If one were to select the person who contributed the most to this task among those who participated in the resource collection mission of the Jupiter system, then whether it was Zhao Changxing or anyone who knew about this matter, they would not hesitate to name Cheng Xuanjia. name.
This man with a profound military heritage is like a hard and heavy rock. As long as he is there, no matter how huge the wind and waves are, no matter how huge the risks are, they will not be able to overwhelm the people in the Jupiter system.
In these years, including the initial stage when Voyager 1 left Sedna and headed for the Jupiter system, this group of people with the mission of saving civilization suffered so many dangers and endured so much suffering that even Zhao Changxing himself could not count. Not sure.
But every time the danger is saved in the end. Not only that, the people there almost overfulfilled the tasks originally assigned by Zhao Changxing.
When resource consumption exceeded previous estimates and the resource crisis arrived early, the Jupiter system transported a huge amount of materials to Sedna in advance, revitalizing the entire civilization.
In this way, only the subsequent development of civilization and the formation of an army can be achieved.
There is no doubt that Cheng Xuanjia is the most suitable person at the top of human civilization to continue to sit in the Jupiter system. In fact, Zhao Changxing also hopes that Cheng Xuanjia can continue to stay there.
But this year, Cheng Xuanjia is 72 years old.
Counting the at least 8 years required for the return journey, he would be 80 years old.
If he continues to stay there, then...he will probably not be able to return to Sedna until his death.
After all, I don’t know when the next spacecraft will return to Sedna.
Zhao Changxing could not make such an inhumane arrangement. He finally decided to choose a new candidate to replace Cheng Xuanjia.
So Cheng Xuanjia could finally come back.
Many people chose to return with Cheng Xuanjia.
They have been wandering in other places for too long, and they are extremely eager to return to the embrace of human civilization. But at the same time, many people choose to stay in the Jupiter system.
The former were mainly young people at the time. They all spent the early stages of their lives here on Sedna, and here are their memories of their "hometown".
The latter are mainly people who were born during the journey, or simply born in the Jupiter system. For them, the distant star Sedna is more like a symbol, but they have no memory of this place.
Zhao Changxing respected their choice.
He was not worried that this would cause the division of human civilization. Because no matter here in the Jupiter system or on the planet Sedna, all humans will receive a complete education at an early age, resulting in a deep-seated identification with human civilization.
Those people just don't agree with Planet Sedna.
Having said that, does Zhao Changxing himself completely and completely agree with Sedna Star? I'm afraid not necessarily.
The earth is the only homeland he identifies with.
This actually doesn't matter much. Anyway, if human civilization continues to develop, it will soon enter the inner solar system on a larger scale, and transportation and communication between the two sides will become more convenient.
Jupiter, Sedna, all the same.
After arranging things in the Jupiter system, at this stage, Zhao Changxing's main focus was on the construction of the army.
With the full support of the human government, the First Military Factory quickly produced the first-generation combat spacecraft.
It is different from the time of the war with deep space civilization. The current combat spacecraft undoubtedly uses the latest, highest performance, and most reliable ion thrusters, and its combat radius has been greatly expanded. The situation of having to leave the battlefield and come back to refuel after going out to fight for a while will basically never happen again.
Each spacecraft is equipped with a small fusion power station inside, which is responsible for providing energy and power to the entire spacecraft. The fusion power supply model has been adopted, a technology that has been studied in the past but has never been put into practical use. It can finally be applied to spacecraft.
That's reactive armor.
Reactive armor has been used in practical applications as early as the earth's age, when people were still using tanks, armored vehicles, etc. to fight. However, what people used at that time was explosive reactive armor. The principle was probably to lay explosives in the armor layer of the vehicle in advance. When foreign bullets or shells hit the armor, the impact force would automatically detonate the armor layer. The explosives laid in advance weaken the impact of foreign bullets or shells through the explosion of their own explosives.
This model has been actually verified and proven to be effective. However, this method is not suitable for use in space battleships. Because the projectiles faced by space battleships are mainly electromagnetic guns, and the speed of electromagnetic gun projectiles is too fast and the projectiles themselves are too small.
At this moment, the technology used by people is another type of reactive armor, or it can also be called electromagnetic armor.
The principle is also very simple.
This armor is divided into two layers, separated by a layer of insulator. At the same time, both layers of armor were connected to high-voltage electricity. When the foreign electromagnetic gun projectile penetrates the outer armor and insulation layer and contacts the inner armor, it is equivalent to the circuit being connected.
At this time, a large current pulse passes through the electromagnetic gun projectile, causing the projectile's own magnetohydrodynamics to become unstable and disperse, thereby weakening its lethality and making it no longer able to penetrate the inner armor.
Experiments conducted by people have shown that an electromagnetic gun projectile that can easily penetrate one meter of standard armor cannot penetrate even 20 centimeters of armor after adopting electromagnetic armor technology.
Unless insulating materials are used to make projectiles. However, the principle of the electromagnetic gun is to use electromagnetic acceleration technology to accelerate the projectile. If the projectile is made of insulating materials, it cannot be accelerated at all.
Or you can make projectiles with outer metal and internal ceramics, but this will face many problems, such as unstable acceleration, insufficient strength of metal materials, deformation when hitting the target, etc., at least at this stage. People can't get over it.
In the past, the main reason why electromagnetic armor technology has not been put into practical use is that it consumes too much energy and is not suitable for equipment on moving targets. But now, combat spacecraft adopt fusion generator mechanism inside, so energy consumption is of course no longer a problem.
The application of this technology can extremely improve the survival rate of combat spacecraft on the battlefield.
In addition, there is another type of electromagnetic armor, called active electromagnetic armor. The principle is to use sensors to monitor the surroundings of the spacecraft at all times. Once it detects an incoming projectile, it will proactively launch a projectile to hit the enemy projectile, thereby achieving a defensive effect.
But this kind of mechanism obviously cannot be created at the moment, and people can only leave it for later.
In addition to reactive armor, fusion reactor power supply, and ion thruster propulsion, the new generation combat spacecraft is also equipped with up to 10 small detection radars and corresponding optical monitoring equipment. The weapon system is mainly based on miniaturized electromagnetic guns, with 13 units equipped on different parts of the hull.
The laser cannon is temporarily unequipped due to some unresolved technical problems.
The guided weapon is a small interstellar missile - or it can be called a rocket. It can accelerate itself to a maximum speed of 13.9 kilometers per second in a stationary state.
In actual combat, this speed must be added to the speed of the spacecraft itself. The superposition of the two is enough to make its top speed reach more than 20 kilometers per second.
Each of these combat spaceships has a mass of hundreds or thousands of tons, and the longest part is as high as 26 meters.
When the combat spaceship prototype was placed in front of Zhao Changxing, and after being introduced by military industry experts and understanding its performance, Zhao Changxing was filled with emotion.
He recalled hundreds of years ago when he led 500 warriors on an expedition to the deep space star in a chemical fuel spacecraft.
At that time, if you have the kind of spaceships you have now, not too many, just a few, it will be easy to destroy deep space civilization.
This is the improvement in strength brought about by technological progress.
The slight emotion in my heart disappeared immediately. Zhao Changxing's expression became serious again, and he looked at the War Commissioner beside him, who was mainly responsible for the training of soldiers: "Commissioner Li, please arrange practical training for the soldiers as soon as possible."
Li Dajiang put away the joy on his face and said seriously: "Yes, leader!"
At this moment, the training subjects for the first batch of 4,000 soldiers recruited into the army are mainly divided into three.
The first is the study of war theory, that is, learning some basic knowledge of interstellar combat, such as the main means of destruction and main fighting methods in interstellar combat.
The second is simulation training to learn the operating skills of various instruments and equipment, learn some emergency repair knowledge, and understand the operating principles of the spacecraft.
The third is discipline training and physical training. Discipline training is achieved primarily through practice queues and the rigors of daily life. To put it bluntly, it means things like military posture and internal affairs. Physical training includes running, cross-country running, etc.
Things like standing in a military posture and walking forward are actually meaningless in actual combat. The enemy will not show mercy just because a person moves well and has neatly folded quilts. Its main significance is reflected in discipline, obedience, collectiveness, and the tempering of personal will.
These things are essential in both ancient wars and interstellar wars.
What is particularly important is that these trainings will also change a person's mental outlook from head to toe, allowing people to notice the difference from civilians at a glance, thereby completely completing the division between soldiers and civilians. This is also of great benefit in shaping a sense of identity, honor, etc.
Now, after almost two years of training, the soldiers finally have the opportunity to actually operate the combat spacecraft created by human civilization itself.
At this time, Zhao Changxing received an urgent message.
The news came from the Voyager 1 spacecraft which was returning.
"Leader, Captain Cheng Xuanjia... is dying."
