Finally, Major General Bull couldn't stand John's "idleness" anymore. At the end of April, he asked Jairo to arrange an errand for John to inspect a new Swedish weapon at the Aberdeen Weapons Test Site. Even if he was reluctant, John reluctantly said goodbye to his wife and took Second Lieutenant Miller to Harford County, Maryland.

As the main weapons testing ground of the U.S. Army, Aberdeen Proving Ground is known as the "last hurdle" before the U.S. Army's equipment rushes to the battlefield. It is mainly responsible for the inspection of conventional weapons of the U.S. Army, the training of ordnance personnel, and occasionally the performance data of some foreign army weapons.

John: This time, they are looking at a Swiss-made anti-tank grenade. Since the brutal World War I gave birth to the tank, an offensive artifact that can break through the defense of "trench + steel wire + machine gun", how to counter-tank has become a new problem in the war.

The earliest infantry anti-tank weapons were anti-tank guns. Because the armor of the tank at that time was very thin, only about 6-12mm, and the guns with a larger caliber could be completely penetrated, it became a natural choice to use a "big gun" to fight the tank.

Although the anti-tank gun was still used by countries such as the Soviet Union until World War II, its shortcomings were simply too obvious. The first is the lack of power, which is often impenetrable when encountering anti-tank guns of "thick-skinned" armored vehicles. Secondly, it is too long and heavy, and the infantry is strenuous and not very mobile. In the end, the recoil of the anti-tank gun was too great, and the tank did not hit and broke the user's shoulder blade.

So, at this time in 1940, after seeing the power of the German armor torrent, countries were actively looking for a weapon that would allow the infantry to not be helpless in front of the tanks.

Anti-tank grenades, Molotov cocktails, anti-aircraft guns and anti-tank mines were all expected to be high. But these weapons are either too close to the infantry to attack the tank, too bulky to follow the infantry, or just passive defensive weapons, all of which are not ideal.

The Swiss were selling a grenade with a hollow-charge warhead, which they had sold to the British military attaché in Switzerland, but without success. Later, when I heard that the Americans were trying to develop an anti-tank rifle, I came all the way to try my luck again.

John had been completely perfunctory about the expedition, but after listening to the Swedish engineer's presentation of the grenade, he suddenly became interested. Without him, later generations of people with a little military common sense knew the power of the hollow charge warhead in dealing with armor protection.

Most of the current anti-tank guns and anti-tank guns rely on kinetic energy to penetrate tank armor. But this conical hollow ammunition warhead was different, his nose was hollowed out and a conical metal cover was mounted. The high temperature and pressure formed when the warhead explodes melts the metal cover into a fluid, which hits the target at extremely high speeds (up to 10,000 meters per second) and penetrates the armor.

The U.S. Army officers present were very satisfied after watching the demonstration of the armor-piercing effect of this grenade. Major General Barnes of the Ordnance Department immediately made a decision, bought the invention patent for this grenade from the Swiss, and prepared to start developing an anti-tank gun to match it.

Although John was also interested in this grenade, he did not approve of Major General Barnes's idea. He knew very well that if this grenade was fired with a firearm, the recoil would be too great for ordinary infantry to handle. The real power of this weapon should be the anti-tank bazooka.

At this time, at the edge of the crowd, a captain officer from the Aberdeen test site spoke: "The recoil of this grenade is too great for an anti-tank gun, maybe we can try to launch it with a bazooka." ”

John was shocked in his heart, he remembered a military program he had watched on the Celestial Empire in his previous life: "Captain, what's your name?" John asked.

"Leslie Skinnay, sir. I was in charge of the rocket weapons research and development project at the Aberdeen Proving Ground. Captain Skinnay's answer allowed John to confirm his suspicions, and the captain in front of him was the inventor of the famous "Bazooka" bazooka.

Historically, as early as World War I, the United States began to develop individual rocket launchers. In 1918, Dr. Goddard designed a 51mm caliber rocket launcher with a maximum range of 685.8 meters. But as soon as such a weapon was developed, the First World War ended, and the entire project was thrown into the cold.

Captain Skinner has been interested in rockets since he was a child, and after coming to work at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in 1938, he began experimenting with the development and manufacture of bazookas. Although he is currently working on a project with neither funding nor assistance, he has succeeded in developing a simple shoulder-launched bazooka with a smoothbore barrel and a stable tail. It is only because of the lack of suitable ammunition to verify the effectiveness of this weapon that it has not been taken seriously by the military top brass.

Apparently, Captain Skinner saw today as a rare opportunity to present his research and development to the higher-ups, and he couldn't wait to speak first. However, his words did not attract the attention of Major General Barnes and others, which also made John breathe a sigh of relief. An opportunity to make a lot of money almost flew away from his eyes.

Others don't know, but John knows too well about the "money" of the "Bazooka" bazooka. Along with jeeps, C-47 transport planes, and the atomic bomb, Eisenhower called it the "four tools of victory" for the Allies in World War II. Not only did the US military equip itself with a large number of "Bazooka", but other allies also bought quite a lot. General Electric, which produced it, made a fortune from it.

Best of all, if John had been involved in other arms businesses, he would have met with resistance from his original market holders. Even in a relatively nascent field like aircraft manufacturing, Hughes Aircraft had to face a large number of competitors. But the bazooka market is a virgin territory, there is no problem of stealing other people's business, and there are no other competitors. If John didn't want to meddle in this business now, then he would be too unqualified as a capitalist.

When he returned to Washington, he asked Reilly to go to Captain Chennai to buy the patent for the bazooka. In fact, John did not need to be in such a hurry, and the invention of Captain Skinnay did not receive any attention until 1942.

In the end, it was when the army leaders came to the Aberdeen test site to watch the shooting performance of the M10 anti-tank gun (specially developed by the army for this gun grenade) that he used the rocket launcher of his invention to fire at the tank target vehicle, which attracted the attention of the military leadership. So, John still has a lot of time to do this.

But unexpectedly, Captain Skinner refused to sell the patent to Reilly. The reason is not that John's price is too low, but because the bazooka is the result of a "special project" of the military. Although Captain Skinnay was the inventor, the patent was not in his possession. (It wasn't until 1963, when President Kennedy issued his first presidential statement of patent policy, that it was first made clear that patent rights arising out of the execution of government contracts should be retained by contractors to the extent possible.) Previously, in most cases, the Ministry of Defense had the patent rights and the contractors had the free access rights. ）

John is not such an easy person to back down, "Without the Skinai butcher, I would have to eat hairy pigs". Isn't it just a bazooka, what kind of technology does it have? He simply gave up "Bazooka" and was ready to get the RPG out in one step.