My Italian: Chapter 437 tough army

The National Socialist's vigorous struggle with the Mafia in the South is a major concern for the party and the government, which is in their interest after all.

However, for Admiral Simeone, this matter is not worthy of attention, because the Army cannot pay attention to it, and there is no time to care about other things.

This is not only the arrival of Admiral Simonyi of the General Staff, but a busy day of work has begun.

"Chief of the General Staff, this is the list of the 21st Division's assessment."

"Okay, I see, put it on the table."

Simone, who was buried in his work, continued to work without raising his head.

"Chief of the General Staff, this is the plan for the division-level confrontation exercise between the Fifth Division and the Thirteenth Division formulated by the Combat Training Office."

"Okay, put it there and I'll look at it later."

"Chief of the General Staff, you need to meet with Marshal Cadorna in the afternoon to discuss the adjustment of the army battalion company level."

"Okay, I know."

After the adjutant went out, Simeone was the only one left in the room working hard. Simeone's office is quite simple. Apart from his own office chair, there is nothing else in a sofa, a clothes rack, and a file cabinet on one side. That's not right. There is a national map of Italy on the wall.

Half an hour later, Simone, who was finally busy with the work at hand, picked up the assessment book of the twenty-first division.

To say that what frightens the Italian Army officers and soldiers the most at the moment is the assessment.

Over the years, Simeone's biggest promotion in his tenure is the strict implementation of the assessment system. Before he took office, the Army also had an assessment system, but this system was more like going through the motions and was not authoritative enough.

After he took office, he deeply felt the inferiority of the Italian Army's combat effectiveness, so he reported the attitude of reorganizing the Italian Army's combat effectiveness and severely suppressed the assessment system. Every officer needs to be assessed, and it is not a one-time assessment. The assessment will be conducted every two years, and the difficulty of each assessment will increase year by year. If you fail the assessment twice in a row, then I'm sorry, you may not be suitable to stay in the army, apply for retirement. No one is an exception, even if you are from a family of military officers, the children of nobles must pass the assessment.

For this reason, many officers referred to Simone as the most severe Chief of Staff in the history of the Army.

Of course, that's not enough, just pressure is not enough, and rewards are also needed, and the reward given by Simeone is promotion. Officers who are excellent in each assessment have an advantage in promotion and job promotion. For example, for the vacant officer positions, these officers with excellent assessments will be given priority to take up positions, and the same is true for promotion.

In recent years, Simeone has promoted the strict implementation of the assessment system, and the combat effectiveness of the Italian Army has also been continuously improved. In the German-Italian military exercise held last year, the 9th Division defeated the German Army's 14th Division in a division-level exercise confrontation. This was the first time the Italian Army had defeated Germany in a division-level confrontation with non-guardian units (equal numbers and equipment). This made the German counterparts look at it with admiration, and also affirmed the results of Admiral Simeone's reassessment.

Of course, the assessment of these years has also brought about an effect, that is, the Italian officers are more reasonable, and a large number of incompetent officers have retired, making the Italian Army more combat effective.

A data can be mentioned here. Before Simeone took office, the Italian Army had more than 500 senior officers at the general level in active duty. It is not a good thing to have so many generals when the size of the Italian army is only 200,000. Having so many generals is not a good thing for the Army. After all, a division-level unit generally has three chief officers who are generals (deputy commander + chief of staff). The army has so many generals that many positions are high, which is not conducive to the construction of the army.

After years of rectification by Simeone, there are now only more than 200 active generals in Italy.

As for the school-level officers, there are also a large number of retired officers. As for the lieutenant-level officers, there are few who fail the assessment. Perhaps it was because most of the lieutenant-rank officers graduated from military academies.

After Simeone's rectification, although the Italian army dare not say that it can compete with the German army with the same number and equipment, at least it will not be too bad. Its quality in the army of the great powers, it is qualified to be ranked in the middle grade.

Of course, Simeone also deserves this honor. If you compare the photos of Simeone before he took office as chief of staff, you will find that his black hair has turned white, and he looks like a man in his fifties. More than sixty.

Simone picked up the assessment report on the twenty-first division and looked at it carefully.

Admiral Simeone attaches great importance to the assessment report, and will check the contents of each report with the most serious attitude.

"Very good. The 21st Division's assessment results are very good, and it has improved a lot compared to the last time. The coordination of infantry and artillery is particularly good. It seems that Commander Mesut has also worked hard."

Judging from Simeone's attitude, he is very impressed with the 21st Division.

Of course, this also has a lot to do with the small number of divisions currently owned by the Italian Army. At present, the Italian Army has a total of 17 divisions. After deducting five independent artillery regiments and three cavalry brigades, each division has less than 10,000 people, which is really miserable. The reason for the army to save the number of people is also due to the lack of army funds.

At present, the Italian Army has an annual funding of 203 million lire. Although this funding is not too much, it is not too small. But unfortunately, this funding is simply not enough for the Army to display. You must know that the emergence of various new technologies has made the replacement of army equipment very fast. For example, Italy was only equipped with the 75mm field gun in 1897. It has faced backwardness in less than two years. Will the 128 purchased by the Italian Army be distributed to the troops?

And new weapons and equipment are being replaced so quickly that the Army must invest more money in catching up. Therefore, in order to save money, the total strength of the Italian army was cut again and again. Originally, 3 fully equipped and fully trained division-level troops were guaranteed, but now they are all changed into one of the shelf regiments. As for other troops, they were also cut down. The most exaggerated 7th Division~www.mtlnovel.com~ has two regiments, two infantry regiments that are not full of personnel, plus artillery regiments and other affiliated units, and a division has only about 6,000 people. .

Of course, it is not bad to keep the formation of this kind of cutting force, and it is really miserable that even the formation of the troops is abolished.

And compressing their own troops in this way is not all to save money, but to upgrade their weapons and equipment, it is inevitable for the army to save money and food.

Of course, the state of the Army has a lot to do with the current Italian strategy. At present, only the relationship with France is not good, the Italian army only needs to consider the land defense of France.

And the pressure on the army is less, and the funding will naturally be less.

Look at the prosperous navy next door. The proportion of military spending in recent years has almost caught up with the army. However, this is also the result of the efforts of the navy. The interests that Italy has captured in recent years have basically depended on the navy. In this case, you let the government not bias military spending towards the navy, how is that possible.

Therefore, in order to improve the army, in addition to the relief of Italy's finances, only Italy is facing land pressure. Of course, this problem, the Army does not want to see. After all, in the event of a war, no one will be better off, and neither of the two neighboring powers will be easy to deal with.