The Qing Dynasty

Chapter 174 Emergency Military Information

Half a month later, in Tianjin city, at night, in the vanguard army camp.

"Teacher! Teacher! Wake up, there is an emergency!"

Amidst a series of hurried knocks on the door and calls, Teng Yuzhao, who had just fallen asleep, suddenly sat up from the bed.

As Teng Yuzhao sat up, he already tightly grasped the Browning pistol that he had pressed under the pillow in his right hand.

The pistol would load immediately if it was rubbed against his thigh.

In the darkness, Teng Yuzhao tried hard to open his sleepy eyes, listening to Wu Peifu's hurried calls outside. With the faint moonlight filtering into the room through the gauze curtains, Teng Yuzhao quickly glanced at the watch on his wrist. The time was just after 11:00 a.m.

It was so late, and Wu Peifu was calling out to him. This must be important military intelligence.

Teng Yuzhao took a deep breath, steadying his heart which was beating too fast due to being suddenly awakened. He responded, jumped off the bed, walked quickly to the door and pulled the bolt.

Outside the door, there was not only Wu Peifu, but behind him, Wei Jinghai was standing there with an anxious look on his face.

"Ningbo, you need to stay calm when facing a big event. This is a quality you must have as a chief of staff. Come in and tell me!"

Teng Yuzao said with a smile while trying to control his emotions.

Teng Yuzhao moved aside, and before Wei Jinghai came in, Wu Peifu had already squeezed into the room. When Wei Jinghai walked in quickly and had not yet opened his mouth, a flash of light appeared in the room.

Wu Peifu, who was familiar with the process, quickly struck a match and lit the candle on the table.

"grown ups."

Although Teng Yuzhao reminded him, Wei Jinghai still couldn't calm down completely. As soon as he stood firm, he hurriedly reported the military situation to Teng Yuzhao.

"Just now the investigators reported"

Wei Jinghai and almost all the people in the Vanguard Army except Teng Yuzao were still accustomed to calling investigation personnel "spies". However, when they heard Teng Yuzao call "investigators" whenever he mentioned spies, the officers of the Vanguard Army were already trying to change their own habits.

"The foreign devils in the concession have set out, but they are not heading for Tianjin City. They are heading north along the east bank of the Baihe River, probably heading for the Sanchahekou Naval Camp Artillery Fort and Ma Yukun's Left Army."

Teng Yuzhao took the two cups of herbal tea handed to him by Wu Peifu and gave one to Wei Jinghai. He tilted his head back and drank the other cup in one gulp.

"How many people are there in the coalition forces?"

Wei Jinghai also hurriedly took a big sip of the herbal tea. The cool and bitter tea refreshed him. While handing the empty teacup in his hand to Wu Peifu, he took a deep breath and said.

"The visibility is poor at night. The scouts reported that there are quite a lot of foreign devils, definitely more than 3,000 of them, and they are dragging four cannons."

"finally come."

Teng Yuzhao muttered to himself that he had been waiting for this day for half a month.

Teng Yuzhao remembered that the coalition forces launched a general attack on Tianjin City by first defeating Ma Yukun's left army and occupying the Navy Camp.

He even remembered that in history, it took only a very short time to defeat Ma Yukun's thousands of left-wing troops, because strictly speaking, the left-wing troops were not defeated, but retreated on their own initiative, or fled to avoid the battle. In this battle, the coalition forces should have dispatched 2600 Russian troops commanded by the temporary commander of the coalition forces, the Russian naval commander Alexeev, and two German companies and one French company as reserves, with a total strength of about 1 people. This coalition force attacked the Sanchahekou Naval Camp Fort and Ma Yukun's 3300-strong troops north of Tianjin City along the east bank of the Baihe River.

"Notify Yuxuan, Kangnian, Xuanqing, the two captains of the assault brigade, Captain Liu of the artillery regiment, Captain Pan of the independent detachment, and Chief of Staff Li to come to the meeting."

As Teng Yuzhao spoke, he turned around to get his military cap.

"I've already notified you. The meeting will start in the conference room in fifteen minutes."

The above-mentioned people will be summoned to all military meetings recently. Wei Jinghai understands very well that Teng Yuzao wants these people to familiarize themselves with military affairs and modern combat concepts as soon as possible. Regardless of whether these people are involved or not, Teng Yuzao will call them together.

Half a month ago, after the Governor's Office decided to assign Pan Jinshan's troops and Hu Dianjia's five rear battalions to the vanguard army, at noon that day, Hu Dianjia and Pan Jinshan brought their troops to Beiguan to be reorganized by Teng Yuzhao.

These two men not only brought their own troops, but also brought many people from other groups of the Wuwei Vanguard Army.

In particular, he learned that the vanguard army only valued officers from the Military Academy and the Camp Academy, and many low-ranking officers from these two academies in the Wuwei Front Army secretly followed Hu Dianjia.

Pan Jinshan did not just bring the remnants of his battalion with him. He also brought many soldiers from Song Zhanbiao's battalion who had followed Nie Shicheng and died in Balitai, as well as officers and soldiers from several battalions and outposts including Fan Zhenxian, totaling more than 1,300 people.

Originally, according to the people brought by Pan Jinshan, they could be organized into a battalion and directly added to one or two regiments. However, after repeated considerations, Teng Yuzhao decided to imitate the model of the assault brigade and organize the troops assigned to Pan Jinshan into a separate unit, with the number "Independent Detachment of the Vanguard Army".

Of course, the troops of the Third Regiment and the Independent Detachment were not their original troops, but were mixed with the First and Second Regiments. Even the captains and sentries were exchanged. These were all firmly requested by Hu Dianjia, who was familiar with the internal situation of the Vanguard Army.
It was not Teng Yuzhao's request for Hu Dianjia's unit to accept the mixed organization. On the contrary, Teng Yuzhao initially wanted Hu Dianjia's unit to form a separate third regiment, but Hu Dianjia strongly opposed it.

In fact, Teng Yuzao did not want to have a relatively complete "foreign army" in the vanguard army. Since Hu Dianjia insisted, he went with the flow and agreed to Hu Dianjia's request.

Since Hu Dianjia graduated from the Beiyang Military Academy, he had always promoted students from the Beiyang Military Academy and the Front Army School. All the captains and sentries under his command were graduates of these two academies, and even most of the platoon leaders were students. This saved Teng Yuzhao a lot of trouble.

After obtaining Hu Dianjia's opinion, Teng Yuzhao organized Hu Dianjia's troops of more than 3,800 into four small battalions, and his artillery team into an artillery battalion with only one company. This was also the first of the three regiments of the Vanguard Army to have its own artillery battalion, and its number was the Third Regiment of the Vanguard Army.

Hu Dianjia's rear army also had a cavalry of 100 people, which was also organized into a company by Teng Yuzhao.

But Hu Dianjia said he didn't want this cavalry company at all, because the first and second regiments not only had no artillery company, but also no cavalry, so he couldn't make any special arrangements.

Helplessly, Teng Yuzhao had to keep this cavalry company with him and use it as the cavalry company of the Vanguard Army's Presidential Guard Battalion.

The chief of staff Li of Pan Jinshan’s independent detachment was none other than Li Jinyu.

Firstly, Teng Yuzhao was very optimistic about Li Jinyu, and it was a good opportunity to send him to the lower level for training; secondly, Pan Jinshan was not from the Beiyang Military Academy, nor from the camp school of the front army.

Although Pan Jinshan was in the Wuwei Vanguard Army and was familiar with the tactics and strategies of modern Western armies, there were still many unknowns. With Li Jinyu around, he could not only help him quickly master these modern military knowledge, but also provide Li Jinyu with opportunities for practical training.

Fifteen minutes later, Teng Yuzhao, still wearing his cavalry uniform, strode into the conference room.

The conference room was already filled with generals of the Vanguard Army who had come for the meeting.

Time was running out, so Teng Yuzao didn't waste time. "I just got intelligence that the Li'an coalition forces have been dispatched to the concession. Now, please let Deputy Chief of Staff Wei introduce the situation."

(End of this chapter)