Chapter 561: Preparation for War

Chapter 562 Preparation for War

As for the source of soldiers, Joseph is least worried about it.

He had previously spent a lot of energy and overcome huge resistance to land reform, and now is the time to reap the dividends.

French farmers who have obtained a large number of lands - even if they have not paid the redemption fee, everyone knows that the land is definitely theirs - now have unprecedented support for the French royal family and the government. In addition, a large number of tax farmers who they hate were killed not long ago, which made them cheer.

Joseph believes that if he issues a conscription notice at the beginning of the month, he will be able to recruit more than 100,000 soldiers by the end of the month.

Of course, the generous treatment and great reputation of the Guards Corps also attract young people to join the army.

Today, even the lowest-level privates in the Guards Corps have a monthly salary of 27 francs. After serving for one or two years, as long as they train hard, they can be promoted to corporal, and their salary will immediately rise to 35 francs.

This is already comparable to government employees. You know, the army provides food, clothing and housing, so the actual income is much higher than that of government employees.

Such a generous salary is enough to impress any young person from an ordinary family.

Coupled with the majestic appearance of the Guards when they returned triumphantly from the Southern Netherlands, and the unremitting propaganda of the Ministry of Military Affairs, being a soldier is no longer the "low-class" profession it used to be [Note 1]. Of course, this refers specifically to the soldiers of the Guards, and the old-style army is still despised.

Even the girls in Paris regard marrying a young man from the Guards as a fashion.

Therefore, the popularity of the Paris Police Academy is extremely amazing every enrollment season. After the expansion of its scale, the Paris Police Academy will recruit more than 5,000 soldiers of various majors and hundreds of officers every year, but even so, the enrollment elimination rate is as high as 70%!

Joseph thought about it and wrote down the plan of "continue to expand the scale of the Paris Police Academy" on paper.

But this is not easy. The Paris Police Academy has already merged with many military academies before, and now there are not many military academies left to expand. Especially around Paris, there are no other military academies except the Royal Military Academy.

It seems that branches need to be established in other regions.

When Joseph thought of this, he suddenly felt that the name of the Paris Police School should be changed. At first, it was to hide its strength and bide its time, so it used the name of the police school as a cover-up. Now it seems inaccurate and lacks momentum.

At the same time, the Paris Police School has too many things mixed in. It not only includes police schools, military schools, and military equipment colleges, but also has to train tax talents.

This seems too complicated and bloated, so it is a good opportunity to sort out the functions of the police school.

So he continued to write:

The Paris Police School will be split into - the Royal University of Police in France, the University of Economics and Taxation in France, the Royal Military University of France, the Royal University of Machinery and Chemical Engineering, the Paris Army Non-commissioned Officers Academy, the Paris Military Technology School, the Lyon Military Technology School, the Toulouse Military Technology...

After he weighed and sorted it out, the first thing is to separate the police, taxation and other majors and build them separately.

Then it is the military field, to establish a mechanical and chemical university specializing in the development of equipment. This must let my father be the president, and even the school site can be located near the Palace of Versailles. The Royal Ordnance Factory was directly allocated to this university as an affiliated factory.

In addition, there is a university for training senior officers, with a three- to four-year course. After graduation, they start as lieutenants and take the route of command and staff.

A non-commissioned officer academy, with a two- to three-year course, trains professional arms and junior officers. For example, cavalry, artillery, map surveying soldiers, etc.

After that, there are three schools for training ordinary soldiers, with a maximum course of one year, and graduates with excellent grades can be awarded the rank of non-commissioned officer.

In fact, the training of ordinary soldiers in later generations was carried out directly in the barracks. However, the quality of the population at that time was relatively high, and at least they had received primary education, so direct training was enough.

At the end of the 18th century, if you want to get high-quality soldiers, you have to start professional training from scratch.

The previous Paris Police Academy actually took this path. And it has been proved that this model is much better than directly entering the barracks, and it can also prevent new recruits from being infected by old soldiers in the army to the greatest extent.

The military schools in Lyon and Toulouse can quickly form a scale by integrating local military schools, and can also absorb local soldiers, thus ensuring the goal of expanding 50,000 new troops in two years.

"Alas..."

Joseph couldn't help but sigh again when he wrote here.

It seems cool to have so many military schools, but each one needs to be piled up with francs. It is estimated that at least several million will be invested.

It seems that we have to "knock" the church for money again. After all, these military schools are also considered to be the affairs of the education system...

After roughly completing the planning of military schools and military expansion, Joseph asked someone to send his manuscript to the General Staff for discussion and improvement, and he began to think about what needs to be prepared in diplomacy.

Historically, although Emperor Napoleon was powerful in military affairs, due to his extremely poor diplomatic ability, he successfully pushed almost all European countries to the opposite side of himself, including Spain, which has always been friendly with France.

Of course, this is also an excellent result of Britain's stirring up trouble.

But Joseph knew very well that no matter how powerful France was, it was unrealistic to deal with Britain alone with its many subordinates.

Even if he is lucky enough to win, France will be hit hard and will not be able to recover for decades. It may even never recover like Britain did after World War II.

The most terrible thing is that Britain firmly controls the ocean and can cut off France's trade channels at any time, making France's ability to fight a protracted war even worse.

Therefore, France must also mobilize its own allies. Letting your "little brother" consume the British "little brother" is the correct strategy.

During this period, the benefits must be distributed to the younger brothers, but as long as the war can be won, this is acceptable. Nahuang wanted to eat alone, but in the end he had to vomit out everything he had eaten.

In terms of diplomacy, Joseph's first thought was France's natural ally, Spain, who is also a member of the Bourbon family.

Thanks to his previous good relationship with Carlos IV and the conclusion of a secret treaty against Gibraltar and Portugal, I believe that if a national war breaks out, Spain will definitely stand firmly on the side of France.

[Note 1] In the old French army before Dage Ming, soldiers were treated extremely poorly and living conditions were difficult. Officers could beat, scold or even torture them at will. So it’s not that they really can’t survive, basically no one wants to be a soldier.

Of course, the conditions of officers are still good. They are completely different from ordinary soldiers.