Nan Ming Sun Never Sets

Chapter 51 The Firing Gun

The conscription situation in Qijin District is much better than previously imagined. In order to preserve the labor force and select the quality of soldiers, the Ministry of War has gone through a series of selections, and selected young people from Guli who are physically strong and have a certain level of education to join the Daming Restoration Army .Joining the army has become a kind of honor for Guli people. In fact, among the Han people in Xitianfu, enlisting in the army to serve the country is also a trend.

On the seventh day after arriving in Xitianfu, Bai Mingxiu wrote an article in the local newspaper "Guowen Daily" in Xitianfu with the title "Weeping and looking forward to when we will return to the Central Plains."In the article, Bai Mingxiu wrote affectionately: "...Thousands of miles of beautiful mountains and rivers are like falling into hellfire, and Shenzhou is suffering from torment. Thousands of Han compatriots are looking forward to it, and we have to personally repay the blood feud of the king who lost the country. The Australian people are also of my Ming blood. I can't bear to see my hometown fall apart. , should be a place for heroes. I, the Prince of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Cixuan, will soon swear to fight for the Northern Expedition. Loulan will not be returned until it is destroyed..."

In the streets and alleys of Xitian Mansion, Bai Mingxiu also instructed to set up various slogans and poems to stimulate people's emotions, which also made everyone ambitious and passionate.

Although Bai Mingxiu was satisfied with getting the huge Australian colony, which can be regarded as opening up a new backyard for the Chinese, he never dared to forget that his mission was to destroy the Qing Dynasty and restore the Ming Dynasty.His positioning of Xitian Mansion is relatively intuitive. This is a logistics base camp, which will continuously produce all kinds of ordnance and military supplies, which will be transported to the mainland of Daming by sea, and handed over to the soldiers of the Daming Rejuvenation Army formed there.

As the Prime Minister of the Cabinet, Tang Beilu also suggested to Bai Mingxiu that after Bai Mingxiu obtained a base in the mainland, he could gather the refugees and send them to Australia for colonization and training as workers, so as to continuously enhance Australia's industrial production capacity and strengthen local control. support.Bai Mingxiu also nodded in agreement.

The conscription work went very smoothly, and the 101st, 102nd and 103rd regiments of the Ming Dynasty Restoration Army that Bai Mingxiu expected to form had already been formed.Among them, the 101st Regiment was the existing organization, and a new batch of soldiers was added. In addition, the mercenary troops brought back by Bai Mingxiu from Batavia were all composed of Australian Han Chinese. It can be said that the combat effectiveness is the most. strong.

Both the 102nd and 103rd regiments were composed of Australian Guli people.

Officially, Bai Mingxiu’s opinion is that the term aboriginal people is not recognized.This title has a strong Western flavor and will create the impression that the Han colonists are outsiders and plunderers.Compared with the burning, killing, looting and evil European colonists, the Han people's colonization was relatively mild, focusing on building homes and production, and it was relatively easy to coexist with the local ethnic groups.

Ethnic groups such as the Guli people also migrated from the outside world, and are essentially the same as the Han people who migrated now.The term aboriginal is itself a pseudo-concept.

And Bai Mingxiu himself doesn't like the Soviet Union's "ethnic identification" method very much. It is not in line with the eclectic spirit of Chinese civilization to distinguish people in terms of civil affairs and legal principles.Therefore, the strategy adopted by the Nanming regime is that the nation is endogenous and self-recognized, not determined by the state.Therefore, Shufans who live near Xitian Mansion can call themselves Guli people, and their ethnicity is not marked on their ID cards.Bai Mingxiu hopes that in the future, geographical concepts can be used to dilute the concept of ethnicity, just like Shandong people and Sichuan people. There are differences among people, but they are all Chinese.

The three regiments are basically mixed, and they are very similar in organization.They are all in the form of a regiment of 4 battalions, with two infantry battalions, one cavalry battalion, and one artillery battalion.As for weapons, the newly formed mixed group with hundred prefixes all use the latest things.

Bai Mingxiu came to the First Ordnance Bureau of Xitian Mansion and saw the first-generation rifled firing gun that was truly developed by Mingren himself.

"Uh, you guys are really amazing. I just described it to you casually, but you can actually do it?" Bai Mingxiu rubbed his head, but he was actually very pleasantly surprised.

These early weapons were actually quite simple in structure.As a senior history buff, Bai Mingxiu also collected a lot of information in this regard.If you ask him to tell you how the Tiger tank is made, he will definitely not know, but if you ask him what the structure of the Dresser rifle that once made Prussia so famous is, and how to make custom-loaded ammunition, he will be able to tell you clearly.These things are actually a matter of a layer of window paper, and it will be fine if it is pierced.

Huang Ying, chief engineer of the Ordnance Bureau, said with a smile: "Actually, our Xitianfu's industrial manufacturing capacity is sufficient. We have experience in using steam machine tools to drill gun rifles. It's just processing some new devices. Manufacturing development We also have ready-made technologies for gunpowder and smokeless gunpowder, it’s just a combination of these things.”

Huang Ying tried to be prudent and said: "However, this gun is still a prototype verification product. We hope to conduct a large number of tests in the short term to obtain the best mass production model."

Zhang Xianyu, Director of the Logistics Headquarters, also said beside Bai Mingxiu: "Without a doubt, apart from the weapons used by the guard company, this percussion gun is the best infantry weapon in the world. Would you like to order a model for it?"

Bai Mingxiu has always considered unifying the model of ordnance, but considering the method of using a few styles, it seems that he will have to do it all over again when his father Yongli gets off the stage.

"Uh, it's better to be Wang Shi, use M as the number, and increase the order upwards. For example, the flintlock gun we used before does not need to be numbered. Starting from this percussion gun, it is named the M1 standard rifle. , Aren’t you still developing a heavy machine gun? Just let us call it M2. In other words, if the M1 is shorter and a carbine is used, it will be the M3, hahaha, simple and straightforward.”

Zhang Xianyu asked again: "How is the cannon named?"

"Well, we already have smoothbore cannons, but we don't want to use weight as the caliber. The actual caliber of the 6-pounder is 84mm, and the 12-pounder is 121mm, right? In fact, there are still some discrepancies, and the bullet shape needs to be regularized. Like this Well, we named the artillery after the past years. The Napoleon cannon is the Type 80 120mm field gun and the Type 16 76mm field gun. Oh, I also exchanged the blueprints for a set of Armstrong guns a few days ago, right? That one is called [-] [-]mm field gun."

Bai Mingxiu looked a little serious, and said to Huang Ying: "The three mixed regiments of the Restoration Army will train for at most two and a half months. I need you to provide as many machine guns and cannons as possible in the shortest possible time."

(End of this chapter)