C761 If you have money, you have to train your troops

The Great Qing Dynasty Hall passed Zai Chun's tax reform plan, and the news of Weng Tonghe preparing to visit all of East Asia immediately spread throughout the entire Beijing, to the point that even the foreign citizens were amazed at the boldness of the ancient empire's efforts, as if an ancient tree blooming in spring was blooming into a new branch, all of these countries expressed their close attention.

Right now, the Great Qing Dynasty was in a honeymoon period with the West, and the benefits obtained by the Second Opium War were not yet digested. Adding to the fact that Prussia was rising rapidly in Europe to challenge the international order, all these involved the attention of the English and French and the other strong powers.

In addition, the news of Zuo Zongtang's western expedition to Xinjiang had already spread to Europe. The British and French people who had always been at odds with the Russian would not come and cause trouble for Qing Province, because they did not wish for the Russian to expand too much in the Central Asia.

Britain, in particular, did not want to see the Russian take control of Afghanistan, as that would mean that the Russian would stand up for India.

Among them was the famous port of Karachi, Pakistan. If the Russian's navy was established here, then Britain could only think about the Russian declaring war here, and the safety of India's shipping routes would be the most important goal of the empire.

So the enemy of the enemy was a friend. Although Britain also wanted to get their hands on the Central Asia, Xinjiang and Tibet, when facing this big enemy, the weak little enemy of Qing Guo could let him go for a while, and even help him a little.

Once the Russian's claws that stretched to the Central Asia were cut off, wouldn't it be easier to deal with the weak Qing Dynasty?

Therefore, Britain's attitude towards the Qing Dynasty's tax reform was very calm. There were no excessive reactions, nor did it arouse any strong resistance from European financiers. Although there were some cautious calls, in the face of the empire's great interests, these calls were suppressed.

When Xiao Letian obtained all the information he needed, it was already the year 1867. It was the late autumn of six years for Tongzhi, and it was already the middle of October.

Xiao Letian and the little emperor, who had finished their negotiations with Japan, were already preparing to leave the Osaka City. According to the agreement, the army stationed in the Ryukyu would leave before the Spring Festival, and the authority of the Osaka City would still be returned to the Government of Japan. However, the headquarters of the Fusang Bank was left in the Osaka City, and Xiao Letian had even left a thousand bank guards in the name of a mercenary.

He was very clear about the character of the Japanese. They were fearful of the might, but they did not want to see Wade. If they had all withdrawn, they would forget about the pain of being beaten in less than two years.

Therefore, Xiao Letian had to choose the time to hit these Japanese s … 's suggestion had already received the approval of the Sky Emperor. Although he had secretly sent a few hundred thousand dollars to the young Sky Emperor, as long as he could eliminate that disgusting country name and flag in the future, it would still be worth it.

"Good, good, good. The British people's reactions are just as I expected. As long as the first ten years of the tax reform is not destroyed by the foreign powers, and as long as I use 10 years of full time, our plan will succeed …"

"My good disciple, the new army you want finally has an army. Ten years, I'll prepare an army of eighty thousand for you …"

Zai Chun was so excited that he could not sit still, he was only eleven years old, and he could already approve such an important proposal in the imperial court, he was not much worse than Master Kang Xi! As long as he worked hard, he might be able to become the true master of the Qing Dynasty. His achievements would surpass Kang Yongqian's three generations of emperors, and he might even be able to become the greatest emperor of history!

"Too little, my master is too little. Can I have a little more? I want to train an army of one hundred thousand!"

"Nonsense, do you know what elite soldiers are? Those are all machines that burn money. The ones that I provide you with are lifelong professional soldier s, do you think they are useless bums like you? "

"Foolish brat, save some money and spend it. In the future, when you spend all of your money, you will know how to cry!"

Through the war in Europe and the memories of his previous life, Xiao Letian knew clearly the military strength of the various countries in the West. Take the Franco-Prussian War in a few years' time for example.

Moreover, not all of these 600,000 soldiers were professional soldiers, and many of them were volunteer soldiers who were mobilized. Their true elite strength would not exceed 40%, which meant that they would only be worth less than 200,000.

If you looked at France, the entire Franco-Prussian War had less than six hundred thousand soldiers, and the number of combat troops was less than four hundred thousand. According to the proportion of 40% of the elites, the number of professional elite troops that France could mobilize at that time was less than two hundred thousand.

What kind of countries were Prussia and France? They were powerful armies that even Britain could not hope to match. True, the strength of Britain was in the sea, and the British army was far inferior to Prussia and France.

The historians of the future could not understand France's performance in that war. The Second Empire of the France that Napoleon III founded should not be this weak, why was it that even Prussia, which had just risen up, was not a match for it.

However, regardless of how hard the historians racked their brains to find out the truth about the past, losing was still a loss. Even if half of the data on the combat prowess of the French Army was added, the number of elite troops would not exceed two hundred thousand.

The reason why this army of elites was so expensive was because not only did they have to pay a high salary, they also had to upgrade their weapons and equipment at all times, which was the true reason why they were so expensive.

Once the gun technology was upgraded, the main force would have to immediately change equipment to ensure their combat strength. Giving two hundred and thirty thousand or even four hundred thousand elite troops a change of equipment in one go was a headache just thinking about it.

The situation of the Great Qing was more complicated than Europe. Because there had never been a comprehensive military reform, the army system of the Great Qing was in chaos.

Historically, the Qing government officials told the Prussian envoy that there were more than two million soldiers in the Great Qing Army. The Prussian officials were stunned, and then they boasted to the British that the army had reached more than 1.8 million, but the British were not so easily fooled.

According to the numbers on the paper, with 2 million troops in Daqing, it was not an exaggeration to say that Daqing had 2 million soldiers. However, the key point was that many places' teamwork was also included in the calculations, and those places' teamwork was completely unable to fight a large-scale national war.

The first was the Eight Banners, the second was the Green Camp, and the third was the Xiang Army s. With these three types of powers added together, they would amount to a little more than seven hundred thousand and it would not increase any further.