50s: Starting with a storage ring

Chapter 314 Searching the Pentagon
Sun Zhiwei rode his bike back to his neighborhood and then returned to his apartment through the secret passage. It was already very late, so he didn't think much of it and went straight to wash up and rest.

The following afternoon, only Belinda came to work.

With the pricing work completed, Sofia, who had been holding back for two weeks, finally had time to go shopping.

So today, disregarding everything, she actually took the day off and went shopping.

For the next week, Sun Zhiwei couldn't think of a better way to go out, so he could only tackle the first task first.

To understand the official stance of the United States, simply providing an answer is insufficient; concrete evidence is essential.

Lockheed conducted this Trident test launch, and a test report will certainly be submitted to the Pentagon and the military.

The White House will certainly issue a report on the progress of such important national offensive and defensive weapons, and may even hold a related meeting.

Without accurate information, he couldn't monitor such meetings, but checking reports was easy; he just needed to be near where the reports were kept.

He could think of two places: the Pentagon and the White House.

If people in China want to know the White House's attitude, they need to go to these two places to find evidence.

He can no longer visit the White House for the time being; that requires an application, and his two applications in a short period of time will definitely be rejected.

However, the Pentagon, like the White House, has been open to the public for tours since last year. He hasn't been there yet, but applying for a tour shouldn't be a problem.

So he immediately submitted a visit request to the Pentagon.

五角大楼对外开放时间是：周一至周四的上午10:00至下午4:00和周五的中午12:00至下午4:00。

His application was answered quickly, and because many people were interested in the place, his visit was scheduled for 10 a.m. three days later.

Three days passed quickly, and on the day of the visit, he got up early, ate breakfast, and drove to the Pentagon.

The Pentagon, which began operation in January 1943, is located on the banks of the Potomac River and has five floors.

The first floor is full of service departments, including banks, post offices, bookstores, coffee shops, photo studios, clinics, telegraph offices, and various shops, providing a full range of services, just like a small city.

The second floor is a public area, mainly housing departments such as the General Staff Office and the Joint Chiefs of Staff Conference.

From the third floor upwards, the departments are, in order, the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force. The Ministry of Defense, the General Staff, the Missile Forces, and NATO Command are each located on one floor.

The information he was investigating this time involved submarines and missiles, so he guessed it was related to the Navy and missile forces.

In addition, since this was a weapons test, it is likely also related to the procurement department.

He needs to go to the site to find out where the specific reports are.

Around 9 a.m., he drove to the Pentagon, where there are two large parking lots on the north and south sides, each capable of accommodating 10,000 cars.

He parked his Ford Pinto in the south parking lot and then went to the entrance.

On one side of the entrance, there is a large lounge where staff are on hand to register visitors.

After registering, Sun Zhiwei was assigned to a group of 15 tourists and began his tour led by a soldier.

Before the tour began, the tour guide explained the precautions to them in detail, including wearing identification badges, keeping quiet, not entering offices, taking photos but not videos, etc.

The so-called identification sign is actually just a name tag with the name, country, military rank, and other information that was just registered.

These sergeants were no ordinary people; most of them were outstanding soldiers from various units who were selected to serve as guides at headquarters due to their excellent performance. This job was actually rotated, and they would soon return to their original units.

Although this place is called a military headquarters, most of the tens of thousands of people working there are civilian staff who do not wear military uniforms.

Sun Zhiwei followed the tour guide and visited the military base floor by floor. Many areas here are open to the public.

For example, the Marine Corps office area on the second floor and the Navy office area on the third floor cover hundreds of square meters and are all open-plan offices.

He even saw the Chief of Naval Staff, the Secretary of the Navy, and the Chief of Staff of the Marine Corps in person.

This level of openness is astonishing.

Besides the various military offices, the most worthwhile places to visit are the numerous showrooms and exhibition halls.

These showrooms and exhibition halls are not only numerous but also vary in size, and the content displayed inside mainly revolves around the history and achievements of the U.S. military.

It includes not only biographies of famous figures and war heroes, but also detailed accounts of major wars and battles, such as the War of Independence and the Civil War.

In addition, the exhibits also display a large number of physical objects, including relics of heroes and weapons and ammunition used by them; he even saw artillery.

Whenever the tour guide sergeant led them through these showrooms and exhibition halls, that was when he would start quickly searching for documents.

Because the target was unclear, he could only search slowly, layer by layer. He focused on the office areas of the navy and missile forces.

By the time they reached the fifth floor, Sun Zhiwei had already gone through all the documents for the Navy and the Missile Force, but still found nothing.

Just then, he ran into an acquaintance. Well, he knew the person well, but the person didn't recognize him.

This acquaintance was the officer who dropped the paper bag containing money on the ground at the Crystal City Steakhouse that day.

He was certain the other party must be an employee of the military's procurement department; otherwise, the arms dealers wouldn't have bothered to give him a share of the profits.

Moreover, judging from his swearing at the time, he seemed very dissatisfied with the amount paid by the arms dealer.

That attitude was quite obvious, and the fact that he was so confident and fearless indicated that he could play a certain role in military procurement.

Sun Zhiwei immediately turned his attention to the officer.

The officer, holding documents in his hands, quickly descended the stairs and soon disappeared.

Sun Zhiwei expanded the space and stared at the officers who were going down to the military headquarters office on the second floor.

He walked to a corner of the office and impatiently threw the documents in his hand into a semi-closed office.

There was a designated person in that office responsible for receiving documents.

Sun Zhiwei immediately covered the room on the second floor with his spatial telescope and began searching.

Sure enough, he found many important documents inside. That room was probably similar to a confidential document room or archive room in China.

He first surveyed the entire archive room to understand the storage pattern of the documents.

The files here are stored according to the following criteria: time as the first search criterion, military branch as the second search criterion, and alphabetical order as the third search criterion.

(End of this chapter)