Chapter 1478 Frontline
After Qian Tiandun finished speaking, Gao Qiaonan took the initiative to come out, clasped his fists to the businessmen and said, "I am in charge of arranging your local visit and inspection itinerary under the battalion commander Gao Qiaonan of the Han Special War Battalion in Xiahai. I will be responsible for arranging this place." This is a war zone. For the sake of safety, we hope that everyone will follow our arrangements and never leave the team to act alone to avoid accidents. You are here to broaden your horizons and seek money. Don't try anything extraneous. , remember safety first.”
As a general who leads troops in war, Takahashi Minami is not very interested in this kind of reception task. If he had a choice, he would not have the patience to greet these businessmen who are dressed in silk and satin and are incompatible with the chilling environment on the front line. . But since Qian Tiandun personally ordered it, he had no choice but to accept the job. He just hoped that these ignorant foreigners wouldn't try to be smart and cause trouble here. There will be casualties on the front line almost every day, but Qian Tiandun gave him an order to ensure that these people can complete the entire journey on the front line of the Jinzhou Isthmus safely, so he had to warn these people first and try his best to make them safe. They are aware of the special circumstances in which they find themselves.
Takahashi Nan had led troops in the army for many years, so he naturally had the chilling aura of a superior person. He Li and others could even faintly smell the smell of blood. At that moment, everyone hurriedly responded to each other's instructions with trepidation. It's just that some of them don't know the origin of Gao Qiaonan, so they inevitably call him "General Gao". At that moment, an insider quickly corrected him, saying that the general's surname was Takahashi, not Gao. Everyone who said the wrong thing quickly apologized.
Gao Qiaonan was actually the general who led the army when Haihan entered Zhejiang. However, at that time, the commanders of Haihan's navy and army were Qian Tiandun and Shi Diwen, so his reputation in the army was naturally higher than that of his battalion commander. I don't know how much higher, so many people in the outside world who don't know the situation don't know that many of Haihan's battles in Zhejiang were actually completed by Takahashi Minami. Of course, there are also well-informed people like He Li, who have heard some secrets about Haihan's army, and know that it was actually such a little-known general who opened the situation for Haihan in Zhejiang, and this person is said to be a Japanese. Among the senior officers in the Haihan Army, who were mainly Han, he was considered an outlier.
Of course, no one dares to question the appointment of Haihan military personnel in public, and no one dares to ridicule the meritorious General Haihan for not being pure enough. Even among the senior leaders of Haihan, almost no one now regards Gao Qiaonan as a foreigner, and his loyalty has long been unanimously recognized by the executive committee. It's just that Takahashi Minami seldom interacts with outsiders, so in the eyes of the outside world, he is still a relatively mysterious figure in the Haihan Army.
Takahashi Nan had no intention of explaining the origin of his surname to these businessmen. He simply agreed and then made a request to the businessmen. Since the situation in the war zone involved many of Haihan's military secrets, Takahashi Minami asked them to keep all their entourage in the logistics base southeast of the defense line, and only he himself could participate in the next trip. Moreover, everything seen and heard in the war zone must be kept confidential for a certain period.
Of course, this confidentiality period will automatically expire when they leave Liaodong. After all, the purpose of Haihan Army's arrangement for them to visit the front line is to show their strength. If they do not actively publicize and spread the Haihan Army's activities in Liaodong after returning to the south, Mighty deeds, then the effect achieved by this trip will be greatly reduced. Moreover, this kind of confidentiality restriction is more important to make these visitors always have a string in their minds, understanding that what they see and hear are military secrets, and they may violate military laws if they act on their own here.
After Takahashi Nan finished speaking, he ordered someone to fetch a stack of documents and asked the merchants to sign and stamp on them one by one. This time, the businessmen who traveled all over the country were well-informed and were frightened by this move. He Li asked tremblingly: "General Takahashi, do you need to sign a life and death certificate?"
"On the battlefield, swords and guns have no eyesight. No one dares to say that if they go up, they will be able to come back intact. This is common sense. If you sign this document, if something unexpected happens, you can contact your family at that time." Gao Qiaonan patiently explained to the businessmen why he wanted to sign this thing.
A businessman trembled and asked: "General Takahashi said before that he would ensure our safety, so why does the content of this document seem extremely unsafe?"
Takahashi Nandao: "By signing this document, you express your approval of our arrangements. This can ensure the safety of the trip. If you are unwilling to sign, don't force it. Just stop here. Only those who sign can continue to the north. Go.”
"I'll sign!" He Li gritted his teeth and took the lead in responding. He had already planned to invest in Liaodong, but without personally verifying whether Haihan's defense line in Liaodong was impregnable, he would definitely not dare to spend the money casually. Although the Haihan military issued warnings and life-and-death warnings, and it seemed that this trip was extremely dangerous, He Li believed that only by gaining more information at this time could he take the initiative in the future, and this risk was worth taking.
Since someone took the lead, the others looked at each other. Although they were worried, they all signed in the end. After coming all this way, if you don't go to the battlefield to see it in person, how can you go back with peace of mind. Since they can't defeat the military, they should just obey the arrangements. Since the Haihan people have planned this itinerary, it is not for the purpose of making money or killing people. As long as they don't mess around, their personal safety should be safe.
In fact, this life-and-death situation has the same effect as the confidentiality requirement. It is nothing more than to prevent visitors from messing around on the front line. If a battle really breaks out on the front line, Takahashi Minami will definitely order the evacuation of these people to a safe area as soon as possible. Since he had accepted this job, he would not just deal with it casually. For this reason, in addition to the accompanying escort team of the special operations battalion, a platoon was specially transferred from the cavalry battalion to provide cover and early warning on the periphery.
In addition, the carriages used by the visiting team were replaced with military carriages. The lightweight body and spring shock absorbers gave this carriage obvious advantages over civilian carriages in terms of travel speed and riding comfort. Of course, this improvement in performance means higher manufacturing costs, and only military equipment can use these manufacturing technologies that are still in the high-precision field regardless of cost. Even for the carriages ordered by a few wealthy businessmen from Haihan, the production technology used is not as advanced as the military version. Moreover, the two carriages transferred were the special carriages that Qian Tiandun used daily, and their workmanship was not the same as those of the caravans used to transport supplies and equipment.
He Li noticed this not long after he got on the carriage. The bumps were obviously lighter than the carriage he ordered from Haihan at a cost of nearly five hundred taels of silver. This was obviously not because the roads here were smoother. smooth. In fact, the official roads along the Jinzhou Isthmus defense line are just loess roads. Haihan currently does not have the spare materials and manpower to carry out road hardening projects, and the road conditions here are not good at all. Haihan's carriage is expensive because of its better riding comfort, and He Li now realizes that his precious carriage at home is nothing after comparing goods - Haihan can obviously make higher-end products. , it’s just not for sale to the public.
However, He Li also knew that Haihan was famous for making all kinds of weird things. Even if one day he built a car that could run without a horse, he probably wouldn't be surprised. But when he came up with this idea, he never expected that he would actually see the Haihan people create such an incredible thing a few years later. He Li really wanted to ask Gao Qiaonan again if there was any way to buy this carriage with money, but unfortunately Gao Qiaonan did not ride in the carriage with them, but chose to ride on his own. For Takahashi Minami, the carriage is comfortable, but he still prefers to ride directly on the horse so that he can react the fastest when necessary.
Starting from the logistics base, the further north you go, the fewer and fewer civilians you can see on the land. Instead, you can see sporadic cavalry walking through the fields, presumably passing between the various units. Messenger of news.
After traveling for several miles, the walls of the Jinzhou Isthmus defense line could be clearly seen on the horizon. Every few dozen feet on the city wall, there is a Haihan two-color flag fluttering in the wind, indicating to the world that the ownership of this line of defense is currently under Haihan's control. Without any extra explanation, visitors on the carriage could immediately tell that this was the northern end of Haihan's current control area.
This defense line was originally built by the Ming Dynasty defenders. Later, after Liaodong was occupied by Hou Jin, the Hou Jin army renovated and reinforced this defense line. However, they never imagined that they would encounter Haihan who was more powerful than them. Unreasonable opponents never thought that they would rely on this line of defense to draw a line with the enemy, so the investment and transformation of this line of defense was extremely limited. When Haihan attacked this place, it was too late for Hou Jin to reinforce this line of defense. Breaking through one point caused the entire line of defense to quickly collapse.
After Haihan occupied this place, he fully learned the lessons of the Later Jin Dynasty and immediately carried out a comprehensive reconstruction of this line of defense to build it into the main defense fortification of the Liaodong colony. This time-consuming, laborious and expensive project is still in full swing and will theoretically take at least several months to take shape. During this period, the Houjin Army in the north would definitely not watch Haihan complete this line of defense, so small-scale confrontations continued uninterrupted.
After the Hou Jin Army almost succeeded in attacking the defense line the previous time, the military also realized that passive defense was not the answer, so it took the initiative to send troops to push the front to the north, trying to limit the activities of the Hou Jin Army to a few miles away from the defense line. But without the cover of fortifications, the battles between the two sides were almost all conducted in the wilderness north of the defense line, so the Haihan Army's relative advantage was not that great. In the recent battles, the number of casualties suffered by the Haihan Army has inevitably been increasing. Although the number is not large, it is not exciting news for this victorious army.
The team came to a slow stop outside Jijia Fort. During the earlier battle, the entire gate of this fortress was blown away by Haihan artillery. Because the main defense direction is to the north, and the relevant reconstruction plans are also to the north of the defense line, Haihan did not repair the city gate after that, but the Jijia Fort on the other side of the city gate has changed beyond recognition compared to before. Some of the buildings were demolished, and their masonry was used to build Haihan's most famous fortification, the bastion.
After passing the city gate of Jijiabao, Gao Qiaonan signaled all the people on the carriage to get off and visit the place on foot. None of these businessmen had ever seen a bastion, and they couldn't help but worry about its practicality when they saw its strange appearance. Takahashi Minami was too lazy to explain the characteristics and combat effectiveness of the bastion to these people in detail. His task was just to take these people on a tour of the war zone according to the itinerary, but what kind of effect they would receive was beyond his control.
Fortunately, there is also a professional guide Liu Shang in the team. He has spent these days in Liaodong and has a general understanding of Haihan's deployment plans in Liaodong, and even knows some inside information about the military. Although there are some things that are not suitable to be said on this occasion, he just used this as a reason to avoid the shortcomings of his lack of understanding of the military.
Most of the questions asked by the merchants were related to the current battle situation. They hoped to be lucky enough to witness the battle between Haihan Army and the enemy. It would be best to have a large-scale battle to confirm that Haihan has enough strength to protect the area south of the defense line. Safety, but this scenario is difficult to occur under the current situation. After Yangguli died on the battlefield, the Hou Jin army did not go south to avenge him. Instead, they became more cautious in their actions, fearing that they would be shot by the Haihan people from a hundred feet away. This attack method was basically impossible to guard against, and Hou Jin died. There are quite a few people who were shot in this inexplicable way.
It was difficult for the bastion under construction to attract the attention of businessmen. The visiting group decisively chose to give up after walking around twice. The lack of freshness is probably the most critical aspect of this script. Their purpose of coming all the way here is very clear, which is to witness Haihan's strength with their own eyes.
Gao Qiaonan asked Liu Shang to take care of the businessmen first, and he immediately rushed to the headquarters to ask for instructions on the next plan. If Qian Tiandun is determined to let these businessmen go to the battlefield to find out what's going on, he can continue to arrange follow-up activities.
Before setting foot on the battlefield, Liu Shang first took the group of businessmen to the field hospital to visit those who were unfortunately injured in the battle with Hou Jin. For visitors, the effect of visiting the field hospital is probably to give them another wake-up call, and they should always remember not to fight head-on with their opponents.
(End of chapter)