#1391 - European and American battle

The power struggle between Europe and the US was in full swing.

Old European powers like France and Germany vehemently opposed the US intervention in Libya.

This wasn't about ideology or whether Libya was a dictatorship.

It was purely about interests!

North Africa was a major export market for the EU.

The 'Arab Spring' had thrown North Africa into chaos, severely impacting EU exports.

A US-led war in Libya would only exacerbate the situation.

Libya was a key destination for European industrial goods because, despite its small size, it possessed abundant oil and natural gas, making it the wealthiest nation in Africa.

If Libyans felt their lives were difficult, it was only in relative terms.

Libya's social welfare programs were comparable to those of Northern Europe.

German and French cars had long dominated the Libyan market.

The fact that Germany and France extended open arms to Russia through diplomatic gestures reflected their extreme dissatisfaction.

Of course, a significant portion of Europeans regained their fondness for the US, which had entered both World Wars as Europe's 'savior' and emerged victorious.

France, Germany, and Russia joined forces to counter this.

Russia increased its troop presence in Libya to help Gaddafi stabilize the country.

To prevent a direct war between the US and Russia, the Libyan conflict had evolved into a proxy war.

On one side was the Gaddafi government supported by Russia, and on the other was the Libyan Free Organization backed by the US.

Although Gaddafi was disliked by countries like Saudi Arabia due to his arrogance, these countries, unhappy with the US-engineered 'Arab Spring,' provided Libya with substantial weaponry and even sent holy warriors from various Arab nations.

For example, Syria, which was also affected by the 'Arab Spring,' faced fierce resistance. Many Syrians, armed with rifles, driving pickup trucks, and using stipends provided by countries like Saudi Arabia, went to Libya.

The 'Arab Spring' even impacted Iraq, where Saddam's forces, receiving significant weapon support, launched a more aggressive offensive.

Previously, US aircraft firmly controlled the airspace, but after withdrawing a large number of planes, the remaining aircraft were insufficient to maintain control over Iraq's skies. They were even hesitant to take off due to the threat of Saddam's anti-aircraft missiles.

To the US's further dismay, Saddam now possessed his own aircraft, a large number of advanced planes.

Despite their dissatisfaction, the US had to accelerate its withdrawal from Iraq, deploying the evacuating troops to Tunisia.

In just over a month, the US military had withdrawn from Iraq.

However, the staff and families of the puppet government, dependent on the US military, barely had time to leave.

As soon as the US military withdrew, Iraqi forces reclaimed lost territory.

On his 74th birthday, Saddam, now 74 years old, led his troops into Baghdad, staging a triumphant return.

From the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 to the present, a full eight years had passed.

Saddam was much older than in 2003, but during those eight years, he had remained active on radio, television, and the internet, maintaining his image as a steadfast and unyielding fighter.

Now, with his triumphant return, leading Iraqi forces to drive out the Americans, Saddam was regarded as a saint in Iraq.

Saddam delivered a victory speech in Baghdad, declaring that the great Iraqi people had defeated the invaders and proven their invincibility.

Saddam's return dominated world headlines that day.

Saddam held a victory parade in Baghdad. The troops participating in the parade were fully equipped with US weaponry; were it not for their skin color, they could have been mistaken for US soldiers.

Even Europe, eager to embarrass the US, extensively reported the US defeat in Iraq and Saddam's victory parade in Baghdad.

In the US, Barack's approval ratings plummeted further.

The public was extremely dissatisfied with Barack, believing that his incompetence had led to the US military's withdrawal from Afghanistan and Iraq, resulting in two 'Saigon moments' that had disgraced the US military.

Even within the Pentagon, many openly expressed their dissatisfaction with Barack.

They publicly criticized Barack, stating that his misguided decisions had caused significant damage to US national interests.

Barack, overwhelmed and enraged, retaliated against the dissenting military personnel by implementing sweeping troop cuts.

Having suffered such a major setback, the US military presence in the Middle East was reduced to only Israel.

It could be said that the US's geopolitical strategy had suffered a major defeat.

The Kurds became pawns abandoned by the US.

The US refused to recognize Saddam's regime, but this did not prevent various Arab nations from sending congratulatory messages to Saddam at the earliest opportunity, recognizing his regime and establishing diplomatic relations. Russia, Europe, and other major countries also sent congratulatory messages to Saddam, congratulating the Iraqi people on driving out the invaders and regaining their independence and sovereignty.

Within a short period, over 150 countries worldwide recognized the legitimacy of Saddam's regime in Iraq.

Saddam ignored US protests and pressure. Relations remained hostile, and Saddam showed no leniency towards his enemies. Officials of the puppet government had their assets confiscated, were punished, and some even faced execution.

The oil and gas fields seized by the US and other countries in Iraq were forcefully reclaimed by Saddam, and those involved were imprisoned.

The major US energy companies that suffered enormous losses were even more resentful of Barack.

These oil and gas fields, after so many years, had barely recovered their costs and certainly hadn't generated profits.

They had spent a great deal of money acquiring the rights to the oil and gas fields, and had invested heavily in construction.

As a result of Barack's troop withdrawal, they suffered such enormous losses.

The saying goes, 'Cutting off someone's wealth is like killing their parents.'

Their hatred for Barack was unimaginable.

Had Barack not increased his security, it was questionable whether he would have lived to see the next day.

However, strangely, the US was not united in condemning Barack, but rather presented two opposing camps arguing against each other.

Those who criticized Barack had too many reasons to list. It could only be said that Barack's performance in recent years had been terrible, completely failing to meet the expectations of the voters.

Those who praised Barack lauded his good image, praised his promotion of diversity, allowing the US to become more diverse and inclusive, and praised the medical bill he had pushed through as a remarkable achievement. Of course, most importantly, they praised the withdrawal of troops from the Iraq and Afghanistan battlefields, allowing the US to avoid being trapped in two quagmires, preventing continuous bloodshed, and that ending the war deserved praise.

Jewish capital naturally played a role in this.

Barack deployed 30,000 elite US troops from the Iraqi battlefield to Israel, greatly ensuring Israel's security and winning the favor of Jewish capital.

And Jewish capital controlled most of the US media.

Amidst the lively power struggle in Europe and the US, South Asia was undoubtedly on the periphery of geopolitical attention, with its focus greatly diminished.

Bharat could no longer sustain the situation.

The outbreak of famine led to the starvation deaths of countless Bharat people.

No one knew exactly how many had starved to death.

Widespread famine was replaying in Bharat.

The fourteen countries of South Asia had become twenty!

Bharat had completely lost its access to the eastern Indian Ocean and the Ganges River.

South India and East India had become united.

Through the efforts of various countries, all parties finally signed a peace agreement in the Maldives, establishing borders.

And various countries provided some amount of humanitarian aid to Bharat.

However, the humanitarian aid provided by various countries seemed like a drop in the bucket for Bharat.

The food aid provided by various countries was far from meeting Bharat's needs.

The other six new countries were in a better situation with the help of Nepal, Khalistan, etc.

But Bharat could not be helped by Nepal, Khalistan, and other countries. The war between the two sides had caused considerable casualties, and the hatred was great, so how could they help Bharat?

Sri Lanka was finally unified and officially began post-war reconstruction.

The countries still at war in the world were the Turkish-Kurdish war, and Africa, especially North Africa!

In the Turkish-Kurdish war, although Turkey's overall national strength was stronger than that of the Kurds, the Kurds occupied favorable terrain, were more united, and were more brave and good at fighting, stubbornly blocking the Turkish offensive.

The Turkish army's modern weapons and equipment were greatly restricted in mountain warfare. Coupled with the disadvantage in terrain, it was not easy to break through the Kurdish defense line.

Moreover, with Saddam regaining control of Iraq, Turkey had to guard against Iraq.

The US-led coalition had launched the war against Iraq from Turkey, and Saddam remembered the account. Although Saddam also hated the Kurds, Turkey had to be on guard.

This caused Turkey to even reduce the number of troops attacking the Kurds, transferring troops to the Turkish-Iraqi border.

And North Africa was gradually and continuously evolving into a series of proxy wars.

The S3 season that people had previously worried about did not break out, and the world had a false alarm.

The summer of 2011 was hot and sweltering.

At this time, inside a workshop of the Panshan Machinery Factory, hundreds of robots were parked.

There were dog-type robots and humanoid robots.

Based on the technology provided by Liu Tao, the research team had made rapid progress in the field of robotics during this period.

Of course, the current research team was more focused on military robots.

Otherwise, they would not have come to the Panshan Machinery Factory from the urban area of Kun City.

The technology of these military robots was highly classified.

Liu Tao nodded slightly as he looked at these robots.

He only needed to provide core technology or solve core technology, and the rest would naturally be solved by a dedicated technical team.

A soldier was hitting a humanoid robot with a stick, which was an impact resistance experiment.

Although these were all military robots, the materials used for robots in different application scenarios were actually very different.

For example, the cow-like robot, which was used to transport materials, used a very strong composite material that could transport hundreds of kilograms of materials at a time, and could move freely in mountainous areas and forests. It could also be used as a transport device for artillery, and artillery could be mounted on it.

The current armored vehicles, whether wheeled or tracked, could not adapt to all terrains.

And this kind of cow-type robot could play this role.

Even on the highway, if it was converted into wheels, it could walk directly on the highway without the need for vehicles.

There was also the dog-type robot, which mainly carried rifles, submachine guns, and small mortars, and the materials used were slightly worse.

Why was there a gap in the materials used for the same robot?

It was nothing more than to reduce costs!

On the battlefield, cost was also a huge advantage.

Therefore, in the military field, it was never the case that the more advanced the weapons and equipment, the better, but the most suitable was the best, and performance and scale must be taken into account.

About ten minutes later, everyone went outside.

A mechanical dog equipped with an automatic rifle followed outside with light steps.

In the test field, a drone took off, and then there was a drone and robot battle.

The mechanical dog was equipped with two thousand rounds of ammunition, and the drone was also equipped with two thousand rounds of ammunition.

The two sides had an air-to-ground shooting battle, with sparks flying everywhere, which was very lively.

Liu Tao communicated with the researchers.

Although from a technical point of view, there was still a lot of potential for excavation, there was no doubt that these two weapons were mature products and could be truly equipped to the troops, thus becoming a force multiplier for the army.

At this year's Two Sessions, everyone originally paid attention to whether China would expand its army.

As a result, no one expected that China would not expand its army at all.

One of the important reasons was that with the equipment of a large number of advanced weapons and equipment, even if the army was not expanded, China's military strength was rapidly increasing.

Like all types of drones, hundreds of thousands of them had been equipped in the army.

This was still without expanding the army. Once the army was expanded, millions or even tens of millions of drones would be easy to do.

There were also these robots. The army currently had a total of 300 robots of various types for experiments and exploration.

In the future, there may be hundreds of thousands or even millions of military robots!

It could not be said that future wars would be unmanned wars!

However, unmanned equipment would definitely play a vital role in future wars.

The entire military theory, strategy and tactics would be constantly updated due to the service of various new weapons.

The speed of this development was so fast that even many people in the army were shocked.

However, people's learning ability was very strong, and their adaptability was also very strong. A new type of weapon could always be mastered in a few years.

Liu Tao communicated with the research team and asked them to arrange for a batch of robots to go to the snow area for high-altitude performance testing.

That's how military weapons are; they need to undergo testing in different environments: high-altitude environments, desert environments, grassland environments, rainforest environments, mountain forest environments, and so on.

Only after completing a series of tests can they be mass-produced and put into service. (End of chapter)