Chapter 2544
Although Ha Jianyi still had doubts about Dai Chengrong's retaining the former Ming officer, it could not affect other inspection tasks during the trip, and Dai Chengrong did not want to give any more explanations on this. So the two parties accepted Wang Anguo's proposal with a tacit understanding, skipped this topic for the first time, and went to the arsenal in the base to inspect the military supplies and weapons and equipment in stock.
According to the Haihan Army's equipment standards, in addition to the basic musketry infantry, troops at the army regiment level will also be equipped with cavalry, artillery, engineers, communications corps, medical corps, cooking corps and other combat and logistics arms. The required equipment The equipment and supplies are of various types and in large quantities, and special warehouses must be built at the station for storage and safekeeping. For example, the base where Dai Chengrong's Second Regiment of the Seventh Division is stationed has three large warehouses for storing supplies.
"The warehouse originally used by the Ming Army was too small and in disrepair. It leaked badly when it rained and could not meet our requirements. The warehouses you two see now are all after we arrived here last year. It is newly built and has just been put into use." Dai Chengrong led the way while introducing the situation of the warehouse to the two men.
These warehouses all have bluestone walls, with gray brick walls on top, and a gabled ceiling on top, covered with tiles. The roof is about two feet high, the width of the bay is almost more than two feet, but the span is more than ten feet. Each warehouse has access channels at both ends to facilitate the transportation of materials.
Dai Chengrong ordered the soldiers guarding the warehouse to open the door and prepare relevant inventory records and lighting tools for them to enter for inspection.
The first thing to be inspected is of course the weapons and ammunition. According to the Haihan Army's organization and combat requirements, the weapons stored here include not only guns and artillery, but also special weapons such as landmines, grenades, and smoke bombs. Ha Jianyi first carefully checked the registration information and the special code on the packaging box, and then opened the box for inspection after confirming that they were consistent.
"Captain Dai, the Second Regiment is currently mainly equipped with Type 48 rifles?" Ha Jianyi asked Dai Chengrong while checking.
Dai Chengrong responded: "In fact, individual weapons include more than Type 48 rifles. Due to various objective reasons, new weapons need to be replaced in batches. Currently, about half of the soldiers are still using Type 33 rifles. When will the update be completed? This is not something we can decide and we have to follow the unified arrangements of the Ministry of National Defense.”
Due to the black technology brought to this time and space by the time travellers, Haihan's weapon research and development work is far ahead of the level of the weapons industry at the same time. However, it is not enough to simply design new weapons. They must be mass-produced and launched on a large scale. There is still a huge gap between equipping troops and putting them into actual combat use.
One is the issue of industrial technology level. Although Fort Victory's large database contains drawings and designs of various advanced weapons, it seems that all they have to do is copy them. However, Haihan's current level of industrial development is far from keeping up with the needs of military manufacturing. Both materials and processing techniques are still at the primary industrial stage, and are not enough to mass-produce advanced weapons with precise structures.
The second is the production capacity issue. From the mining of metal ores to the manufacturing of specific parts, the entire production chain has been facing the problem of insufficient production capacity. For example, the copper mined from the Fushan Copper Mine in Shandong every year is extremely limited due to its wide range of uses. .
To solve these problems, the industrial sector must start by increasing the scale of mining, which in turn involves investing in more mining machinery, recruiting more miners, increasing mine transportation capacity, improving smelting technology, and a series of other measures. Each measure has to face a bunch of new problems, and it is difficult to achieve effective improvements in a short period of time.
The third is the most fundamental problem - funding. It will cost a lot of money to solve the first two problems, and then it will be possible to update military equipment, but this is not easy. If Haihan uses the limited capital budget to improve the level of the weapons industry, then the military budget for Haihan's army can only be compressed. Although the combat performance of new weapons has been improved, their cost, maintenance, and combat expenses will also increase accordingly. The Haihan Army currently has almost no rivals of comparable strength in East Asia - at least not within the area that the Haihan Army's logistics can cover. Moreover, the two main opponents, the Ming Dynasty and the Manchu Qing Dynasty, also surrendered one after another. The combat missions of the Haihan Army were much reduced compared to previous years. This also resulted in the Executive Committee not being particularly willing to continuously upgrade weapons and equipment.
On the premise that the weapons and equipment of the Haihan Army still have great technical advantages, the Executive Committee prefers to maintain the existing equipment first and gradually complete the replacement of the troops based on the actual production capacity of new weapons and the combat needs of the troops.
Of course, this process will be relatively long. Haihan Ordnance Industry is still manufacturing weapons developed in the 1930s. Even though the 2nd Regiment of the 7th Division commanded by Dai Chengrong is considered one of the elite troops in the Donghai Region, it is inevitable that it is still using weapons that were finalized and produced more than 20 years ago. You must know that Ha Jianyi was only three years old when the Type 33 rifles began to be installed in the Haihan Army.
Although the Type 48 rifle has better combat performance, due to the use of metal-cased fixed-loading ammunition, the cost of use is much higher than that of the Type 33 rifle. At this stage, only a few units of the Haihan Army have installed this type of seven-type rifle. Rifle developed years ago. If Shi Diwen had not promoted the plan to move the capital and increased the importance of the Hangzhou area, the progress of Dai Chengrong's troops equipping new rifles might have been much slower than it is now.
Of course, it is actually difficult for Ha Jianyi to understand the difficulties faced by troops stationed overseas. After all, the garrison troops in the Sanya area are naturally well-equipped and have always been the first to install new weapons. Now, in order to facilitate rapid maneuvers in Sanya city, they are even equipped with several troop transport trucks powered by diesel engines. These are all treatments that are beyond the reach of overseas troops.
So when Ha Jianyi heard Dai Chengrong say that half of the troops in the Second Regiment were still using Type 3 and Type 3 rifles, his heart skipped a beat. He secretly thought that the Donghai Region had even built a Glorious-class battleship. Logically speaking, it shouldn't be short of money. Yes, why does Dai Chengrong's army still have so many old-fashioned weapons?
Dai Chengrong guessed it by looking at his expression, and he laughed at himself: "Master Ha, our Seventh Army Division cannot compare with the treatment of the East China Sea Fleet, and there is not so much military budget to use to update equipment!"
Ha Jianyi said: "It seems that Lord Shi is still partial!"
Dai Chengrong shook his head and said: "I can't say that, Master Shi also has his difficulties!"
(End of chapter)