When Luo Jia talked about the grasshopper rocket, some people suddenly showed a bitter smile on their faces.

"Hey, don't mention it, I predicted that grasshoppers were a joke, but I became a joke, and I was slapped in the face, and I was swollen."

"It's the same, although Musk is arrogant, he really has a few brushes, from grasshoppers to Falcon Nine, he has created miracles again and again, slapping the world in the face."

"As one of the people who was not optimistic about Musk at the beginning, the grasshopper is simply a black spot on my life path."

Most of the people who say this kind of thing are a little older, and they participated in the large-scale group ridicule of Musk and Grasshopper Rocket in the scientific community back then.

It was in 2012, Musk made a small rocket named Grasshopper, claiming to change the world, but was ridiculed by the group of scientists, no one was optimistic about him, and they all thought he must be crazy.

Until October 2013, when the Grasshopper rocket was successfully launched for the seventh time, flying to a height of 744 meters, the scientific community still sneered at Musk.

However, time will eventually tell who is the real fool, only three years later, Musk's Falcon 9 was successfully launched, shocking the whole world, and two years later, on February 6, 2018, the Falcon Heavy rocket, a great milestone in aviation history, was also successfully launched.

This time, the scientific community is no longer a matter of being slapped in the face, but there is no face!

The Falcon 9 cost $60 million, while the North American Hercules and Delta rockets with the same thrust, and the European Alyana rockets cost about $200 million, and the Falcon is only one-third of theirs.

On June 25, 2019, the Falcon Heavy successfully recovered a fairing worth six million dollars, which, together with an expensive one-stage rocket booster, reduced the cost of a commercial launch.

It's a pity that due to the difficulty of recycling, Musk gave up the two-stage rocket recovery plan, otherwise he can control the launch cost of the Falcon at a terrifying 10 million US dollars, you know, it was previously recognized that the cheapest launch vehicle in the world, the Huaxia Long March series, the cost is close to 100 million US dollars, and Musk is good, 20 million US dollars to help you launch satellites, he can still earn millions.

Just look at the development process of Huaxia, the low cost is really terrifying, according to the calculation of carrying 100 satellites per launch, the launch cost of a single communication satellite is only 200,000 US dollars, and it is precisely because of this confidence that Musk dares to be the first in the world and put forward the shocking Starlink plan.

Luo Jia said with a smile: "Of course Musk is very strong, but as the saying goes, there are three gangs of heroes, and the driving force behind him is NASA, which is known as the emperor of science and technology, and NASA has given Musk great help in terms of manpower and funds." ”

"Liu Cixin once said that weakness and ignorance are not obstacles to survival, arrogance is."

"No matter how many scientific research successes we have achieved before, now when we face a large-scale space race, we are out-and-out novices, and we must lower our profile and take every detail seriously."

Luo Jia made the brainstorming team understand the fact that North America is not a fool, they dare to start the space race, they have confidence, behind it is the countless scientific research accumulation that has taken decades and trillions of dollars.

When Apollo 11 successfully landed on the moon in July 1969, 90% of the brainstorming team had not yet been born, and the gap was too big.

As for some people who suspect that the moon landing program is fraudulent and that NASA has deceived the world, it can only be said that mentally handicapped children have a lot of fun, and there are even people who believe that the earth is flat, and they can't reason with those anti-intellectuals, and the best way is to agree with them and let them continue to be stupid.

The members of the brainstorming team have a feeling at this moment, as if Musk has deliberately dug a pit, a prehistoric giant pit, and then wants to bury Xingchen Technology in its entirety.

"Mr. Luo, this guy Musk shouldn't be cheating on us!" Chao Anbang of the Materials Department said: "I simply calculated that if we want to catch up with NASA's decades of technology accumulation, if we participate in the space race, the whole company will have to pounce on it and build it for 20 years." ”

"I also plan to engage in deep submersible research after the development of semiconductors, and get a marine ecology department, assuming that the space race starts, I want to go to Mariana to build a villa, but I am afraid that it will be completely frustrated."

"After all, it is aerospace, thousands of sub-projects, larger than the scale of semiconductor research and development, in addition to aerospace engines, we must also launch aero engines, the electrical department can start the pre-research of electric aero engines, and strive to complete it within two years, and aerospace engines, need the Ministry of Machinery and Chemistry to be the main force."

"If that's it, will the quantum department still be formed? Judging from the current known conditions, the quantum direction is also a giant pit, and the scale is by no means smaller than that of life science. ”

Ordinary people often have a misconception that scientific research is a flash of inspiration for one or two people, but they are not clear, in fact, the field of scientific research also needs a lot of manpower to pile up.

Taking the semiconductor industry as an example, although Xingchen Technology has created a complete semiconductor industry chain from upstream to downstream, so far, Huaxia Semiconductor has not completely replaced the hegemony of North America, the main reason is not that the technology is not in place, but because of the lack of human resources.

It's funny to say that Huaxia, which has always been known for its large number of people, can't find enough engineers to support the semiconductor industry.

However, this is the fact, at least 400,000 semiconductor engineers talent gap, has made Huaxia enterprises have the idea of their neighbors, they offer high salaries, go to Japan and South Korea to poach people, and even Xingchen Technology, which is a benchmark in the field of Chinese science and technology, has also dug up a part.

Talent is actually a kind of hegemony, according to 2018 data, more than 60,000 doctoral students graduated in North America that year, of which 80% were foreign students.

Knowledge is the primary productive force, and it is no exaggeration to say that the land of North America is home to some of the world's smartest brains, and it is difficult to think about underdevelopment.

What's even more terrifying is that these more than 60,000 PhDs did not return to their hometowns after graduation, and 80% of them stayed in North America.

Judging from the current situation, if Xingchen Technology accepts Musk's challenge, the company will not think about developing agriculture and developing quantum in the next 20 years, or even beyond, and as for interest activities such as deep-sea exploration, it will not be able to carry out.

Because they don't have enough manpower.

……

White House, Washington, North America.

"Twenty years!" Musk smiled and said to the president: "If Xingchen Technology accepts my challenge, it will bring twenty years of respite to the entire North American scientific research community." ”

"They will be overwhelmed by the huge and complex space program, and we, who have a chance to breathe, can quickly close the gap with them in the electrical field, the optical field, the chemical field, and the semiconductor field."

"The best way to deal with an opponent of the level of Xingchen Technology is not to defeat them, but to find a way to entangle them and not let them go too fast."

After listening to Musk's explanation, the president laughed very exaggeratedly, and the fat on his body trembled.

"If you're a famous super genius, I knew that you must have a way to deal with the damn Star Technology!" The president affectionately grabbed Musk's shoulders and said very excitedly: "God bless America!" Your plan is really great, if Xingchen Technology is caught in this endless scientific research competition, we can take the opportunity to achieve overtaking! ”

"The only question is, can we hold off Star Technology for that long just by relying on the technology in NASA's stockpile? I've heard that those Chinese people are very hard-working, and before the Spring Festival this year, they had no holiday for two whole years because of the development of semiconductor plans. ”

"I can't imagine what it would be like for 220,000 engineers and scientists, working twelve hours a day, without any holidays, day and night, to be a terrible Chinese people, they are like a group of machines."

Hearing this, Musk shook his head with a smile, "President, please forgive me for having to refute your point of view, what is terrible is not the Chinese people, but a belief called ideal, starting from Luo Jia, the founder of Xingchen Technology, almost every one of them is an idealist." ”

"As for our technical reserves in the field of space, you can rest assured that investing in space research and development with the strength of the whole country, and researching space technology with one enterprise, are completely different levels of existence."

"It's like a long marathon, we've already run half the way, but Xingchen Technology has just started, in this case, even if we go slowly, it's enough to keep the lead all the way to the finish."

The prisoner's dilemma of the technology chaser, Luo Jia once talked about this problem, in the case of the same route, other marathon runners start first, and it is difficult for you to catch up with them later, because while you are running, they are also running wildly.

Xingchen Technology needs to mobilize hundreds of thousands of engineers and scientists to chase hard, and a small team of a few thousand people in North America is enough to maintain its leading position.

It's not fair, but that's the reality.