The rise of a great power: starting with military industry

Chapter 118 Export version?
Liu Tao showed curiosity.

Factory 256 is a large military factory, the largest armored vehicle manufacturing factory in the entire southwest, and is directly under the jurisdiction of the Fifth Ministry of Machine Building!

The armored vehicles produced by Factory 256 have appeared in military parades and been reviewed by the Party and the country.

Logically speaking, such a large factory should be very prosperous.

Even if the army does not have any orders, the superiors will allocate a large amount of funds to Factory 256, so the normal operation of the factory should not be a problem.

No matter how you look at it, it seems like Wang Baoguo is getting rid of a burden.

Zhang Zhen looked at Liu Tao's expression and knew that Liu Tao didn't know much about Factory 256, so he gave a brief explanation.

Factory 256 is located in the mountain city. It is the largest special vehicle manufacturer in the entire southwest. It has a large number of equipment and can carry out the production of body welding, oil and gas suspension, hydraulic parts, heat treatment and surface treatment of parts. It has good cutting, stamping and forging processing production capabilities and strong manufacturing capabilities for body, transmission, movement, control, sheet metal parts, power auxiliary devices and general assembly and adjustment capabilities. It even has the largest power transmission comprehensive test bench in the southwest.

The entire Factory 256 has a total of employees, covers an area of ​​more than acres, and has a population of more than people including their families.

Since the second half of last year, Factory 256 has not had any planning targets. The factory director calls his superiors from time to time, complaining about his poverty and asking for targets!

But you have to know that at this time, priority must be given to several large tank manufacturing plants in the north.

For example, the First Machine Factory!

The First Machine Factory was one of the 156 key construction projects during the country's "First Five-Year Plan". With the help of the northern big brother, the factory introduced the full set of production technology of the T-54a tank and produced the famous Type 59 tank. Since then, the First Machine Factory has become the largest tank manufacturer in the country.

Transferring Factory 256 to Panshan Machinery Factory means that Panshan Machinery Factory will be responsible for paying the wages of the employees of Factory 256 and taking care of Factory 256's food, drink, defecation and urination.

To some extent, this is a way of getting rid of burdens.

"Panshan Machinery Factory is a reform pilot factory and is responsible for shouldering the heavy burden of reform." Wang Baoguo said with a smile.

Liu Tao's mind moved, and he quickly asked: "Leader, if Factory 256 produces this self-propelled anti-aircraft gun, can it be exported?"

"I heard that the price of West Germany's 'Cheetah' self-propelled anti-aircraft gun is as high as 440 million US dollars, which is more expensive than the Leopard 2 main battle tank. Will anyone buy it at such a high price?" Wang Baoguo was stunned.

Zhang Zhen thought for a moment and said, "It can be exported, but the performance of the export needs to be appropriately reduced. We can't export the same equipment as the one we use ourselves, right? We still need to be careful about leaks when it comes to this kind of national treasure."

Oh my goodness, does this mean that we have to use the monkey version to export?!

Liu Tao thought about it and understood.

Self-propelled anti-aircraft guns and main battle tanks are different from firearms. They are heavy weapons. It is no exaggeration to say that they are national heavy weapons.

Naturally, some technical indicators have to be restricted.

This is also an international practice, as Europe, the United States and the Soviet Union all do this.

Tanks, armored vehicles, aircraft, and warships, the versions for domestic use and the versions for export are completely different things.

"Thank you, leader. I understand!" Liu Tao smiled.

It's really easy to reduce some performance.

Improving performance is not easy, but reducing performance is not easy either?

As long as we can export and earn dollars, we can sell it to the troops at a lower price and regard it as supporting national defense construction.

But if we cannot export and can only rely on orders from the army, how many self-propelled artillery can the army purchase in a year?
Liu Tao knew how frugal the army was now.

They were reluctant to buy heavy machine guns and heavy sniper rifles, and they had to offer buy one get one free for anti-aircraft machine guns.

In the Fifth Ministry of Machine Building, Liu Tao also saw the two Xerox 860 personal computers that Ho Ying-tung had someone bring over.

This is a personal computer released this year with 128K memory. It is also the first to have the word processing tool BravoX, a graphical GUI, a circular touchpad on the right side of the keyboard, and the XEROX Network System (XNS) protocol. It can be connected to XEROX file, printer and mail servers via an Internet cable.

A computer costs two thousand dollars!
Looks ugly, and performance is simplistic.

The memory is only 128K!

Of course this is not the most expensive. In 1975, IBM launched the IBM 5100, which sold for a staggering $!
Now in the United States, Apple II is the best-selling personal computer. It is equipped with a 1MHz CPU, 4KB of memory, two 2-inch floppy drives, a color monitor and a built-in keyboard. It is priced at US$5.25 and has occupied the first place in the US personal computer sales list for five consecutive years.

Liu Tao is not used to using these two computers, as he wants to use them for research.

Liu Tao spent several days studying these two computers.

Before I knew it, a few days had passed.

He also had to embark on the return journey.

This time, it was not just Liu Tao who returned to Panshan Machinery Factory, but a large group of people.

At the airport, Wang Baoguo led the team personally and introduced each person.

The leader was a man in his sixties, wearing a simple military uniform. He shook hands with Liu Tao with one hand, and his other sleeve was empty.

Liu Tao, however, stood in awe and showed respect.

He still remembered in his mind that he had watched a documentary that introduced China's third-generation main battle tank, and this man was the chief designer!

When he was appointed as the master of the third-generation tanks, he was 66 years old. He took on the heavy responsibility, overcame numerous difficulties, and finally made China have its own third-generation tanks.

This old man participated in the Anti-Japanese War. He was fearless in the face of the enemy, and in the struggle, he showed his extraordinary military talent. After the war, he studied tirelessly, mastered a lot of knowledge, and has been fighting for the country's military industry until now.

"Zhu Yusheng was admitted to the Huangfu Military Academy at the age of 19, and entered the Anti-Japanese Military and Political University to study military affairs at the age of 19. During the war, he created and improved more than 20 kinds of weapons and combat equipment according to combat needs. He is currently the vice president of the Weapon Science Research Institute of the Fifth Ministry of Machine Building, in charge of scientific research, and is also the leader of this expert group!" Wang Baoguo solemnly introduced Zhu Yusheng.

It can be said that Zhu Yusheng is an outstanding student and a valuable technical talent.

"President Zhu, I've heard of your great name for a long time!" Liu Tao couldn't help but feel excited.

He knew that Zhu Yusheng's right arm was blown off when he was organizing a mortar test firing in front of the enemy in January 1948.

Liu Tao is full of respect for this hero of the military industry system.

In this era of talent shortage, Zhu Yusheng is a top talent.

Even though his right arm was broken, he never gave up, but kept going and continued to learn.

If we talk about the technology in the field of armored vehicles, Zhu Yusheng can be ranked among the top five in the country.

The most important thing is his will, an extremely strong will, and his indomitable spirit. That kind of fighting spirit is what Liu Tao admires the most.

This man can be said to have dedicated his entire life to the motherland and contributed to the rejuvenation of the motherland.

Look at the military uniform he is wearing, I don’t know how many years he has worn it. You have to know that his salary is among the high-income earners in this era, but he lives such a simple life.

(End of this chapter)