The number of people on the list of marshals this time is five, and Wang Sa, Jiang Yong, Liu Lu, Li He and eight people are responsible for research, comparing merits, contributions, and ages, but Jiang Fangzhen resolutely disagrees with his inclusion in the list of marshals, and he also said that there are staff officers who are marshals, and then he proposed to leave the marshal evaluation team. However, Sa Zhenbing smiled privately at Lu Rongting and said: "Jiang Baili doesn't want to be the commander in his heart, it stands to reason that his merits are enough, and the reason why he proposed to leave the marshal evaluation team this time is to circumvent it." ”

Lu Rongting said: "Xiusheng must support him, you see that as soon as he proposed it this time, Xiusheng immediately agreed, and he will never be missing from the list of commanders." ”

Sa Zhenbing said: "But I know that Zhang Zuolin and Wu Peifu are at odds with Jiang Baili, and I don't know if there will be any constraints in this." ”

"Your arms can't twist your thighs." Lu Rongting said with a smile, "Who will be the commander, the final decision is still decided by Xiusheng, how can others dictate?" Zhang Zuolin, a bandit, is more shrewd than the southerners, but Wu Peifu, a Shandong stick, I don't know if he will be stupid in this matter. ”

Wang Maoru asked the Fengshuai evaluation team to keep the list strictly confidential, but everyone has been speculating. There is no doubt that the targets of everyone's speculation are Zhang Zuolin, who arrived in Beijing to serve as deputy commander of national defense, Wu Peifu, who came from Mongolia to report, and Ren Yuanxing, who returned from the Western Regions, must be in the position of marshal.

The rumors of the marshal have also intensified, many officers speculate on the list of marshals, and some even list the list of thirty-six marshals, because there are folk rumors that Wang Maoru is the reincarnation of Emperor Ziwei under the thirty-six Tiangang Stars and seventy-two Earth Evil Stars, so it must be thirty-six marshals.

After hearing this, Wang Maoru laughed and said, "Thirty-six marshals." The marshal is not worth much, does it still need such hype? ”

Later, Sa Zhenbing and other people in the old Beiyang thought that the list of five people was too small, and there were many future commanders of the National Defense Army. There are more than five in terms of seniority. Especially if there is no Wang Maoru in the list, everyone thinks it is inappropriate, as a person who single-handedly created the National Defense Army, Wang Maoru's handsome name has been called for a long time, but it has always been unruly. If Wang Mao is not the commander, wouldn't others be the commander and put others on the fire? Sa Zhenbing and Lu Rongting, two old men, took the lead and demanded that Wang Maoru's name must be on the list of marshals. If you don't have the first place, you can't do it. Wang Maoru just smiled, noncommittal, as if he had a deep meaning.

When Wang Maoru revealed the list to Zhang Zuolin. Zhang Zuolin found that Wang Maoru's name was not in the list of marshals, and immediately objected: "This is not good, Brother Xiusheng, if you don't become a marshal." What do we do marshals? Wasn't it scolded to death by everyone? ”

Subsequently, Zhang Zuolin, Sa Zhenbing and others persuaded Wang Maoru one after another. A day later, Wu Peifu arrived in Beijing, and Wang Maoru held a welcoming ceremony for Wu Peifu. When the two were chatting, Wang Maoru talked about the five people on the list of Feng Shuai, and Wu Peifu also said: "Xiushuai, there is a problem with this list, and the problem is not small. ”

Wang Mao said curiously: "What's the problem?" ”

Wu Peifu said: "The bandits and I in the list are because we have promoted the republican government and made the country stop the civil war, which can be regarded as a small personal effort to unify China." Liu Xiang's subordinates recovered Tibet, and he himself was one of the heroes who promoted the return of the Sichuan army to the republic. Ren Yuanxing was guarding the Western Regions and opening up the territory, and he had nothing to say. It's just Jiang Fangzhen...... He has never led troops to fight alone, so I'm afraid that the people below will not be convinced. ”

Wang Maoru smiled, he knew in his heart that Wu Peifu had opinions on Jiang Fangzhen, and it seemed that all warlords in history had opinions on Jiang Fangzhen, whether it was Yuan Shikai, or Zhang Zuolin, Wu Peifu or Duan Qirui, only Feng Guozhang was better to him, and the reason was because Jiang Fangzhen and Cai Ye were classmates and close friends, and when Cai Ye rebelled against Yuan, Jiang Fangzhen did his best to help Cai Ye defeat the Beiyang Army. Although Jiang Fangzhen himself was not a Three People's Activist, and he himself had gone one step further with the Progressive Party of Liang Qichao and others, and was considered a nationalist, his help to Cai still made the Beiyang warlords distrustful. Of course, the Kuomintang government is not very interested in Cai Yi, and later history has not unanimously recognized that Cai Yi is not a member of the Kuomintang Party, but a love ** valve who opposes dictatorship. Although Jiang Fangzhen is a think tank, he has never been able to hold power, and is only a senior staff officer.

Everyone in the world knows that Jiang Fangzhen is smart, understands military affairs, and is capable, and it is precisely because he has so many advantages that his protégés are all over the world, and no one dares to hand over power to him. Just imagine, if Jiang Fangzhen was in power during the Kuomintang period, and all the ** lords did not stop the command of the Kuomintang leader, but only listened to the dispatch of the teacher, where would Chairman Jiang be placed? Therefore, it is precisely because of his qualifications and intelligence that Jiang Fangzhen makes it impossible for him to really hold power. However, Jiang Fangzhen was a man who knew the great righteousness of the nation, he was not greedy for power, and he vowed to fight for the rise of China all his life because of the defeat in the First Sino-Japanese Naval War in his childhood, and to achieve his goals all his life, rather than fighting for power and profit.

Jiang Fangzhen, a native of Zhejiang, spent all his shrewdness on the study of military theory, rather than on personnel struggles and political factions fighting for power. He sometimes speaks out of the general interests of the nation and the country, and it is inevitable that he will offend people, offending Zhang Zuolin when he was in the northeast, and offending Wu Peifu after the reunification of the National Defense Force.

"Jiang Fangzhen is a person, and he talks about soldiers on paper, but this person is Zhao Kuo's talent, and he can only talk about soldiers on paper, and it is difficult to win a battle if he leads the troops alone. He made him marshal, which is an injustice to the veteran who fought bloodily in front of him. Wu Peifu vigorously opposed Jiang Fangzhen's appointment as marshal.

And this time, Zhang Zuolin, who has never been very good at dealing with Wu Peifu, rarely chose to stand on the same front with him this time, and also opposed Jiang Fangzhen's claim to be the commander.

Wang Maoru actually made a difficulty, in fact, some of Wu Peifu's words are indeed reasonable, but Jiang Fangzhen's contribution to the national defense force cannot be judged solely by whether he leads the army to the expedition. For example, when the Wehrmacht was unified, Jiang Fangzhen wrote a letter to his students, hoping that his students would abandon the darkness and turn to the open to safeguard the unity of the country. Many local officers not only came to the banner of the Wehrmacht, but also their teacher and principal, Jiang Fangzhen, whose role was more inconvenient to explain.

After Wang Maoru avoided everyone, he looked at the list and was silent for a long time, his kindness to Jiang Fangzhen could not be disappointed.

In this way, can only Liu Xiang or Ren Yuanxing be crossed? Liu Xiang has been in Sichuan for a long time, and the biggest reason for Wang Maoru to let Liu Xiang enter Beijing is to ban the Sichuan military group, and if he does not take this opportunity to move him to the central government, it will be difficult to transfer him in the future. Liu Xiang cannot be crossed off the list. And Ren Yuanxing's great achievements made it even more impossible to cross it off the list, so he had to think about it carefully.

Later, He Rufei and Li Delin respectively found Wang Maoru, meaning that Wu Peifu and Zhang Zuolin entered the Central Committee and would lead the bloodline of the National Defense Army to be polluted, which meant that they were unwilling to accept the management of these two old Beiyangs. Moreover, there are not a few Wehrmacht officers who have the same four items as him, and many officers have expressed their disgust with Wu Peifu and Zhang Zuolin. Wang Maoru said soothingly: "The national defense force is still our national defense force, and letting them come to Beijing to be officials is actually a clear promotion and a secret descent, and the various departments with real power are still led by our people." You don't have to worry about blood, and eventually they will be integrated into us. You, the Wehrmacht officers who follow me, must get along well with the officers of the old Beiyang and not cause any trouble. Although Li Delin and He Rufei didn't like the officers of the old Beiyang, they couldn't stop them from entering the Ministry of National Defense, so they had to reluctantly accept it.

Fortunately, after Wu Peifu and Zhang Zuolin came to the Ministry of National Defense, they did not do anything immediately, but waited and watched to see what the Ministry of Defense could do. This made many officers feel relieved, and Lao Beiyang did not come to Beijing to fight for power and profit.

After the news of the marshal came out, Liu Zhe and Wei Dongling and other people from the guard department once again united to advocate Wang Maoru to be the supreme marshal, this time they not only united the people of the Baoding department and the Lu Da department, but also united Zhang Zuolin, Wu Peifu, Liu Xiang and other officers from Beiyang to say to Wang Maoru that Xiu Shuai is not a marshal, where do the rest of the people dare to be marshal. The commander of the Eighth Army Corps, the commander of the Gyeonggi garrison, Gai Tianjiu, took the opportunity to get a 100,000-strong signature, demanding that Wang Maoru be the commander before anyone else could take the command, otherwise the armies would not accept it.

Jiang Fangzhen also saw the thoughts of the whole army at this time, and said to Wang Maoru with a wry smile: "Xiusheng Fang can be called handsome today, and the time is ripe." ”

Wang Maoru saw that it was difficult to resist, and decided to increase the list of five people to six, and he was the last, but Jiang Fangzhen once again persuaded bitterly: "Xiusheng is the last, how dare the rest of the people go ahead?" Sa Zhenbing and Lu Rongting also took the opportunity to persuade that you must not shirk under pretext, otherwise everyone will think that you are following the hypocrisy of Song Taizu.

Subsequently, the officers jointly implored Wang Maoru to be the commander, and if he was the commander, he would be embarrassed to continue to serve as a member of the evaluation committee in the marshal evaluation team, so Wang Maoru announced his withdrawal from the selection and evaluation team.

However, Wang Maoru still ordered Pu Ding, director of the Military Department, Ji Yiqiao, director of the Organization Department, and Wang Ke, director of the reception department, to prepare for the appointment of the commander. Ji Yiqiao believes that the time for the appointment of the commander should be arranged in early July, because at this time, the competition of the whole academy is launched, and at the same time, all officers have time to come to witness it. And most importantly, at the beginning of July, the officers had not yet gone to the regiments to take up their duties, so they could participate in the ceremony. Wang Maoru approved that the time for the appointment of the marshal was set for July 10, and the on-site work of the marshal was arranged by the three of them, and they were under the leadership of the marshal evaluation team. On 15 July, when the National Defense Army's northern and southern military academies were in a big competition, and during this period of time, when the Ministry of Defense was at its most lively, the responsible persons of various military regions gradually left Beijing after 15 July and went to their respective military regions to manage their troops.

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