Traveling through the sword to engage in military industry

The Dongda military's development wasn't too significant. After five long years of digestion, absorption, and training, Dongda's sole aircraft carrier, the Yandu, formed a carrier battle group. Fully equipped and combat-ready, it completed a convoy mission from the South China Sea to the Red Sea via the Indian Ocean.

Although it was just a small taste of combat, eliminating only three or four batches of ignorant pirates, the 20,000-kilometer round trip served as realistic combat training, testing the carrier's true combat capabilities and the effectiveness of the complete operational system!

During an unscripted offensive and defensive exercise with a two-destroyer escort fleet already in the Red Sea, the carrier battle group overwhelmingly crushed the Blue Force attack fleet, which included a Luyang-class advanced destroyer.

In the simulated combat plan, relying on its massive air superiority and early detection capabilities, the carrier battle group "sank" the two destroyers almost without taking damage!

This simulation fully verified the irreplaceable role of aircraft carriers in naval warfare.

Without an aircraft carrier as a platform, no matter how large a destroyer fleet is, it cannot provide air support. Relying solely on non-real-time reconnaissance tools like satellites cannot provide timely guidance for combat tactics.

Faced with the combined combat system of airborne early warning aircraft, electronic warfare aircraft, and multi-role carrier-based aircraft, the carrier battle group could detect targets hundreds of kilometers away. By using electronic deception and suppression to blind the enemy destroyers' electronic systems, the destroyers' radar would either display densely packed "enemy" targets or simply detect nothing at all, allowing enemy fighters to calmly launch air-to-ship missiles from dozens of kilometers away before leaving!

The destroyers' air defense systems were virtually helpless against such a situation.

Given such a significant advantage, the Dongda Navy vowed to build another aircraft carrier, even if it meant selling everything, to form a dual-carrier battle group on duty!

After proving the reliability and effectiveness of its first-generation aircraft carrier, Dongda initiated the development of its second carrier. In terms of the ship's technical architecture, the second carrier, the Mingzhu, underwent minimal changes. It only increased slightly in displacement, exceeding the first carrier's full load displacement by more than 10,000 tons, bringing the second carrier into the category of large, 80,000-ton aircraft carriers!

The most direct effect of this increase was that the new aircraft carrier could accommodate 10 additional carrier-based fighters and 2 carrier-based helicopters, further enhancing its air control capabilities.

But that wasn't the biggest change. Due to the exponential increase in computing power, the latest generation of carrier avionics was fully updated to the "Aegis" system supported by ARM11's new computing power!

Of course, the current Aegis system is still in its initial stages and lags significantly behind the Aegis system of the main world. Currently, only air defense detection has been deeply optimized. In conjunction with the carrier-based early warning aircraft, the air defense detection range can be expanded to over 500 kilometers.

However, in terms of carrier-based air defense and anti-missile capabilities and the ability to counter enemy aircraft, the project team is still desperately developing new long-range air defense missiles, constantly improving the effective interception range of air defense missiles.

But the computational performance of radar detection has improved exponentially, providing great convenience and accuracy for airborne detection, early warning aircraft, and shipboard electronic data processing. This greatly improves anti-interference capabilities, making it possible to avoid the impact of simulated echoes sent by opponents by changing wavelengths for detection.

Compared to early radar systems, the performance improvement with today's stronger computing power is more than an order of magnitude!

The research on this new aircraft carrier is not so much the research on an aircraft carrier as it is another round of equipment upgrades for the navy. After the successful development of this Aegis system, at least the Luhai-class and Luyang-class destroyers and amphibious assault ships will undergo a comprehensive upgrade of their shipboard avionics systems.

The Aegis system, developed using new technological means, can be redeployed on older destroyers and amphibious assault ships to enhance their combat effectiveness.

After all, Dongda is still short of money, and military spending must be carefully calculated to ensure key priorities. Even though the current economic scale has grown to $600 billion, the total increase in military spending is only about $9 billion, which translates to 27 billion in Dongda's currency. This amount is the result of Dongda's assessment that there will be no major wars in the next ten years, leading to restraint. Of course, in terms of total amount, the increase in military spending is still significant compared to the past, with the total amount nearly doubling.

Relying on Dongda's relatively stable prices, the purchasing power of this money is still quite strong. After all, at this stage, a Dongda carrier-based aircraft only costs about 5 million yuan, a large destroyer about 35 million yuan, and an aircraft carrier about 80 million yuan (mainly due to the expensive nuclear reactor). An attack submarine costs about 100 million yuan. In terms of hardware configuration, building a carrier battle group at this stage costs about 1 billion yuan in hardware, which is of course very difficult with the current funding.

After all, the navy now has a large family and a large business, and now it has to support hundreds of various ships (30+ Jianghu-class, 20+ Luhai-class, 10+ Luyang-class, 2 amphibious assault ships, 1 aircraft carrier, 5 large supply ships, 10+ Qin-class and Han-class nuclear submarines). Therefore, it is somewhat difficult to configure a carrier battle group with all-new destroyers and nuclear submarines at this stage. However, it is possible to select relatively new Luyang-class and Luhai-class destroyers from the existing fleet, upgrade their avionics and weapon systems, and form a new carrier battle group with the new aircraft carrier, which would only require the addition of carrier-based fighters.

Currently, the Luyang-class destroyer is undergoing research and upgrades, with the most upgrades being made to the ship's avionics and weapon systems. Thanks to Ren Zhong's transported data from the main world, the first-generation vertical launch missile system has finally been successfully developed.

The Luyang-class destroyer already considered such modification factors during its initial design, so the first batch of 4 Luyang-class and 2 Luhai-class destroyers, serving as the carrier battle group's bodyguards, were the first to undergo the universal vertical launch missile system modification and Aegis ship electronic system modification.

As a result, the combat effectiveness of the Luyang-class destroyers has increased significantly in disguise. The introduction of the new vertical launch system not only greatly improved the destroyers' combat response speed, but also allowed them to carry more missiles after the modification, which greatly enhanced the overall combat power of the destroyers.

Therefore, the modification of other Luyang-class and Luhai-class destroyers will also be rolled out step by step.

The Navy's temporary five-year goal is to build another aircraft carrier battle group, forming a main combat formation of two aircraft carrier battle groups. The current speed of naval construction is undoubtedly much slower compared to the construction speed of the previous ten years.

However, considering that the Navy's missile destroyer fleet is already quite strong, ranking firmly second or higher in the Bright Sword world, and given the relatively limited military expenditure allocated to the Navy, maintaining over a hundred ships of various types is no easy task.

There isn't enough budget to build brand new destroyers and new amphibious assault ships for the time being, so the current strategy is to build the new aircraft carrier and then use the old destroyers and attack nuclear submarines to support it.

Ren Zhong is no longer worried about the personnel allocation for the new aircraft carrier fleet. During the training for the first aircraft carrier, there were already backups for carrier-based fighter pilots and aircraft carrier crew members. As soon as the new aircraft carrier is completed, it can quickly form combat capability, much faster than the first aircraft carrier.

Dongda now has four military branches: the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Rocket Force. Ren Zhong can't completely favor one over the other.

For the Army, the new generation Type 60 tanks and armed helicopters developed by the research department have been waiting for funding for several years. It has been difficult to squeeze out some funds each year to mass-produce and equip five brigade-level or higher combat groups. Under the overall situation of making way for development, the Army only has enough time to equip one combat group per year.

Speaking of which, it's all tears. If the Dongda Army wants to fully equip the remaining combined arms brigades and combined arms divisions, according to the current progress, six or so per year is the limit. It would take about 20 years to equip all the remaining 120 or so combat units!

There's no way around it, the current conditions are like this. It's not just the Army that's stretched thin, the Air Force is also having headaches. The J-9 has developed the next-generation J-9B new fighter jet, which has replaced the brand-new radar system, and the weapon system has also been greatly upgraded. The air-to-air missile has achieved a brand-new 60-kilometer attack range. However, due to funding limitations, the number of new fighters added or replaced each year does not exceed 2 air regiments. This only ensures the demonstration and teaching functions of the new fighter jets to the minimum extent.

For the Rocket Force, the brand-new 15,000-kilometer mobile strategic missile has achieved a comprehensive breakthrough from the heavy missile transporter to the missile body. The latest generation of Dongfeng missiles has now achieved direct access to most parts of the world.

Plus, it can be moved at will on the road, the new Dongfeng has become Dongda's well-deserved trump card.

However, the current economic conditions only allow the configuration of 3 to 5 missile battalions, lacking the financial support for large-scale deployment.

Ren Zhong approves of this result. After all, the current world situation is improving, and there is no risk of large-scale war.

The part of the Great Black Fish that Dongda has revealed has formed a powerful deterrent to the two major powers in the Bright Sword world. So far, no country has been able to catch up with Dongda's level in terms of the Great Black Fish.

Even if Rogue Eagle and Big Bear have now achieved the launch and service of nuclear submarines, neither of them can directly face the fact that this is Dongda's unique technology that can dive to a depth of 400 meters. Theoretically speaking, the depth of the submarine is the king. If you can't play the Great Black Fish with such a deep dive, it's all an unsolvable existence for Rogue Eagle and Big Mao.

A little more or a little less doesn't really matter, because this thing is a deterrent, and it will basically not be used. So, as long as the opponent doesn't know the real number, then the meaning of this number is not great. From the perspective of deterrence, the existence of the Great Black Fish and submarine-launched missiles is enough.

Now, Dongda's military research work is constantly updating new models according to the plan, but in terms of equipment, it is updating as much equipment as it can afford. Dongda's military expenditure is limited, and it is impossible to achieve the standard configuration of equipment for the entire army under the current financial resources.

At the same time, the rapid reaction force trained and commanded by Li Yunlong also frequently appeared in international special operations, including international cooperation in blue helmet operations. Every attack was like a thunderous crushing of the opponent. Whether it was mobility, combat effectiveness, or equipment, everything was beyond the Bright Sword world's understanding of power!

Therefore, even if the new equipment added in the past five years is not much, and the personnel have not increased, the combat power is still constantly improving. While developing the economy, we are grasping both hands and making both hands hard.

Occasionally showing a hand is to make people remember deeply, and no one dares to despise it.

As for the island-building construction in the South China Sea, it is now following the funding and titles of infrastructure construction. The biggest expenditure is the 15,000-ton self-propelled cutter suction dredger, but this ship follows the research and development costs of Liming Shipbuilding. After the development showed strong strength, friendly partners in the Middle East bought two ships at a high price and earned back all the investment in research and development, including the manufacturing cost of the first ship.

However, not everyone can buy this heavy weapon. Some Western capital groups wanted to get one to study, but at present, Dongda restricts the export of this heavy weapon. The Middle Eastern partners bought two ships, and they had to hire crew members from Dongda at a high price. The sensitive nuclear power above is impossible for people to easily access.

However, those little partners with a piece of cloth on their heads are not at a loss. After they have this big guy, the cost of their enthusiasm for island building has not only been greatly reduced, but the construction speed has increased several times!

The world island project that failed in the main world was implemented many years in advance. With the assistance of Dongda's self-propelled cutter suction dredger and Dongda's infrastructure maniacs contracting, it has progressed rapidly in the Bright Sword world. The first phase of the project has been completed. The super project, which originally invested as much as 160 billion in the main world, was expected to be completed in five years, but it was not completed in 20 years, and eventually became a unfinished project.

However, after intensive development in the Bright Sword world, in the past five years, more than 300 islands planned according to the world map have been built in a sea area of ​​nine kilometers long and seven kilometers wide, and the cost is less than one million pounds on average per island. However, the built islands are sold to the wealthy in the world for as much as 3.5 million pounds to 20 million pounds. The guys with a piece of cloth on their heads in this Bright Sword world have made a fortune, and in the future, after these islands are developed, there will be more follow-up businesses that can bring them a constant stream of new income.