Romanian Eagle

After seeing off Ludendorff, the crown prince and Presan went back, and there was still a lot of work waiting for them.

Ludendorff finally arrived in Berlin after almost two days of train rides. Looking out the window at the familiar and unfamiliar place, Ludendorff was also melancholy. When he got off the train, a young officer in his twenties walked in front of him and saluted. "Colonel Ludendorff, I am Second Lieutenant Mandrill of the General Staff, and have been ordered to meet you."

"Thank you, second lieutenant." After speaking, Ludendorff followed Lieutenant Mandrill out of the station, and the second lieutenant pointed to the Model T parked on the side of the road. "Let's go by car."

Lieutenant Mandrill told Ludendorff after putting away his luggage. "Colonel, I'll arrange for you to stay first. Tomorrow morning, His Excellency Mao Qi, Chief of the General Staff, will meet you to learn about the military situation in Romania."

The next day at the German General Staff, Ludendorff stood in front of the chief of the general staff, Mooch, and reported on his work. "Colonel Ludendorff, you are an adviser to the Romanian army, can you rate its military situation?"

"Okay, Your Excellency Chief of the General Staff, when I first arrived in Romania, its military personnel were bloated, the senior officers were severely corrupted, the lower-level officers had poor tactical understanding, and many of them had a low level of education, and could not even recognize military orders. The morale of the soldiers is not bad, but the lack of training has led to the poor overall combat effectiveness of the army. We can fight with one division, and there were two Romanian divisions before the reorganization."

After Ludendorff introduced the state of the Romanian army before the complete compilation, he paused and continued.

"During the reorganization in Romania, we have increased the amount of soldier training. The junior officers have been re-learned mainly at the Bucharest Military Academy, and the senior officers have also been retrained. After three years of reorganization, they now have our nine-tier organization in terms of military personnel. It is not worse than us in equipment. Generally speaking, the troops that have been reorganized now can compete with us one-on-one at the division level. I personally think that their large-scale reorganization of the army now has the idea of ​​war. "

Although Ludendorff and Edel are friends, and they are not influenced by their feelings, they still tell the chief of staff what they see and tell their opinions.

General Mooch, who heard Ludendorff's story, was also thinking about Romania's plans. From the German perspective, it is of course hoped that Romania will join the war against Russia in the future. It's just that Romania has not yet been fully drawn into the chariot. An elite army is placed on the front line of Bessarabia in Russia, which is also a kind of protection for East Prussia and Austria-Hungary.

Now Romania's plan Xiaomaoqi guessed that the only people he can make decisions around Romania are Serbia and Bulgaria. Considering the dispute between Romania and Bulgaria over the Dobroga region, Xiaomaoqi has his own answer.

"Thank you very much for your analysis of the Romanian army, Colonel Ludendorff." Moloch told Ludendorff.

"It is an honor for every German to serve the Empire." Facing the thanks of the chief of staff, Ludendorff leaned on his legs and answered without hesitation.

"This time when you return to China, I plan to arrange you to be the director of the Second Division of the General Staff. What do you think?"

"I don't have any problems at all. I feel honored to be able to work under the chief of staff." Faced with the questioning of Xiao Maoqi, how could Ludendorff refuse, and the Second Division of the General Staff is in charge of marching work, which is more suitable his appetite.

Little Mooch was very satisfied with Ludendorff, he had read the information before. He also gained a deep understanding of Ludendorff's ability to work in Romania.

"You just came back to rest for a week and see if your family is coming to work." Little Mao Qi was still very understanding and gave Ludendorff a holiday.

Ludendorff left the General Staff after getting the leave approved by Mooch, and drove to the retired Schlieffen's house.

General Schlieffen, who is concentrating on his own plans,

At the butler's prompt, he stood up and walked to Ludendorff. "It's Ludendorff. I haven't seen you for a long time. How are you doing in Romania?"

"Thank you, Your Excellency General, for your concern for me. I have a good time in Romania. Now the chief of the general staff, General Mooqi, has transferred me to the second division. I can help you continue to complete the plan." Ludendorff introduced General Schlieffen. own status.

"Also, all kinds of new things appear now, all affecting this plan. I'm too old and I don't have enough energy. Ludendorff, you can help me, I'm very grateful to you." Schlieffen expressed his gratitude to his former subordinates.

"You're welcome, General."

Ludendorff told Schlieffen about the changes he had seen in the Romanian army, with a focus on Romania's fast-moving divisions. Schlieffen pondered when he heard that this division with 800 cars could maneuver twice as much as a normal division without relying on railroads. "This is a new trend. The advantage of being twice as fast as others can give the military more options, but it will give the government another headache in terms of military spending."

"Yes, I calculated in Romania that if you want to improve logistics, you need at least 300 more cars per division to work, it's not a small expense and it can only improve logistics. Plus personnel training, daily maintenance of roads Generally speaking, car transportation can only be supplemented by train transportation." Ludendorff said the results of his own calculations.

This is also the limitation of technology in this era. After Edel has produced Dongfeng trucks, the main force of transportation is still trains. At present, a train can transport nearly 1,000 tons, and a truck can transport only 1.5 tons. It takes more than 600 trucks to achieve the transportation capacity of a train, which is a big problem in terms of cost.

"The truck is still a lot better than the horse-drawn carriage. It can supplement the distance from the train to the troops, but it doesn't cost a small amount of money."

Schlieffen sees the problem very thoroughly, but now the stock of horses in Germany is a very large number. Don't say that he is just a retired chief of staff, and even the current little Mao Qi does not dare to replace all short-distance transportation with trucks, which involves a lot of problems.

"But it can still be done by equipping the vanguard with enough trucks for transportation." Schlieffen muttered silently. In his plan, the maneuvering speed of the rotating attacking troops had always been the topic of his greatest concern. Now that there are better short-distance means of transportation than horse-drawn carriages, it is no wonder that he will be obsessed with it.

"Your Excellency, we can actually make a plan first, and whether it can be implemented or not depends on the decision of the General Staff." Ludendorff told Schlieffen about his plan.

"I really need your help this time, Ludendorff."

Finally, with the joint efforts of Schlieffen and Ludendorff, a more reasonable 'Schlieffen Plan' was released. There is no change to the troops in this plan, except that trucks are used on a large scale in the detouring troops on the western front. According to the new plan, the detouring troops are equipped with different trucks according to different positions. The follow-up troops to follow also have at least 300 trucks. According to the new plan, the entire 53 divisions of the circuitous force are equipped with 23,000 trucks.