major awards in the team competition every year are almost all swept by the four major war zones.

Because their overall war zone strength is stronger than other war zones.

Feng Kite continued, "I won't go into detail about the team events, like the three-person battlefield competition, the five-person battlefield competition, the squad capture the flag competition, the squadron city competition, and so on. Snipers are also needed in these areas, but if you don't participate, there's no point in talking about it."

"Let me start with the sniper competition."

Feng Zheng seemed to be accustomed to sitting in the position of the school's chief trainer. Once he started the teaching mode, he could not stop talking.

Xia Shu listened attentively, so he didn't interrupt her at all.

"Let's not talk about the differences between individual soldiers in the hot weapons battlefield. Speaking of individual competitions, almost all arms have two modes of competition: one is skill competition, and the other is field competition.

"Skills competition can be simply understood as the mastery of each soldier's basic abilities. This competition encompasses a wide range of subjects, most of which are fair competitions with defined rules. Examples include snipers' various target shooting techniques, medics' casualty management skills, and demolitionists' bomb disposal techniques.

"The field competition is more complicated. Due to the different battlefield positions of each type of military, the combat methods and scoring results are also different. I don't know much about the other types of military, so I can only watch and can't say much about them. Let's just talk about the sniper field competition - how well do you know the rules of this competition?"

After Feng Kite asked Natsuki this question, Natsuki thought for a moment before answering, "A lot of people are having a battle royale-style competition in one area?"

Feng Kite nodded and said, "That's about it. It's also worth mentioning that this competition accounts for a very high proportion of the ranking points, almost half. It also has the highest viewership of all the competitions."

"Because physical confrontation is so important, we'll discuss that later. For now, let me explain the skill confrontation items to you.

"Sniper skill confrontation can generally be divided into three categories: dynamic, silent, and precise shooting.

"You don't need me to teach you specific sniper skills. What I want to teach you are various reference techniques."

Feng Zheng said as he called out his lesson plan from the panel and presented a detailed classification of the assessment items in front of Xia Shu.

He pointed at them one by one and said:

Dynamic confrontation refers to the various techniques used by snipers to move on the battlefield. The confrontation events include individual triathlons, concealed armed cross-country, four extreme sports, and rapid infiltration.

Silent confrontation refers to various techniques used by snipers to conceal themselves on the battlefield. The confrontation events include silent battlefield passage, rapid concealment, and patience competition.

"Precision shooting confrontation—no need to explain this, you're definitely familiar with it. The confrontation includes multi-gun shooting, complex environment sniping, moving target sniping, and ultra-long-range sniping.

"I'll send you the information on these competitions later. Please take a closer look. After you've read the information, I'll explain the techniques for each subject in detail."

As he spoke, he passed the information in the lesson plan to Xia Shu.

After Xia Shu had fully received the information, Feng Zheng picked up his pipe again and continued to speak while smoking. "A skill competition is ultimately a fair competition of strength. No matter what, lack of strength is lack of strength, and you can't blame others for not getting a ranking. In comparison, a field competition requires some luck and special skills."

"Natsuki, what do you think is the best way to achieve a good ranking in a field competition?"

Xia Shu thought for a moment and said, "In a battle royale, of course the longer you survive, the better. The last person standing gets the most points, right?"

"That's right." Feng Zheng nodded, puffing on his cigarette and speaking slowly, "A field competition is nothing more than dropping a hundred soldiers into a restricted map and letting them fight it out to determine a single winner.

“But there are more ways to get ahead in the standings than just ranking up.

"Actually, we can understand this as any action taken during a match earning a certain amount of points. It's just that some actions earn more points, while others earn fewer."

"Any action?" Xia Shu seemed to not understand the meaning of this sentence.

"Yes, any action." Feng Kite said calmly, "Such as killing an enemy, setting an ambush in an area, tracking a target, or setting a trap.

"As long as your actions are legitimate and necessary for a sniper, you will definitely get extra points."

Xia Shu thought about it and quickly understood what Feng Zheng meant.

"In other words, we should treat the competition as a real battlefield, right?" she asked Feng Zheng.

Feng Zheng nodded and continued, "The competition map is different every year, and before the official competition, the venue will give you the map so that you can familiarize yourself with it in advance.

"So I'm not going to teach you a specific move. I'm going to teach you some tricks to score.

"Okay, I'll stop here for now. If you have any questions, ask them now."

After Feng Zheng finished speaking, Xia Shu did not rush to ask questions.

Instead, he carefully looked at the subjects of the competition, and then sorted out the questions and asked them all at once.

Feng Zheng really likes Xia Shu's attitude towards learning and answers all of Xia Shu's questions.

After answering almost all the questions, Xia Shu asked Feng Zheng, "When you were the chief trainer at the Sniper Academy, did you teach your students this way?"

When Feng Zheng heard this, a look of nostalgia appeared in his eyes.

She sighed and said, "That's right."

But soon, he added in a bleak tone, "But by now, the Sniper Academy no longer exists..."

507. The Survival and Demise of the Sniper Academy

Xia Shu had also heard something about what Feng Zheng said, that the Sniper Academy no longer existed.

It is said that decades ago, there was a period of time when hand-to-hand combat was popular on the imaginary battlefield.

Close combat between squadrons was basically the norm, and a large number of ace-level ruthless people were born and fell during this period.

There are soldiers from all branches of the military.

At that time, military academies in various war zones began to spring up like mushrooms after rain, with a large number of combat academies for various arms being opened. Not only non-commissioned officers, but also many officers would attend the academies to learn the combat techniques of various arms.

But this period did not last long. After just a dozen years, the once prosperous military academies suddenly declined and disappeared without a trace.

It seemed as if the frenzied fighting trend of that period was just a fleeting image in a dream.

Xia Shu didn't know what happened during this period, which caused the academy-style skills learning to come and go in a hurry.

She was slightly interested in the inside story, so she asked Feng Zheng with a curious look on her face, "So, why was the Sniper Academy canceled?"

Feng Zheng sighed, looked at Xia Shu, and said, "It's okay to tell you. But you heard it today, so don't talk about it when you return to the squadron. Understand?"

Xia Shu nodded. She understood that the secret should not be passed on to the sixth ear.

Feng Zheng smoked a cigarette and explained to her the mystery of the survival of the Combat Academy.

“Speaking of the Sniper Academy, and the birth of other arms academies, we have to talk about the hot weapons battlefield combat style of the time.

"Back then, the number of soldiers on the battlefield was much greater than it is today, almost double the number. A soldier's life wasn't as valuable as it is today. Furthermore, because of the dense concentration of troops, the combat systems of each company were fanatical and disorganized.

"There were indeed top aces in each branch of the military, and their rankings were similar to today's. It's just that they all learned their combat skills through niche instruction—roughly speaking, after an ace retires, he'll take on several newcomers, a bit like a master teaching his apprentices.

"So overall, the soldiers' professionalism is low, and their tactical theories are superficial. Girls are also unwilling to spend a lot of time learning tactical skills that will be useless after retirement."

"Until someone shows up."

Feng Kite put on a serious expression and said a name, "Nidalee Barton."

"This Lieutenant General from the Eagle District, upon taking office, vigorously implemented her NCO military reform plan. She recruited retired NCOs and re-enlisted them in military academies. She also established various branch academies dedicated to teaching each branch of the military.

"Especially the Sniper Academy."

Feng Zheng emphasized this and continued, "So, for a period of time afterwards, the snipers in the Eagle Zone practically drove the other zones into hiding. More than half of the top ten snipers were in the Eagle Zone.

"At this time, in order to counter the Eagle District's dominance on the imaginary battlefield, we also opened academies for each branch of the military. I wasn't the first academy sergeant major, but I was the last."

Feng Zheng's mouth was dry after talking so much, so he picked up the cup and took a big sip of tea.

After hearing this, Xia Shu sorted out his understanding and then asked, "Why was the college establishment later abolished?"

"You know," Feng Kite spread his hands, "why do most of your training camps for the training team only last a week? Can't it be longer?"

Natsuki shook his head.

Feng Kite smiled and explained, "It's obvious that a week of training won't teach you any professional skills. The training team only teaches you some very superficial and simple knowledge. It's not very profound."

“So if you want to go further on the path of becoming a non-commissioned officer in this profession, you need to have incredible savvy and unwavering perseverance.

"But what if we trained soldiers in a systematic and comprehensive way, like at a military academy? Instead of a master teaching apprentices, we had a professional soldiers factory that mass-produced professional soldiers. What would the result be?"

Feng Kite knocked on the table and uttered two words, "Massacre."

Xia Shu's pupils constricted slightly.

Feng Kite continued, "When professional soldiers from the NCO Academy face ordinary combat troops who haven't received professional training, it's pure slaughter.

"Three snipers who have trained for six months can easily wipe out an entire ordinary defensive squadron. An entire one.

"Under such crushing combat and frenzied academic competition, the entire imaginary battlefield lost hundreds of thousands of manpower in just six years.

"For ordinary soldiers who haven't attended the academy, the imaginary battlefield is hell, a living hell. The major war zones will try every possible means to nail down the battle lines, then use the harsh terrain that armored units cannot enter to engage in a millstone-like attrition campaign. Do you understand? Millstone-like.

"If we don't engage in combat, the entire logistics unit will face endless harassment. Those professional soldiers will suck at your heels like leeches, torturing the entire front battlefield to the point of collapse. But if we engage in combat, we will be filling it with blood and flesh, letting soldiers bite each other like fighting dogs.

"Can we afford such damage?"

Feng Kite paused here and changed the tube of e-liquid.

Xia Shu understood very well the difficulties they faced.

Unlike the human population in the true industrial age, the proportion of people here who can join the army is only a very small part of the population.

If it were a real modern war, tens or even millions of people might be lost in one battle.

The casualties in the Battle of Okinawa were 110,000, the casualties in the Normandy Landing were 550,000, the casualties in the Battle of Leningrad were over 1 million, and the casualties in the Battle of Stalingrad were as high as 1.8 million.

If they die this way, which war zone can withstand it?

"Such casualties are meaningless," Feng Kite said with a frown. "Aside from creating a bunch of war machines for society, it has no purpose. This goes against the original purpose of establishing the Imaginary Battlefield."

"The teaching goal of military academies should be to train a group of battlefield commanders with strategic vision, rather than to create a group of killing machines who only know how to kill."

Xia Shu nodded and continued, "So the Sniper Academy was later cancelled?"

"What else could we do? In the end, girls of military age were no longer willing to join the army! At that time, the total number of soldiers enlisting in the Flower District throughout the entire year was less than 100!" Feng Zheng smiled sarcastically and continued, "Nidalee Barton thought she had implemented her military reform plan and restored the soldiers' wildness. Unexpectedly, this result was exactly what humans didn't want to see.

"After all, once war machines are freed from restrictions, they are no longer something mere humans can control."

508. My Little Thing with Primary School Students

"So, the Sniper Academy just disappeared into the vast river of history?"

After listening to Feng Zheng's historical story about the imaginary battlefield, Xia Shu immediately asked a summary question.

Feng Zheng smiled, touched his pipe, and said with a sigh, "It's not completely gone. The various non-commissioned officer academies are still there, and they still exist as the superior departments of the various training teams.

"It's just that these academies no longer have their original purpose. Their only purpose now is to help the training team formulate training plans."

Xia Shu nodded and asked, "What happened to Nidalee Barton?"

"Her..." Feng Zheng said with a hint of disdain, "It seems that after she was promoted to the rank of general, she was retired from active service early."

When Xia Shu heard this, he felt quite sad.

I believe that when the general came up with his reform plan, he was in high spirits and full of confidence.

However, her reform plan was ultimately proven to be useless by the imaginary battlefield.

No, it can't be said to be completely useless. It's just that in today's social situation, overemphasizing the combat capabilities of individual soldiers does not fit well with the modern combat system.

If she had spoken out in the ancient times after the Industrial Revolution, she might have received greater praise.

All I can say is that I was born at the wrong time.

"Of course, the military doesn't mean that soldiers should just eat and wait for death." Feng Zheng continued with a smile, "It's just that overemphasizing the abilities of individual soldiers, and even implementing systematic training arrangements for this, seems to be missing the point.

"I think the idea of ​​this generation of the Generals' Council should be to establish those talented geniuses who can reach heights that ordinary people cannot reach, and use them as role models for joining the army. This will help young people gain greater enthusiasm for joining the army.