Siheyuan: I eat melons while doing scientific research

Chapter 1327 The Predicament of the Research Institute (4k)

He didn't know when it started, but in matters concerning the people of the East, he could only retreat step by step, unable to even form an effective defense, which he found very difficult to get used to.

The only consolation is that, unlike John Bull who lost several men inside, they can at least watch from the sidelines.

Even if it's a case of the pot calling the kettle black, at least they really only ran fifty steps.

The most important thing for a person is to learn to make peace with themselves, like the current Citibank employee. Otherwise, if you can't get over a hurdle in your life, then you might as well not live at all.

For the American people, this matter is not too sad when viewed in isolation. The Langley Center is not without its failures. For example, when facing the Cigar Nation across the sea, they have basically never gained an advantage.

However, that place is unique; in reality, the area they need to attack is very small, which also means the area the opponent needs to defend is not large. Under such circumstances, if they encounter a truly ruthless person, nothing is surprising.

But it's different when facing Easterners. They have a long battle line and many cards, some of which are even trump cards. You would think they would win eventually, right? What child cries every day? But these past few years have just been unlucky.

"Let's retreat. The training camp can't stay in the High Mountain Country anymore, so let's move it to India."

"The situation in Sindhu is also not optimistic. The reality is that of the three regions in Sindhu, the one that has the best relationship with us is the one that is furthest from East Asians because of the closest contact in terms of climate and geographical conditions. There is no possibility of a breakthrough in that region at present."

Liberation theology is a magical thing, and it has been surprisingly effective in the magical land of India.

Forget about theology, just ask yourself if you're liberated or not.

"We need other breakthroughs, what about Siba?"

As a traditional friendly force of the United States, and given that the Second Indian War did not occur and is unlikely to follow its original trajectory, the West's wariness and dissatisfaction with the United States did not reach their peak, and they were generally quite easy to talk to, as the war had not occurred in the Indian subcontinent and was not outmaneuvered by the United States.

"It's unlikely. Apart from a few areas in Siba where we can still maintain our presence, in other areas, they also prohibit us from using their land to do work that is too detrimental to the people of the East. Even in those few areas, we can't openly organize relevant training camps."

Like India, a sworn enemy and also a close ally, Siberia also faced the troubles of separatist forces. The reason is actually quite simple: half of all the troubles in the world from the 19th to the 20th century were caused by British rule. Siberia also bears some responsibility for the other half.

Therefore, in several provinces where the West Pakistani government has difficulty penetrating to the grassroots level, the people in Langley Center can still live relatively comfortably. After all, in such places, money talks, and coincidentally, Langley Center is not short of money right now.

But while things are comfortable, it's difficult to do more, since officially it's still Xiba's territory and under Xiba's control.

Several senior employees at the Langley Center simultaneously frowned.

After a long while, one of them suddenly pointed to a spot.

"here!"

The others turned their gazes toward him, looking at him as if he were an idiot.

"Didn't we just discuss this here?"

The person who made the suggestion shook his head: "No, it's not that simple. I know this is also Ba territory, but have you considered one thing—it doesn't have to be Ba territory!"

As I said before, thanks to the tyrannical and immoral John Bull, Pakistan is not peaceful, and the most turbulent part is the eastern part.

High emotional intelligence: Pakistan surrounds India with its own resources.

Low emotional intelligence: Pakistan is separated from India by Indian influence.

Moreover, when John Bull left, he sowed the seeds of separation in the Dongba region.

If the provinces of West Pakistan are only somewhat unstable, but not affecting the overall situation in West Pakistan, then East Pakistan is a powder keg ready to explode at any moment.

Moreover, the geographical separation meant that the Ba Kingdom had very limited control over East Ba. If they could leverage the traditional skills of the Langley Center in East Ba, they would likely gain a fairly stable base of operations.

“This place… but between this place and the East, there is India.”

"But that corridor is narrow enough, and it's a special place. Of the three countries that actually border it, India (North) doesn't dare to interfere, Assam doesn't want to, and that small country that was once coveted by India but should be safe for the time being is incapable of interfering. Maybe we can do something. At least the first half of this plan isn't too difficult, and it also yields enough benefits."

The person who proposed the plan analyzed it.

The others listened and nodded in agreement. What he said did make some sense. At least it wasn't that difficult. And even if it couldn't cause enough trouble for the Easterners in the end, creating a new country and controlling it to some extent would be beneficial to both the Langley Center and the Citizens government.

"Yes, I agree. We need to do something here, otherwise our situation on the South Asian subcontinent will become increasingly passive."

"I agree."

"..."

Pakistan never expected that while the biggest reason for the separation between the east and west, the Sindhu people, had run into problems, someone else had set their sights on their huge enclave to the east.
-
Of course, not all Americans feel frustrated and complain when they talk about East Asians; at least some of them feel good when they do.

For example, Citibank Communications employees have already received the latest issue of "Laser" magazine, which has traveled across the ocean.

"Federico, can you stop your hands? My attention is completely drawn to it, I have no idea what you're talking about." A partner at a private communications research institute complained to his partner as his colleague excitedly waved his hands, making various hand gestures, and chattering away while holding a translation manuscript.

Federico, just from his name you know he's of leather boot descent, and the constant gesturing he makes while speaking only confirms that.

As we all know, after the real Americans have contributed their scalps and turned into turkeys, there are very few left. Strictly speaking, there are almost no real Americans left in the United States; they are all foreigners.

Federico barely managed to suppress the urge to continue gesturing with his hands: "Guess what I discovered? The Easterner, the one who invented the laser, has released new findings!"

At this point, as if still feeling his hands were bound, he didn't know how to speak, so he waved his hands again. But this time, his colleague clearly didn't care about his hands anymore, and was interested in what he was saying.

“Um… Mr. Gao?” The American man didn’t know Gao Zhendong’s title or educational background, so he didn’t address Gao Zhendong as Dr.

But professional titles or academic qualifications are unimportant; what matters is that this person invented the laser. And now he has achieved new results, which is something that deserves attention from anyone aspiring to laser applications.

Moreover, as the world's undisputed technology leader, there are many people in China who want to apply lasers to communications.

"Let me see!" He immediately held out his hand.

He didn't understand Chinese either, so even if an original copy of "Laser" was lying there quietly, he would still go find the copy that his colleague had.

“Wait a minute, you have to let me finish reading it first, or you can print a copy yourself.” Federico remained unmoved.

Half an hour later, they both looked up, their eyes filled with joy.

"Our research direction is correct!" They are also researching laser fiber optic communication technology, but their focus is not on how to manufacture qualified optical fibers, but on how to use qualified optical fibers for communication once they are in place.

In other words, no matter how good their research results are, they still depend on two things.

First, it proves that optical fiber truly has the capability and potential for long-distance communication.

Secondly, we need to manufacture this optical fiber.

This made their research very difficult. Investors, who had not seen results for a long time, had threatened to withdraw their funding more than once, since capital is always profit-driven.

Now, one of the most fundamental problems that had been troubling them has been solved, giving them a chance to breathe. At the very least, this gives investors greater confidence. With this confidence, coupled with the various advantages of fiber optic communication, the probability of their project surviving is extremely high.

Most importantly, the person who presented this research result is the pioneer of laser applications and the world's first person to do so!
The technical endorsement from someone with this kind of background has a different effect than that given by others.

Moreover, the other party's paper is very clear. They not only demonstrated under what conditions optical fibers can be used for long-distance communication, but they also actually built such optical fibers!

"Federico...we need to get our hands on this fiber optic cable!"

After the initial joy, a harsh reality struck them like a blow to the head.

Yes, the paper does mention the manufacture of optical fibers, but it contains almost no substantive content. It seems more like it was mentioned briefly to prove that such a thing exists.

To be honest, if it weren't Mr. Gao who said this, but someone else, neither of them would have believed that such optical fibers had already been built just by reading the paper, mainly because the relevant content in the paper was far too brief.

Therefore, since neither of them were originally professionals in optical fiber manufacturing, they had absolutely no way of reproducing the manufacturing process of qualified optical fibers through this paper.

In other words, their situation has improved slightly, but not by much.

Without physical samples for further research, the threat of investors withdrawing their funding remains like the Sword of Damocles, hanging over the heads of their small, private research institute.

Many of Citibank's small private research institutes later became large companies and enterprises, but many more failed during the startup phase.

"Is it possible to reproduce this using a research paper?"

"The manufacturing process cannot be replicated; the paper contains absolutely no in-depth discussion of the manufacturing process." Perhaps someone who specializes in fiber optic manufacturing could produce this after receiving the confidence from the paper and knowing some specific required parameters, but these two are clearly not among them.

"Then let's wait for our domestic companies to manufacture this kind of optical fiber?" They still had faith in the capabilities of domestic companies, believing they could solve this problem, especially without having to worry about intellectual property rights. And coincidentally, that Eastern country was one where they didn't need to concern themselves with intellectual property rights.

“Federico, we don’t have that much time! You know, even if the investors don’t withdraw their funding, we need to complete our research as quickly as possible. We’re not the only research institute doing similar work.”

For them, it's not just about survival; they also need to address the issue of research progress.

“Hmm… let me think… maybe I should go find my relatives in Gaul…” Federico said.

"Gallic? Aren't you from the land of leather boots?"

"Yes, I am, but don't forget, my ancestors had relatives on that island that was sold to Gaul."

It is well known that the Gauls could only achieve victory when led by non-native or non-male leaders. The non-native leader mentioned in this anecdote is Corsica, the birthplace of the man who almost unified Europe. This island was sold to the Gauls in the 18th century.

In a way, one could even say that he was once a native of the country of leather boots.

But Federico's partner didn't realize the significance of this: "And then what?"

They all knew that it was wishful thinking for the Americans to want to buy this kind of thing from the East, which was why they were so frustrated when they realized they had to get qualified fiber optic cables as soon as possible.

“Perhaps you don’t realize it—these two computers we use for research were bought from Gaul, but their actual place of origin is the East!” Federico, who had relatives in Gaul, was very proud at this moment. Without me, this small research institute simply wouldn’t survive.

In reality, after Gao Zhendong "actively open-sourced" the DJS-59, causing many related companies to go bankrupt, the French took advantage of this to seize a large share of the low-to-mid-range computer market in the United States, and the weapon they used was the DJS series computers that they had re-exported.

However, the computer market landscape wasn't their concern right now. Federico's partner's eyes lit up, and he grabbed Federico's hand: "You mean, your relative can get in touch with the East so we can buy this fiber optic cable?"

Federico nodded and then shook his head: "I'm not sure. I do have a distant cousin who works in a trade organization in Gaul. I'll have to ask him. Anyway, it's better than us being helpless, isn't it?"

"Yes, yes, contact him as quickly as possible, and the research institute will cover the expenses!" From their conversation, it was clear that the private research institute was not in a very good financial situation.
-
Three days later, Lou Shouxing, who was preparing to leave Macau and return to Beijing, received a phone call because of Gao Zhendong's summons.

(End of this chapter)