My soldiers are all Fourth Calamities!

19. Post-war debriefing is a magic weapon for improving the combat effectiveness of troops.

After annihilating the enemy, their troops went to the village they had previously visited and returned all the remaining villagers' property, which had been seized by the White bandits, to its rightful owners. Guard posts were quickly set up at the village entrance and high ground.

After the troops established a foothold in the village, accompanied by the dull, rhythmic sound of supply wagon wheels, several small trucks loaded with supplies carefully rolled over the dead branches and leaves at the edge of the deep forest outside the village, eventually disappearing into a hollow in the dense forest not far from the village.

On the dirt road at the village entrance, marked by tire tracks, several rather robust military horses snorted and slowly pulled a field kitchen—the horse-drawn four-wheeled light field kitchens of various companies had also been brought here—to begin cooking something barely edible.

Rochester and his company received canned food and dried bread as distributed.

The army of the "Redvet Union" currently follows the principle of eating whatever is edible as its staple food. If one had to name something edible, it would be a canned meat called "Tussanka".

However, it must be said that the level of light industry in this other world, "Russia," is truly in line with that of Russia. The level of industry is really not impressive. Theoretically, the shelf life of canned meat in "Tusanka" is more than eight years, but when many cans were delivered to the soldiers, the cans were leaking air—and the meat had spoiled.

You think this can is sturdy? It's leaking air.

You might say this can isn't sturdy, but he just can't open it no matter what—the experience is absolutely hellish—it's no less than Rochester's previous life on Earth, tearing open a jelly package, and finally managing to rip off the whole outer ring after a long time.

As World War I quickly depleted the empire's already meager treasury, the current civil war is now its last hope.

The production of canned food declined sharply, and the shortage of meat led both the Redwit Alliance and the White Bandits to fill their canned food with large amounts of peas and onions.

It was more like canned peas than canned meat. The black bread in the rations was replaced with dried bread, which did make transportation easier, but the dehydrated bread was dry and hard. Long-term consumption of this kind of staple food has caused many soldiers to suffer from varying degrees of stomach ulcers and intestinal bleeding.

To make sure the soldiers could swallow the bread, the field kitchens mainly produced hot porridge.

"I'll start cooking right away!"

Rochester walked briskly toward his company's mess hall as he thought to himself. The food might be unpalatable, but on the battlefield, filling one's stomach was the first priority for survival.

Rochester was also among the first to arrive at his company's food line. When it was his turn, he was taken aback by the solid object he scooped out with his spoon—there was meat in the pot.

The cook paused for a moment when he saw Rochester.

"It was found while cleaning up the battlefield. In peaceful times, they might have erected a monument for the horse, but now..." the cook explained.

It was only from the cook that they learned that while cleaning up the battlefield, they had found many dead horses, and the meat in the pot was horse meat.

In the past, when wars were not so fierce and food was not so scarce, horses might have been buried, but now, there is nothing wrong with eating horses that died in battle.

Moreover, the Russians are not particularly averse to horse meat. In the past, a Japanese cavalry unit once attacked a Russian tank unit, and the Russians ate horse meat for a month.

Rochester took the iron bowl full of broth, turned and walked to a shady spot on the edge of the village where he could sit down.

The surrounding area was filled with soldiers wolfing down their food. Rochester stuffed the broth and bread into his mouth, the scalding porridge sliding down his esophagus, finally dispelling the burning hunger in his stomach.

As the noise of dinner gradually subsided, Rochester wiped his mouth and glanced at the company. He beckoned Guo Ruhe, Anton, and eight other veterans brought by Sokolov.

They chose a location that was relatively close to all the troops—a location where the surrounding soldiers could vaguely hear their conversation.

The people gathered around Rochester, looking somewhat bewildered. Rochester cleared his throat and broke the silence: "Let's take some time now to have a post-war debriefing."

In postwar analysis, it was found that European forces at the time also had methods for rapidly improving combat effectiveness, but these methods were not implemented at the grassroots level.

"Post-war summary?"

Apart from Guo Ruhe, who remained composed, Anton and the other veterans exchanged bewildered glances. In their minds, this kind of action was something high-ranking officers would do in the map room while looking at a sand table.

They simply need to wait for orders, obey, and then wait for the next order.

Besides, this was a victory. What's there to summarize about a victory?

Rochester didn't offer much explanation, but instead posed the question directly: "Regarding that small-scale skirmish just now, if you were the White Guards, what would you have done? Or rather, what do you think the enemy did wrong?"

The air seemed to freeze for a few seconds. Everyone was even more bewildered—what had the enemy done wrong?

The men stammered and couldn't say anything, but one of the new recruits raised his hand and said, "When we charged, the enemy fled in disarray and didn't establish any defenses."

The recruit scratched his head. "I was terrified. If the enemy had a strongpoint, we would have suffered heavy casualties."

A hint of approval flashed in Rochester's eyes, and he nodded. "That's right. Did we also make a mistake? While we need to provide timely support to our allies, we must think things through before taking action."

Although Rochester was touched that the company commander had come to his rescue, he did not want others to die because of his own problems.

"We cannot launch an attack rashly when we do not know the number of enemy troops or even whether they have fortifications."

With someone taking the lead, the others became less reserved and started discussing it.

"The pre-battle preparations were indeed poor; this time it was purely luck that the location was chosen to facilitate a surprise attack."

"Also, it was only because other comrades in front drew their fire that we were able to catch them off guard from behind; otherwise, it wouldn't have been so easy."

Rochester showed great patience with everyone who spoke. Regardless of the depth of the question or the immaturity of the viewpoint, he offered sincere praise and encouragement.

He knew that only by breaking this rigid mindset of "superiors ordering subordinates to carry out orders" and popularizing the awareness of reflection and summarization at the grassroots level could this unit truly possess subjective initiative.

It's not that this way of thinking is bad, but rather that we can't only have this kind of thinking.

This kind of reflection and summarization should be disseminated to the entire team. Illiterate people cannot produce brilliant ideas, and the initiative of grassroots troops is also very important.

Although Rochester would love to develop infiltration tactics like the "Stormtroopers," under the current conditions, it's nothing short of a pipe dream.

More importantly, he had not yet seen those illogical "weapons of war".

Simply applying the tactics of World War I from his previous life will inevitably have some problems. Rochester cannot guarantee that he can come up with any advanced tactics in this regard. Practice makes perfect, and we still need to experience it to solve the problems.

This unique battle debriefing meeting lasted a full half hour.

As dusk settled and the crowd dispersed, Rochester looked at the first group of people who remained.