Chapter 4: Recruiting Soldiers and Buying Horses (New Book Seeking Attention)

  Chen Feng deeply understood that survival in this era was like dancing on landmines, whether one was an official, a soldier or just an ordinary citizen, no one had it easy. As for the common people, they didn't need to be mentioned, the poet Zhang Yanghao's line "When the dynasty prospers, the people suffer; when the dynasty declines, the people still suffer" spoke volumes about the difficulties of their survival.

  In this era, being an official is not easy either. This era is the world of guns, without military power, no one will take you seriously. As a result, numerous large and small warlords emerged. The big warlords include Zhang Xueliang of the Fengtian clique, Li Zongren of the Guangxi clique, Yan Xishan of the Shanxi clique, and Feng Yuxiang of the Northwest. There are countless smaller warlords, from those controlling a single town to those ruling over an entire county.

  Those politicians without military power found it difficult to survive in front of these big and small warlords, where political orders were often ineffective in the face of guns, and sometimes even lost their heads.

  Let's talk about the privileged group of warlords in this era. The big warlords are easy to deal with, as long as they don't make trouble themselves, others can't do much to them, and if their skin is a bit thicker, they can rest easy. However, the days of those small warlords are not as comfortable as imagined, they are also a group that survives in the cracks.

  Why is that? Because in the eyes of the big warlords, these small warlords are both their subordinates and potential threats. They have to rely on them to get things done, but at the same time they must be constantly on guard against them, lest one day they become too powerful. Therefore, these small warlords must have their own way of survival, and their military strength cannot be too little or too much. If it's too little, the local gentry and clans won't fear you; if it's too much, you'll be targeted by even bigger warlords.

  Chen Feng has now become the commander of the security team in Xinghe County and the city defense commander. It can be said that Chen Feng is already the highest military officer on this land in Xinghe County, and he is already a small warlord. Therefore, Chen Feng must think about his own way of survival.

  In this era, warlords want someone with a gun to not be coveted by others, and there are only two ways to do it. The first is to hold on to the thigh of a powerful person, as long as someone above speaks for you, then you have nothing to fear. However, Chen Feng is now just a small county security team leader, and the highest-ranking military officer he knows is Li Jingyuan, the provincial security chief.

  Moreover, Chen Feng also knew that the war was about to break out, and clinging to anyone's thigh would be useless. If things went wrong, he might even become someone else's cannon fodder.

  Moreover, this leg-hugging has its own rules, equivalent to taking a stand in the officialdom. Once you've taken a stand, you'll thoroughly be classified into a certain camp. When the opposing side attacks you, you won't have anything to say. And someone like Chen Feng, with his current status, even if he really wants to hug someone's leg, that person may not necessarily appreciate him.

  The second road is the bandit, what is a bandit? A bandit refers to an outlaw who commits crimes and causes chaos among the people. They burn, kill, loot, and commit all sorts of evil deeds, trampling on party discipline and national law as if it were their greatest achievement, and are detested by the people of the nation.

  Only on your turf do you have bandits, so whether it's the local people or the higher-ups, they all have to rely on you. When the time comes, getting guns, money, and numbers will be much easier. Judging from the current situation, Chen Feng wants to have greater development, and the only way he can go is this route. Moreover, it's just a few months' time, after a few months, the Japanese devils will launch a large-scale attack, who will still care about this small shrimp.

  However, there are many types of bandits. In addition to the common bandits, there are also more troublesome horse bandits and even more thorny red bandits. The horse bandits, as the name suggests, are bandits who ride horses. They are difficult to deal with because they have good mobility, attacking when they can win and fleeing when they cannot. Local security teams were mostly infantry, often suffering heavy losses against horse bandits. As for the red bandits, they were even more notorious. In the Nationalist government's propaganda, red bandits had red hair and eyes, killing and robbing everyone in sight, with no distinction between men and women, extremely terrifying. However, the vast majority of intellectuals knew that these red bandits were just demonized workers' and peasants' red armies.

  These three bandits have two that can be stained, and one that cannot be stained. The local bandit and the horse bandit are indeed stainable, and at that time and place, there were not many powerful people who occupied the mountain as king, it was a common thing. However, the red bandit is not commonly seen, and the National Government views the red bandit as a tiger wolf, changing color when mentioned. Once the red bandit appears in that place, the local military commander will be held accountable, and a large number of regular troops will be deployed, at which time it will not necessarily be a good thing for the local military commander, so the red bandit is absolutely not stainable.

  Now Chen Feng's territory indeed has Ma Fei, this is beyond doubt, after all, the former security team leader Li De Guang proved it with his own life and the lives of several hundred team members.

  But Chen Feng knew that the horse bandits came and went without a trace, and no one dared to guarantee that they would stay in Xinghe County all the time. Using them as an excuse was not very safe. Moreover, if there really were such a powerful group of horse bandits stationed within his jurisdiction, Chen Feng himself might not be happy about it either.

  To be on the safe side, there must be a bandit gang on Chen Feng's turf. However, Xinghe County doesn't have any particularly powerful bandits. Originally, there was one on Mount Daqing, but it was secretly eliminated by Chen Feng half a year ago. This matter is only known to Chen and his son, and others are not aware of it.

  So Chen Feng set his sights on the Great Green Mountain, if there weren't any bandits then he would create a group himself and even create a group of fierce bandits.

  In the backyard of Chen's house, hundreds of men in black uniforms stood upright. When Chen Feng walked in, a young man in his twenties ran over and gave him a military salute, saying loudly: "Report to the superior officer, the special forces team has assembled, 455 people are present, please instruct!"

  And these more than 400 people are a crack team trained by Chen Feng in two months. Although there are only more than 400 people, but in terms of combat effectiveness, Chen Feng believes that among the dozen or so counties and cities around Xinghe County, there is no force that can match these more than 400 people.

  These more than 400 people were trained by Chen Feng as an excuse for training the Chen family's grain protection team. The training method fully follows the training method of special forces in later generations, and it is also selected from more than 2,000 grain protection team members of the Chen family, with a elimination rate of over 75%. It is Chen Feng's first trump card to survive in this chaotic world.

  However, due to the short training time, it only has the prototype of a special forces team and cannot be considered a real special forces team. Moreover, this force has not really been on the battlefield, so no one knows what its actual combat effectiveness is.

  "Halt!"

  "Attention!"

  "Brothers, yesterday the provincial government issued a document, formally appointing me as the commander of Xinghe County's Security Regiment and Garrison Commander. Now it's our turn to show off our skills. Listen to my orders: Special Forces, except for the first battalion, everyone else will immediately head to the Daqing Mountain base under Xu Hu's leadership, and openly develop there with the banner of 'Replace Heaven and Walk the Way'. I will send you weapons and personnel in the next few days." Chen Feng shouted loudly.

  "Yes!"

  The next morning, Chen Feng brought more than 100 special warfare team members to the military camp. After a night's rest, these refugees finally looked somewhat human again and were no longer on the brink of death like they were yesterday. However, everyone's complexion was still very poor, and their physical condition was not good at all.

  Adding Zhou Tiedan's squad, the entire security team had 922 people. Chen Feng reorganized all of them into two infantry battalions with 360 people each, a guard company with 120 people and a cavalry company with 80 people. As for the over one hundred special warfare soldiers he brought, except for leaving a 38-man special warfare squad, others were assigned to the newly established security team as officers.

  Soon a list of security team officers was sent to the provincial security department for filing by Chen Feng, and the list included not only Chen Feng, the commander-in-chief and security commander, but also Li Wensheng, deputy commander, Yang Yi, chief of staff, Li Bin, battalion commander, Hu Tiesheng and others.

  The troops were well-organized, but the combat effectiveness of the entire army was extremely weak. One reason was that almost all of the soldiers were refugees who had been fleeing for several months and were physically exhausted with very poor physical fitness. Another reason was that their morale was very low, or they didn't even have any morale to speak of.

  It will take some time to solve these problems. Considering that these people were refugees yesterday, Chen Feng did not dare let them eat their fill, as people who have been hungry for a long time may gorge themselves when they finally get food, which can be harmful to the body.

  The body is not well-nourished, and training is naturally delayed. Therefore, after Chen Feng finished the appointment of the troops, he did not rush to train, but instead gave each soldier two sets of newly made military uniforms, letting them immediately return to the barracks to take a hot bath, and then gather at the large school field.

  This military uniform was customized by Chen Feng according to the camouflage training uniforms of later generations. In the eyes of this era, it is very strange with its colorful and green appearance. However, this era itself is an era of anomalies, and the security teams in various places were not regular troops to begin with, so there was no uniform uniform either.

  Xinghe is a poor place, so the security team here doesn't even have a uniform. The original security team wore black coarse cloth clothes, and only officers were issued a set of clothes worn by local police. It's already great to have uniforms, and the team leader gave out two sets at once, who would bother to pick on the style of clothes.

  Wearing the same uniform is different, at least this momentum looks different. Chen Feng ordered the troops to take to the streets immediately and continue recruiting, this time not only recruiting those single men with no strings attached, but also recruiting those with families, women too, whether they are young girls or middle-aged women, all are wanted. With Chen Feng's order, the entire security team quickly sprang into action.