After the dinner, Roque drove back to his temporary residence in Paris.

It's Christmas again, but there is no festive atmosphere on the streets, perhaps because the banquet ends a little late, there are almost no pedestrians on the streets, there are not many lights on either side of the street, and few street lamps on both sides of the road are on.

One winter, London was nicknamed the "fog capital", and Paris was not much better, because every winter because of the consumption of a lot of firewood for heating, the whole city was covered in thick smoke, which was unbearable for southern Africans.

Unlike the cold winters in Europe, the winters in southern Africa are not cold, only the southernmost Cape Town will snow in winter, and the amount of snow is not large, there is no snow in the central and northern parts of the country all year round, and the winter is not to the point where you have to burn things to keep warm, so from this point of view, southern Africa is really pleasant in climate, and it is simply a paradise compared to Europe.

Roque's temporary residence was in the suburbs, and when the convoy was out of town, a thick tree appeared in the middle of the road for some unknown reason.

Angel, who was sitting in the co-pilot, silently pulled out her gun, and watched the guards in the car in front of her get out of the car and scold and move the trees away, and there was no accident.

Roque didn't speak, but Angel explained: "Now the law and order in Paris is very chaotic, theft and robbery often occur, and the road we are taking now has a robbery a few days ago. ”

Roque can understand that in the third year of the world war, the devastation of the war is becoming more and more obvious, a severe famine has broken out in India, Britain and France are not much better, the soldiers at the front will not be affected, and the situation of civilians in the rear is very bad.

For an old imperialist country like Britain and France, at Christmas in previous years, the dining table of ordinary families did not mention the delicacies of the mountains and seas, but at least turkey and bacon were indispensable.

This year, the situation is more tense, and the French newspapers even started to teach those housewives how to make potatoes into chicken taste in the newspapers a few days ago, which looks a bit funny, and the problems reflected are shocking.

Back at the headquarters, Roque was concerned about what the logistics department had prepared for the officers and men of the expeditionary force during the Christmas season.

"Beef stewed potatoes, fresh fruit, unlimited alcohol and tobacco, and fish and chicken thighs, coffee is still enough—" Sidney Milner was confident that the British government was doing much better than the French government, after all, there were colonies all over the world to loot.

After Roque became commander-in-chief of the British Expeditionary Force, Sidney Milner's status also rose, and now he is the head of the logistics department of the British Expeditionary Force, a position that can be appointed by Roque himself without consulting the British War Office.

Of course, Britain also had to pay for the purchase of supplies from southern Africa, and the price was still on the market, at most for the sake of the suzerain, the price would be a little lower than that of other countries.

Even so, the British government can not bear it, with more and more troops on the front line, the British government has borrowed more and more from the RAND Bank, only this year, the British government has borrowed more than 500 million pounds from the RAND Bank, with a total loan of more than 1 billion, these loans are not directly given money, but used for local procurement, which is one of the conditions of such a generous RAND Bank.

So why was Roque able to be the commander-in-chief of the British Expeditionary Force?

This has a lot to do with Roque's outstanding performance in the position of commander-in-chief of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force, but that's not all, the factors of the RAND Bank, the Nyasaland Military-Industrial Group are also important, at least now no one doubts Roque's loyalty to the British Empire.

Once the British Empire loses this war, then these loans from the RAND Bank will be lost.

So in order to recover the loan smoothly, Roque will also do his best for the British Empire.

"What about the French government?" Of course, Roque also cares about the logistics of the French army, Britain, France and Russia are the three major customers in southern Africa, and all orders are met as soon as possible.

The difference is that Britain and France could not only take loans from the RAND Bank, but also could owe money when the money for the purchase of materials was insufficient, and the Russian Empire had to trade in cash, and there was no loan.

The "arrears" here also have interest, and in business, no one will be less.

"It's a bit bad, the logistics of the main French forces are okay, the colonial servants—" Sidney Milner pouted, obviously unable to explain.

This is also normal, and the logistics supply within the British Expeditionary Force is also focused, with the British mainland troops, as well as troops from southern Africa, at the top of the supply chain, then the Anzac, the Canadian Expeditionary Force, the Indian Legion, then the colonial servants, and the colonial labour.

The situation on the French side is also hierarchical, the troops on the French mainland must have everything, the logistics supply of the colonial servant army is much worse, Roque knows the situation, it is good to have bread, occasionally open meat, don't think about fresh fruit, and the amount of cigarettes and alcohol with ingredients is unlimited.

Ignoring the logistics of the French troops, Roque turned to Paul Cocker and ordered his troops to use the winter truce to hurry up and build fortifications in preparation for next year's battle.

After a winter, more German soldiers will come out of the training camps, and the German troops will be able to find a way to deal with the tanks, which, after a short period of glory, will be greatly limited in their use next year, and the Western Front will be plunged into trench warfare with heavy losses if there are no accidents.

Roque has to be ready now, more tanks, more planes, more artillery grenades, now 100,000 British troops arrive in France every month, these are troops from the British mainland, by the middle of next year, the total number of British expeditionary forces will exceed 2 million, by then, whether the Americans will join or not, Roque will have the strength to fight the Germans.

While Roque was recuperating, the 2nd Cavalry Division was recuperating in distant Antwerp.

In fact, it is not a recuperation, sporadic firefights occur every day, but the 2nd Cavalry Division and the German troops on the opposite side have a tacit understanding not to organize large-scale battles, try to make the soldiers feel some festive atmosphere, precision shooters shine, hundreds of people die under precision shooters every day, the German casualties are slightly more, and the British expeditionary force is less.

It was not the officers and men of the 2nd Cavalry Division who died on the side of the British Expeditionary Force, but the 28th Indian Division, which assisted the 2nd Cavalry Division in the battle.

Like the German army, the defense line of the British expeditionary force is also composed of several lines, the first line of defense is defended by cannon fodder, the real elite are on the second line of defense, the third line of defense is artillery and reserves, and the position of the second cavalry division is on the second line of defense.

On the Antwerp side, the distance between the first and second lines of defense was 1.5 kilometers, and if the Germans attacked, such a distance would be enough for the 2nd Cavalry Division to be ready for battle.

Every morning, the precision shooters of the 2nd Cavalry Division go to the first line of defense in off-road vehicles to look for prey, and return en masse at 6 p.m., the precision shooters call this kind of operation "going to work", and the entire 2nd Cavalry Division, 65 precision shooters have been awarded the Medal of Hero.

The criterion for receiving the Medal of Hero is to kill a hundred enemy soldiers.

Unlike the British Expeditionary Force, where at least half of the army was a colonial servant army, the German army was composed entirely of white Germans, so one of the biggest benefits of sniper warfare was to completely break the fear and self-protection of southern Africans against white Europeans.

Qin Ling is the best accurate marksman of the Second Cavalry Division, and the number of German soldiers killed by him has reached 265, which is not the most in the Second Cavalry Division, and the one with the most has returned to Nyasaland as a sniper instructor, killing more than 300 German officers and soldiers with his own hands, and is the recognized "Grim Reaper" of the Second Cavalry Division.

Qinling departs on time at six o'clock every morning, a team of seven people is dedicated to serving Qinling, Qinling does not live in the barracks of the troops, but lives in a young woman's house in Antwerp, this situation is very common in the second cavalry division, as long as there are no human lives, not infected with some kind of virus that cannot be described, the top of the expeditionary force will not care about this kind of thing.

They are all young people in their twenties, the age when hormones are most vigorous, it is impossible to lock them all up in the barracks, if they do not make mistakes in this regard, they will have to make mistakes in other aspects, officers can bring their families, and soldiers cannot not be ignorant of the taste of meat for a year or two, so the management of the expeditionary force in this regard is gradually relaxed.

Of course, it must be emphasized that in any case, health is a prerequisite, and it is not merciful to be thrown to Shark Island to contract some unspeakable disease.

Around Christmas, Qinling also has to take a break, no longer go to the front line to work, the expeditionary force to Qinling all kinds of benefits, also Qinling sent to his "girlfriend" home, the second cavalry division has always been very generous in this regard, Qinling received all kinds of materials are double, in addition to the expeditionary force standard materials, there are also all kinds of condolences from southern Africa, so many things that Qinling had to use a car to send things to the "girlfriend's" house.

"Thank you, William, would you like to come in and sit down for a while, I've got a bottle of wine from Oaktown." Qinling is very happy today, the expeditionary force is not short of wine, but the best wine is still very rare, and the wine from Oak Town is in short supply.

This is not to say that the quality of the wine in Oak is good, and the quality of the wine in France is good, but the wine of Oak is the most popular in the expeditionary force, especially the more qualified generals, who only drink the wine of Oak Town.

At Qin Ling's feet, there were a lot of things, large and small, and behind Qin Ling stood a graceful blonde woman, who was smiling politely at William.

(Speaking of which, brothers may not believe it, I thought about the name Qinling for half an hour, so it was a little late-)