Regarding the "armies" that have been seen in this world so far, Gao Wen only has two words for his evaluation: wonderful.
At least in Ansu territory.
The severe decline in civilization, low productivity, the separation of nobles, and the absolute dominance of high-end military professions have led to the deformity of the Ansu Kingdom's military system. This country is a unified whole in name, but in fact Each enfeoffment noble is equivalent to occupying an independent kingdom, and the so-called king is just the most glamorous (and not necessarily the most authoritative) of all the lords. There are no unified professional soldiers in this kingdom, only the leaders of various nobles and the knights directly under the royal family in the city of Saint-Sunil, and the nobles at all levels do not have top-down ruling authority, similar to the classical European "on earth" The situation of my vassal's vassal is not my vassal" is particularly serious here. Even many families in the south who claim to be directly subordinate to the king are just attached to the royal family in the form of a covenant. They only have the responsibility to the king to monitor the southern border, The few duties of providing intelligence and sending troops in wartime will not obey the king's other dispatches.
The soldiers under their hands are naturally only their own.
Even a few soldiers under a viscount belonged to the viscount himself.
So if a great noble needs to wage a war, how does he raise a large army
Simple, if his prestige is enough, and he finds a good reason for the war, and promises enough benefits for the post-war division, then the big and small lords under his name are obliged to bring their own private soldiers. To aid in the battle, these private soldiers form their own teams, led by their lords or powerful military professionals sent by the lords (usually the latter, many Anzu nobles in this era have degenerated to the point that they cannot ride horses to fight, and can only use money to fight. The level of hiring strong people to sit in the family), when fighting, these "mixed armies" with all kinds of banners, designations, and tactics all swarmed up, depending on the strength of the enemy and their own interests, they chose to work without exerting effort or lying on the ground The posture of pretending to be dead, after the fight is over, the team leader will go to the big lord or the king to calculate the benefits of dividing up.
The result of this is obvious: the entire kingdom does not have a professional army, nor does it have a unified command system and soldier training rules. The nobles use various methods to piece together their own private soldiers. The weapons are not unified, and the military system is not unified. , the logistics are not unified, and even the army trained by the noble father and the noble son may not be unified if the relationship between the two is not so good.
In addition to the variety of soldiers, this chaotic military system has also led to a series of other serious consequences: the formation of the army's combat effectiveness is extremely slow, the training efficiency is low, the selection of soldiers is chaotic, and the desertion rate is frighteningly high. If only one of the strong men died in battle, the whole team of soldiers would be completely lost because they had neither discipline nor knowledge, and all they had learned was to charge with the leading knights.
The Cecil family is slightly stronger than other nobles in this regard. As the "Guardian Family of the Southern Border" that defended against monsters in the frontier, even if the Cecil family fell, they still retained the habits passed down from generation to generation: more scientific militia system.
In addition to formal soldiers (that is, family fighters), another source of Cecil's soldiers is the trained militia. Family knights train these people recruited from free people according to standards lower than formal soldiers. Train soldiers in leisure time and farm in busy time to make up for the lack of regular soldiers. At the same time, this method is also used to reserve a large number of reserve soldiers for the territory, because there are many people who have received basic combat training. In case of emergency, they need to be replenished Formal soldiers will be much easier than other nobles.
And Rebecca's expansion of the scope of enlisting militias and converting militias from freedmen to serfs is the result of further development of this system.
But Gawain decided to take it all a step further.
Considering the future planning, he needed a professional, professional army with a stable source of troops, so he simply abolished the system of separating the militia and family soldiers, and instead organized all soldiers into a "combat corps". He demanded that all soldiers must undergo systematic training in a new, uniform way, and announced that they would be paid uniformly.
Previously, the private soldiers of the nobles had no salary. Usually, the private soldiers of the nobles had to prepare their own weapons or buy weapons from the lord at their own expense. They even had to prepare their own food when going out. In this case, The reason why soldiers are still willing to fight for the nobles is because of the existence of "private plunder": soldiers can plunder on the battlefield and after breaking through the enemy's city, and keep half of the property for their own use. Soldiers' pay.
The situation in the Cecil Territory is different from other places. The Cecil Lords of all dynasties will provide soldiers with weapons and equipment on lease, and distribute food as subsidies for training and delaying farm work during service. Those who do not pay any salary, the food is only enough to make ends meet.
As a matter of course, Gao Wen decided to pay salaries to professional soldiers, and at the same time announced that Cecil's soldiers would permanently prohibit any private plundering.
And if the soldiers want to get promotion or extra rewards, it's very simple: Gawain also promised to formulate detailed references for promotion based on military exploits and various contributions. Behavior, the wealth that can be obtained by fighting the enemy bravely or earnestly executing orders will be more in the future.
This is not a problem, because the Cecil family has always fought against monsters, at most they fought against foreign barbarians in the early years, and their soldiers did not have any private plundering habits at all, and they have always maintained their loyalty to the Cecil family. , Those food subsidies, and various benevolent policies for families who join the army. At this time, Gao Wen just made the "prohibition of private plundering" into a clear law. Everyone didn't feel it, and even welcomed it: After all, Gao Wen promised that even if serfs joined the army, they could rely on their military exploits to be promoted. Privileges only for family warriors.
But the next thing made them feel a little bit: As a reservation and extension of the original militia system, Gao Wen stipulated that all adult men in the territory are obliged to receive basic military training during the slack season. It has become universal and mandatory.
This does not mean that everyone has to go to the battlefield to fight, but to ensure that the citizens have basic military literacy and can be easily transformed into professional soldiers.
If this point was brought up at another time, it would probably cause some dissatisfaction, but at this moment, less than a day has passed since the monster attack, and Gawain Cecil's prestige is unprecedentedly high. Inspired by the facts caused by the camp, this system was announced.
And everyone also thinks very openly: anyway, serving the lord's labor is also a contribution, and participating in training at this time is also a contribution. If you think about it this way, there is actually no change, as long as you can eat enough.
Besides, if there is a chance to be selected as an official soldier, putting on armor and holding a sword is equivalent to becoming a "half decent person", which is a rare opportunity for most poor people who live in poverty The way out, in front of this way out, it is completely worthwhile to just take out the slack time for training.
The change in the military system cannot be completed in one day, and the details involved are far from being explained in a few words. Considering the audience's acceptance and the complexity of various detailed rules, Gao Wen did not put all his ideas on stage. According to the above statement, he only briefly talked about the integration and formation of all soldiers into "combat corps" and basic military training, and then left the high platform. As for the real details... then he had to discuss with the two knights and Hetty.
Moreover, what he announced today was just laying the groundwork. To put it bluntly, considering the current status of the territory, what he said was a bit too advanced. There were only one hundred soldiers, and these one hundred people were actually the entire "army" led by Cecil. Its scale was completely different from the future that Gawain had envisioned.
And don't look at only one hundred, this military-to-civilian ratio has actually reached the point of insanity. One-eighth of the population has been transformed into professional soldiers. Looking at the ratio alone, it is almost the word "military" written on the face. Gao Wen's impression In this world, the military-to-civilian ratio of a kingdom in a state of world peace is usually between forty to one to seventy to one, or even lower, and even in times of war, this ratio will not exceed one-tenth unless something happens The battle of life and death may be a nomadic people who are all soldiers like the northern barbarians back then.
And on his territory, one-eighth of the people are soldiers!
If these are full-time soldiers, it means that almost all the property output of the camp will be used to support this one-eighth full-time combat population, and all development will stagnate as a result, and social stability will also decline accordingly. Therefore, all the soldiers in the territory are not full-time now. They usually train and guard, and they have to participate in the construction of the camp and land reclamation work when they have time to ensure sufficient labor force.
This made them similar to the Construction Corps, and fortunately for Gao Wen, the soldiers had no complaints about this.
Part of the reason for this is that more than half of the soldiers are militiamen, which themselves belong to the category of not being out of production. The best fighters will not become old-fashioned soldiers who eat too much and are lazy, which is why this situation is now.
Even so, this one-eighth soldier ratio is not a long-term solution. Gao Wen's next plan is to find a way to introduce more people to make up for the biggest shortcoming of the camp.
If you don’t make up the population, everything you say is just a dream. Facing the camp with only 800 people and the soldiers with 100 people, Gao Wen thought that if he planned a professional and professional modern army, even if he opened the coffin at the beginning. At that time, a person who was not stable and was hit on the head by the coffin lid would not have such a dream.
It's just that he has to set these frameworks in advance, even if it can only be a framework now, because once the influx of foreigners, it will be too late to do many things. If there is no mature and stable framework to support him, he will All efforts made here will be diluted by the mixed new population.
After the assembly was dispersed, Gawain immediately summoned the camp managers including the two knights, and this time he also called on Norris, the farmer who had been adapting to the position of "Agricultural Supervisor" for more than ten days, and Hammer, the blacksmith who has taken charge of the steelworks.
(Mom, the transitional chapters are so difficult)