Chapter 910 Tank Proving Ground
The tank testing ground in East Africa is built in the Rukwa Lake Basin. This place is northwest of Mbeya City. On the one hand, it can draw on the industrial resources of Mbeya City, and on the other hand, the terrain and climate are suitable for tank experimental operations.
Lake Rukwa is also a larger lake in East Africa, equivalent to half of Qinghai Lake, and is located between Lake Malawi and Lake Solon (Lake Tanganyika).
As a saltwater lake, the biggest difference between Lukwa Lake and Qinghai Lake is that Lukwa Lake is a seasonal lake and may even completely dry up during the dry season.
A large number of wild animals such as hippos and crocodiles live in Lake Rukwa. Unlike other places, the development and utilization rate here is extremely low. After all, the two characteristics of saltwater lakes and seasonal lakes are destined to prevent large-scale development here in East Africa for the time being. Local The resource is the salt pond in the southern part of the lake, where East Africa has installed a small salt refinery.
Other than that, there are basically no human settlements around Lake Rukwa. A small number of villages and towns are mainly distributed on the rivers that flow into Lake Rukwa. This also provides the East African Army with a good weapons and equipment experimental site.
After all, the sparsely populated area is not only conducive to confidentiality, but also difficult to be interfered by external factors. As for some blind "animals", they deserve to be killed by trauma or bombing due to weapons experiments.
In order to ensure the safety of the test site, there are special armed personnel guarding the vicinity of Lake Rukwa. In fact, they are guarding against the hippos in Lake Rukwa, and crocodiles will not easily come ashore.
Hippopotamuses are absolutely disgusting to humans and dogs in Africa, and just a single "tail gas" emission is unbearable.
At the beginning, in order to ensure the safety of water sources, East Africa "killed" a lot of hippos. After all, more than a thousand hippos can pollute the entire river.
As for why the hippos in Lake Rukwa escaped, it is entirely because this is not a water source. At the same time, Lake Rukwa is an inland lake that cannot be entered and exited, and the lake water does not affect other areas.
So the hippos in Lake Rukua were born in the right place, just like the animals in the Serengeti grasslands, they have escaped the "sanctions" of understanding due to their range of activities.
That was a special situation in the Serengeti grassland. After all, Ernst did not want the famous scene of "wildebeest crossing the river" from previous documentaries to disappear.
Lake Rukwa has temporarily managed to escape the clutches of East Africa entirely due to its harsh environment. In fact, in the future, with the development of local salt industry resources in East Africa, it will still be affected to a certain extent. Of course, the current domestic demand for the salt industry here The resource requirements are not large.
Because there are many saltwater lakes like Lake Rukwa in East Africa, the largest of which is Lake Turkana. Salt lakes are widely distributed in East Africa except the Congo rainforest area, so they are a very common resource.
Not to mention other places, there are many salt lakes in Plateau Province, and they are also close to coastal industrial developed areas. The advantage of Lake Rukwa is that it is close to Mbeya City.
However, the climate of Mbeya is completely different from that of the Lake Rukwa Basin. As the Lake Malawi basin, Mbeya City has very abundant rainfall, which prevents droughts and floods like the Lake Rukwa Basin.
“The tracked chassis of the tractor is more suitable for the terrain of the Rukwa Lake Basin than the wheels. It can travel smoothly no matter in the dry season or the rainy season. Of course, another important reason is that the tires are difficult to bear the heavy body of the tank, and the track is more solid and reliable. "Phillip, an expert on tanks in East Africa, said to his colleagues.
Colleague Yarsk said: "Wheeled armored vehicles also have their advantages, such as speed, but they have high requirements on road conditions. If it is a hardened road, it may be okay, but in a battlefield environment, smooth roads are difficult to encounter. It is an ideal state that cannot be achieved, not to mention that the infrastructure level of many countries is not even comparable to that of our country, and the road conditions are very bad. "
As for East Africa, although it started late, it has also been in a state of explosion in recent years. Roads, railways, canals, etc. have exploded, and it has quickly caught up with other countries in the world.
It is no exaggeration to say that the current infrastructure level of one country in East Africa may be better than that of all of Africa in the previous life. In another 40 to 50 years, East Africa will be able to completely catch up with Europe and the United States. In fact, in some fields, East Africa is already number one in the world in terms of scale. The most typical example is hardened roads, which can also be called "modern highways." In order to pave the way for the automobile industry, East Africa has made great progress in highways, especially cement roads and The scale of construction on asphalt roads is the largest in the world.
After all, other countries cannot foresee the demand for roads after the future explosion of the automobile industry. The importance of railways in land transportation in various countries still ranks first.
In the field of canal construction, it is even more exaggerated. Although Germany and Belgium are no less enthusiastic about domestic canal construction than East Africa, East Africa's huge land and inherent shortcomings in inland water transportation make the East Africa Grand Canal project alone surpass that of other countries. Sum of the canal plan.
Therefore, the level of infrastructure in East Africa was absolutely top-notch in the 19th century. This was also the result of being forced to do so. Just like a test paper, other countries have a certain foundation. East Africa started with zero foundation, so the room for improvement in East Africa is naturally limited. maximum.
Of course, with the development of East Africa, not to mention compared with Europe and the United States, at least compared with the Far East, South America and other regions, it has surpassed these relatively backward regions. As for European and American countries, there is still a certain gap, but as time goes by, overall One day we can reach the same level.
"You are right. If the level of infrastructure is improved, the maneuverability of military armored vehicles will be higher, but in the end they cannot surpass tanks, unless the whole of East Africa is a big cement field. Even so, wheeled armored vehicles still have to solve many problems. This includes load, stray bullets, etc.”
The current tire design of military armored vehicles does not exceed the limitations of the East African automobile industry. However, if the tires encounter sharp objects or stray bullets, they may be directly scrapped. Of course, how to solve this problem specifically is a situation that Philip's competitors should consider.
While Philip and Yarsk were talking, the East African "tank" had already started a new round of performances. It was an extremely bulky big guy, covered in thick steel, with a medium-caliber barrel extending from the top. , shuttling through the mud as fast as a turtle.
“Click…”
Hearing the sound, Phillips and Yarsk's expressions darkened, and familiar pictures emerged in their minds again.
I saw the big guy lying directly in the mud, with black smoke billowing from behind his buttocks, looking half-dead.
“Expert Philip, the engine has exploded!” the tank driver said helplessly as he climbed out of the tank’s iron box.
Although Philip and Yersk were used to this result, they still couldn't help feeling uncomfortable every time they failed.
“Go and get the tool box. Let’s take it apart and take a look at it this time. I don’t believe there are always problems.” Philip ordered.
It was very difficult to disassemble this big thing with a complex structure. It took several people a long time to complete it, and this was only the first step. After all, the problem was the engine, which meant that today's fault must not be eliminated. .
“Pull the engine back to the laboratory first.” Philip could only say helplessly.
After working on it for a long time, Philip and Yarsk had long lost their image of "civilized people". Their bodies were covered with oil stains and dirt, and both of them had big faces. The others were also similar. They were working in the mud, so they didn't want to work at all. It may be spotless, this is the normal life in the proving ground.
The engine of the tank is not small, so it took more than ten people more than ten minutes to lift this big thing onto the rear frame of the tractor.
(End of this chapter)