A Journey Through the Flames of War in the Republican Era

Song Hongfei, who is currently a graduate student at MIT, is feeling somewhat frustrated. As a graduate student at MIT, an assistant to Professor Vannevar Bush, and a 'newcomer' in the lab, he is naturally the one who does the hard and tiring work.

Every day, he has to work day and night doing 'low-level' tasks such as compiling data, writing calculation programs, disassembling and assembling machine parts, and wiring control panels.

As the saying goes, new recruits go to their units, while veterans celebrate the New Year.

The happiest person was none other than Professor Bush's former assistant, Tony Young. He used to do all the rough work, but now he was finally free to leisurely direct the new recruit, Song Hongfei, to do this and that.

What infuriated Song Hongfei the most was that Tony Young not only became idle and bossy, but also shamelessly came to freeload, stealing his Chinese food without any hesitation. He was truly shameless and didn't hesitate to take advantage of others!

Facing this ancient mechanical computer, Song Hongfei, who had experienced the baptism of the information and network age and had conducted simulation calculations at the National Supercomputing Center when developing the "X Combat System," felt as if a top F1 race car driver was diligently operating an ancient 18th-century steam-powered automobile.

However, as the saying goes, every loss has its gain.

Song Hongfei thoroughly examined the principles of various mechanical and analog computers from beginning to end, inside and out—somewhat like a chef's journey to mastery begins with slicing radishes.

Another advantage is that he can frequently and without restriction have priority access to computers to perform the ballistic and firearm mechanics calculations required for his designs.

Professor Bush was often impressed by Song Hongfei's brilliant ideas. The theories and methods proposed by Song Hongfei were not only novel and unique, but also insightful and often hit the nail on the head, with immediate and remarkable effects, resulting in a doubling of the machine's computing performance.

Song Hongfei's outstanding work in the MIT laboratory transformed the machine from its initial mechanical form into an electromechanical computer by incorporating relays.

Further improvements, including the addition of more relays, dramatically increased the level of automation, and the overall performance improved by dozens of times, as if a slingshot had been replaced with a cannon.

Professor Bush would often murmur in disbelief, "Hongfei, sometimes I have to wonder if you've ever experienced a computer far more advanced than this one. I simply can't believe that China or West Point could have a more advanced capability than MIT..."

Song Hongfei could only chuckle ingratiatingly and offer compliments such as, "It's all thanks to the professor's excellent guidance and the leadership's capable leadership."

Gun design is definitely not like what is depicted in some time-travel fantasy novels of later generations, where the protagonist is incredibly powerful and can simply draw a sketch and the arsenal can immediately ramp up production.

Some online articles even claim that airplanes, tanks, and cannons can be built simply by drawing a shell on them!

But readers just love this kind of mindless, feel-good novel!

Song Hongfei could only chuckle bitterly: "That's awesome! I wish I could just flick my wrist and have the world at my fingertips! We're both time travelers, so why am I so miserable?!"

"It involves too many things like ballistics, aerodynamics, and gun mechanics, requiring a lot of calculations. This computer may be outdated, but without it, would I be using a hand-cranked calculator or an abacus?!"

The same ammunition, bolt-action and high-rate-of-fire automatic firing methods are vastly different in terms of the impact and vibration of the bolt on the barrel, as well as the pressure, deformation, friction and high-temperature erosion of the barrel during the accelerated rotation of the bullet.

Different types of ammunition require even more calculations and verifications for matching and designing firearms and ammunition. Even with the same type of weapon and ammunition, the instability of ballistics can be severely amplified under different conditions of cold and hot conditions.

Only by conducting in-depth and meticulous research on the characteristics of these changes, the basic factors that cause these changes, and the intrinsic mechanisms of their interactions can we accurately and efficiently find the root causes and prescribe the right solutions.

Before Song Hongfei's series of research results came to light, the approach of gun designers around the world was to "draw and shoot," requiring repeated test firings and error corrections before the final design could be developed.

Song Hongfei's research theory on precise calculation and design can be described as pioneering, capable of efficiently and accurately identifying its internal mechanism and forming targeted improvement designs.

His unique approach of first designing and modeling, then developing an "algorithm," and using computers to perform calculations to assist in the design of firearms, makes him probably the first person in the world to do so!

Professor Vannevar Bush was already completely in awe!

He even said to Song Hongfei, "Hongfei, I have to tell you something. You've been targeted by the Army and the FBI. They're very interested in studying you."

Song Hongfei wasn't surprised. He laughed and said, "My research papers are public; anyone can cite them! Collaboration is welcome!"

Song Hongfei conducted comparative tests on all the different structures he envisioned, such as long pistons, short pistons, offset locking, rotary locking, receiver + receiver cover, upper and lower receivers, straight stock, pistol grip, magazine, belt, drum magazine, and ammunition compartment.

He also verified several design structures for machine guns using belt-fed, magazine-fed, or drum-fed ammunition. As the mainstay of infantry firepower, machine guns mainly have two feeding methods: one is using magazines or drum-fed ammunition, emphasizing mobility; the other is belt-fed ammunition, emphasizing sustained firepower.

While MIT was researching and improving computers, Song Hongfei's meticulously designed semi-automatic rifle, after numerous discussions and revisions, was finally finalized in the same year.

This rifle can be described as a completely new design, using a gas-operated short piston working principle that was rare at the time, and a rotating bolt locking mechanism.

It uses a 10-round magazine and fires 7.92x57 Mauser pointed bullets, with an effective range of 600 meters. Furthermore, it can also use the 20-round magazine from the ZB26 Czech light machine gun, which undoubtedly brings significant benefits to infantry ammunition carrying capacity and troop logistics.

This rifle was designed by Song Hongfei by combining the advantages of several rifle structures, including the famous Type 56 semi-automatic rifle, the SVD sniper rifle, and the Type 03 rifle. It can be said to be a combination of the advantages of several rifles.

However, as soon as the design drawings came out, Yu Dawei, the director of the Ordnance Bureau, and several ordnance factory experts were at a loss.

It wasn't that the gun had any flaws, but rather that it was too advanced and sophisticated. Ordnance experts had to painfully confront a problem: given China's weak industrial capacity at the time, it was difficult to mass-produce it, and even if it could be produced, the cost would be prohibitive.

Song Hongfei was immediately faced with a difficult situation. In fact, he had tried his best to simplify the design, but unfortunately, the level of China's steel, metallurgy, and machinery industries at that time was simply too low.

The construction of related supporting industries in China, such as steel, metallurgy, power, and machinery, is still in full swing, and it will take some time before they can be fully operationalized.

Yu Dawei, the director of the Ordnance Department, lamented that he was overwhelmed with work. On the one hand, he had to coordinate efforts at all levels to urge all parties to carry out industrial construction, and on the other hand, he organized and coordinated Song Hongfei and many ordnance and industrial production experts to repeatedly discuss and revise the design drawings.

Through the efforts of many parties, this advanced semi-automatic rifle was finally finalized after multiple rounds of modifications.