Reaching Duchway, Westwood thought for a long time. The arms race can be regarded as the most direct confrontation of strength between countries other than war. Before the outbreak of the "Sino-US Cold War," that is, after the Fourth Indo-Pakistani War in the old year, the arms race between China and the United States was already in full swing. Arguably. Before the Peninsular War, the United States had always been in the leading position, and although China had superiority in several technologies, it was difficult to pose a direct challenge to the United States due to the limitations of its basic technological strength.

After the half-Ukrainian war, the situation changed. The Chinese team defeated the American team and made the most successful advertisement for "Made in China". China has conquered cities and land in the international arms market, surpassing the United States in one fell swoop and becoming the world's largest arms exporter. The huge arms trade has brought huge returns. It provides the most powerful impetus for the industry.

Although the United States has increased investment in research and development, lowered the price of arms, increased the level of exports, and so on. Most of the traditional markets have been retained, but after the Japanese war, the hot sales of the first fire in China far exceeded that of the United States, and the global sales of only four of them exceeded the tens of millions of dollars in the thugs, almost three times the sales of the first fire in the United States. So far, the weapons and equipment marketed by China are not only of high quality and low price, but also have very advanced performance, and some of them have even surpassed the standard equipment of the US military.

Arms sales are the best proof of the pros and cons of the arms race.

Over the years, the United States has gone from being a leader to catching up, and China is expanding its lead.

Westwood does not want to expand arms exports, after all, the support of arms groups is of great significance to the Democratic Party, but the arms race requires not only the input of arms dealers, but also the investment of the state.

After several years of Cold War with the Soviet Union, although the United States had the last laugh, it also encountered a lot.

It can even be said that the global financial turmoil triggered by the subprime mortgage crisis in the United States in the second year and the financial turmoil in the United States that exploded in the second year are to a large extent inevitably related to the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. During the Clinton administration, the United States was given the opportunity to show off its success in the past few years, but to a large extent, it was paying for the legacy of the Cold War. Not really benefiting the U.S. economy. During the Bush administration, the United States was embroiled in two large-scale regional wars. The Clinton administration squandered the wealth it left behind, and it had to blow up the financial bubble and use the money of investors all over the world to pay for the war in the United States. Eventually, it led to a global financial crisis that put the United States on the road to recession.

The greatest impact of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union was the arms race.

The Soviet Union was dragged down by the arms race, and the United States was left half-dead by the arms race.

In an all-out arms race with China, does the United States have any hope of winning?

It's not Westwood pessimistic, it's that China is not the USSR.

Polar bears are greedy, and to a large extent they are not lost to the United States, but to frantic expansion. Although China's performance in the recent years has been no worse than that of the Soviet Union, China's "expansion" is fundamentally different from that of the Soviet Union. Strictly speaking. The long wars that China fought in the first century had basically nothing to do with expansion. With the exception of the Diaoyu Islands, the Spratly Islands, and southern Tibet, China has not gained any new territory or territorial waters during the war. From the point of view. Even though China hopes to enhance its international influence through war, it has never hoped to gain more living space through war, but only to improve the surrounding environment according to the requirements of the national exhibition.

In terms of military ideology, which is closely related to the arms race, China is also fundamentally different from the former Soviet Union.

"During the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union." Even in the era of Brezhnev, when the Soviet Union was at its strongest, it was not able to surpass the United States in military technology, let alone lead the arms race, except for some theoretically powerful technologies that were superior to those of the United States, and basically followed behind the United States. For example, Khrushchev's extreme admiration of "strategic rockets, that is, strategic ballistic missiles, in addition to being used to threaten the United States." does not have any practical value; For example, the world's largest "Typhoon"-class strategic nuclear submarine, in addition to being the largest, is much worse than the "Ohio" class of the United States in all aspects; Another example is the miraculously blown, serial tanks, which, in addition to being easy to build in large-scale wars, are not at all opponents of the main battle tanks of the United States. In general, the biggest problem of the USSR was that it always thought about a world war with the United States, focusing all its energy on it, and it turned out that in the case of mutually assured destruction, the probability of a world war was almost zero. For this reason, the Soviet Union not only displayed a lot of weapons and equipment that could not be adapted to high-tech local wars, but also made serious mistakes in strategic decision-making. In order to bring down the Soviet Union, US President Ronald Reagan relied on just a few pieces of false information to convince the Soviet Union of "Star Wars". It has spent countless national strength to compete with the United States on a battlefield that does not exist.

Many facts can prove that China has no intention of fighting a world war with the United States at all, at least not in the foreseeable future. Although the strategic defense systems of China and the United States are becoming more and more advanced, and they are getting closer and closer to the idea of "Star Wars", within a few decades. At most, the strategic defense system can only deal with second-rate nuclear countries, and it is impossible to have the capability of being a first-class major country. China has not competed with the United States for the number of nuclear weapons, and its many nuclear warheads, combined with advanced defense penetration technology, are completely capable of tearing apart the US National Missile Defense system. in the basic strategy

In the absence of a broken order, China and the United States are unlikely to fight with the United States, and China pays more attention to winning local wars, especially defeating certain second-rate countries under special circumstances. This basic policy determines that China will not engage in a face-to-face arms race with the United States, but will compete with the United States for military technology through a third party. If it wins, China will be able to reap immeasurable benefits from it; If you lose, you won't lose directly to the United States. More importantly, the indirect arms race does not need to directly compete with the United States for military strength, but allows China to concentrate on certain military technologies of critical importance in the face of limited resources. It will not consume too much national power in the arms race. On the contrary, it is able to sell arms through victorious local wars.

In an arms race with the USSR, it was dangerous for the United States to win.

Whether the United States can win an arms race with China is a question.

After thinking for a long time, Westwood asked the secretary to send off the guests waiting outside and called Brooklyn over.

"General Dudgway's analysis is very realistic." Brooklyn listened to the president's story. said, "Strictly speaking, Du Qiwei is not a soldier in the sense of legend, he participated in the Peninsula War. I know very well China's military strength, and I am very aware of China's military policy. India cannot afford to lose the next war, and neither can we allow India to lose the next war. Massive military assistance is only one of them, and if India is to win the next war, or at least a tie with China, we need to accelerate the development of key technologies. We will strive to catch up with China's progress within a few years. ”

"The problem is that the arms race is too costly."

Brooklyn sighed and said: "It's true, now that the economy has just entered the stage of normal development, if we concentrate our forces on the arms race, it is very likely that we will lose economically to China, and the impact on us will be even more serious than India losing the war." There are two ways to increase investment: one is to clarify the direction of development, concentrate on key technologies, and avoid spending too much financial resources in secondary areas; The second is to invite other countries to share research and development costs, reduce technical risks, and achieve the purpose of saving costs. If you want to pass China on several key technologies as soon as possible. We must do both, using both approaches. The former could involve several major arms dealers, as well as major national laboratories. Emphasis should be placed on strengthening the development of basic technologies. The latter can attract allies such as the United Kingdom and Australia to participate, and of course, in some non-core technology areas, India can also be invited to participate. ”

Westwood nodded slightly and said, "I think so too, but I don't know if these countries will agree." ”

"As long as we agree to share patent technology, it's not a big problem."

"If India is involved, with India's technological strength

"It is undeniable that India's technological foundation is very weak, which is also the basic condition for winning over India."

Westwood frowned.

"India doesn't have the technology, and it's definitely hungry for it. We do what we like, and India will not refuse. The most important thing is that India will not make too high demands, so there is no need to consider involving India in the development of core technologies. Of course, even if India makes such a request, we can reject it on the grounds that India's technological base is weak. There is no need to make a direct decision, as long as it promises to wait for India's basic technology to make a breakthrough. Then we will cooperate with you. It will take years, even decades, for any kind of basic technology to mature, and whether India can withstand China's military pressure in a few years, I am afraid that it will not have the ability or opportunity to participate in the development of basic technology. ”

"You are..."

"India has needs and a certain economic foundation, so it is definitely the best partner."

Westwood immediately laughed.

"We can also include technical cooperation in the scope of assistance, so that India is willing to contribute money and efforts."

"That's true, that's exactly what Rurajapani needs."

"Rurajapani needs it, and so do those who want to change the political landscape and the social fabric of India. Any high-tech research requires huge investment, and only enterprises with real strength and capital can participate in it, and those small capitalists who have become rich overnight do not even have the opportunity to get involved. ”

"It also became an opportunity to win over India's traditional aristocracy."

Brudrin nodded and said, "Several factors are combined, even if we don't consider the arms race, we have to increase relevant investment."

If you can take this opportunity to balance China's technological superiority, why not? ”

"You're right, in that case, we have to redefine the aid package for India."

"We still have to solve the domestic legislative problem as soon as possible."

Westwood was stunned for a moment, then let out a long breath and said, "I will meet with party representatives in both houses of Congress as soon as possible, and then meet with representatives of several major lobby groups." This is not only helping India, but also helping businesses that are on the verge of failure, as well as the millions of workers, should not be too much of a problem. ”

Brooklyn smiled and said nothing, as Secretary of State. He didn't want to meddle in Congress.