Back in 1978, I was admitted to Northwestern Polytechnical University.

Chapter 155: All the money I earn must be spent on shopping!
In a hotel.

"This airshow has truly broadened our horizons." Liu, the leader of the Eastern delegation and a member of the Science and Technology Bureau of the Eighth Ministry of Machine Building, said with great emotion, "The Europeans exhibited the Ariane rocket for the first time, which was truly spectacular. Our Eastern aerospace sector also needs to work hard to catch up with the world's trends. However... our performance was also quite good. On the first day of the airshow, our transaction volume was nearly 200 million!"

After getting off the plane, they signed several technical support projects, earning 20 to 30 million US dollars. The goods they brought with them had already been shipped out, earning another 10 to 20 million US dollars. With the addition of the large orders for J-7 and J-7 fighter jets, the transaction amount reached an incredible figure!
Two hundred million US dollars! How much are our foreign exchange reserves in the East?
"Great! Now we have foreign exchange to buy whatever we want!"

"Yes, Comrade Qin Liang is truly outstanding! He's practically the backbone of our export earnings!"

Seeing the expectant looks in their eyes, Qin Liang smiled and said, "Distinguished leaders, this is just the transaction amount, not the profit. In these transactions, we still need to purchase a large number of spare parts from outside..."

Leader Liu realized what was happening: "Comrade Qin Liang, you didn't spend all this foreign exchange, did you?"

"This... how could that be? If we want to continue to improve our strength, we need to buy some more things from the international market. Mr. Lin, let's go to the air show tomorrow and see what the Air Force needs. We'll buy whatever the Air Force needs. Don't worry, the money will come from Northwestern Polytechnical University's account. We'll buy them back and then map and copy them."

Old Lin gave him a meaningful look: "Good!"

This kid really wants to spend all the money he earns!

In fact, most of the contracts only require a down payment, which is not much. After the products brought over are sold, they just offset the cost of the exhibition area, so there is not much foreign exchange left.

As for what Qin Liang wanted to buy...

The next day, at the airshow.

Qin Liang led Elder Lin and the others, walking and stopping along the way, until they arrived at the British exhibition area.

"Ladies and gentlemen, this is our British aerial refueling company's MK32 aerial refueling pod! It can be easily mounted under the wings of various aircraft..." Chris, the company's salesman, saw that customers had arrived and immediately ran over with a sales brochure in hand.

"Hmm, not bad, Mr. Lin, shall we go in and take a look?"

Old Lin glanced at Qin Liang with a complicated expression. "That's it? This should be something the Navy desperately needs, right? If I'd known, I wouldn't have let you take the blame at last night's meeting!"
In recent years, the East has been focusing on homeland air defense. With hundreds of air force bases of all sizes, it is enough to organize a dense homeland air defense network. Take off, intercept the enemy, and return to base. That's the process. There is no need to fly very far, and there is no need for aerial refueling. On the contrary, the Navy has a lot of blank areas in the South China Sea that existing domestically produced aircraft cannot reach, so they need aerial refueling!
With mixed feelings, Old Lin followed Qin Liang inside.

"At the front of the pod is an air turbine-driven generator oil pump assembly. The advantage of this design is that it minimizes modifications to the prototype. Behind it is a coiled 50-millimeter diameter hose, with a maximum length of 18 meters. Further back is a 0.4-meter diameter umbrella-shaped stabilizing cone and a phase-locking device, capable of delivering 1,300 liters of fuel per minute..."

"Okay, not bad, we'll buy this!"

Chris was overjoyed. It was open for business! It was finally open for business!

How many do you want?

"One."

Chris was disappointed again: "How come there's only one? For an airplane, you need at least two, one on each wing, so that it's symmetrical."

"Okay, two it is. Don't worry, if they perform well after we use them, we'll buy more in bulk later. Next, you'll have to give us a discount..." "No problem!"

Once the contract was signed and the full payment was made, the other party delivered two sets of aerial refueling pods and related product information to the Oriental booth, stuffed them into the Y-10 transport aircraft, and the deal was considered done.

Leaving his assistant behind to handle the follow-up work, Mr. Lin and Qin Liang continued walking forward.

"Hey kid, how did you manage to drag the navy's affairs into the air force's mess?"

"Navy? What's wrong with the navy? Elder Lin, I'm doing this for the sake of the air force! Currently, all the air force's fighter jets and attack aircraft are short-ranged. Will they be able to fulfill the sacred mission entrusted to them by the motherland? Take the other side of the river, for example. It's five or six hundred kilometers to fly there and another five or six hundred kilometers to fly back. That reaches the maximum range of some aircraft. How can they fight? If we build an aerial refueling corridor above the river..."

Old Lin's eyes lit up.

"Of course, the most important thing is to guard against interference from third parties. In that case, we will have to fly even further, even to the other party's doorstep, so that we can win from afar."

"You've got a point!"

"After we get back, we will start the project of converting the Y-10 into an aerial refueling tanker. At that time, the Air Force will have to provide strong support."

"Support what?"

"Let's make some purchases!" Qin Liang said, stopping in his tracks. "Old Lin, the David Country booth is up ahead. Let's go take a look; they have some really good stuff over there!"

David is a small country that has faced the threat of war for many years, so it has developed a first-class military industry. In the 1980s, there was no conflict of interest between the East and David, and the military cooperation between the two sides was relatively close. The real disagreement occurred in the 1990s. After the contract for the Phalcon early warning aircraft was ruined by the Americans, the cooperation between the two sides was almost interrupted. After that, they just couldn't stand each other.

Right now, it's the honeymoon period.

We need to seize the next ten years to develop, and the Great David Nation has many things that we need, such as... the Python 3 missile!

The Skyflash missile project has solved the problem of medium-range air-to-air missiles in the East, but short-range air-to-air missiles are still a weakness. Both the PL-2 and PL-5 only have tail-chase attack capabilities and can be considered second-generation missiles at most. The Python 3 missile, on the other hand, is an advanced third-generation short-range air-to-air missile. Its biggest feature is that it has head-on attack capability!
Taking this opportunity, we can also solve the problem of short-range air-to-air missiles, and the Air Force will be completely upgraded!
"Really? Hmm, there seem to be air-to-air missiles on their display stand?"

"Yes, Elder Lin, let's go. Don't tell me this time that your air force won't need it!"

"Ok!"

At the booth, Rafael's representative, Raymond, enthusiastically introduced the product to the visitors: "Ladies and gentlemen, this is our Python-3 missile model. It will use a state-of-the-art nitrogen-cooled indium antimonide infrared detection device as its seeker, with a maximum off-axis launch angle of twenty degrees..."

Wait, what?

Qin Liang remembered that this missile project was initiated in 75 and entered engineering research and development in 77, but it wouldn't be officially finalized until 81. Then it participated in the war in 82. Now it's only 79, and there are still many technical difficulties that this missile cannot overcome!
(End of this chapter)