Chapter 1. The Hopeless Years
When YF22 first flew in the early 90s, China was still struggling to improve on the old J-8. Around 1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis, a sense of hopelessness loomed over people's minds; facing the might of the Ameircan superiority, are we able to catch up?
In the last reform oriented decade, China's military industrial complex almost didn't change since the early 80s, and what was the industry like back in the 80s?
In the early 1980s, China's industrial capability and corporate management was behind the world by at least 50-70 years. There was a journalist from Hongkong that best described a typical scene in the factory; three stucco workers, one applies, one passes the stucco, and one shouts orders. Inauguration of president Chiao(no idea what this refers to, I guess I'm too young to ever hear of it, but I'm guessing it probably refers to an old story of some kind) started a new era, also greatly reflected the management and production skills of that era. The workers often skip work, half the products don't meet standard, supervision is almost next to none, managers don;t have a clue, and everyone is still stuck to the class struggle political lifestyle.
The Shanghai Automotive of the 1980s represented the peak of China's industrial capability, and they intended to cooperate with Volkswagen (later turned out ot be Shanghai-Volkswagen). Majority of foreign companies doubt its possibility. One optimistic 30 year old German journalist joked in his report after visited the factory, "Volkswagen is going to manafacture on an island from 100 years ago, with sloppy workers, and even equipments like hoist cranes and rubber hammers date back to my grandfather."
A Japanese journalist once visited the most advanced steel factory in Wuhan, he even found a hydraulic press tagged to be made in Japan from 1898. Even the factory president himself confirmed of such existence.
The military complex was slightly better off than those civillian counterparts. But it was put aside in the wave of economical and political reform, so the industry today is not too much different than that of 20 years ago. (I think this is probably exaggerated. I think the guy is commenting on 2011 from a 2000 memory.)
Deng (Xiao Ping) was not a superman, he planned to protect and emphasize on those critical areas, and expand communications with foreign companies to acquire advanced technologies and fabrication abilities, in order to improve China's overall military tech abilities. (Everyone these days bitch about how China's increasing military budgets, but no one heard about the constantly decreasing budget of the 80's and early 90s. If it wasn't becuase of the budget cut in favour of the economical development, the capabilities of the Chinese arms sector would definitely be better off than what it is today.) Because he wasn't superman, he wasn't able to forecast the embargo of 89 and the collapse of the Red Empire in 91, and especially the pro-independence movement in Taiwan during the mid 90s. But he was still able to set a solid foundation for China; including the biggest wind tunnel complex only after America, the biggest missile testing facility in the world, and many other high tech accomplishments that were not noticed by many. Although China has a solid foundation, it is still not enough for China to catch up quickly with simly pouring in lots of money.
A nation's military might is built on its overall national strength, industrial capabilities, quality of workers, and advanced magement system. "You have to have good silk first in order to make good fabrics".
Tom Cruise from Top Gun didn't raise a bit of my interest, but the appearance of F14 deeply impacted my young soul with its might. Many must also have had similar feelings, in fact, F14 was already very close to its retirement, yet we were still revising the J8 that was a generation behind.
Quoting from a famous reformer, "we begun, with almost lunatica amount of passion, look back to the roads we trekked, we are proud, but then, we understood the size of the gap, the road is so bumpy, I wondered if we would have the will to catch up".
Then in the 96 Strait Crisis, even blind men could see. The future became dim, with F22, Sea Wolf, and many waves of new weapons entering service in the US, what can we do?
To the Chinese leaders, military industry, the soldiers, and countless military fans, it was a almost hopeless era with no hope of seeing light.
This guy is very pro-China, but I have to say, he is very very objective in the technical analysis. This is only a prelude to the actual analysis. So sit back for my translation.\
I'm currently in the school library, going to get to the cafe to get some food and then I'll keep translating.
