Chapter 242 Salary Cut

In recent days, Wang Yingkai has been in a bad mood. In the face of the increasingly chaotic situation in China, he feels more and more powerless to control.

Zhao Dongyun in the east was coveted and was ready to show his teeth to seize the presidency at any time. After Duan Qirui in the south led his army to the south into the two rivers, his strength increased significantly. In just half a year, he expanded a so-called fourth division supplementary brigade, and he also collected many remnants of the Southern Federation. The 'Two River Army' of two brigades has been compiled.

It's okay to have people. What's more important is that Duan Qirui took advantage of the large amount of money looted in Beijing and the large amount of money collected after going south to Jiangsu and Anhui to buy arms.

Wang Yingkai is convinced that in the past six months, Duan Qirui has purchased at least tens of thousands of rifles from Zhao Dongyun, millions of which are arrogant. As for the number of weapons purchased from foreign countries, I don't know how many, and Duan Qirui has also captured a large number of ordnances of southern federal troops in the south.

It can be said that after Duan Qirui went south to the two rivers, although he went through several wars, his troops fought more and more and more ordnances. He even learned from the British minister that Duan Qirui actually ordered more than 60 artillery and 20,000 second-hand Type 88 rifles from the German Foreign Bank.

All this shows that Duan Qirui's strength has rapidly expanded to threaten Wang Yingkai in less than half a year after going south.

Every time I think about it. Wang Yingkai regretted letting Duan Qirui go south and also went south to fight, but Wang Shizhen's development speed is far less than Duan Qirui's. Now Wang Shizhen controls southern Henan and northern Hubei, but most of the money seized has to be used to maintain the current troop size, and the remaining money is just Wang Shizhen. It's just a brigade, but Duan Qirui, taking advantage of the prosperity of the south of the Yangtze River, has begun to double.

However, regret is useless. Now Wang Yingkai's first task is no longer to eliminate the so-called Southern Federal Empire, but to weaken Duan Qirui to a certain extent. If you want to weaken Duan Qirui, the best thing is to weaken the territory actually controlled by Duan Qirui.

In this case, with Zhao Dongyun's acquiescence, Wang Yingkai did not hesitate to take measures. Through the cabinet, he directly appointed Zhang Huaizhi as the governor of Anhui. At the same time, he also sent a secret telegram to Zhang Huaizhi, asking Zhang Huaizhi to suspend the southern offensive to delay Duan Qirui's south of the south of the Yangtze River.

Zhang Huaizhi is also a subordinate of Wang Yingkai. Although he was estranged from Wang Yingkai last year, he later fell to Wang Yingkai and became a collateral force under Wang Yingkai like Wang Ruxian. Therefore, when Wang Yingkai gave him the territory of Anhui, although it was impossible for him to work on Wang Yingkai in a day. He died, but he still obeyed Wang Yingkai's request to postpone his attack to the south.

After all, it is not good for him to take the initiative to go south to help Duan Qirui take down the rest of the two rivers!

However, this matter has a great impact on Duan Qirui!

"Good fat man, he has only turned against him in half a year!" After Duan Qirui learned that Wang Yingkai bypassed him and directly appointed Zhang Huaizhi as the governor of Anhui, it was naturally unbearable.

However, under this big situation, Duan Qirui also knows that Wang Yingkai can turn against him, but Duan Qirui can't turn against Wang Yingkai now.

For the current Duan Qirui, the most important thing is not to compete with Wang Yingkai for power and profit. Now his top priority is to cross the Yangtze River, go south to the south of the Yangtze River, and then control southern Jiangsu, Zhejiang and even Jiangxi. Only after controlling these places can he have the confidence to turn against Wang Yingkai!

"And Zhao Ziyang, who was beaten to death with Wang Fatty in front of him, and now he is wearing the same pair of trousers in a blink of an eye!" Duan Qirui was also extremely dissatisfied with Zhao Dongyun's performance in this matter, but he knew better that he could only scold him.

There is no other reason, because he still relies more on the arms sold to him by Zhao Dongyun. If he falls out with Zhao Dongyun, although the source of arms will not be cut off, it will inevitably cost more money to buy imported goods. At this moment, it is still necessary to save money.

Wang Yingkai's simple appointment may be nothing to outsiders, but it can be clearly found in the eyes of people that the fragile alliance of the four northern warlords is about to collapse again.

In the face of the competition between Wang Yingkai and Duan Qirui, Zhao Dongyun acted quite realistically. He put on a posture of watching the play. First of all, he acquiesced in Wang Yingkai's appointment of Zhang Huaizhi as the governor of Anhui. Of course, in exchange for Zhao Dongyun's acquiescence, Wang Yingkai promised to reduce the number of troops stationed in Ninghe County, Ji County and Baodi on the front line of Tangshan. .

After Zhao Dongyun and Wang Yingkai reached the Tianjin agreement last year, Zhao Dongyun could only station no more than 5,000 troops in the Tangshan area and no more than 5,000 in Chengde area. However, the corresponding one is that Wang Yingkai, with Beijing as the core, deployed more than 30,000 troops around the two key points of Tangshan and Chengde.

Wang Yingkai's three direct forces: the 1st Division, the 7th Division and the 1st Mixed Brigade are almost all deployed around this line. If Wang Yingkai and Zhao Dongyun break out a war, the troops of more than 30,000 can immediately attack Tangshan. In this way, the two mixed brigades of Fengjun in the customs are under great pressure.

It can be seen from the strategy of the Feng army in the Guannei area that if the war breaks out, what the fifth mixed brigade and the seventh mixed brigade have to do is to "hold" and wait for the third division of the main force of the Feng army deployed in Shanhaiguan and the first cavalry brigade to advance west for reinforcements.

This time, in exchange for Zhao Dongyun's plan not to weaken Duan Qirui, Wang Yingkai promised that the garrison on the front line of Tangshan and Chengde would not exceed 15,000.

Although for Wang Yingkai, if a war breaks out between the two sides, he can still quickly increase troops from the Beijing Division to the front line, and more than 15,000 troops on the front line are enough to stop the existing 10,000 troops of the Feng army in Guan, and there will not be too many problems. The most important function of this commitment is that Wang Yingkai gave up the opportunity to attack Tangshan on a large scale.

For Zhao Dongyun, this move can undoubtedly greatly guarantee the security of the Guan area, especially Tangshan, thus winning more time for the reinforcement troops.

With the conclusion of this private garrison agreement, Zhao Dongyun sat and watched Wang Yingkai and Duan Qirui fight in secret, while on the other hand, he had a great sense of crisis. He deeply felt that the speed of military expansion was still insufficient.

Seeing Wang Yingkai getting two infantry divisions, and Duan Qirui greatly expanded his army in the south, who finally knew that they would have hundreds of thousands of troops.

However, now that raising the army is so expensive, it is very difficult for Zhao Dongyun to raise the existing three divisions and five brigades. It is very difficult to expand a new division this year. It is obviously unrealistic to continue to expand the army.

In this case, Zhao Dongyun has to consider some other methods!

First of all, the salary of the army. At present, the salary standard adopted by the army is still a high salary in the era of recruitment. The basic monthly salary of a second-class soldier is four or five yuan. In peacetime, food, clothing and other expenses are deducted from the salary and paid in full in wartime. In order to improve the physical fitness of soldiers, Zhao Dongyun paid monthly on this basis. One or two silver meal allowance, which is impossible for soldiers to get, but together, the monthly salary of a second-class soldier is actually five or five yuan. This salary is quite high compared to the income of ordinary people in contemporary China.

However, it is no longer the pre-Qing era. Zhao Dongyun also heard that several other Beiyang warlords have successively reduced the salary expenses of personnel. For example, Wu Fengling, who lacks financial resources, is rumored to have cancelled the so-called allocation fee, that is to say, even when fighting, the food expenses of soldiers have to be paid from their own money. In addition to the second division's monthly pay, other newly recruited troops are often paid half-reaves.

Even if he moved into Jiangsu, Duan Qirui, who has plundered a lot of money, often owes money to his subordinates, especially the newly expanded troops.

As for the Southern Federation, not to mention, many of them only pay a few yuan for the family money, but the military pay is more chaotic. Some troops completely rely on themselves for private looting.

This kind of looting has begun to happen even in the well-disciplined Beiyang army. After all, the army is not paid, and the army eats and fights. Therefore, the senior chief officers of the army often turn a blind eye to the looting of the army. Many people even think that this can not only solve the military expenditure. The lack of problems, and it can also improve the morale of the army...

Compared with the troops of other warlords in China, Zhao Dongyun's troops are in peacetime, and Zhao Dongyun has always insisted on continuing to pay full military pay in order to build elite soldiers, which undoubtedly has also caused a significant financial burden to the three eastern provinces.

In this case, Zhao Dongyun also had to consider lowering the standard of military pay!

"Remember that in the future, the food and clothing of all military officers and soldiers, regardless of peace and wartime, will be borne by the Military Supply Department, and the soldiers' pay will not be deducted!" Zhao Dongyun continued to say to Zhao Dongping thoughtfully, "The officer will bear his own responsibility as usual!"

"In the future, all soldiers's will be sent with 'Fengyuan', with a tentative set of four yuan for second-class soldiers and five yuan for first-class soldiers. The full payment will be paid without any deduction!" Zhao Dongyun continued: "All officers will be issued 80% according to the existing standards!"

When Zhao Dongyun said this, Zhao Dongping beside him looked worried: "I'm afraid there will be trouble next!"

Zhao Dongyun didn't care: "If there is anyone who doesn't want to, directly order him to retire, and the troubler will be shot on the spot!"

Zhao Dongyun actually doesn't care about the departure of those low-level soldiers. In this era, even if he doesn't pay a cent of military pay, as long as he is full, a large group of farmers' children will come to join the army and do is just to eat. Otherwise, you think Duan Qirui and Why doesn't the Southern Federation pay much, but why are there so many people coming to join the army? Because these days, soldiers can have enough to eat. Well, under normal circumstances, they eat better than ordinary small landlords.

There are more rural children who want to be soldiers these days. After two months of Zhao Dongyun, he can train tens of thousands of cheap cannon fodder soldiers.