Chapter Eighteen: The Year of Suffocation

  From ancient battlefields of swords, bows and shields to modern rifles and cannons. The time it took for humans to transition from cold weapons to hot weapons was not long, but in this short period, they were able to create a variety of excellent weapons. Tracing back to the roots, the large-scale wars that occurred repeatedly in modern history were more brutal than any ancient war. In pursuit of maximizing the killing of enemies and saving themselves, humans invented various excellent weapons before and after the two human holocausts. However, at this time in 1914, before the arrival of the first human holocaust, in a space-time that had already undergone some changes, there were people who began to manufacture all kinds of lethal instruments.

  "The firearms used by infantry will definitely not be limited to infantry use in the future. The three armies of sea, land and air can also use firearms, pilots need to be equipped with defensive pistols, marines are equivalent to the army, and some personnel on naval vessels also need to be equipped with certain firearms. So when we don't have enough technical and economic strength to develop large-scale weapons, we can focus on the most basic weapon equipment, that is infantry firearms, or rifles!"

  A person was dazed and stayed in the drawing room, with Zhang Yu's opinions still echoing in his ears. Zhang Yu was completely confused, and for a group that had just gotten on the right track for a few months, even if the industrial technology passed, it would definitely not be possible to manufacture large-scale weapons. Warships, tanks, aircraft and other things were far beyond the capabilities of the Zhongzhong Group. However, as basic weapon equipment, rifles and small-caliber artillery still had the ability to fight. The biggest task for Zhang Yu and others in the military factory was to select the most suitable gun family from the many weapons selected by Zhang Yu to equip the future army.

  "Semi-automatic rifles, automatic rifles, light machine guns, general-purpose machine guns, heavy machine guns, anti-aircraft machine guns, and pistols. These seven types of firearms form a large family of weapons, with the first four using 7.62mm caliber ammunition, while the heavy machine gun and anti-aircraft machine gun use 12.7mm, and the pistol uses 9mm caliber ammunition. The three types of ammunition can be produced by military factories, but it's difficult to decide which ones to produce."

  Zhang Yu looked at the dozens of firearms that Zhang Yusheng had picked out from his computer's postmodern library database over the past three days. After all, Zhang Yu and his team had already entered the era of energy weapons, so their understanding of thermal guns was not high, making Zhang Yusheng the best candidate for selecting weapons. But what Zhang Yu didn't expect was that this big brother really gave him face, with a stroke of his pen, he brought down all the excellent firearms that spanned the 20th and 21st centuries, then eliminated those that used too many advanced materials, advanced processing technologies, etc., but still left a lot of things for Zhang Yu to identify himself.

  "King Hanming, come in!"

  Zhang Yu quickly decided to start with the first item. Currently, many countries, including security company personnel, use manual rifles, which are also known as bolt-action rifles that require reloading after each shot. Although these rifles often have high accuracy, such as the British Lee-Enfield rifle and the German Mauser series, their low firing rate is definitely not in line with Zhang Yu's requirements, given the limited number of security personnel.

  "Take a look at this gun, is it suitable for our semi-automatic rifle?" Wang Hanming quickly walked into Zhang Yu's temporary office and was called over to look at the drawings. "A semi-automatic rifle is a type of rifle that automatically loads and chambers a bullet, although it also fires one shot per trigger pull, but its firing speed is much faster than a manual rifle!"

  "Director, this gun's principle is similar to our Maxim machine gun, also using gas-operated automatic principle, utilizing the power of gunpowder gases to complete unlocking, shell ejection, and loading processes. The rate of fire must be extremely fast, but the lethality of the bullets still needs to be tested." Wang Hanming, who had bulletproof glasses with thick lenses, spoke his opinion in a very measured tone. "If this gun can replace the soldiers' manual rifles, it will definitely exert great suppressive force on the enemy in terms of firepower. However, we also need to test its own ammunition issues - the eight rounds in the magazine are definitely not enough, especially during intense battles. Once the firepower suddenly stops, the impact on our side would be huge."

  Zhang Yu had always admired this genius, a mechanical talent who stood out from the many employees of the Asia-America Group. His opinions often gave Zhang Yu a feeling that "this guy is also a time-traveler", but in fact, after multiple tests, he was indeed a person of this era. However, his innate talent in mechanics did surprise Zhang Yu quite a bit. The vast China indeed had many talents, it's just that they lacked discovery. Upon receiving such a suggestion, Zhang Yu nodded and said: "Actually, this gun, large-scale equipping by the military is definitely difficult to achieve, or rather we have no need to make a single-shot, insufficiently lethal, semi-automatic rifle that can't fire continuously. Either it's fully automatic or manual!"

  Zhang Yu's words also caused Wang Hanming to nod in agreement, habitually taking off his glasses and wiping them clean, which was a sign of him thinking deeply. After wiping the two lenses clean, he had formed his own opinion: "This gun has such a fast firing rate, but it can only fire single shots. Why not develop a special sniper rifle? After all, snipers often only fire one shot at a time and don't need continuous firepower or precise killing power to attack the enemy like ordinary infantrymen do. Our infantry can continue to be equipped with manually operated high-precision, high-lethality Lee-Enfield rifles. Equipping sufficient machine guns can also make up for the disadvantage of slow firing rate brought by manual rifles."

  "The sniper's special rifle can actually be manual, of course, if it can fire a shot and immediately fire again, with fewer large-scale movements in between, it will definitely minimize the exposure of the sniper's position. The development of sniper rifles is based on semi-automatic rifles as the basic carrier, you assign this task." After finishing speaking, Zhang Yu took out several full-proportion drawings and handed them to Wang Hanming, who knew the rules and wouldn't ask where these drawings came from. "Right, your task isn't a sniper rifle," Wang Hanming took the drawings and was about to go out and work hard, but Zhang Yu quickly stopped him with his quick eyes and mouth.

  "In the past few days, many team members have reflected that the heavy machine gun is indeed good, but it's just too big and too heavy. Moreover, a class should also be equipped with a machine gun to provide absolute firepower suppression capability. After some investigation, I think this is also reasonable." Zhang Yu said, gesturing for Wang Hanming to sit down before continuing. "This machine gun, we can't look at it as too important, nor can we belittle it. I plan to equip two types of calibers with three models of machine guns, the basic infantry class's class-use machine gun, and the tactical unit's general-purpose machine gun, which can use 7.62mm caliber bullets. As long as the firing speed and range are sufficient, they can meet the usage requirements. And as an important firepower suppression weapon, only the 12.7mm caliber heavy machine gun is used."

  Zhang Yu didn't say anything about high-altitude machine guns or the like. At this time, human flight has just transitioned from a dream to low-altitude slow-speed flight, and anti-aircraft machine guns have already appeared. It's really too ahead of its time, and it would definitely raise suspicions in others. Zhang Yu wouldn't do such a thing, and proposing three types of machine guns is already the bottom line.

  "Actually, Director, we've already discussed this issue privately among ourselves. Since the emergence of firearms, from muzzle-loading rifles to breech-loading rifles, there has always been a pursuit of increasing the rate of fire for individual soldiers' weapons, and then pursuing the firepower capability of the entire unit. So we dared to imagine that with the advancement of technology, it won't be long before every infantryman can be equipped with a weapon similar to a machine gun, although the requirements for rate of fire, weight, and human-machine efficiency will not be too high. Before achieving this, it is indeed necessary to take the path of equipping units with rapid-fire firepower, but we didn't expect it to be divided so finely." Wang Hanming said with a smile.

  "Alright, machine guns are indeed divided into three categories. The squad-use machine gun prioritizes portability, its main features being lightweight, long firing time, simple maintenance, and short reloading time, etc. In other words, when equipped with a squad, it is to make up for the lack of firepower of the remaining infantrymen, and can cause casualties to the enemy at a distance of 800 meters, and can be used as the main force in both charging and counter-charging. The highest rate of fire per minute is 150-300 rounds; absolute control ability with 3-5 short bursts or 10-15 long bursts; total weight of less than 10 kilograms; these are the minimum requirements for a squad-use machine gun."

  "What should we consider for our general-purpose machine gun?"

  "He is the intermediate body of heavy machine guns and squad machine guns, mainly prepared for tactical troops. He naturally has the characteristics of long-range shooting and great power of heavy machine guns, and also takes into account the convenience of carrying and flexibility of use of light machine guns. Its role is to follow infantry to perform various tasks, not like heavy machine guns to perform large-scale firepower suppression tasks, nor can it be like squad machine guns to only make up for the lack of firepower of some soldiers."

  "We can't just develop squad machine guns or heavy machine guns!" Wang Hanming suddenly blurted out. "Since the general-purpose machine gun is supposed to have the common advantages of both, it means it can replace one of them sufficiently. Heavy machine guns are too cumbersome and cannot follow troops for large-scale combat, they are more suitable for defensive positions, vehicle-mounted attacks, etc. The basic equipment for infantry should still be mainly squad and general-purpose, beyond 800 meters of combat distance, we can completely hand it over to other heavy weapons, such as our mortars, light artillery, carrying a cumbersome heavy machine gun is not as good as carrying two general-purpose machine guns or mortars."

  "Every time you speak, I am surprised. At a time when the major powers are still equipping themselves with heavy machine guns, it's great that you can come up with such an idea. However, for now, we still need to develop heavy machine guns, as our individual firepower is not yet strong enough. Once we achieve continuous fire in individual weapons, then heavy machine guns can be phased out from basic infantry equipment and deployed to places where they are more needed, such as on vehicles." After finishing his words, Zhang Yu started rummaging through the papers in his hand, spending a considerable amount of time before selecting three gun design papers to hand over to Wang Hanming.

  "Director, you just said 'single-soldier weapon achieves continuous fire', are we going to develop single-soldier automatic weapons? Something even lighter than a machine gun?" Generally speaking, people with extremely high talent or geniuses are always those who have curiosity that can scare people to death. Wang Hanming was naturally one of them, someone with a strong sense of curiosity and attention to detail. Zhang Yu's unintentional remark just now immediately caught his attention on that thread of detail.

  "Oh, you're talking about individual automatic weapons? That's definitely something to be developed, but currently we can't even supply enough ammunition for regular training exercises. If we were to equip every soldier with a rapid-firing weapon, our ammunition supplies would really become a problem. You can go think about it and develop an automatic rifle that is lightweight, uses standardized 7.62mm caliber ammunition, can fire single shots or bursts, and so on. In short, we need to create a weapon that falls between semi-automatic rifles and squad machine guns, with single-shot power greater than semi-automatic weapons, as well as some burst capability. Of course, accuracy and human-machine efficiency are also issues that must be considered."

  Zhang Yu did not give Wang Hanming the drawings of the automatic rifle, a sniper rifle, three machine guns, and four major tasks were enough to keep him busy, there was no need to think about too distant problems at this time, nor was it necessary to disperse the limited research and development capabilities. It is worth noting that an automatic rifle from design to manufacture, testing, and finally being equipped by troops requires a test period that cannot be measured in months, and if single-soldier rapid-fire weapons are to be developed, it means that ammunition production problems have been well solved, otherwise, the main equipment for individual soldiers would still be non-automatic rifles.

  Zhang Yu was considering manufacturing large-scale lethal weapons, while many parts of the world were also restless. In short, 1914 was a restless year anyway.

  The first to feel itchy was the President of the Republic of China, Yuan Shikai. His emperor dream finally took its first step in this crazy year. On February 7, 1914, Yuan Shikai ordered all provinces to worship Confucius on the spring and autumn equinoxes. This was not a completely crazy move, but on the 28th, he made an even more absurd action, dissolving all provincial assemblies with one paper order. He then began to revise textbooks, control newspaper opinions, and actively eliminate any traces of democratic revolution, including enacting laws prohibiting political associations and strikes. These were just warm-up measures before reaching his goal, but Yuan Shikai was not the first person to go crazy. Compared to Kaiser Wilhelm II, Yuan's actions were too calm.

  At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, the major capitalist powers in the world transitioned to imperialism one after another. Due to the establishment of industry on the latest achievements of science and technology, Germany's economic strength expanded rapidly. By 1900, Germany had already become the second-largest industrial producer in the world. After entering the 20th century, Germany continued to develop its economy and military power without limit. By the spring of 1914, many departments in Germany had taken a dominant position in world trade. In industries such as shipbuilding, textiles, chemicals, electrical engineering, metallurgy, and machinery manufacturing, Germany had already possessed world-leading advantages. All this can be explained by the fact that many German technical talents were employed by Chinese enterprises, and Germans occupied the largest proportion of foreign employees in both the Zhongzhong and Yaomei groups.

  In fact, in the 14 years from 1900 to 1913, Germany's pig iron production more than doubled and steel production increased by nearly one and a half times. The amount of iron ore mined and consumed, pig iron smelted, and steel produced in Germany was about 60-70% higher than that of the old British Empire, and its foreign trade also reached an astonishing tens of millions of dollars. In 1912 and 1913, even countries like the British Empire became dumping grounds for German and American products, with various products from the United States and industrial goods from Germany flooding European markets. Germany's industrial strength had reached a surprising level. As Wen Xinghua wrote in a letter to Zhang Yu-sheng not long ago, Germany's industrial strength was truly enviable, but also necessitated sufficient vigilance. Even the American group that dominated the automobile industry absolutely had to be taken seriously, and other countries could naturally feel the pressure of Germany's industrial might.

  Germany's achievements in industrial economy are impressive, but as a latecomer to imperialism, its position on the international stage, especially in the struggle for world domination and division of the world, seems somewhat disproportionate to its actual strength. "A Germany without colonies is destined to be a second-rate power", "Germany needs colonies just like it needs bread every day", "The greatest injustice of our time is that the nation with the most economic talent, the strongest ideas and the greatest organizational ability cannot play a dominant role in the world, take responsibility". This kind of thinking has been stirring up wave after wave of nationalist fervor in Germany as its industrial and economic strength grows, establishing numerous nationalist organizations such as the German Colonial Society, the Pan-German League, and the Navy League. These organizations constantly pressure the government to take a tougher stance, annex more territory, open up more colonies, and build a stronger army or navy.

  Although the Germans were eager to expand overseas and implement "world politics", they were after all latecomers. The old colonial powers, such as Britain, had already carved up most of the world through years of operation. Under the leadership of the crazy German Emperor Wilhelm II, the confident Germans decided to demand a "fair share" from the old imperialist powers like Britain and redivide the world based on strength. This was naturally unacceptable to the British who regarded themselves as the "first race in the world". In the end, both sides could only solve the problem through a mad arms race and competition on the battlefield.

  Thus, Kaiser Wilhelm II soon became the craziest person in 1914, with strong backing behind him, he had enough ability to speak for Germany, and what specific actions to take to demonstrate the determination of a superior nation, and the most direct display measure was to start a military equipment competition. Therefore, by May 1914, the arms race launched by Germany reached its peak, allowing Wilhelm II to continue sitting on the throne of the craziest person in 1914, of course, his time on this throne had started since 1904, and a decade-long career on the throne was indeed a bit long.

  With the habit of "prioritizing and overestimating military thought and military values", Wilhelm II deeply believed in the interrelationship between oceanic hegemony and world hegemony, and considered building a massive fleet modeled after Britain to be the best and only way to solve all of Germany's problems. Only by occupying the oceans could one effectively strike at enemies and maintain freedom of military action. Therefore, he actively advocated for the German global power fleet policy, and created various favorable conditions to support naval construction through monarchical authority, ultimately causing the German fleet to swell into a fighting force second only to Britain, forcing Britain to launch a naval race with Germany.

  The time when he formally ascended to the throne of the world's number one madman was in 1904, when King Edward VII of England visited the German naval port of Kiel, and Wilhelm II almost showed off all his naval power, and later at a state banquet declared, "Welcome the British monarch with the shock of the guns of the German fleet." The British king and naval leaders were indeed deeply impressed by the German navy, but they saw this display of naval strength as a huge threat to Britain, rather than admiring its great achievements as the Kaiser had hoped. From then on, the British government considered it their duty to pay attention to the development process and potential intentions of the German Navy.

  Seizing oceanic hegemony is an important content and step for imperialism to contend for world hegemony, and Britain rose to the position of world hegemon relying on its naval strength.

  British Foreign Secretary Grey once said: "The real determinant of our country's foreign policy is the issue of naval supremacy!" Germany wants to implement a powerful "world policy", and it must break Britain's maritime monopoly. Wilhelm II wildly declared: "Germany's colonial purpose can only be achieved when Germany has become the master of the sea", "whether it is in line with the wishes of the British people is irrelevant." Germany wanted to rise to become a world power in competition with Britain, while Britain strongly resisted Germany's rise to ensure its advantageous position. This contradiction led to an intense struggle for maritime supremacy, which was undoubtedly the most fundamental and deepest reason for the naval arms race between Germany and Britain.

  Thus, an old empire for its long-held colonies and maritime interests, a rising industrial nation for broader living space, adopted various forms of competition between them. The shipbuilding craze sparked by the struggle for ocean supremacy alone was enough to make the whole world smell the pungent gunpowder flavor. However, it is still unknown when the two giant powder kegs will be ignited. Nevertheless, many people know that once these two arsenals are ignited, the resulting explosion will have a great impact.

  Of course, everything that happens in Europe will not bring any other impact to the southwest border except for some people's trade problems. But who would easily give up such a world war that burns money? The military expenditure of both sides can reach 50 million or more just by maintaining an arms race for less than ten years. Once the war starts, the stimulation to various industrial manufacturing in the whole world is not small at all. The medium and heavy groups that are waiting to be fed will definitely not give up the rich war cake.

  The year 1914 was destined to be an unforgettable year, a suffocating year for many people.