Chapter 3599
It is good news that the Executive Committee has given overseas regions greater autonomy, but Zheng Agui is not particularly optimistic about the prospect of expanding the scale of military conscription.
To be precise, he doesn't have much confidence in the Luzon Region's own recruitment plan.
The population size of the Luzon Region is more than adequate compared to the upper and lower regions. Compared with regions such as Singdao and North America, it still has obvious advantages. However, the population composition is actually not ideal. Han Chinese with higher quality account for less than a quarter. No, this is very similar to Star Island.
Among the areas under the jurisdiction of the Luzon Region, only central and northern Luzon Island has a relatively concentrated Han population. From the area south of Manila Bay, the proportion of Han people drops sharply, and the proportion of Han people decreases as you go south.
On the island of Mindanao at the southern end of the current jurisdiction, the local proportion of Han people is said to be only about one-tenth, and this even includes those of mixed race who are only half Han.
The vast majority of the population in the jurisdiction is still the local indigenous people, but the cultural quality of these indigenous people is almost non-existent, and the languages they use are diverse. Whether it is to organize them for production activities or to recruit young people to join the army, None of it is easy.
Most of the soldiers in the several indigenous battalions under the jurisdiction of the Luzon Army are young people who have received basic education in schools run by Haihan. But even so, the process of training these undisciplined indigenous people into soldiers who follow orders and prohibitions is extremely difficult. difficulty.
This has also led to the fact that the overall combat effectiveness of these indigenous battalions is not strong, and they are only suitable for carrying out some clearing missions with low combat intensity in tropical island environments. If it is a large-scale battle on a frontal battlefield, or a fortified battle against a fortress, these indigenous troops will inevitably expose many shortcomings.
In several fierce battles in the central Philippine Islands in the past two years, the performance of the indigenous troops was obviously inferior to that of the Han-dominated troops. Zheng Agui had personal experience of this.
As for some more important special positions in the military that require certain professional skills, such as communications, medical, sniper, navigation, military supplies, etc., basically they can only employ Han Chinese or Hispanic soldiers with a certain foundation, while pure indigenous It is difficult for soldiers who are born to meet the corresponding requirements.
But if the Luzon Region were to start large-scale military recruitment, it would only be based on indigenous people as the main source of troops. This is an objective fact determined by the proportion of population. By then, the establishment of indigenous troops may be several times greater than now, but the combat strength will be It may not be possible to get corresponding improvement.
For Zheng Agui, although there is a great possibility of being promoted due to the expansion, it also means that the proportion of indigenous soldiers in the troops he will command in the future will greatly increase, and he may even be transferred to the command of an indigenous unit. Officer, this may also happen.
However, these problems are not his turn to worry about. He still has to complete the established combat mission first. The more than a hundred prisoners here will take a cargo ship south to Beimen Port in the New World, where a large number of manpower is needed to build infrastructure.
Zheng Agui and the company he led need to continue to carry out the mission of clearing out Spanish colonial points in the Lesser Sunda Islands. Fortunately, they had rested for many days, and their condition was almost adjusted. Several slightly injured personnel had also returned to the team, and their combat effectiveness had basically returned to normal levels.
Based on the current battle situation, the command headquarters determines that there are not many combat troops deployed by Spain in the southwest Pacific. However, because the geographical environment of this sea area is too complex, it is difficult for the Haihan Army to complete its success in one battle. It can only eliminate them one by one. Settlement method to cut off the opponent's channels for obtaining supplies. This is why all the immigrants’ food in the settlement where Zheng Agui performed his mission was taken away by the Spanish fleet.
No matter how powerful the Spanish fleet is in its guerrilla warfare, it will still need supplies to maintain it. Once supplies are completely cut off, even if the navy and Han army do not continue to exert pressure, they will have no choice but to withdraw from this sea area on their own.
But the problem is that the command believes that there are no large colonies in the region, but there are at least two or three Spanish fleets that still appear in various places from time to time, and even have the power to sneak attack Haihan's supply fleet, so they can only There is a reasonable explanation that the Spaniards had some supply channels that had not yet been discovered.
After many repeated interrogations of prisoners of war, the Military Intelligence Bureau believed that somewhere west of the current war zone, the Spaniards also control at least one or two secret ports, where there are long-term hoards of supplies and food, as well as supplies from The ammunition transported across the ocean from South America can support their armed fleet to continue fighting for a long time.
But the problem is that among the prisoners captured so far, there are almost no high-level officials. The information held by the Military Intelligence Bureau is very vague and it is impossible to confirm the location of the secret port.
Although Manila is very dissatisfied with this situation, they also know that the number of troops that can be mobilized has almost reached the upper limit of the Luzon region. If all the troops guarding the home are really mobilized to the front line, it will not only be difficult to maintain logistical supplies, but also There is a risk of being taken advantage of by the enemy.
Therefore, Qiu Yuan and Xiao Liang could only temporarily put down their dignity and ask for help from the country. The areas closest to Luzon are Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian and Taiwan.
The two vast regions have the strongest military power among the three regions, but now they are focusing on the inland Yunnan, Guizhou, Hunan and Jiangxi regions, which have a huge amount of land and population, so they have little interest in conquering overseas. He took the initiative to push this job to the neighboring Fujian and Taiwan.
The troops stationed in Fujian and Taiwan currently have no combat missions, but they are just right to take over this job.
Needless to say, Taiwan has no room to expand its territory externally, and there are few opportunities to gain military glory in normal times. The most important task of the local garrison is probably to keep an eye on the other side of the strait to ensure that the Xu family does not have second thoughts about the Executive Committee.
Although Fujian has always been controlled by the Xu family and is the nominal local emperor, it has basically been cut off from continued expansion. To the north is the Donghai Region, to the south are the two major regions, to the east is Taiwan, and to the west is bordered by Jiangxi, but the Executive Committee has strictly restricted the dispatch of troops, and can only look at the meat in the bowl without moving chopsticks.
If the children of the Xu family want to gain military merit to enhance their resume, they can basically only focus on overseas battlefields. Therefore, no matter whether the battlefield is in the Philippine Islands or somewhere else, as long as there is an opportunity to send troops to participate in the war, the Xu family is still happy to help out.
Fu built so many warships and raised so many soldiers, he had to find a place to use up some of them, so as to make the executive committee feel at ease - this was one of the admonitions that Xu Xinsu left to the Xu family when he was still alive.