Warring States Survival Guide

Chapter 126: Eighty-eight Cuts of the Simple Rules

There are many ways to classify armies. The most representative way is to divide armies into four categories: classical armies, mercenary armies, modern armies and contemporary armies.

The main body of the classical army was the citizen soldiers, such as the Qin Dynasty's brave soldiers, the Northern Dynasty's soldiers, and even the armies of Sparta, Macedonia, and Rome (in the Republican period). Their soldiers were composed of citizens, freemen (in the slavery period) or small landowners and self-cultivating farmers (in the feudal period). Soldiers had a high social status, usually trained spontaneously, took the initiative to join, and had a relatively strong will to fight.

The internal motivation of these classical armies, which mainly relied on personal honor and the desire to improve their social status, has become difficult to replicate after the end of the classical era.

Mercenary armies are groups formed by conflicts of interest. Their characteristics are that the soldiers are privately controlled by the generals, and the soldiers belong to the generals. The army is composed of a small number of elite soldiers and a large number of poor civilians who lack training. In battle, they mainly rely on a small number of elite soldiers. Once the elite soldiers are defeated, the civilians will immediately flee. Representative armies such as the imperial army of the Song Dynasty, the frontier army of the Ming Dynasty, and even various knights in the West, as well as messy nomadic groups and pirate groups, can all be considered mercenary armies.

The internal driving force of this kind of army's operations is mainly based on violent oppression, financial rewards, and robbery and rape. They usually have a weak desire to fight independently, and their overall combat effectiveness is also very poor.

At present, various daimyo and powerful families in Japan adopt this kind of military model, going to the battlefield in the form of "langdang + foot soldiers".

Modern armies are composed of professional officers and a large number of trained poor soldiers. Soldiers, as the main body, undergo harsh and professional training under the whipping of a small number of officers until their brains go blank and they become mechanical combat puppets. Then they can rush forward in an orderly manner, regardless of life or death, and actively engage in consumption of the enemy.

A typical modern army is the army of various countries in the Western Napoleonic era.

The main driving force behind the combat of this kind of army is discipline. Soldiers fear military discipline more than death, so under the pressure of military discipline, they can display tenacious combat effectiveness in a daze and truly refuse to turn back.

As for the modern army, we won't mention it. Such an army could not have been created in medieval Japan. There were no prerequisites at all.

Under the current conditions in the wilderness, the classical army has no social foundation, at least temporarily, there is no place to find so many honorable freemen, and it is impossible to create one;
He didn't like mercenary troops. He gathered a group of retainers, who in turn recruited retainers and their cronies. In the end, his subordinates had many factions, big and small, and everyone had their own accounts. What if a retainer was a little loose, and his people went out to rob and rape at will, or if a retainer led his men to gamble openly...

If something like this really happened, given his personality, he would definitely suffer from insomnia and nausea at night.

In addition, he can only use weapons that have been available in Japan since the Middle Ages, and he dares not even make large-scale improvements. His military organization system is the same as that of the local natives. He really doesn't have much advantage, and there is a high possibility that his life will be in danger. Therefore, a purely profit-based mercenary army is not advisable.

Then the only way left is the modern army, which uses strict military discipline to restrain soldiers, turning them into professional combat puppets, going out to rob... rescue more people, and then train more combat puppets to ensure that in the end whoever mentions him will tremble twice, and that they will all be as well-behaved as quails.

As for whose homework to copy... Yuan Datou is a good choice. Yuanye had studied the text "Training at Xiaozhan" before and remembered some of it.

He selected people from the coolie team, more than 140 people who had been in good health in the workshop and had a certain sense of discipline, and formed 14 small flag teams with ten people in each team. He formed his first regular army, or rather, built the skeleton of a regular army.

Then he took out the "Soldier Training Manual" that he had compiled after two months of further study outside, after copying, thinking and holding back, and broke it into booklets of varying thicknesses, such as "Eighty-eight Simple Rules", "Camp System Regulations", "Personal Technical and Tactical Training Regulations", "Monthly Salary and Treatment Regulations", and "Camp Education Guidelines". He handed it over to Aman, Aqing and the "Military Police" composed of senior Lang party members, asking them to assist in the training.

Seeing that Yuanye was doing something new again, Ah Man did not rush to speak out. After all, Yuanye had succeeded several times, and she had learned her lesson. She did not dare to talk nonsense casually. She directly picked up the "Simple Rules of Eighty-Eight Cuts" and opened it for a closer look. She was surprised to find that it was not a swordsmanship secret book, but a simple and brutal military law:
1. Anyone who advances or retreats in battle without waiting for orders, or who fails to return to his unit after the battle, shall be executed.

2. Anyone who looks back and retreats in battle, or whispers to others, will be beheaded.

3. Anyone who escapes when encountering orders or training, or feigns injury or illness, shall be beheaded.

4. Anyone who loses military equipment during training, or abandons military equipment in battle without being injured, shall be executed.

……

86. Anyone who screams in the dark, runs and dances wildly, sneaks out of the camp in the dark to wander around, or gathers people to gamble, drink and have fun, all those involved will be executed as an example.

87. Those who harass residents, rob property, or rape women will be executed as a warning by the soldiers of this banner.

88. If a commander dies in battle and his subordinates fail to provide adequate support, leaving no casualties, or if a small flag dies in battle and the soldiers of his flag do not suffer any injuries or merits, all shall be beheaded as a warning to others.

Listed one by one, it was really brutal. Even not participating in the training would result in beheading. Just looking at it was a bit bloody... Ah Man read ten lines at a glance. After quickly finishing reading, his scalp went numb. The idea of becoming the chief general was immediately extinguished. He felt that once he entered the camp, he would be beheaded and buried in the ground in six hours at most.

She swallowed her saliva, quickly closed the booklet again, and said with some difficulty: "This... Lord, I'm not saying anything bad about you... Uh, I don't mean to accuse you of doing anything reckless, it's just... Military law doesn't need to be so strict, right? After killing so many people along the way, how many people will be left in the future? These people are all the people you bought back with money. It's not good to waste them like this, right?"

Yuan Ye insisted, shaking his head and said, "The army should have strict laws and regulations. There is no tenderness here, let alone bargaining! So, even if we kill all of them, we have to cut the head off properly!"

After that, he took out the "Camp Rules and Regulations" and handed it to her, "This is the daily rules and regulations. You should also read this carefully. When the time comes, they will have to memorize the whole book. Those who can't memorize it will be beaten until they can recite it by heart!"

Ah Man took the thicker booklet, flipped it open and quickly read through it. He was surprised and said, "What? You even have to take care of the laundry, bathing and cleaning the room? And you have to make it so clean?"

"Of course I do!"

Housekeeping must be taken care of and is the top priority, but it is not to further cultivate discipline as most people think, or this is not the main reason, but most people are not aware of the terrible consequences of cramming ten men into a small room - without strict housekeeping discipline, within three days, the room will become a dirty and smelly pigsty, and the sanitary conditions will be so bad that it will cause infectious diseases, vomiting and diarrhea, which can really kill people!

At least every day there are people who miss training due to illness, resulting in various non-combat casualties.

Yuanye handed her a short wooden stick and said, "We need to be stricter in this regard. Anyone who doesn't follow the rules will be beaten. But it's not convenient for me to do it myself, so you can do it for me. No one in the camp will be exempted."

Ah Man took the short stick and weighed it. He remembered that Yuan Ye seemed to be joining the camp as well. He looked at him and asked thoughtfully, "Everyone?"

"Not including me. I will do it consciously. You don't have to worry about me." Yuanye will definitely lead by example, but she still quickly made a patch in case the wild child Aman wanted to find a reason to try to beat the lord. She could do such a thing. By the way, she also emphasized, "What you are going to do is very important. You must strictly implement the rules and regulations. You must not hit people at will. If this happens, don't blame me for publicly beating you."

Ah Man knew he was serious, so he nodded honestly: "Okay, you are the lord and you have the final say. I will memorize these two books first, and no one will find fault with them. You can just trust my brain."

But after she finished speaking, she hesitated for a moment, and still couldn't help but say a piece of unpleasant advice, "Is this okay? If we keep chopping heads and beating people, what if those guys can't stand it and rebel? Of course, I'm not afraid of them rebelling. With more than a dozen of us in armor, it won't take much effort to kill them. But these people are also property. It would be a pity to kill them."

"Of course, we can't just use pressure all the time. We still have to give them benefits. But I'll take care of all this, you don't have to worry about it!" Yuanye patted the "Monthly Salary and Treatment Agreement" and "Barrack School Regulations". "They just need to be patient for two and a half years. These two and a half years are considered as redemption fees. After two years, they will become free citizens and can leave the barracks. They will have a series of priority qualifications such as buying houses, land, and ships, small loans, group blind dates, etc. Moreover, as long as the law is enforced fairly and they obey orders, they will not be punished. They can also receive a monthly salary far exceeding that of the workshop. Most people should be able to endure it and will not deliberately cause trouble, so you don't have to worry too much."

"So I'm the bad guy and you're the good guy!"

Ah Man was not stupid, and immediately understood what Yuan Ye meant. It was just one person playing the good cop and the other playing the bad cop. But she had no objection. Besides Ah Qing and Yuan Ye, few people in the world liked her anyway. She even liked others to be afraid of her more than to like her. But after she took the "Monthly Salary and Treatment Agreement" and looked through it, she hesitated again and said, "Are we going to let these people go free after two and a half years? If they are injured or disabled, we have to arrange jobs for them and keep them around. Isn't that too much of a loss?"

"If we don't allow them to retire, they will only become cowards. It will do more harm than good if they stay." Yuan Ye thought about it over and over again, and made the decision based on the advanced experience of later generations. He said it without hesitation, "Let's give it a try first. After two and a half years, they will get used to military life and may not want to leave. Then we can sign a new contract with them until the day they are no longer fit to fight."

Ah Man hesitated for a moment, and thought it was okay to give it a try. After all, Yuan Ye had succeeded in the past, and this time might be the same. So he stopped objecting and took the "Barracks School Principles" and flipped through it. He was also surprised: "You still want to run a school in the barracks? What can those idiots learn?"

"This is for the purpose of selecting officers. Those who perform well in training and are smart can go to the 'camp school' to study common characters, arithmetic, marching, camping and so on. They will be junior officers in the future, and the capable will be promoted and the incapable will be demoted." Yuanye plans to teach in person in this regard. He will then be the principal of the first batch of officers, which will be very beneficial for improving loyalty. Moreover, he does not plan to recruit retainers on a large scale, so if he wants to establish a command system, he can only train himself.

After he finished speaking, he handed the book "Personal Technical and Tactical Training Rules" to A Qing, "Here is this book for you. I asked for the training methods in it, and I'm not sure if they are correct. Take a closer look and feel free to modify and try. In the future, in addition to assisting A Man, you will be responsible for teaching the soldiers archery and spearmanship."

Ah Qing nodded slightly, took the book and opened it to read it carefully. She was quite confident in her martial arts and did not feel embarrassed.

Yuanye also called the dozen or so senior Lang gang members who were going to act as the gendarmerie to come closer, and signaled Aman to read the military discipline and regulations to them, asking them to memorize them first, and give their opinions and brainstorm to see if it was feasible, so that he wouldn't work alone and fail to consider some aspects, which might lead to fewer heads being chopped off.

This is the only thing he can do for now. After all, he is just an ordinary person in modern times. This is the best solution he can think of. He just doesn't know what the actual effect will be and whether it can help him survive in this unfortunate era.

Now I can only pray that it really works...

(End of this chapter)