Shepard's words can be regarded as a shot in the arm for the frustrated funders, making them no longer pessimistic about the prospects of Afghanistan, but correspondingly, their ambition and enthusiasm have also faded a lot.
But on the contrary, the Saudis have increased their financial investment, because according to Shepard, providing help in times of need is far better than adding icing on the cake. Now most of the resistance forces in Afghanistan have lost a lot of manpower and weapons. Now it is really When support is needed, it is easier to gain support from the other party by giving them financial support at this time.
After all, Saudi Arabia has been the leader of all countries for a long time, and it supports Afghanistan because it is easier to gain favor and support from other countries.
And these funds are also in proportion, part of them goes into Shepard's pocket, part of them goes into the pockets of the US gun dealers, and the remaining part goes into the pockets of Saudi Arabia as kickbacks.
As for the Afghans, they were given piles and piles of used arms, and forget about funding, which also costs money.
It is worth mentioning that Saudi Arabia did not know whether it was influenced by the little butterfly Shepard, and decided to replace the old weapons in the hands of infantry with the C26B bullpup rifle produced by Knight Ordnance, a subsidiary of Shadow Company.
After going through several iterations, the c26b has been extended to a number of styles, including compact carbines. The c26b is compact, and its appearance has changed slightly from the original version. It is somewhat similar to the f2000 later developed by the Belgians, and Saudi Arabia did later purchase F2000 rifles, which can be regarded as reaching the same goal through different paths to some extent.
After years of expansion, Knight Ordnance’s business is not limited to firearms accessories and ammunition. Due to the mutual merger with General Motors and AAI, Knight Ordnance has begun to expand to bigger things, including but not limited to army vehicles, tactics Missiles, naval ships, facilities, aerospace smart drones, etc. After all, Shepard has a father who is a naval commander, so it makes no sense for government and businessmen not to collude.
In addition to purchasing light weapons and missiles, Saudi Arabia also purchased a batch of Pioneer drones from Shadow Company. This is currently the hottest selling product of Knight Ordnance. In addition to the three countries in North America, various countries in Western Europe have also purchased a number of them. few.
In private, a batch of bulk drone parts were sent to the Eastern powers by Shepard. In exchange, he received a larger number of weapons and ammunition in stock, including a full 200,000 pieces of wood. grenade.
Although this type of wooden handle grenade is old-fashioned, it is not bad at all. The power of the grenade is even more than that of a conventional grenade, and it can be thrown much farther than a grenade.
The Afghan guerrillas like this thing very much, because considering their combat terrain, oval grenades tend to roll down the hillside when thrown in the mountains, but wooden handle grenades are not so serious.
And the most important thing is that Afghan fellows have a lot of satchels suitable for wooden handle grenades, which they don’t need in vain.
In short, Shepard was as busy as usual in 1985, with business cooperation, dispatch contracts, security and defense, many of which required him to run personally. After all, those were government orders, but there were also some that did not require him to run, such as the mining company Gemstone Company. Waiting for business orders.
These living shadow companies will even act as subcontracting intermediaries, because when doing these jobs, there will always be many places where you need to betray your conscience, and it will also turn your reputation into a bad one.
Therefore, Shadow Company will also have an intermediary center whose commission is quite fair and can almost be said to be extremely conscientious. Just like the team matching mechanism in the game, if scattered mercenaries want to make money, the intermediary center only needs fifty dollars. For a handling fee and a one-hundred-dollar introduction fee, we can find you a job and a team along with it.
Moreover, by being affiliated with an intermediary center, mercenaries do not have to worry about their remuneration being swindled by their employers, because Shadow Company will also take 5%. Therefore, if the employer does not pay the money, then there will be staff to negotiate with the other party.
However, thanks to the intermediary center's principle of giving money first and then assigning workers, there have been no cases of armed workers demanding wages.
Under such a prosperous operation, Shepard cannot be said to be making money every day, but he can still easily achieve some small goals in a year, and his French vacation estate, Pacific islands, and Caribbean plantations
There is no need to synthesize anything, you can get it directly.
And with his pockets already full, on a dark and stormy night, a luxurious motorcade appeared at Shepard's stay outside Riyadh.
"This manor is a bit shabby, how about we change it?"
Seeing the man sitting opposite him pointing at his decoration taste, Shepard was not dissatisfied at this moment, because this guy was considered a big official in Saudi Arabia, and the current king of Saudi Arabia was his brother.
"There's no need to exchange, that's a bit too much! I already live here emotionally!"
Shepard politely declined the other party's kindness.
"That's it, then I'll ask my butler to redecorate it for you!"
The arrival of Prince Sultan was a bit beyond Shepard's expectations, because the latter had a special status, that is, he was a member of the royal family and a government official. If you wanted to see him, just send someone to pick him up, and now he took the initiative to come to the door. There will definitely be something big!
And this was indeed the case. After some polite exchanges, Prince Sultan immediately stated his intentions.
The Saudi government is striving to strengthen its own defense capabilities. Reforming the military is one aspect, but the same guys also need to be tougher because of the threat from Israel. Therefore, Saudi Arabia hopes to use Shepard to lobby the United States, including the political and business circles. Push the U.S. government to sell short-range ballistic missiles to Saudi Arabia.
"I know this is difficult, but when it is done, we will be deeply grateful!"
Prince Sultan felt that Saudi Arabia and the United States were now allies on the same front, and the two sides cooperated so closely on the Afghan issue, so this small request would definitely be met!
But Shepard poured cold water on the opponent.
"Your Highness, this kind of thing is impossible. No matter how much money you spend, you can't achieve it. The United States will never allow weapons that can threaten Israel to appear in the Middle East, let alone the deep-rooted Jewish class in the United States. Therefore, I really can’t help the Saudi government’s request!”
"money is not a problem!"
"The problem is not money. Your Highness, we are friends. Let me put it bluntly. The relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia is incomparable to the relationship between the United States and Israel. Therefore, this is impossible!"
"Then there's no other way?"
"It's not like nothing!"
