Babylonian Empire

"Besides, this unified currency cannot be realized without a start-up capital of 1000 billion U.S. dollars. Once this huge investment project fails, it will be a big loss for Saudi Arabia. After all, your country's one-year Oil revenue is only $500 billion," George said.

In later generations, at the initial stage of the start-up of the euro zone, the cost from the issuance of the euro to its use was as high as 1600 billion to 1800 billion euros. George said 1000 billion US dollars, but it did not scare King Fahd.

Especially the last sentence, as if mocking Saudi, just now he was crying poor, but he was very generous in this matter.

After finishing speaking, George looked at King Fahd, the wise king, who was silent. He didn't know whether his words had moved King Fahd.

King Fahd pondered for ten minutes, and George waited for ten minutes like this. He thought that he had already impressed King Fahd, and as long as he persuaded Saudi Arabia to give up the plan, his trip would be considered a complete success.

Unexpectedly, after King Fahd thought deeply, it turned out to be another result: "Mr. Schultz, you still don't understand us in Saudi Arabia, and you don't understand us in the Middle East. Here, in many cases, it is not money that can dominate Everything, more, and the love between our Arab brothers, blood is thicker than water, our entire Arab world is a whole. Now, we Saudi Arabia, relying on rich oil resources, the country has become rich, but, There are still many countries whose economic development is not as good as ours, and people’s living standards are not high. However, this plan can drive the economic development of the entire Arab world and improve the living standards of our entire Arabs, which will benefit our entire Arab world. Therefore, although we in Saudi Arabia have invested heavily, we will never withdraw from this plan just because of this reason, and we must do something for our Arab brothers."

King Fahd's tone was very flat, but what was revealed from the words was a view that the interests of the entire Arab world were even higher than Saudi Arabia's own interests, leaving George completely speechless.

Everyone in the world knows that the Saudis are very generous.When no oil was discovered, the Saudis could slaughter the only sheep in their family to entertain guests.And now, after the Saudis have huge wealth, this is even more so. For example, when you go to a Saudi house as a guest, you must not express too much curiosity about a certain item, otherwise, when you are leaving, the other party This kind of thing will be packaged for you and presented to you.

However, George didn't know that the generosity of the Saudis had reached such a level. For the sake of making the entire Arab world rich, even if Saudi Arabia suffered a little, Saudi Arabia was very willing.However, he knows that it is very normal for Saudi Arabia to have this view.On the issue of exporting oil, OPEC has set quotas. However, some countries secretly export more oil for their own interests, which will lead to an oversupply of oil and a drop in prices. Reduce oil exports by yourself to balance the output of oil exports.

However, Saudi Arabia is actually willing to invest huge sums of money in this currency plan for the overall benefit of the Arabs, which makes George a little unbelievable. Either, King Fahd is great, or he has a deeper purpose .

For the interests of the Arabs as a whole, Saudi Arabia certainly has such an awareness. However, for Saudi Arabia, after unifying the currency, using this currency to settle oil and truly transforming the wealth of oil into the wealth of Saudi Arabia is their deeper the goal of.

"So, your country is unwilling to give up this plan?" George asked.

"Our plan doesn't seem to have anything to do with your country, does it?" asked Prince Sultan next to him.

"If your country can stick to your country's consistent policies, for example, stick to the current oil export policy, then we in the United States will change our current views." George said.

"Our Saudi oil policy will never be shaken." King Fahd said: "For example, the US dollar is the only settlement currency for oil exports, and we in Saudi Arabia will always insist on this."

They are all sensible people, and they don't need to go around in circles when they speak. King Fahd's words can be regarded as a reassurance for George.

The difficult negotiations are over, and the sea exercises are slowly coming to an end.

In a certain sense, George's visit this time is relatively successful. As long as there is strong financial support from Saudi Arabia, the United States will be able to successfully resolve the problems it is facing now if it transfers this stock market crisis to these wealthy Arab countries.

However, George also knew that although the Saudis advertised that they would not go back on their promises, when their currencies were really all in circulation in the Arab region, there was no guarantee that such thoughts would come, especially if there were countries like Iraq. country included.

His next visit is to Iraq.

The United States has always been very troubled by Iraq's actions. Iraq is increasingly developing in the direction of confrontation with the United States. Moreover, Iraq's military strength is very strong, and it has grown into a potential threat that is more difficult to deal with than Iran. But this time, Iraq dared to Confronting the U.S. Navy head-on, launching an anti-ship missile, and flying a fighter jet over a U.S. aircraft carrier are all serious provocations.

How to deal with Iraq, George can't come up with a better way. He only knows that the CIA has been planning a plan to plan a big incident in Saudi Arabia, and first disintegrate an important ally of Iraq. In the Middle East, if there is no Saudi support Well, Iraq is definitely not as arrogant as it is now. It has solved the Saudi problem and disintegrated Iraq's allies. At that time, after the new president takes office, it is very likely that he will completely change his attitude towards Iraq and launch a real blow.

For Iraq, intimidation is useless, only real action will work.I hope that after Bush takes office, he can come up with practical and effective measures.

But now, the United States still needs funds from Iraq. Not only Saudi Arabia, but Iraq also needs to increase its holdings of US national debt.As difficult as it was, George needed to wade through the water.

When George arrived in Baghdad, the Arab Space Corporation in southern Iraq was preparing to launch their first launch vehicle.

Chapter One Thousand and Seventeen

Eastern region of the Hijara Desert, Arab Space Corporation.

In the flat desert, modern buildings have already sprung up, and an open-air launch platform is the most eye-catching. This is the launch site for flying into the sky.

The launch tower is more than 40 meters high. Although such a size is not very large, it can meet the current needs of Iraq.

The carrier rocket developed by Dongfeng-3 is only more than 20 meters high. Even if the second stage and fairing are added to it, the height is only more than [-] meters. Iraq needs to carry out multiple developments before it can have a new type of carrier rocket. , when the time comes, a new launching stand will also be established.

The current launch towers still have a lot of experimental nature. Although they have learned a lot of technology from the eastern powers, in these aspects, the eastern powers are not willing to be teachers, and many of them need their own design and practice.

On the launch tower, there are various workbenches, and projects such as liquid, water, electricity, and fuel filling are also carried out on this.

Below the launch platform is a large pool structure, which is used to overcome the reaction force during take-off and reduce the impact of heat flow.

There are two ways to launch a carrier rocket. Soviet rockets are assembled lying down. After assembly, they are transported to the launch platform lying down, and then hoisted up for various tests to complete the launch. preparation before.

Other aerospace powers, however, do the final assembly, that is, the vertical assembly. Various tests are completed in the assembly workshop, and they are transported vertically to the launch platform before they can be launched. re-measurement.However, if this is done, the factory building of the assembly workshop must be made very high. For example, when the United States launched the Saturn V rocket, it built a super assembly building with an internal height of 136 meters to meet all the harsh external environmental risks. , such as hurricanes, and internal assembly requirements, such as cleanliness, constant temperature and humidity, etc., before assembling such a large rocket with a height of 110 meters.After the assembly is complete, it is also a very challenging task to transfer this big guy vertically to the launch platform, because during the vertical transportation, it must be guaranteed that it cannot shake. For this reason, the United States specially designed The unique crawler transport vehicle carefully transports the assembled behemoth to the launch pad.

And because Iraq is still unable to develop such a big guy for the time being, the final assembly plant in Iraq is only more than 50 meters high, and a railway is laid from the final assembly plant to the launching platform for transportation.

Compared with the 40-meter-high launch tower, the 20-meter-high launch vehicle is relatively short.

In fact, to put it more appropriately, this is a sounding rocket of the Arabian space company. Since it has only one stage, it cannot reach the first cosmic velocity at all, and launch the payload into an artificial earth satellite.

However, the Arab Space Company did not announce this to the outside world.

Their space-one launch vehicle is a two-stage rocket capable of delivering a 300-kilogram payload to a [-]-kilometer orbit.

No one would disassemble their rockets to have a look, although there would be many devices that would track their launch process, but on the radar screen, it was just a spot of light, nothing special could be seen at all However, only when the second-stage rocket needs to work, they will find out that the launch of Arab Space Company was a failure this time, because the second-stage rocket did not ignite and did not send the payload into the intended orbit, but, in fact, , This launch has been completely successful, and the load inside the fairing of the rocket head will also fall in the Thar Desert in eastern Pakistan.

Since the earth rotates from west to east, all satellites launch eastward.

Now, on the launch pad, the first launch vehicle of the Arabian space company has stayed there quietly, and all the technicians are working nervously in the launch hall.

The launch window is still more than half an hour away, and the space-one carrier rocket has been filled with fuel on the launch pad, and the launch has entered an irreversible process.

Since the Middle East has little rain and a dry climate, it is very unfavorable for agriculture, but it is a very good opportunity for launching satellites.The launch window can appear for more than 300 days in a year.

Reporters from various countries are waiting around the launch base. Although Iraq has put martial law around the launch site to prevent damage by unknown elements, and has deployed anti-aircraft missiles around the launch site, due to the launch vehicle technology and Ballistic missile technology has many things in common and may be hostile to certain forces.

However, this is a desert area, which does not affect these reporters visiting the launch process outside the martial law area.With the help of high-powered binoculars, they could clearly see the rocket standing on the launch pad.

From top to bottom, they are all the same diameter, and some of them stand quietly like telegraph poles.

There are many rumors about this launch vehicle, but most of them are the same version. This is a launch vehicle developed by Iraq on the basis of the Scud missile.

Although it is called Arab Space Company, it is obviously led by Iraq. In the name of launching launch vehicles, it studies ballistic missiles. Especially under the current international situation, Iraq chooses this time to launch so strongly. The response of the United States is, I am very much looking forward to it.However, even the United States cannot prevent a country from developing its own aerospace industry. This is a country's own choice, just like the nuclear power plant in Iraq, which is currently generating electricity stably, and the Americans have no right to intervene.

Moreover, this is the Arab Space Company, a project jointly carried out by people from various Arab countries, and the United States cannot object to it.

Even the defeated country of World War II, Japan, is conducting research on launch vehicles.The United States does not have sufficient reasons to oppose the aspirations of the Arab countries for the peaceful use of space.

However, they are not optimistic about this launch. After all, it is one thing to have Scud missiles in Iraq, but another thing to launch rockets. Scud missiles are just short-range missiles with a range of less than [-] kilometers. As for the launch vehicle, at least long-range missiles or even intercontinental missiles are needed. There are many technologies to overcome.

Just from the height, the Scud missile is 11 meters long, and this missile is more than 20 meters long, and it is a second-class missile. There are even third-rate tabloids commenting that this kind of carrier rocket is made by welding two Scud missiles together in Iraq. of.Moreover, this comment has also won the approval of many people.It seems that they don't know at all that a Scud missile can't fly against another Scud missile.

Time passed by minute by minute, and finally, in the launch hall, a solemn voice was counting down, ten, nine...two, one, ignite, launch!

Following the sound, the person in charge of the ignition pressed his hand on the ignition button.

The footage from the camera was displayed on the big screen. A puff of smoke came out from the bottom of the rocket, and then a fire appeared. A second later, they felt a slight vibration on the ground, and the rocket had already started to rise!

The launch was a complete success!

Immediately, the entire launching hall was filled with jubilation.

Although the Dongfeng-3 missile has been equipped with No. [-] troops, and although Iraq has not conducted a test launch, it has been tested many times in the eastern powers, fully confirming its effect.So, what is the performance of this missile made by Iraq itself?No one knows, this experiment is also to verify the performance of Dongfeng No. [-].