February 1, 1986 was the first successful launch of a communications and broadcasting satellite in history, marking the day when China mastered the technology of carrier rockets. However, because of Qi Yiming's wind and rain, in October last year, in order to cooperate with China Mobile and other communications companies that appeared in advance, with the support of the technical personnel of the Red Alert Base, the Long March-4C medium-sized carrier rocket produced by the base has already launched four communication satellites in the sky at one time.

These four communication satellites involve satellite television services, maritime communications, mobile satellite communications and other fields, with the further progress of civil spaceflight, more and more satellites of this type will be sent into space.

For example, in the military industry, the aerospace industry has also been subject to certain restrictions, but such restrictions are situational. For example, the state still vigorously promotes civil aviation products such as communication and broadcasting satellites, or in the final analysis, aerospace products that can make money, especially units like the Aviation Industry Group, which have spent considerable energy on researching similar things. However, the great manned space program is still being delayed indefinitely, and Qi Yiming can roughly understand the reason.

If you send a few communications satellites up, other countries won't particularly care, because many countries in the world can do it. But if you send people to the sky, that is the essential difference, the third country in the world to succeed in manned spaceflight, in addition to being able to inspire the people's morale, is definitely setting itself up as a target, there will be continuous doubts, saying that you use space with bad intentions.

On 1 February, the second CZ-4C rocket produced by the base was once again set up at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Base, and Qi Yiming still took time out of his busy schedule to go to Jiuquan to watch the satellite launch. Because this time the things carried on the launch vehicle are things that are directly related to the military industry that he is mainly responsible for - the Beidou series of navigation satellites.

The Beidou plan was listed in the Ninth Five-Year Development Plan, and the project code name was "Beidou-1", which began to brew as early as 1983. The specific development is still a classic Chinese three-step process: the first step is the test stage, that is, a small number of geostationary orbit satellites are launched to complete the test task, the main purpose is to accumulate technical experience for system construction, cultivate talents, and make technical reserves; The second step is to launch more than 10 satellites by 2012, so that the Beidou Satellite Navigation and Positioning System (Beidou-2) will initially cover the Asia-Pacific region; The third step is to build a global satellite navigation system consisting of 5 geostationary orbit and 30 non-geostationary orbit satellites by 2020.

The first Beidou-1 satellite was launched in 2000, and a total of four satellites were launched over the next few years, which were largely experimental in nature. Beidou 1. The performance of the four satellites in 0 is far from meeting the requirements of both ordinary military and civilian use, but it marks the beginning of China's entry into global navigation. First 1. 0 system coverage is only in the Celestial Empire, and secondly, the positioning accuracy can only reach 20 meters, compared with the 10 meter level of GPS, there is still some gap. Because it adopts a radio communication protocol, the signal is extremely easy to be detected by others, and has no military value, and the terminal of this system cannot be used in high-speed aircraft, and the use of the market is limited.

Most of the equipment provided by the Celestial Empire now relies heavily on satellite positioning systems, and it is barely able to use GPS to cope with it, but it is not a long-term solution after all. It is rumored that the Celestial Empire made up its mind to develop the Beidou system because during the 96 Taiwan Strait crisis, in order to contain China's missiles, the US military suspended all the missile satellite positioning authorized to China, so that in an instant, most of the weapons discovered by TG declined from high-precision to earthen artillery. This feeling of being controlled by others is absolutely intolerable to the insecure Celestial Empire, so the development of its own satellite positioning system has become an even more important project in the aerospace industry than manned spaceflight.

Qi Yiming didn't particularly understand things in aerospace, and at this moment there was a red police engineer standing next to him, who specially introduced him to the situation of the Beidou system that appeared more than ten years in advance.

"We directly skipped the level of Beidou-1, and basically the technical indicators are close to Beidou-2. 0。 This satellite launch is also a double satellite, two satellites will be launched into geostationary orbit, after the completion of the whole system construction, these two satellites will be used as backup satellites, now mainly to provide us with short message communication, precision timing and positioning services. ”

It seems that he also knows what the base boss is most concerned about, and the engineer said: "The application of the Beidou system will fill the last gap in the integrated data link system of the whole army, and after Beidou, the construction of digital troops will no longer be a problem." Beidou and a number of other communications satellites and spy reconnaissance satellites will provide our armed forces with the greatest possible intelligence and information support as well as the most timely communications assistance and positioning services. ”

Qi Yiming certainly understood the meaning, and he also asked eagerly: "When will we be able to initially reach the level required by the digitized troops?" ”

The engineer, who didn't seem to have much emotional intelligence, replied dryly: "We need at least 202 more satellites." ”

Qi Yiming almost collapsed, but it is not surprising to think that even in 2015, PLA did not dare to say that he had completed the construction of all digital armies, and the level of some centimeter-level reconnaissance satellites was not enough, and the global positioning Beidou satellites were not all in the sky, plus some software and hardware problems on the ground terminal system, this road to a digital army is definitely a long way to go.

He is not too sad, the current leader of military innovation, the Eagle Sauce Family, has just begun to explore this model, Qi Yiming at least knows what to do in the future, this is an advantage in itself, the punishment of clicking the wrong technology tree is absolutely terrible, at least he will not click the wrong technology tree.

In the specially set "private room" to watch the satellite launch, the countdown to the launch commander began to sound, and Qi Yiming saw many such scenes on TV in later generations, and he was not too excited. Instead, he looked at the huge Long March-4C rocket outside through the display screen, and said secretly: "CZ-4C is definitely not a first-class level in the eighties, and the American devils have made Delta and Mao Xiong's Soyuz Divine Horses, all of which are stronger than CZ-4." In other words, in the aerospace field, the gap between the rabbit family is actually bigger than some ordinary military fields. ”

With the blazing tail flame, the launch vehicle first slowly broke free from the shackles of gravity, and then rushed towards the vast universe, without hesitation, Qi Yiming in the private room was particularly calm, but the astronauts in the command hall outside hugged each other excitedly and applauded.

Qi Yiming could generally feel their feelings, and what he brought to these sincere astronauts was not actually those huge rockets and advanced satellites, but a road that could see the dawn. There is no doubt that in this era, many people who are engaged in scientific research are extremely confused, after the **** subsided, people regained their senses and re-entered the development track, and suddenly found that their opponents were getting bigger and bigger, so big that they were originally enthusiastic and they were afraid.

Just like the article "How Long Can the Red Flag Last" written by a certain usurper Lin in the Soviet area, today's scientific research workers are worried and even extremely pessimistic in the face of a huge gap in technology. Just like a gentleman with great ambitions on his chin back then, with the courage to fight the heavens and the earth and your whole family, in order to refute revolutionary defeatism, he wrote a few big words - a spark can start a prairie fire.

Qi Yiming was indulging his thoughts, and the engineer next to him interrupted him without a long look, and said: "Boss, to be honest, there are still many problems in the Beidou system that need to be improved, especially in subjects such as high-resolution reconnaissance and anti-jamming. ”

Qi Yiming shook his head and said, "You think I don't want to, but the speed of upgrading is also a little slower, it's been a year, and it's not enough to run half of the experience bar, and I don't know when I can upgrade to the second level to unlock the combat laboratory." ”

The engineer replied naturally: "The Red Alert base is something that exists for war, and it is not mainly used for combat since you mastered it, but is like a hamster-like reserve of materials, so that the large equipment production of the base is not for you to build weapons for storage, but for the purpose of being able to quickly replenish the required war weapons." Only by participating in the war will you be able to level up and unlock more advanced technologies and equipment. ”

Qi Yiming was stunned, he hadn't reacted to such a simple truth for so long. He patted the back of his head, and secretly said that since he had the Red Police Base, he was never thinking about dragging the Celestial Empire into any war, but thinking about how to build the Celestial Empire better and the PLA stronger, so he subconsciously avoided the question of what to fight. In this year, he has grown such a little experience points, basically from the southern Xinjiang battlefield, aiding Iranian pilots, and dealing with the Korean rebellion, and these conflicts of not too large scale can bring him experience points are quite limited.

"Are you really going to fight a big war?" Qi Yiming immediately killed this thought, he was not afraid of things, it was the objective conditions that absolutely did not allow him to provoke the high-level to launch a large-scale war, and this time at the end of the Cold War was also relatively sensitive, and it was difficult to deal with the serious consequences that might break out. What's more, Qi Yiming is not a warmonger, and it is difficult for him to have the kind of killing decisiveness of a traverser, because after all, when he sees a fresh life being taken away like this, without a more noble or hypocritical excuse, it is really difficult to make a decision.

"What should I do with this?" Qi Yiming had a headache.