The decisive battle between the Wehrmacht and Wu Peifu's direct army was also the most high-tech decisive battle of the Republic of China so far, and the use of a large number of aircraft and airships gave the direct army a very severe psychological blow.

Wu Peifu also did not think that the appearance of planes on the battlefield to bomb the army on a large scale would make morale so low, and some troops even scattered and fled when they saw the bombing, magnifying the role of the planes, especially the exaggerated threat of the planes in the army by those who had been bombed, which aggravated the spread of this pessimism.

One of the most ironic things is that Feng Yuxiang's 16th Mixed Brigade, which came to support him from the rear, said with a smile in order to boost the morale of the army after seeing the plane: "The plane is not a big deal, it will definitely not bomb itself, so you don't have to be afraid." As a result, the plane dropped two tons of explosives, and the 16th Mixed Brigade was killed and injured more than 400 people, and even Feng Yuxiang himself was injured and unconscious, and the soldiers of the 16th Mixed Brigade were so frightened that they ran away by a third.

Just when Zhao Zengfu's Qilin Army was preparing to recover Henan in one fell swoop and wipe out all the direct lineage, Zhu Er, the British minister to China in Beijing, directly approached Wang Maoru and said to Wang Maoru: "The European countries do not want your country's war to damage the interests of all countries in China, so all countries want your country's war, and this is our ultimatum." "The arrogance of the British Empire was written in his face.

Wang Maoru frowned, and said in a deep voice: "The war can be stopped, but the Two Lakes Patrol Envoy should return to his own territory and protect the interests of Britain, not in Henan." We can stop it, but Henan is our national defense force. ”

"Your requirements for the immediate army. I'll relay it on my behalf, but hopefully in the meantime. Don't go to any war. Zhu Erdian still arrogantly demanded that he be his master.

Wang Maoru raised his sleeves and said, "Please, don't send it." ”

"Humph! No polite Chinese! Zhu Erdian went away in a rage.

Destroying the direct army in one fell swoop and restoring Beiyang during the Yuan Shikai period was certainly what Wang Maoru thought in his heart, but there were too many interests involved, especially the Anglo-French group standing behind Wu Peifu, which was a force that he could not underestimate. If they angered Britain and France, they liberated Japan. Take your own back and you will suffer.

Now Wang Maoru is very conflicted in his heart, he is facing the double temptation of reunification in the south and opening up the territory in the north, and the Japanese are also eyeing the side and cannot afford to lose, which is like holding a large stuffed meat bun in each hand and squatting on the side, the wolf's target is not the meat bun but this person. Therefore, it can be said that the deterrence of the Japanese helped the direct line. made it impossible for Wang Maoru to send a large army south. But the purpose of driving Wu Peifu back to Hubei, Wang Maoru must achieve it, and the next thing to be solved is Zhang Zuolin's Northwest Army.

After retreating to Xuchang, Henan, the direct army encountered unprecedented troubles, and hundreds of thousands of displaced people who had to leave their homes and go north because of the great drought and military disasters this year blocked the ranks of the direct army going south.

Cao Qiang immediately prepared to order his troops to shoot at the homeless. Let them withdraw from the passage. Then Wu Peifu's subordinate Xiao Yaonan immediately stopped Cao Qiang's actions, Wu Peifu would never allow anyone to do the matter of shooting at his own people, Xiao Yaonan didn't arrive, and if he didn't stop it, Wu Peifu would definitely not spare him.

Cao Qi ran to Cao Kun and complained about Wu Peifu. He said: "These mud legs are going to stop us and let us be eaten by the Wehrmacht." "I didn't finish a few words. Wu Peifu lifted the curtain of the tent, and it was obvious that Cao Qi's words were heard in Wu Peifu's ears.

"Butcher!" Wu Peifu glared angrily, and Cao Qiang immediately wilted, hiding to the side and not daring to fight back.

Cao Kun's henchman Li Yanqing haha: "It's all your own people, don't quarrel, now there are refugees in front of you and chasing soldiers in the back, let's discuss how to solve it." ”

"If you want me to say, it's better to go back to Hubei first, the two lakes are rich in the world, we play the role of Hunan and Hubei, occupy the granary of the world, and then with the help of the British, Wang Maoru's team will not dare to fight." Wang Yaobin said.

"I agree with Brigade Commander Wang." Cao Qiang said hurriedly.

Wang Yanzhen, commander of the 16th Division, said: "It's too embarrassing to lose Henan like this." ”

"What else? Our soldiers are not even able to buy ammunition, and if you go to the Wehrmacht, the bullets will be poured like rain, and we can't exchange ten dead soldiers for one person, how can we fight this battle? Wang Yaobin said.

Wang Yanzhen sighed and said, "But I can't go back to Hubei now, this refugee ......."

Wu Peifu's staff officer Zhang Zuomin suddenly said: "Marshal, can you do this, tell the refugees that the National Defense Force is ready to relieve the people, let them go to Wang Maoru's National Defense Army, so ...... a few people's eyes."

His eyes suddenly lit up, Orr laughed, and Cao Kun said, "Good, good, good!" What a plan, what a plan! ”

Wu Peifu was noncommittal, but his eyes showed disagreement with this plan, but he couldn't put forward a more reasonable proposal, so he had to remain silent. Afterwards, Wu Peifu said to Zhang Zuomin: "This plan is really not the power of war, and it is not beneficial to our soldiers, you should still be a staff officer next to Cao Kun." Zhang Zuomin also knew Wu Peifu's temperament, but he just sorted it out and came to Cao Kun's men, Cao Kun asked him to be Cao Kun's chief of staff.

After the displaced people publicized that the Wehrmacht was about to deal with the victims in Henan, the victims poured towards the Wehrmacht's north of the Yellow River and Kaifeng, and the road for the direct army to the south was immediately cleared. It was Cao Qiang's department that led the army into Hubei first and finally arrived home safely, and then the direct army retreated to Hubei and abandoned Henan.

Commander Zhao Zengfu of the National Defense Army, who had just arrived in Kaifeng, received a secret telegram from Wang Maoru not to enter Hubei for the time being, and to suppress bandits in Henan. The abundance of bandits has brought great disasters to the people of Henan, especially the people of Henan who are in a great drought this year can survive for the time being, but after paying land rent and paying taxes and rents in the autumn, the people obviously cannot survive. Cao Kun and Wu Peifu led their direct family to withdraw from Henan, not necessarily without the intention of abandoning Henan, they are not stupid, Henan disasters and bandits are everywhere, there are more bandits than soldiers, refugees are everywhere, throwing a mess to the national defense force, it is much better than defending in their own hands.

After taking over Henan, Wang Maoru realized the severity of the disaster in Henan, and the drought in the areas along the Yellow River was slightly eased, but in the areas far away from the Yellow River, hundreds of thousands of displaced people were fleeing to the areas where the legendary food could be eaten by the Wehrmacht. The Defence Force had to use the strategic reserve of rations to keep the displaced people alive. An even greater catastrophe would be two months later, when the autumn harvest would be unsustainable, and millions of displaced people would be created, and it would be clear that there would not be enough food for the Wehrmacht to move again. Wu Peifu's move was indeed a surprise to Wang Maoru, and the wolf was extremely bèi.

The direct line was defeated and lost Henan, and the Henan overseer Zhao Kui rebelled against the direct line at this time and led the Henan Army to join the national defense army.

At this time, Wang Mao controlled the National Assembly and the presidential palace and the prime minister's office in Beijing, but in fact, Beijing had already implemented military control at this time, so this central government was obviously the national defense force system. After the implementation of military control, the first thing to do was to control newspapers and opinions, and schools were not allowed to propagate all kinds of ideas, and every teacher was contracted to ensure that teachers did not carry out ideological propaganda among students. This has aroused the dissatisfaction of many teachers at Peking University, Yan University and many other schools, who believe that universities should be free of speech and should not be lifeless, so that the people have become stupid and empty horses.

The Minister of Education, Fu Yuedi, immediately threatened to resign, demanding that the government must not listen to the demagogy of Wang Maoru, an ideological executioner, and prepared to launch student protests. But Wang Maoru sneered, announced the increase in education investment, and the improvement of teachers' salaries, and at the same time fired a large number of teachers, among whom the teaching ability is strong but the life is very confused, such as Jin Jiming, the returning professor is jealous of prostitutes in the eight alleys, and returns to the school to promote the Soviet Russians, and also falls in love with their students, which is called freedom of love.

Wang Maoru authorized the government to announce that Jin Jiming was prohibited from continuing to engage in any educational work on the grounds that the teacher's moral quality was not up to standard, so as not to mislead people, especially to demand that the newspaper publish the list of these people, and asked Ma Liang of the Propaganda Department to clearly write down the reasons why these people were not allowed to engage in educational work. People are always at fault, some people are lustful, some people are good gamblers, some people are good smokers, some people like to collect antiques, but all people make mistakes. Like the large number of professors who were expelled this time, and used the bad morality of teachers as the reason, it is a great negation and destruction of knowledge.

Of course, the one-vote veto system of teacher ethics is not an invention of Wang Maoru, it is a great invention of our country in later generations, and it is a great tool for leaders to punish teachers. Since the veto vote is in the hands of the leader, after an ordinary teacher violates the leader, it will be difficult for him to engage in educational work if he is vetoed by the one-vote system, and other units will not want a teacher who is not qualified in teacher ethics, and it will be difficult for this teacher to find employment.

Shi De commented that a killing tool dressed in the cloak of sacredness is like a woman's chastity, and once it is denied, it will be difficult for people to raise their heads and be a man.

After the resignation of Fu Yuetong, the former director of education, Yuan Xitao, the deputy director of education, acted as the chief of education, and Yuan Xitao was not used to Wang Maoru's meddling in education, so he resigned a few days later. Because Wang Maoru and Duan Qirui jointly controlled the country, Duan Qirui immediately appointed Fan Yuanlian as the chief of education, and Fan Yuanlian did not dare to take office, Wang Maoru knew that everyone was afraid of himself, so he sneered and appointed his confidant Xu Nailin as the chief of education. And Duan Qirui didn't attach importance to the education department, so he let Wang Maoru interfere, this is not a real power department, Duan Qirui naturally won't care.