GBP Chapter 309: The food shortage is more than 2000 million catties. Lao Zhao, you definitely miscalcul
Chapter 309: The food shortage is more than 2000 million catties. Lao Zhao, you definitely miscalcul
Led by Lin Zhenhua, the transport plane fleet flew three more times and finally stored enough fuel for two round trips. The land in the city had also been leveled, so the transport planes could land directly in the city, saving the trouble of long-distance transportation.
"Du Dapeng, the city will be guarded by you from now on. The first platoon will be responsible for guarding the city, and the second platoon will be responsible for protecting the fuel. I have left you a total of eight tricycles. On weekdays, you will patrol within a radius of 30 miles. Don't worry about the fuel you consume. Your own safety is the most important thing."
"There are eight light machine guns and two Maxim heavy machine guns stored in the city. In addition to the Type 81 infantry gun and two 200mm mortars we brought this time, as well as more than rounds of artillery shells, they are enough for you to use for a long time."
"When I come back next time, I will give you another batch of bullets and two more machine guns. With this kind of firepower, you should be able to withstand even a squadron of Japanese invaders attacking! I have armed you to the teeth, so you must not get into trouble here. Be careful when you go out. There are many poisonous snakes and ferocious beasts around here. Try to reduce non-combat casualties. Try to stay in the city these days and dig a well to solve the problem of water!"
"For safety reasons, we will continue to bring you some drinking water next time we come. We will stop bringing you drinking water after you dig out water from the well. Next time we will go to the trading location and refuel here. We will not turn back but continue to fly forward along this route. There are many dangers in the process. Even I am not sure whether it will succeed. I hope you can prepare for the worst in advance."
"If I haven't returned within ten days, you will take your men away from here and follow the map I drew for you to find a way out with your warriors!"
After explaining everything, Lin Zhenhua boarded the transport plane and started his return flight. At this time, Wang Daniu, who was thousands of miles away, had been waiting impatiently. Now there were only ten days left before the deadline agreed by both parties. If the transport plane still didn't arrive, it would prove that the independent regiment had given up this air transport line, and Wang Daniu would be forced to return.
"Platoon Leader Wang, let's go back. We probably won't be able to wait today. We underestimated the difficulty before. I was a little too greedy and bought a lot of rubber from my friends, hoping to make a fortune. I didn't expect to lose it now. Let's just think of it as a lesson learned!"
"If we still can't get anyone in ten days, we must sell the rubber as soon as possible. There is only half a month left before the time I agreed with those merchants to pay the full amount. If I can't pay them as agreed, it will have a great impact on my reputation, and I will no longer be able to gain people's trust. I hope that Platoon Leader Wang can understand this." Chen Minggeng said bitterly.
Wang Daniu did not lose his temper at this time. After all, he also had a great responsibility for this matter. If he had not followed Li Yunlong's order and persuaded Chen Minggeng to buy more rubber, he would not have been faced with a dilemma. It was not unfair for him to bear this blame.
"Mr. Chen, our group leader told me that no matter how much it costs, we will open this air transport line. Now we must have encountered some troubles. This is the last thousand dollars in my hand. You can use it for emergency. After all, we need money to eat, drink, defecate, and buy supplies here. Tomorrow I will bring people to transport the rubber here. This will be safer. After the transport plane arrives, it can also transport the rubber away in time to prevent any unexpected situations."
The rubber has not been transported to the trading site, but hidden in another place. In order to avoid the leakage of this air transport line, Wang Daniu followed Li Yunlong's prior arrangements and executed them step by step to ensure the safety of this batch of rubber to the greatest extent. At least so far, this batch of rubber has not been targeted by anyone.
Chen Minggeng can only try his best now and hope that the air transport line will be opened as soon as possible so that he can sell the 20 tons of rubber in his hands as soon as possible, otherwise most of his family business will be lost!
Lin Zhenhua's return journey was smooth and he did not encounter any interception by the Japanese fighter planes. However, when landing at Maoershan Airport, there was still a problem. A transport plane was too fast during landing and ran off the runway. Fortunately, the pilot was only slightly injured. However, the transport plane was seriously damaged, but fortunately there was no explosion, which was a blessing in disguise.
"Captain Zhou, dismantle this transport plane immediately. I just took a look and it's no longer worth repairing. Such a large aircraft parked here will easily attract people's attention. Fortunately, there was no explosion, otherwise, it would have caused a big commotion."
Li Yunlong and Zhao Gang rushed over immediately after learning that the transport plane had crashed. When they learned that there were no casualties, they put their worries to rest. For the independent regiment, fighter planes are really not as valuable as pilots. Whenever there is a problem with a fighter plane, the safety of the pilot is the priority. It is precisely because of this that only two pilots and four flight trainees were sacrificed during training, otherwise this number would be several times higher.
"College student, what exactly happened? Our transport plane had been flying well before and there had been no problems at all. Could it be related to the continuous missions in the past few days?" Li Yunlong asked with a serious face.
Lin Zhenhua cleared his throat and felt it was still a little dry. He took two gulps of the water Zhao Gang handed over and felt his throat was much better. He then replied, "Old Li, this matter is not as complicated as you think. I have just asked the two pilots on the transport plane and found the cause of the problem. They were careless and forgot to close the throttle valve. They were landing at a relatively high speed, which caused the accident."
"As for the high flight intensity you mentioned, this has not happened so far. During the flight, we rotate every two hours to ensure that each pilot can get enough rest. In addition, transport planes are relatively simple to fly. We now have 24 pilots who have mastered the flying skills of transport planes, which will be a huge help to our subsequent air transport lines."
"Tomorrow I will take the 11 transport planes from our base to open up the last section of the air transport line and deliver the rubber we urgently need. I have notified the arsenal to immediately manufacture the remaining rubber into gas mask sets. Given the nature of the Japanese, they will definitely use a large number of poison gas bombs when they attack our base next time. We must start stockpiling now."
"I won't talk to you two for now. I have to go to bed quickly because I have important things to do tomorrow. I am very relieved to leave the affairs of the base to you. Before this air transport line was opened, I rarely went to the arsenal. Now time is very tight and we don't have much time left!"
After these days of production and consumption, the arsenal's rubber reserves have run out, and the remaining 600 kilograms must all be used to produce gas masks. If this aerial rubber transportation line is not opened up quickly, the arsenal will lack rubber and the weapons it produces will be unusable.
Li Yunlong also learned about the situation in the arsenal during these days and found that things were exactly as Lin Zhenhua said. 70% of the rubber that was received with great difficulty had been consumed. What was even more worrying was that the Japanese were not fools. They were very eager for rubber. The part that was revealed before was just to show their sincerity.
But as the transactions between the two sides deepened, the Japanese tightened their blockade on rubber. In the past few days, not a pound of rubber has flowed into the base. Li Yunlong also discovered something was wrong at this time, and I was powerless to do anything about it.
"College student, take some time to rest! The situation is indeed similar to what you expected. This air transport line must be opened. It is related to the lifeblood of our independent regiment. Before, you planned to transport a batch of canned food and compressed biscuits by transport plane, but Lao Zhao disagreed. Now I think if there is really spare tonnage, this matter must be done in advance."
"Our base has now received 50,000 disaster victims, and this is only the first batch. The second batch will arrive in ten days, and the number of people will be greater than the first batch. If we don't find a way to get more food, we won't be able to survive this winter. Food is more important than anything else. If people don't have enough food, something bad will happen!" Li Yunlong said with a serious face.
Zhao Gang did not insist at this time. The weight of food flowing into the base area now is about 25 catties per day, which is 750 million catties per month. Based on 50 people, one catty of food per person per day can only last for half a month at most. If the amount is reduced by half and some wild vegetables are added, it can only last for a month.
"It will take eight months until next year's summer harvest, which means the base must reserve 5000 million kilograms of grain. The gap is too big. I feel that even if I sell myself, I can't find so much grain."
"You, the college student, also said before that the Zhangjiazhuang market can only last for three or four months at most. This means that the grain purchased in one month can only feed 50 people for one month. We can only gather enough food for three or four months at most. The food gap in the meantime has reached more than 2000 million catties. I even suspected that I had miscalculated, but I calculated it several times and confirmed that I was definitely not wrong. I really have to compromise!"
Zhao Gang calculated the accounts clearly, and this gave Lin Zhenhua a headache. Even if he could transport back more than ten tons of compressed biscuits at a time, it would only be a few tens of thousands of kilograms. Considering the huge food gap faced by the base, it is not an exaggeration to say that it is a drop in the bucket.
Lin Zhenhua originally planned to leave, but the impending food crisis made it impossible for him to move. He said with an extremely grim expression: "Call Captain Ding over as well. We have to hurry up and discuss countermeasures. The food shortage of tens of millions is not a small number. We have to find a way to solve it as soon as possible, otherwise there will be a big mess!"