Spark

Chapter 427 Space Race

"A new round of the space race has begun."

In the Russian Federal Space Agency, Director Demirit looked at the latest report and said with emotion.

The deputy chief, Vyacheslav, nodded in agreement and replied:

"Yes, their tentacles expand rapidly."

"From the beginning of Africa, to now Europe, the Middle East, the Americas, and even space, their footprints have been spread all over basically every piece of physical space."

"Maybe they will become the new empire on which the sun never sets—of course, in another form."

Hearing this, Demirit couldn't help being a little amused.

After shaking his head in silence for a moment, he sighed and said:

"This is the real empire on which the sun never sets. Do you know how the old men of the Ministry of Social Science judged it? They said that China may become the first 'star-level empire' in human history."

"Well, the term empire may not be accurate. Their expression is 'star federation', but I think the title empire is more suitable for them."

"And in fact, they have never given up on pursuing the so-called 'great unity' and the so-called 'community of shared future for mankind' in the past. This is probably the courage that only real empires can have."

"In short, we have been left far behind, and in the future visible to the naked eye, there is no hope of overtaking."

Vyacheslav gave Dmirit a sneaky look, and then said:

"Unless it's war."

"Unless it's war, yes. But we're not so stupid."

"If China's development path is still within the scope of human understanding, hot war and cold war are options."

"But now? Even the top scholars can't explain their continuous technological breakthroughs. They can only regard it as some kind of mysterious force that has not been observed by us at work."

"In this case, confrontation is meaningless, forget it, let's talk about business first."

Having said that, Demirit turned the file in his hand to the first page again, then pointed to the table of contents above and said:

"We currently have three main requests from China."

"The first one is to open up technical cooperation on space station construction."

"Second, conduct exchanges on talents related to solid rocket fuel technology."

"The third"

Before Dmirit could finish speaking, Vyacheslav interrupted:

"The first two are very reasonable, so the third requirement is what they really want, right?"

"That's right."

Demirit nodded slightly, and continued:

"The RD-180 engine technical framework--not just the engine itself, nor the related technologies of this type of engine, but all technologies including this type of engine."

"Including the RD-191 engine that we will test later."

"They probably found a shortcut. Now they are like bandits."

"Only solve the core technical problems. As for the foundation and framework, it is either from us or from the United States."

"I have to say, this method of operation is so efficient, I'm really envious."

Vyacheslav laughed and replied:

"This is just a part of their globalization strategy—in short, it is impossible for us not to give them."

"The construction of the 2013CNF fusion reactor is about to start, and we cannot have problems at this critical moment."

"Compared to the pressure from superiors, Isotov's resistance is nothing at all."

"It's just a few old-fashioned old people clamoring for the so-called 'self-reliance' with outdated concepts. I can solve it."

"You have to solve it."

Demirit repeated his words, and went on:

"According to the information I have, Huaxia is expected to complete the launch of Chang'e-5 within six months, and the Long March-9 rocket used by Chang'e-5 will be equipped with the latest LITV engine."

"This engine must be built on the frame structure of the RD-180, and we also need to provide them with corresponding system engineering technical support."

"So, objectively speaking, we are also the key to the moon landing project. If the progress of the project is slowed down, they will inevitably recover the loss from other places."

"Whether it's a metal hydrogen plant, a natural gas pipeline, or a power station, it's an outcome we can't afford."

"So, why don't we cooperate -- anyway, we can rely on this thing to get the follow-up space station participation quota."

"It's not a loss at all. You know, the Arab Commonwealth has paid a price of hundreds of billions of dollars just to get two places every year."

"Hundreds of billions? Are they crazy?"

Vyacheslav asked dumbfounded.

"They were crazy—maybe they thought, Allah's voice could be heard there."

Demirit said jokingly.

"If they want to hear the voice of Allah, they might as well take a few hydrogen bombs to North America. If they don't have one, we can help."

"The world would be a much better place without that annoying country."

Vyacheslav muttered.

In fact, his resentment against the United States is almost equal to his resentment against the Arab Commonwealth.

Needless to say, the United States has been fighting for decades after all.

As for the Arab Commonwealth, they are dissatisfied with their crazily raising market prices, making the negotiations with China more difficult.

In his opinion, this kind of behavior is no different from feeding the last fish in the river to the bear. Not only can it not develop a relationship with the bear, but it can also make the bear become more greedy after eating.

——

Yes, like most Russian high-level officials, he has always been wary of China, but relatively speaking, his vigilance is more obvious.

"Don't have so much resentment and think about it on the bright side. It is precisely because the Arab Commonwealth has drained their last fossil energy potential that we have a chance to keep up with China."

"Otherwise, this part of the cost gap can only be filled by us."

"Well, I admit that what you said makes sense."

Hearing Demirit's authority, Vyacheslav could only nod helplessly.

After a few seconds of relative silence between the two, he got up and planned to leave.

Before turning around, he asked:

"Should I leave this exchange to Marokov?"

"Leave it to him, at least for now, he is quite credible."

"He is a more determined fighter than us, and everything he does is only for the goal in his heart."

Vyacheslav nodded thoughtfully.

The goal in mind?

At one time, most of the top decision makers in the country to which he belonged were like Marokov.

But now, such a trend of thought may only be found in China.

——

But who knows?

Integration has already begun to emerge, and perhaps in a short while, this kind of thing that almost disappeared will spread rapidly.

"Is the RD-180 thing done?"

Walking on the trail inside Cheng Fei, Chen Nian asked Chen Guo who was beside him.

"It's basically fine. Marokov just flew to the imperial capital today. He will go to negotiate with the representatives of the Great Wall Industry Group to discuss specific quotations and exchange conditions."

"However, this negotiation is basically just a formality. Most of the issues have been discussed before."

"The most important thing is the issue of the seats of the space station and the lunar base. We plan to give them 2 to 5 seats, depending on the specific development situation."

"This condition can be said to be quite generous. After all, we are all superior, and they don't have much bargaining chips to exchange."

Not much leverage.

Hearing this, Chen Nian couldn't help feeling a little emotional.

You know, Huaxia paid an unknown price for this RD-180 engine in the previous life, and even Dongfeng, which took advantage of the tightening of the global situation and the closer cooperation between the two parties, finally won it.

And if you don't talk about the consideration, just discuss the RD-180 engine itself, in fact, you can never say "there is not much bargaining chip" in this judgment.

After all, the high reliability and high technical level of this engine are famous all over the world, and even Lao Mei called it "a technological miracle that is difficult to replicate."

Coupled with the innovative design of the serial combustion chamber + main turbo pump, it can be easily adapted to various modifications. Loma has modified many different models on the basis of this framework, including solid-liquid combination Load the rocket.

Therefore, Chen Nian actually included the RD-180 in the product target that must be obtained from the very beginning, and the development of the matter was smoother than he expected.

With the support of this framework, the design and manufacture of the new LITV engine will become much simpler, and the assembly speed of the Long March-9 rocket will also be greatly accelerated.

6 months to the moon?

It's still conservative. Under the best circumstances, it may be completed in 4 months.

After all, the equipment other than the main launch unit is almost ready up to now.

When the rocket is in place, it can go to the sky immediately.

Thinking of this, Chen Nian said:

".RD-180 itself is still a good target. After all, our technology is behind. The available framework will be of great benefit to our future development."

"The era of the rocket engine will continue for a long time. This is not a waste."

Hearing Chen Nian's words, Chen Guo on the side smiled and said:

"Talking about this, I recently heard an interesting piece of news."

"Great Wall Industry is working on an inertial rocket launch project—they plan to build a super-large electric fan on the Gobi? Then tie the rocket to the fan blades and fly out."

"Do you think this idea is feasible? It seems that it looks like it is unreliable and somewhat reliable."

Chen Nian couldn't help laughing out loud, he never thought that the plan he had ruled out before would be preempted by Great Wall Industry.

But yes, the Great Wall Industry Group has already undertaken a considerable part of the construction work of the metal hydrogen plant in cooperation with Russia, and is more familiar with the characteristics of new materials, so it is not surprising that it can shoot this plan.

However, slapping the forehead is the slapping the forehead, in fact, Chen Nian also knows that the real solution cannot be as simple as the "big electric fan" that Chen Guo said.

"The solution of vacuum duct, high-speed motor, and highly sensitive control system is feasible, but it is not so simple to implement at present."

"To be honest, it belongs to a 'beggar's plan' at this stage. If you say it's useless, throwing some small satellites is more than enough."

"But you said it's useful. First of all, people will definitely not be able to send it up. Accelerating to the first cosmic speed, people will be crushed by centrifugal force."

"This kind of solution is only suitable for Great Wall Industry. After all, their degree of commercialization is relatively high, and they can be directly converted into profitable civilian projects."

Chen Guo nodded and said casually:

"Yes, they plan to use it to throw the star chain."

"Oh, that's okay—wait a minute? Our Starlink project, so soon?"

Chen Nian was a little surprised.

In fact, Huaxia certainly has its own Starlink project, but for a long time, he has never heard of this project being put on the agenda.

It only exists as a vision for the future, and whether it will be useful in the end is another matter.

"Yes, several private enterprises in China are currently doing it, which can be regarded as a kind of exploration."

"Of course, what they want to engage in is not traditional electromagnetic wave communication, but quantum communication. They mainly want to take advantage of the advantages of quantum computing."

"Understood."

Chen Nian nodded thoughtfully, and secretly sighed about the efficiency of domestic enterprises.

This layout can really be said to be quite early - but from another perspective, it can also be seen that domestic private enterprises are gradually becoming richer.

This is a good sign, which shows that after the emergence of fusion, the trend of improving the overall economic environment has indeed accelerated.

I don't know what Musk's expression will be when he hears the news. The bulls he bragged are realized one by one by us. This feeling probably won't be too good.

The two continued to walk forward, chatting about recent project progress, SpaceX's actions, and Musk's nonsense at the press conference.

None of them took the phrase "it will be before Huaxia" to heart. After all, they all knew that even if they were able to launch first, it would only be an extra metal satellite in lunar orbit.

And the only way to really take "that giant leap for mankind" is by Huaxia.

"The space age is really coming."

Chen Nian said suddenly.

"Yeah, I always talk about the sea of stars, but I didn't expect it to be lazy faster than we thought."

"It's as if we haven't even been in a flying car -- or even an electric car -- before we're flying to the moon."

"So, have you figured out what we're going to say after landing on the moon?"

"This is not a trivial matter. You have to suppress Armstrong's words."

"Think about it early."

Chen Nian replied.

"Think about it long ago? It's strange. Let me hear it?"

Chen Guo looked at Chen Nian curiously, and the latter answered without any hesitation:

"That's one giant step for man, one small step for mankind."