Expedition to Europe

Just when the news about Qin Zhiyuan and the Catholic Church was overwhelming.

An accident happened suddenly.

After the First Brigade moved to Paris, the soldiers lived in the Renault factory because the camp had not been built yet. This was agreed by old Renault. It was not a big event, but since Marcus entered the Renault factory to be responsible for tank research and development, conflicts gradually grew.

Marcus was from Nivelle, and he naturally hated Qin Zhiyuan, and he also hated the First Brigade.

When Marcus found out that the people of the First Brigade lived in the factory, he asked old Renault to drive the First Brigade out of the factory. The reason was simple. As a factory that provided weapons and equipment for the French army, the Renault factory was not suitable for too many idle people. Therefore, it was not appropriate for the First Brigade to live in the Renault factory.

Old Renault rejected Marcus's request.

Don't look at the fact that old Renault showed no temper in front of Qin Zhiyuan, that's because Qin Zhiyuan can provide old Renault with almost unlimited human resources, and old Renault can benefit from Qin Zhiyuan. When facing Marcus, old Renault immediately restored the authority of the head of the Renault family, the top French family. Old Renault really didn't take Marcus, the colonel, seriously.

Let alone whether Marcus's weight was enough, Marcus's reason was also untenable. Almost half of the workers in the Renault factory are now Chinese. If there was a leak, it would have been leaked a long time ago. How could it wait until now?

Marcus knew that he didn't have enough weight in front of old Renault, and he didn't dare to be too presumptuous with old Renault, so he instructed his men to start finding faults and prepare to use excuses to drive the soldiers of the First Brigade out of the Renault factory.

The Chinese in the First Brigade are no longer the Chinese who were submissive when they first arrived in France. When facing the French, the Chinese dared to stand up and confront the French head-on.

So during the Christmas period, because two soldiers from the First Brigade's cooking squad returned too late after going out to purchase, they were stopped by Marcus's people when they entered the factory and asked the commander of the First Brigade to come forward as a guarantor before the two soldiers would be released.

There are precedents for this kind of thing. Chen Kangjian, who lives in the factory, didn't waste any time. He took the guards and knocked the people to the ground in a few seconds. Then he took the two soldiers away and took over the defense of the Renault factory.

Fighting is not a big deal, and robbing people is not a big deal, but taking over the defense of the Renault factory is a big mess.

Renault is a military stronghold. Under no circumstances should a foreign force take over the military defense, even if this force is in the battle sequence of the French army, which is absolutely not allowed.

So Lucas reported the complaint and reported it directly to Nivelle. Nivelle already knew that Qin Zhiyuan was not easy to mess with, and didn't want to deal with Qin Zhiyuan, so he submitted the complaint directly to President Raymond Poincaré.

Poincaré has been very annoyed recently.

In another three or four months, when spring comes, Britain and France will prepare to launch a spring offensive. According to Raymond Poincaré and Lloyd George, Britain and France must go all out and end the Second German Empire in one fell swoop to win the war.

The truth is always harder than expected.

The spring offensive has just been determined, and Britain and France have serious differences when making plans.

In mid-1916, two major battles took place on the Western Front, one was the Battle of Verdun led by the French, and the other was the Battle of the Somme led by the British. Both battles were massive and protracted, and Britain and France paid huge sacrifices for them, but achieved almost no results. And this has triggered a series of subsequent problems, the dominance of the spring offensive is one.

As early as November last year, when the offensives of both sides basically stopped, the main Allied countries of Britain, France and Russia reached a consensus. They unanimously agreed to launch an offensive at the same time in May 1917, and the Italians will also cross the Alps to join the war.

Nivelle was a hero of the Battle of Verdun at that time. Nivelle proposed the Chemin de Dame offensive plan, but unfortunately Nivelle was not a decision maker and his plan did not attract attention.

From November to December, the focus of the dispute was on the direction of the British attack. Haig, the commander-in-chief of the British army, wanted to launch an attack in Flanders with the goal of seizing the Belgian seaport. The British people's stubborn yearning for the seaport was amazing. The then French commander-in-chief Joffre asked the British to move their attack direction south, close to or in the Somme River area. Joffre relied on the French army's superiority in manpower to make his opinion win again.

In December, the situation changed dramatically.

Lloyd George became the British Prime Minister, and Robert Nivelle replaced Joffre as the commander-in-chief of the French army.

The battle plan that had just been determined before December suddenly became meaningless, which was simply the biggest mockery of the work results of the British and French in the past two months.

So, just before Christmas, Nivelle and Haig met again.

Nivelle brought up the old issue again and demanded an all-out attack on Chemin des Dames. Haig was stubborn and demanded an attack from Flanders.

Britain and France were once again in a period of wrangling, which left Raymond Poincaré at a loss.

At this time, as if it was not chaotic enough, Italian Commander-in-Chief Luigi Cardona proposed that an attack should be launched in Italy now to eliminate the remaining Austro-Hungarian troops and force Vienna to withdraw from the war. This plan won the approval of the new British Prime Minister Lloyd George, but it aroused opposition from General Robertson, the Chief of the British General Staff, and also caused dissatisfaction from Haig and Nivelle.

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Raymond Poincaré had a big headache. On the one hand, he had to coordinate the attacks of the British and French armies, on the other hand, he had to appease the emotions of Prime Minister Briand, and on the other hand, he had to suppress the domestic opposition parties' restlessness and try to maintain an increasingly difficult situation.

On Christmas Day, Raymond Poincaré received another report from Nivelle, saying that the First Brigade of the Foreign Legion occupied the Renault Group's factory.

To be honest, Raymond Poincaré now has the urge to resign and throw this mess to anyone, as long as it is not Raymond himself. For this reason, Raymond hit the sandbag in his office for a whole morning.

While venting, Raymond Poincaré imagined the sandbag in front of him as Kaiser Wilhelm II, Franz Joseph I who had just passed away, Ludendorff and Falkenhayn, and even Lloyd George and Haig.

After all, this kind of thing can only be thought about. After Raymond Poincaré vented his anger, he still had to deal with government affairs calmly. The most urgent task was to solve the problem of the Renault factory.

After calling Louis Renault, Raymond Poincaré confirmed the safety of the Renault factory and then ordered Qin Zhiyuan to "enter the palace for an audience."

After receiving the call, Qin Zhiyuan immediately drove to the Elysee Palace.

Raymond is now at the Elysee Palace. Tonight, Raymond will host a celebration at the Elysee Palace to entertain a group of bigwigs.