The Davout brothers met during the exercise

Joseph's North Africa strategy never intended for the French Army to launch a full-scale offensive. ♪🐠 Claw 🏆😾

That would not only be a huge drain on the troops and cost a lot of money, but it would also easily provoke fierce resistance from local forces in North Africa.

Countless examples from later generations have shown that defeating the enemy's main force is often not difficult, but the subsequent mopping up of scattered local armed groups is the most troublesome. For example, the later world superpower defeated the Atta in just over ten days, but spent two trillion dollars fighting guerrillas over the next ten years and still lost.

Therefore, the best approach is to mobilize local forces in North Africa to serve one's own purposes, using a small number of elite French Army as leverage to influence the balance of power and ultimately determine the outcome.

France diplomats and Police Intelligence Division have been working towards this goal in Algiers for quite some time.

Joseph's Carriage was still half a mile from the training grounds of the Paris Police Academy when he heard the melodious Bugle Call.

A group of Military Uniform Police Academy students in crisp uniforms ran in two Column, stopping every two meters at the end of each column. Soon, two straight walls of people formed from the entrance to the training ground to Joseph's car.

As the officer shouted the order, both groups of the Police Academy students turned around at the same time, lowered their rifles from their shoulders, and the butts almost hit the ground with a loud "thud".

The Carriage passed between the two rows of cadets, Joseph nodded with satisfaction to the Police Academy students on both sides. Just from the welcoming procession, one could see the training quality of these cadets. A line of hundreds of meters long, yet they could maintain such straight lines and uniform movements—this would definitely be considered elite in Europe today.

Several neat Phalanx had already been lined up on the training field.

At the very front, arranged in battalions, were nearly a thousand veterans from the first cohort. Behind them were even more numerous, though their ranks were noticeably less orderly, of the new second cohort. Joseph had already read Friant's report; the Police Academy's second cohort had enrolled a total of 3,000 students.

This is thanks to the fact that the Police Academy provides food and accommodation and is completely open to the public, with scholarships available for those with good grades. Many children from ordinary families who live far from Paris travel for half a month to enroll after learning about the various favorable conditions of the Police Academy.

Of course, the most important thing is that Joseph now has some money and can afford to support so many trainees—the cost of their brand-new Military Uniform alone exceeds 120 Livre. Keep in mind, the France Finance has never allocated a single Denier to the Paris Police Academy.

Behind the second batch of new recruits were over a thousand soldiers in relatively worn Military Uniform, with an average age of over 1,000. They were the Berthier Legion, who had come to observe the ceremony.

Joseph Carriage and, surrounded by military and police leaders such as Friant and Berthier, came to the center of the Reviewing Stand, gesturing to the cadets and soldiers on the field.

The thousands of people on the training ground immediately stood at attention, chests puffed out, and hats raised in salute, while simultaneously erupting in thunderous shouts, "Long live His Majesty the King! Long live His Highness the Crown Prince!"

Joseph smiled and returned the greeting by raising his hat, then delivered his routine speech as the principal. Such a speech would be given here at least once a year thereafter.

Subsequently, all the trainees and soldiers Phalanx Reviewing Stand in turn to be inspected by the Crown Prince.

Behind Joseph, Mirabeau, the newly appointed Minister of Industry who had been invited to observe, was utterly shocked by the imposing and well-trained Phalanx before him.

For the past few days, he had been wondering why the Crown Prince had wanted him to attend the Police Academy's new student entrance ceremony. Only now did he finally understand: the Crown Prince was demonstrating his power to him—these weren't just Police Academy cadets; these were the Crown Prince's army!

He originally thought that the young Crown Prince was well-versed in the path of industrial development and could bring prosperity and hope to France industry.

At this moment, he finally realized that the Crown Prince was definitely a genius monarch—promoting industrial development while guarding against possible Famine, having just consolidated a large number of banks, and now he had created a powerful army.

Most importantly, His Crown Prince accomplished all of this without anyone noticing!

Mirabeau sighed inwardly, thinking that perhaps in a few years, France would welcome another King as great as the Sun King. No, perhaps even more dazzling than the Sun King!

The resounding Bugle Call from the Phalanx interrupted Mirabeau's thoughts. He looked towards the training ground and suddenly noticed that the rifles the soldiers were carrying were very peculiar, definitely not any model produced by Charleville —he was an avid hunter and quite knowledgeable about common firearms.

So he turned to the Police Commissioner beside him and whispered, "Viscount Besançon, do you know what kind of guns they're using? I don't think I've ever seen them before."

The latter immediately replied, "It's the August 1788 Model Percussion Cap Gun. It's the latest product manufactured by the Royal Armory, which His Majesty the King personally oversaw the establishment of."

Today, the Royal Armory Versailles Palace and the Ordnance Factory in Saint-Etienne are on track, and the Standardized Production Model is beginning to show results. If the production capacity is fully utilized, the two factories can produce more than 2,000 Percussion Cap Gun per month.

This was only Joseph had Saint-Etienne devote most of their energy to researching cannon casting; otherwise, production could have been even higher.

Under Lavoisier's leadership, the Royal Gunpowder Bureau had already mastered the technology for preparing Fulminate of Mercury fulminate, easily producing 30,000 Copper Percussion Cap every month.

With production capacity support from both sides, the Paris Police Academy and the Berthier Legion have already equipped all personnel with the new Percussion Cap Gun, and their daily shooting training is based on the Percussion Cap Gun.

After all the ceremonies were over, Joseph announced that the first cohort of the Police Academy cadets would immediately begin their practical training.

The trainees in the first cohort were clearly not informed beforehand and were quite surprised upon hearing the news.

However, the Instructor ' commands immediately made them realize that the practical training exercise had begun.

This was also specially arranged by Joseph, with the purpose of testing the troops' mobilization capabilities and response speed.

The Instructor ' urging voices rang out everywhere. "Hurry up! Move faster!"

"This is war! Everyone, get out of there!"

"The last company to complete assembly will have to run five laps as punishment!"

The trainees did not panic. Instead, under the command of their respective company commanders, they dispersed in an orderly manner and quickly ran back to their barracks.

The cavalry and Artillery headed for the stables.

Mirabeau was surprised that His Crown Prince would invite him to lunch at the Military Camp.

He sat among hundreds of police officers, looking at the simple tableware in front of him, feeling quite awkward. But when he turned his head, he saw that the Crown Prince and the Police Commissioner were already eating heartily.

He had no choice but to eat with them, and only then did he notice that although the food looked rough, it tasted passable, and it had all the usual meat, vegetables, and bread, almost comparable to the officers' meals he had when he served in the Cavalry Regiment.

When lunch ended, all the trainees stood up at the same time and watched the Crown Prince leave the dining hall. When Mirabeau saw the unparalleled reverence and trust in their eyes, he immediately understood the significance of this meal.

After returning to the training ground with the Crown Prince and his entourage, Mirabeau was surprised to find that most of the Infantry had completed their preparations for departure, and Artillery were driving horses to pull several cannons toward them.

He glanced at his watch; only half an hour had passed since the officers had ordered them to assemble!

Only two words remained in his mind: elite.

Half an hour later, thousands of fully armed Police Academy cadets formed neat Column and left the training ground in a grand procession.

Of course, this speed can only be achieved without considering logistical preparations; it would take at least several days to assemble Logistics and Baggage.

The first batch of trainees marched south at high speed, finally arriving at Tuxi Town at noon on the sixth day.

After resting here for another day, they finally met their training opponents for this internship - the Third Infantry Regiment of the Moulins Legion, led by Andre, who had just arrived from Moulins.

After the two armies joined forces, Andre first met with the Police Academy's commander to discuss the upcoming training arrangements, and then they had dinner together.

Once all official business was finished, Andre couldn't wait to go to the Police Academy cadet camp. Led by a Police Academy Instructor, he finally met the young Second Lieutenant who was not yet twenty years old.

The young man and Andre first saluted each other with their hats, and then embraced each other warmly.

Andre pulled the Second Lieutenant a little distance away, smiled, and looked him up and down, saying, "My dear Nikola, you've finally become a real officer!"

The young man Nikola said with great enthusiasm, "Perhaps it won't be long before I can become a great legion commander like you, my dear brother."

"Haha, that day will come. But you've just graduated, so focus on gaining experience and don't think about anything else." Andre patted his younger brother on the shoulder and said, "Actually, I think you'll be the most accomplished member of our Davout family in the future."

"You've been smarter than me since you were little, and you serve under the Crown Prince, so you'll definitely rise through the ranks much faster than me."

The two brothers hadn't seen each other for over two years, and they immediately started chatting and laughing as they walked toward the edge of the Camp.

"Wow, your Military Uniform are really nice! Look at how crisp and clean the edges are!"

Nikola nodded. "It's said that His Crown Prince commissioned a famous Paris designer to design it. Oh, you haven't seen the winter clothes yet; those are truly magnificent, made entirely of Wool, and reportedly cost 70 Livre per garment."

Andre glanced down at his old Military Uniform, tears of envy welling in his eyes. He quickly changed the subject. "By the way, when did you set off? How come you arrived a day earlier than us?"

"I left Paris last Wednesday, brother. It was a high-speed march the whole way, and I'm exhausted. You know, we've never had such Forced March at military school."

Andre's eyes widened immediately. "You mean, you only traveled for six days? It's almost 40 Lieue from Paris to Toussaint!"

40 Lieue is 160 kilometers, which means that the Police Academy students marched more than 26 kilometers a day. This was an absolutely astonishing speed in the 18th century.

It's worth noting that the Moulins Legion also set off last Wednesday, covering less than 30 Lieue, and even took a day longer than the Police Academy students.

This is the result of the rigorous physical training at the Paris Police Academy. In fact, if they didn't need to maintain marching formation, the Police Academy could easily walk another ten kilometers or so each day.

Nikola nodded. "These Police Academy cadets are all in excellent physical condition. I heard they often have to run a mile carrying a Lieue. I tried it a few days ago and could only barely keep up with the slower ones."

Nikola attended the Paris Military Academy. Although he studied very hard and had excellent physical strength, he hadn't undergone systematic cross-country running training and almost couldn't keep up with the Police Academy students.

Andre frowned upon hearing this. "If what you said is true, then my legion will likely have a very difficult time in this exercise."

But he quickly smiled again, "Fortunately, I brought Moulins's best regiment. Even if we can't match your marching skills, we can definitely make up for it in terms of formations and shooting."

"That's hard to say." Nikola looked at his brother with a strange expression. "Do you know how Police Academy practice shooting?"

How to practice?

"When we were using Flintlock Gun, we fired 10 shots every 3 days. After we switched to Percussion Cap Gun, the Dean of Academic Affairs said we needed to get familiar with the new guns faster, so we changed it to 5 shots a day."

"Five shots a day?!" Andre gasped in shock; his corps only fired that many shots every two weeks.

He suddenly noticed a word his brother had just mentioned. "What's this ' Percussion Cap Gun ' you're talking about?"

Nikola pointed to the Musket carried by the Police Academy students patrolling not far away. "Look, that's it. I have one too, but I left it over there. It's said to be a new gun designed by His Majesty the King, or some say by His Crown Prince. When firing, you don't need to pour in priming Gunpowder, you just insert a copper cap. Oh, that's it..."

As he spoke, he took a Percussion Cap from his pouch and handed it to his brother. "This gun reloads three or four seconds faster than Charleville, and its range is also slightly longer."

Andre's face darkened as he pondered how he would explain to his wife, Villar Duchess, if his veteran soldiers lost to the Police Academy students who had only been training for less than a year.

The next morning, with the sound of a cannon, the joint exercise between the Moulins Legion and the first cohort of the Paris Police Academy officially began.

According to the rules, whoever arrives at the Paris Mars Training Field first will "occupy" the high ground and become the more advantageous defensive side. Those who arrive later will have to engage in an assault.

Just two hours later, Andre received a report from a scout that the "enemy" had entered a marching state.

He looked through his Telescope in surprise and, sure enough, saw that the Police Academy students had already set off in neat rows.

"How is this possible?" He turned to his advisor. "Did they prepare in advance?"

The latter hurriedly raised his Telescope as well. "That's impossible, Regiment Commander. I sent people to supervise them, there's no way... Wait, they didn't bring Provisions wagons?"

"Hmm?" Andre observed more closely and found that it was indeed as his advisor had said.

He immediately smiled, "These inexperienced young men will soon have to stop and wait for the supply convoy."