The First Volume Enters the War of Resistance Chapter 65: Yak from the Soviet Union

  Through the Chinese Embassy in the UK, the achievements of Chinese volunteer pilots in Britain soon spread to China, causing a great stir among intellectuals and gentry in China. Although ordinary people were busy with their own livelihoods and had no time to pay attention to things that were too far away from themselves, the elites in China at that time paid close attention to international situations, especially after the outbreak of the European war, everyone looked forward to linking China's anti-Japanese cause with the great war in Europe.

  "Have you heard? Our air force has shot down twice as many German planes in Europe." An old man wearing a long gown said to the tea customer next to him while filtering the tea foam with a covered bowl.

  "It's great, I didn't expect our air force to be so good." Another middle-aged tea customer took over the conversation excitedly while sipping the tea water from the covered bowl with his mouth.

  "It seems that our military equipment was indeed not good enough in the past, and the Japanese invaders took advantage of it!" The old man shook his head and said regretfully. The four great kings of the air force fell one after another, and many excellent pilots sacrificed their lives to protect their planes for the country, which often made Chinese people sigh endlessly.

  "Yes, we're using equipment that others have discarded. It's not just the air force, the army is like this too." Another tea customer chimed in. Now that the skies above Chongqing had calmed down, business at the teahouse was gradually picking up, especially with the influx of wealthy people from the occupied territories who had also learned to indulge in the unique Sichuan pastime of drinking tea at a teahouse.

  At this moment, a group of young students noisily walked past the entrance of the teahouse, some holding small flags.

  "These students are born to march, not to do real work. The country is being ruined by these young people! If it weren't for them, we wouldn't be bullied by the Easterners to our faces!" The old man said angrily.

  "It's all just a bunch of isms, this and that. I think they're all just looking out for their own interests, not thinking about the country at all. If it weren't for the warlords fighting each other for so many years, we wouldn't have lost to the Japanese." The middle-aged tea customer chimed in with the old man's words.

  "It's not worth the effort, it's better to join the army, that's the real deal. Our air force has many young students, they are the backbone of our country!" The old man stroked his beard and said in agreement.

  "So, it's still up to the military and the chairman. Especially our air force, they're really something, unfortunately we don't know how to support them yet." The air force is now in a more prominent position within the National Revolutionary Army, victory after victory has greatly boosted the nation's morale in resisting the enemy, even the people in occupied territories are secretly talking about these heroes of the skies.

  "Donations, ah, our hometown collectively donated an airplane to the air force." The middle-aged tea customer said, his hometown is in Hangzhou, now it has been occupied by the Japanese, he was talking about things from the early days of the War of Resistance Against Japan.

  "Donations, the money probably ends up in the pockets of those officials. Look at them keeping mistresses, buying houses and land, starting factories, where does the money come from?" The tea customer who had joined in raised an objection.

  The old man looked at him with disdain and said, "If you want to talk about other things of the National Government, that's fine. But if you want to talk about the Air Force, then you're out of date. Do you know that the Air Force punished a big case last month? Many officers were taken out and shot, their heads are still hanging on the city gate. I heard that General He Juncai is now the director of the Air Force Economic Management Bureau, this person is a capable man, all the victories of the Air Force are related to him. He also urged the Sichuan government to severely punish the officials involved in the airport corruption case, offending many people, and it's said that the 'Chen' family upstairs is very dissatisfied with him."

  "It's hard to be a good person nowadays." The middle-aged tea customer shook his head and sighed. "Now the air force clearly publicizes the use of every donation, so there are fewer people who dare to embezzle, like us old folks who are members of the supervisory committee." The middle-aged tea customer pointed at the elderly man.

  He Juncai obviously drew lessons from the government and a certain club in later generations. The method of dealing with such things is actually very simple - open and transparent, and it's not difficult to do so, it's just that those who have vested interests are willing or unwilling to do so. It happens that He Juncai is not one of the vested interest groups, and he has control over the most core power in the air force, so all obstacles that conflict with his goals are within his scope to sweep away.

  Every donation from the people and overseas, He Juncai ordered the Economic Management Bureau to make the use of the process public. Even on open days, the public can apply to visit the airport site and personally maintain their donated aircraft. The names of the donors are also clearly written on these planes. Through this move, a large amount of donations were directly targeted at the air force, enriching the strength of the Economic Management Bureau.

  After the Economic Management Bureau was separated from the Equipment Department, it became the purse of the entire air force. The lifeline of the air force is here, all profitable enterprises are concentrated here, and all spending matters are also concentrated on expenditures from here. As some investments overseas gradually began to make profits, and the air force has been secretly printing counterfeit Japanese, German and puppet government banknotes, although spending money like flowing water, the surplus of the Economic Management Bureau has become more and more, at least the military salary for each airman and ground crew member is fully paid, including the 1st Land Warfare Brigade, which makes other troops envy. The air force began to become a relatively independent branch of service, gradually having a tendency to evolve into a new warlord clique.

  He Juncai wanted this effect, the current National Revolutionary Army land force is full of warlords, only nominally unified, and many are still in the old warlord's habits. He Juncai hoped to introduce some fresh forces to transform them, but before that, he must grasp this power, controlling the Economic Management Bureau was just the first step.

  After the military ceasefire on September 1, He Juncai did not idle away. First, he arranged for two batches of aviation teams to go to England, and then he was busy shuttling between Lanzhou, Chongqing, Kunming, and Burma, using the transportation capacity of the floating airbase to transport materials and personnel. Of course, building the Northwest Base was also one of the contents.

  Today, October 3rd, He Junkai arrived at the base in Lanzhou and received a batch of secret equipment, Soviet Yak-1 fighter jets. Just on September 27th, an important event occurred in the course of World War II - Germany, Italy, and Japan signed the Tripartite Pact in Berlin, formally forming a military alliance. In theory, this made Germany and Italy enemy states of China, while Japan was an enemy state of Britain. Under such pressure, Sun Ke immediately set off for Moscow to seek Soviet aid for the fourth time. The Soviet government also worried that Japan would become aggressive after signing the Tripartite Pact and launch a pincer movement with Germany, so they quickly reached an agreement with Sun Ke. The first batch of equipment that could be rapidly delivered was the Yak-1 fighter jet.

  The fact that this fighter was put into production so quickly is largely thanks to the Chinese. After the Chinese Air Force raided the Hankou base, they secretly handed over a captured Zero fighter to the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union was shocked after performance testing, as their current aircraft were far inferior to the enemy in terms of performance and firepower, only having thicker armor, but even with thick armor, what could it do against 20mm cannons? Therefore, under the suggestion of Aleksey Shakhurin, executive committee member of the Aviation Industry People's Commissariat, and committee member Yakovlev (also the designer of the Yak-1), the Aviation Committee accelerated the development and testing of the Yak, La, and MiG aircraft, and made preparations for mass-producing the Yak. Because war was imminent, if there wasn't a fighter that could match Germany and Japan's current fighters, they would inevitably lose air superiority. For this reason, the Aviation Committee actually took some risks, not only did they not wait for strict testing before mass production, but also stopped producing some I-16 aircraft, as the new plane's speed was almost 100 km/h faster than the I-16, a staggering difference, and its firepower was also stronger.

  At this time, the Soviet Union was already able to produce 3 Yak aircraft per day. So these 30 Yak aircraft almost took up one-third of the monthly production capacity. One reason for giving China such new aircraft was the signing of the Tripartite Pact, and another reason was that the Soviet Union hoped to test this new aircraft in actual combat in China, comparing it with the Zero fighter.

  No matter what attitude Stalin had, the Chinese Air Force was very welcome. After this batch of aircraft flew directly from the Soviet Union by members of the Soviet Volunteer Aviation Corps to Lanzhou, Zhou Zhirou immediately instructed the 4th Flying Regiment to go and receive them. So He Juncai quickly brought the pilots of the 4th Squadron to the base in Lanzhou.

  After entering the airport, they saw those metal killers parked on the apron from a distance. The Yak-1 with its cantilevered low wing looked very different from the I-16, more like the J6K fighter that served as a dedicated escort on floating bases. Because the Yak-1 used an in-line liquid-cooled engine rather than the air-cooled type of the I-16, it had a smaller nose and was more streamlined, rather than the cylindrical shape that tapered from the nose to the tail of the I-16. So the pilots of the 4th Wing liked the appearance of this plane, which seemed to have a threatening presence.

  There is also a big difference that the Yak has an enclosed cockpit, which was unexpected by He Junkai, and most pilots do not like this. It may be that the enclosed space can produce fear, and later facts have proven that this type of enclosed cockpit is indeed unsafe. Because the canopy is difficult to open during dives, it takes a lot of effort for the pilot to parachute out, which is a big problem if they are injured. The Chinese Air Force raised this issue with the Soviet Union and also provided a solution - ejection seats. However, due to technical limitations, the catapult seats installed on Yak aircraft during World War II partially solved this problem.

  It wasn't until they walked closer to observe this batch of unpainted fighter jets that everyone discovered a cannon barrel protruding from the center of its propeller, which was 20mm in caliber and had 60 rounds of ammunition. Even if only one shot hit the enemy plane, it would be enough to make them look good, because the relationship between caliber and power is not linear, but exponential.

  For the pilots of the 4th Large Team who came to receive Yak-1, another advantage of this aircraft was immediately revealed. It is much easier to fly than I-16. These pilots only spent dozens of hours and were able to drive these planes proficiently. So soon, He Juncai took these planes to Chongqing. Now, in addition to the 11th Large Team with a built-in J-1 base, the 4th Large Team also has the ability to compete with the Zero fighter.

  Staying up late and getting up early, am I diligent or what?

  Click, collect, recommend, reward, comment, all of this is coming more fiercely!

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