Chapter 215 Are they...upgrading?

Author: September Sauce

Chapter 215 Are they upgrading?

On the other side of the sea, in May Club's secret office.

Houston never imagined that one day he would replace Paine and sit in the main seat of the conference room.

He once thought that if he wanted to sit in this position, he would have to at least wait until Paine was too old to think anymore, or until the threat to his side was completely gone and May would become a useless department, then he would have a chance.

But unexpectedly, the opponent's development speed far exceeded our expectations.

The adjustment we were forced to make was not because the opponent was no longer a threat, but because the threat from the opponent was too great.

It was so big that even Paine made no mistakes, just a slower pace, which resulted in a complete defeat of his own side.

Of course, it was this outcome that gave me hope of entering the core decision-making level.

On some level, I should be grateful to Paine.

Although he was sorry for the country, he was really sorry for himself.

No matter what, I hope he can live well on his farm in Texas.

Houston breathed a sigh of relief, put down the report he had read, and said to the assistant beside him:

"Are you sure that this is their latest plan? Are they going to develop their efforts in the field of construction machinery?"

The assistant nodded and replied:

"Yes, the confidentiality level of this plan is not high, and it has even been disclosed to the relevant participating departments."

"According to the intelligence we have obtained, they should be planning to prioritize solving problems in the fields of shield machines, heavy excavators, and bridge erecting machines. The person responsible for coordinating this is a newly established working group called the Office of Civil Development.

.”

"The authority of this working group is very high. It is said that it may be at the same level as the Office of Heavy Equipment, or even above it."

"We suspect that the Office of Civil Development is related to the mysterious working group we speculated before, and is probably their spokesperson in the field of civilian technology."

Hearing the assistant's words, Houston frowned slightly.

"You mean, their No. 0 working group?"

"That's right."

"But this is somewhat unreasonable. Working Group 0 has always been responsible for scientific research in the military field. If it is now turned to civilian use, the span will be too large."

"They don't have the technical accumulation and reliable talent pool. If they rashly adjust their direction, will they really be able to do it?"

The assistant shook his head and replied:

"We are not particularly clear about this."

"But what is certain is that the early stage of the Tianjing Project is related to the No. 0 Working Group."

"In this project, they should have accumulated some civilian scientific research experience, which is enough to support them in launching large-scale civilian scientific research projects."

"No, it's definitely not enough."

Houston interrupted the assistant and said:

"No matter how rich the accumulation of project experience is, it is impossible to completely eliminate the technical gap. This is an objective law."

"But the intelligence cannot be wrong. It has even been made semi-public."

The assistant said doubtfully.

Houston sighed, his expression gradually becoming serious.

He took a piece of white paper and wrote several words on it.

Military industry.

Civilian.

Fighters, missiles, electronics.

Ships, high-speed rail, infrastructure.

Then, he turned the paper towards his assistant and asked:

"Did you find anything?"

The assistant shook his head, still looking confused.

".It's so obvious, but you still can't see it?"

Houston glanced at the assistant helplessly, and then continued:

"They are making up for their gaps step by step, and they are choosing the shortest path."

"The development of the military industry is to maximize our influence during the window period when our energy is involved in the Middle East, establish a relatively stable external environment, and at the same time establish our international influence as quickly as possible.

.”

"And all of this is actually paving the way for the development of their civilian technology."

"After all, civilian technology requires a lot of capital and market support. If they don't have a voice internationally, their domestic market alone cannot support the goal of rapid development."

"So, military industry is the first step."

"After taking this step and reaching the 'enough' level, they began to switch to civilian use."

"The high-speed rail is their first test project, followed by the Tianjing Project, which is a mixed military-civilian project, and the current construction machinery project, in their words, is a failure."

"They want to quickly build a strong composite economy based on the military industry."

"Right now, their GDP ranking is only ranked sixth, but if this trend continues, they are likely to enter the top five within two or three years, and the top three - or even second - within 10 years.

"

"At that time, the economic advantages will feed back to the military, and the entire situation will be completely revitalized by them."

"So, what they are doing now is just one thing in the final analysis."

"They're upgrading!"

"upgrade?"

The assistant repeated subconsciously.

"That's right. This is like a tabletop game. You must collect all the elements required for upgrades before you can complete the upgrade."

"And once the upgrade is successful, your strength will instantly increase a lot."

"Obviously, the element they are collecting now is infrastructure."

Houston suddenly stood up and spoke firmly:

"We must not sit idly by, otherwise, we will make the same mistake as Paine."

"In the past, it was difficult for us to intervene militarily, but economically, there is much more room for maneuver. Do you have any ideas?"

The assistant was obviously stunned when he heard Houston's question.

After hesitating for a few seconds, he answered:

"Trade protection, sanctions, monopoly, dumping, technological blockade. These are the only ones I can think of."

"However, when it comes to heavy machinery, we actually don't have a big say in the international arena. Mitsubishi and Hitachi are actually each other's largest suppliers."

"It is not feasible to achieve the goal through sanctions."

"In terms of technical blockade, you also know that the technical strength of Working Group Zero is not bad. Now that it has been proposed, it is almost impossible to rely on external technology. This goes against their original intention."

Houston nodded in agreement. After thinking for a moment, his eyes suddenly lit up.

"If all of these don't work, then the only option is trade protection + dumping, right?"

"If this strategy is implemented, we can destroy both their domestic and international markets at the same time."

"By then, no matter how advanced their technology is, whatever they can't sell will just rot in the warehouse."

"As soon as the funding chain for research and development is broken, they will no longer be able to pose a threat to us."

The assistant beside him nodded silently.

Deep down in his heart, he actually did not agree with such a plan.

After all, relying on "dumping" to occupy the market is actually not the most "economical" approach.

But now, if you really want to curb the opponent's "upgrade" trend, there seems to be no other better solution.

A few days later, Caterpillar headquarters.

Chairman Qian Ning looked at the man opposite him with a serious face and asked:

"Are you serious? Are you sure you want us to cooperate in implementing the price-cutting and dumping strategy?"

"Do you know that once the price of a product is reduced, it is not them that will be affected first, but our own domestic market!"

"Our profits will plummet, the capital chain will be broken, and we may even be unable to repay bank loans. Is this what you want?"
To be continued...