Reborn during the early days of China’s reform and opening, the narrator finds himself in the 1980s countryside. In this setting, the past is still a cold reference, yet it is also a fresh start....
Zhu Guoxiong was very patient and asked questions covering topics including land, sea and air. After asking about planes, he asked about tanks, and after asking about tanks, he asked about warships.
"Can you imagine what China's navy will look like in ten, twenty, or even thirty years? Let me have some idea first."
Zhu Guoxiong took Wan Feng's fantasy as reality.
"Then let's think of something a little further in the future, say thirty years. You won't be able to see it in thirty years anyway, so I won't feel any burden even if I talk nonsense."
Zhu Guoxiong puffed his beard and glared: "You little bastard, you are not looking out for my own good. If you blow me well and make me happy, I will live as long as I can."
Wan Feng recalled what he had learned about the current situation of the Chinese Navy before his rebirth in 2018, and began to paint a rosy picture for Zhu Guoxiong.
It was a real drawing. He took out a stack of paper and first drew a 056 frigate on a piece of paper.
"What kind of ship is this?" Zhu Guoxiong was very confused when he saw the warship drawn by Wan Feng.
In 1992, China's warships were all developed by itself, all in the Soviet style, with various weapons piled up in a mess on the deck, giving people a messy feeling.
But the warship drawn by Wan Feng was very neat. Apart from a main gun on the front deck and a quad-mounted missile launch system in the middle, no other weapons could be seen.
"This is what I imagine a Chinese frigate to look like thirty years from now, about 1,400 to 1,500 tons."
"Ah! Such a beautiful warship is only a frigate of 1,400 to 1,500 tons? You are a spendthrift." The countries were very arrogant. Such a beautiful warship is only more than 1,000 tons and is used as a gunboat!
Wan Feng chuckled and said, "If you want to see something nice, don't worry. My greatest strength is my wild imagination. Let's continue painting."
So Wan Feng drew the 054A frigate on another piece of paper.
"The frigate just now was a near-shore defense type. This frigate is for offshore defense. It's over 4,000 tons. Are you satisfied?"
Zhu Guoxiong was equally confused: "Are there frigates over 4,000 tons? Isn't that a destroyer?"
"That's what I want to think about. Why won't you let me?"
Zhu Guoxiong was depressed. What the hell was going on with a paralyzed frigate of more than 4,000 tons?
"What's that fly swatter-like thing behind the turret?"
Wan Feng drew a bird's-eye view at a forty-five-degree angle, so he could see everything on the deck.
"I imagine future naval battles will no longer be based on cannon-barrel bombardments. Instead, they'll be all about beyond-visual-range missile attacks. They won't be the current tilted missile launch pattern. They'll use vertical launch systems. These fly swatter-like things are the vertical launch systems for missiles. This type of frigate has over thirty missile launch pits, capable of launching over thirty missiles."
Zhu Guoxiong smiled. "That's a good idea. You really have an extraordinary brain. You can even come up with this. Oh! It would be great if you could realize it just by thinking about it."
This is nonsense. If you can achieve whatever you want, what is the use of warships? Wouldn't it be better to just think about the enemy to death?
"I'm now extremely interested in your imagined destroyer."
Both of these are frigates, so the next step would of course be destroyers.
Zhu Guoxiong's idea was of course wrong. The next thing Wan Feng drew was a supply ship, a 40,000-ton supply ship, and after the supply ship was finished, the destroyer.
"This is the destroyer I imagined, a guided-missile destroyer. Around 7,000 tons. How's that? Impressive, isn't it?"
Zhu Guoxiong put the two frigates drawn by Wan Feng and this destroyer together.
"They're really from the same series. They look pretty much the same. How many missile craters are there on this one?"
"What do you think of the Sixty-Four Pit?"
"If it's a little less, there must be more than a hundred pits."
"No problem."
Wan Feng quickly drew another destroyer, of course it was the 055.
"Twelve thousand tons fully loaded, one hundred and eleven pits, is this okay?"
Wan Feng felt like a kindergarten teacher, coaxing children to play.
"This is good, this is good!" Zhu Guoxiong is now a little friend in kindergarten.
"What else? Keep drawing."
Just draw. Being a teacher requires patience.
Wan Feng then drew two more nuclear submarines, an attack nuclear submarine and a cruise missile nuclear submarine.
Now Wan Feng has drawn two frigates, two destroyers, two nuclear submarines and a supply ship.
"Grandpa! What kind of fleet should we form with these warships?"
Zhu Guoxiong frowned and thought for a while, then smiled: "Of course it's the aircraft carrier fleet!"
I can get whatever I want, it's just an aircraft carrier! I can't build an aircraft carrier, and I can't even draw one!
Wan Feng quickly drew the Bei Liao ship, and then he drew a flat-headed aircraft carrier without a smokestack.
"This fleet is complete. One ski-jump aircraft carrier and one catapult-powered nuclear-powered aircraft carrier. How's that?"
"Okay!" Zhu Guoxiong smiled, and tears came down as he smiled.
Making the little kid cry proves that Wan Feng is a complete failure as a teacher.
"Grandpa! Why are you crying? We're just here to have fun, right? It's no fun if you cry. Come, let me wipe your tears for you."
Wan Feng picked up a piece of drawing paper and started drawing on Zhu Guoxiong's face.
"Go! Get out of the way!"
When Zhu Guoxiong found out, Wan Feng took a piece of paper to wipe his tears and waved his hand to wipe them away.
Wan Jun quickly took out a clean handkerchief and wiped Zhu Guoxiong's tears.
"Oh! Can I see these things you drew come to life?"
"That depends on whether you can live to the next thirty years. You're already in your seventies, right?"
"How do I look like someone in his seventies? I'm only in my sixties!" Zhu Guoxiong roared.
"Haha! Not bad, Grandpa! Start exercising and staying healthy from now on. You should have no problem living for another thirty years. You will definitely see what our Chinese navy will look like in the future."
If Zhu Guoxiong could really live another 30 years, he would see that all this would not be a problem.
Because China's development speed is as fast as lightning and thunder, except for Wan Feng who has experienced it, probably no one on the entire earth can imagine how China will change in thirty years.
In the early 1990s of the previous life, when China and the United States signed the agreement on the return of Hunan and Hong Kong, the designer's vision was that by the end of the 50-year period of "one country, two systems" in Hunan and Hong Kong, China's GDP would reach 6 trillion US dollars and the per capita income would be 1,000 US dollars.
It has basically reached the upper-middle level among developing countries.
This was the blueprint that the designer originally designed for China until 2047, but what he didn't expect was that China had actually achieved the goal he designed in 2010.
At that time, everyone in the central government was probably scared, because many things could no longer be concealed by that day.
1992 plus 30 years is 2022. Zhu Guoxiong is over 90 years old. If he takes good care of himself, there will be no problem for him to live to that day.