In the last week of 2023, our army showed a batch of relatively old ** in public reports, so that the stalks of "crying poor" and "playing money", which have begun to circulate in recent years, have once again spread among military fans at a much faster rate than **red envelopes. The author, who likes to follow Shi Lao to "talk about the ancients", although he realized it later, but he also saw a lot of stalks in the past two days, but there are many of them that looked several years ago, and now the "electronic pulp" is layer by layer of old pictures, in the end, what is the situation of this year's "crying poor", then briefly sort it out for readers and friends.
And it can't be counted in everything, for example, the recent use of Type 54 pistols by non-ground combatants in the Air Force for target training is not considered "crying poor", at least the author has a different opinion - "crying poor", no matter what, it has to be a heavy equipment.
According to the author's observation, with the rapid development and construction of the People's Navy, there are indeed very few "scenes" in the "crying poor" past in the memories of military fans in recent years. When the 037IG and 037II missile boats have settled down in the national defense education base, the so-called joke of "dragging the 037 out for New Year's greetings" is absolutely impossibleTherefore, even the 053H1G missile frigates, which have been incorporated into the training ship detachment and provide a practical training environment for naval cadets, and are no longer responsible for combat readiness, have to be forcibly linked to "crying poor" by everyone.
Indeed, now that the "Beihai Nursing Home" has long been a thing of the past, and now if you want to find an old ship in the real sense, it is really difficult to find it on the side of the main battle destroyer. Recently, the official ** is commemorating the 15th anniversary of the People's Navy's Somali escort operation in the Gulf of Aden, and in the early years, when I went to the Gulf of Aden, in addition to the supply ships that could not be thundered (the slow Qinghai Lake ships were on five turns), it is reasonable to bring or not destroyers, two 054 054A companions, and even a 054A plus a 053H3 are the same;Starting from the 33rd batch of escort formations that departed in August 2019, the "starting type" of the People's Navy's bright ships has been solidified into a Type 052D missile destroyer + Type 054A missile frigate + 903 Type 903A comprehensive supply ship.
The fact that the new defense minister is Dong Jun, the previous commander of the People's Navy, also demonstrates the important significance of the People's Navy in the diplomacy of major powers. However, strictly speaking, the first defense minister with a naval background in the history of New China should be Zhang Aiping (Minister of National Defense from 1982 to 1988), who was ordered to form the East China Military Region Navy in 1949 and served as the first commander and political commissar of the East China Military Region Navy on April 23 of the same year
In addition, the first head of the defense department of the Taiwan puppet regime was Song Changzhi, a native of Shenyang, Liaoning Province, who graduated from the Qingdao Naval Academy in 1937 and participated in the Anti-Japanese War, and went to Britain to study in 1944. On April 23, 1949, when the Kuomintang Second Fleet uprising, Song Changzhi, then the captain of the Yat-sen ship, led the ship to escape from Taiwan after "fraudulent surrender", and then rose all the way, and was promoted to "Commander-in-Chief of the Navy" in 1970, "Chief of Staff" in 1976, and head of the defense department from 1981 to 1986.
Under such a momentum, generally speaking, the various types of ships that will appear in the relevant reports of the People's Navy in 2023 can be called cutting-edge, and the occasional "hairy" minority such as one or two "modern" or 051C missile destroyers will appear, which makes people feel a little rare. The Russian-made 877EKM "Kilo" class conventional submarine introduced in the mid-90s of the last century was officially decommissioned as a museum and will be open for a visit soon.
Therefore, when a certain destroyer detachment of the Northern Theater Navy, which has four Type 055 large missile destroyers, appeared in the year-end report the two oldest Type 052 missile destroyers, the former star ships of the People's Navy, it really made the author, who has never believed in the theory of "crying poor", a little shaken. At that time, when they also represented the top combat effectiveness of the People's Navy, ships were often staggered, and each led a formation to perform tasks, so the proportion of two ships in the same frame in the report was not high;Now, when we see that they have become the oldest destroyers in the whole army, they are operating in formation, which makes people feel mixed feelings.
In the distance is the Harbin ship (ship number 112), and near is the Qingdao ship (board number 113).
As two heroic ships of honor, they have been in service for nearly 30 years and are still neat and majestic under the careful maintenance of generations of crews. There are even rumors that after the decommissioning of these two warships, they may usher in a new "next home". However, as one of the students who have wandered on the banks of the Songhua River, the author is still looking forward to the retirement of the "China's first ship", which can go upstream along the Heilongjiang-Songhua River and park on the banks of the Songhua River (such as the Sun Island Wharf) for permanent display, adding a scenic spot ...... to HarbinHowever, no matter which outcome it is, today, when the new drivers of the two shipbuilding bases in the north and south continue to launch sea trials, these two ship names will surely usher in a stronger successor.
On March 11, 2023, the Harbin ship appeared in the waters near Thitu Island in Nansha after thousands of miles of southward to control the situation.
is also a veteran of the battle sequence of the People's Navy, and there is no certainty who will come to some old equipment. As the "first teacher" of the pilots of fixed-wing aircraft in the whole army in the flying career of the troops, the Beginner 6 will continue to play this duty for a long time, and after several rounds of argumentation on the issue of successor aircraft, it has now returned to the state of "building a new Beginner 6 and replacing the old Beginner 6." In the naval aviation moving towards the era of carrier-based aviation, the first teaching 6 of the Naval Aviation University appeared at the end of the year, not only generously appeared in the name of "classic never goes out of style", but also showed the new teaching direction of the landing process from the traditional way to the carrier-based characteristics, better docking with the middle and senior training aircraft, and laying a good foundation for the new HNA students in the aircraft carrier era.
Simulating the aircraft carrier's beveled deck markings and genuine landing lights, shipborne thinking, starting from the first lesson of the sea and sky.
To come up with equipment that is not inferior to the "heavy sense of history" compared with the Chujiao-6, and even in terms of the unpredictable outcome of the factory time (the Chujiao 6 has been produced so far after all), the big brother of the army has always been down-to-earth. The Type 59 medium tank that appeared in a certain equipment base of the Xinjiang Military Region for seasonal maintenance - the author does not say here that the "five pairs of wheels" are not to make up the number of words, but because there are indeed at least 3 "whiteboard" Type 59 tanks that are so pure that they can no longer be pure and still use 100 mm rifled guns, no wonder the title of the original report is "Helping the 'old iron' to change its face".
Interestingly, there is also a "fake 96" in the picture above, that is, a Type 59 tank driving training simulator modified from a Type 96 tank chassis;The Type 88A main battle tank and the Type 89 armored transport vehicle (track glue) can be seen in the picture below
Beside these "old irons", there are also Type 88A main battle tanks that ushered in the "highlight moment" in the "International Military Competition" and the Sino-Indian front-line confrontation in the past few years. It is expected that some of these old vehicles will be unveiled again in the Korla competition area of the "International Military Games-2024" as exhibits showing the development process of the People's Army, while the rest of the vehicles will continue to wait for their fate in a round of rotation season maintenance - to maintain (remote-controlled) drivable state, better simulate the battlefield enemy situation on the actual combat training ground, and meet the more fierce and fierce attacks of the juniors, which is not necessarily a bad result.
It's better than their brothers who are arching back and forth on the Russian-Ukrainian front.
If the scope of the "five pairs of wheels" is expanded to non-first-line combat vehicles, the "four modernizations" group training of the 73rd Group Army of the Eastern Theater Army in the rear loading support specialty is now standardized, and the Type 05 amphibious infantry fighting vehicle towing the Type 84 tank rescue tractor (using the Type 79 tank chassis) can probably be regarded as a case of "crying poor". Because the winch rescue device of the vehicle can even be used to tow a new generation of heavy main battle equipment such as the Type 99 main battle tank and the Type 05 155 mm self-propelled howitzer, it is naturally a piece of cake to tow the 05 series amphibious vehicle family weighing more than 20 tons on the hardened road, which is enough to undertake the rescue and traction tasks of various infantry fighting vehicles, self-propelled anti-aircraft guns, missile launchers and other vehicles, and let the rescue tractor of the 96 99A Type 15 tank chassis concentrate on "saving the big guy".
The lessons of the Russia-Ukraine conflict have made countries around the world generally realize how important the support forces that accompany mechanized forces are. While the new generation of support vehicles is being distributed one after another, the previous generation of equipment that still has residual heat should also be reasonably maintained to make full use of its efficiency.
In the Army, "post-80s" equipment such as Type 84 can justifiably be "ranked in the poor class", while in the Navy and Air Force, the standard of "poor" is often relaxed to that of "post-90s". The aforementioned Navy ** in the mid-90s of the last century is like this, and the Air Force's J-7E J-7 is also about the same. After the "Red Second Weapon" and the old-fashioned antiaircraft artillery of the ground air defense forces have long been completely eliminated, it is natural that several aviation units equipped with J-7 are regarded as the "main force of crying poverty" by military fans, while the J-8 unit, which is smaller in number, is currently mainly carrying out tactical reconnaissance missions.
The winter solstice debuted the Detective 8F
In fact, in the official report in 2023, the two J-7 units of a certain brigade of the Air Force of the Southern Theater stationed in the south of Caiyun and a brigade of the Air Force of the Central Theater of the Central Theater of Gongwei have appeared many times, but in the last week of 2023, it just so happened that they stood out and were selected by the WeChat *** of their respective theaters (air forces) as the units to appear in this week's report, which inevitably makes people feel that this coincidence is somewhat "connected to the same fate".
In recent years, the Central Theater Air Force, which is regarded by the outside world as the general reserve, has not lagged behind in the slightest in the frequency of rearmament, and many units have successively replaced with J-10C, J-20 and other models, and several units that are still using J-7 are particularly "eye-catching", but compared with the more low-key brother units on the land of Jingchu, the "Gongwei Gyeonggi Brigade" has a special position after all, and in this flight training report, the appearance of the unit with almost all Jianjiao-7 is even more impressive.
There is even a feeling that this is some flight academy training brigade.
Military fans and friends are more or less aware that the flight performance of the J-7 has decreased significantly compared with the J-7B H, and the gap is even greater compared with the J-7E G, which has been changed to a double delta wing. However, in addition to being able to keep two pilots in flight condition with one sortie, taking into account the vigilance needs around the capital, the J-7, which always has one more pair of eyes in the sky, has a little advantage over the J-7 when looking for low, slow, and small targets such as balloons. For an aviation unit that is not on the front line, it is also normal to wait for a change of equipment in such a posture.
In contrast, a certain brigade of the air force of the Southern Theater stationed in the southwestern border was much busier. As the last Jian-7 unit of the theater air force, the department's report in the second half of the year not only included such difficult subjects as flight training at dawn in the second half of the night and low-altitude flight training at sea, but also verified the "fast seven masters" in the implementation of front-line combat readiness tasks by idling and transporting support equipment from the Y-20. This attitude of "being old with an old machine and never getting old" can be said to be a result of the training style of the air force units of the former Guangzhou Military Region of "striving to be the benchmark of the second-generation aircraft units." It is believed that after another brother unit that said goodbye to the J-7 took the lead in modifying the J-16 this year, it is just around the corner for this unit to appear with a new attitude.
At dawn in the second half of the night, the sea was at an ultra-low altitude, which was their high-spirited fighting posture.
With the final battle of China's aviation industry in 2023, the production of new domestically produced fighter aircraft this year has reached a record high. With the successive delivery of these fighters in place, and the use of new aircraft into combat readiness duty after the completion of modification and training, those replaced third-generation and even third-generation half-generation fighter aircraft will set off a round of "poverty alleviation battle" that will sweep the north and south in 2024, and work with the new aircraft to fill the equipment shortcomings of the front-line duty troops.
Completing the annual batch production test flight task one month ahead of schedule does not mean that they will be idle and idle in the last month. The situation waits for no one, and the front-line forces of the sea and air are waiting for more powerful warhawks to join.
For example, a certain brigade of the Air Force of the Northern Theater Theater stationed at the combat take-off site of the People's Air Force on the Sino-DPRK border, in the face of the P-3 CP-140 four-engine turboprop reconnaissance and patrol aircraft platform that the United States and Canada are excessively active in the northern part of the Yellow Sea under the banner of "supervising the situation of United Nations sanctions against the DPRK." Although the J-7E is currently equipped with the advantages of short preparation time for take-off and rapid response, its "short legs" and insufficient time to stay in the air make it obviously deficient in carrying out accompanying flight surveillance. Compared with the situation when encountering our advanced aircraft, when the outsider came to the J-7E, it was obviously more contemptuous, and the provocation of the flight action was also stronger, and even dared to make a pressure flight in the direction of China's territorial sea line.
History has proven time and time again that opponents can only understand language backed by strength. Today, when China has become the largest country in the production capacity of heavy fighters, it is an indisputable development trend to form echelon deployment of heavy aircraft in each key threat direction and to form a sufficiently tough response plan at different levels of confrontation.
After returning home during the Spring Festival last year, the author mentioned in a weekly military review that a friend who works in his hometown said, "You came back just in time for the New Year this year, and you won't be able to see the seventh master next time." Although the plan can never catch up with the rapid changes, when they go home in more than a month, those J-7s will still be waiting on the wide tarmac to return home, but for those fortified aircraft forts temporarily occupied by the "Seventh Master" Magpie's Nest, their real owners have begun to wash off the dust on their bodies and are ready to continue their legendary career of defending the motherland's sea and air in the new battlefield.
When I matched this picture last year, it was said that "although it is not hit, it is not far away". Indeed, the day is one step closer.
The Air Force of the Northern Theater, which was reorganized after the military reform and has a wide range of defense areas, has now achieved "no coincidence" with the units equipped with the "Three Musketeers" of the J-20, J-16, and J-10CBut the J-7 units still exist in twos and threes, they are not only stationed at the take-off place of the People's Air Force and the combat take-off place of the People's Air Force, but also on the almost forgotten Saiwai Plateau, the J-7 is also "thriving" - after all, there is the latest single-seat "Seven Masters", equipped with fire control radar J-7G.
Because the station is indeed closer to the capital and the conditions are more convenient, and the aircraft are new and relatively able to withstand tossing, compared with the "Seventh Master" unit of the Southern Theater Air Force, which maintains a high standard in training and combat readiness, the self-reliance and self-improvement of this second-generation aircraft unit is mainly reflected in the endless improvement ideas for the Jian-7G. If some of the scientific research results that have completed the test flight appraisal work are made public, it is believed that military fans will have another dimension of understanding of the "ultimate fish nest". It's just that with the imminent shift change of the new fighter plane, these stories are destined to become a thing of the past.
Regardless of whether they will go to the flight academy like other J-7G in the future and help the young eagles take off, they have already had their own extraordinary "machine" life.
Whether it's a joke or a serious one, the root cause of "crying poverty" is because we have really experienced "collective poverty". As the aftermath of those difficult years, the retention and disappearance of old equipment are unchangeable objective laws. In the face of this objective law, some units go with the flow, and some units strive to go upstream, which is also an objective phenomenon in the process of changing clothes again and again. "The wind knows the strength of the grass, and the frost knows the chastity of the wood", the troops who stand out in the face of adversity will eventually break through the cocoon into butterflies and establish new and greater feats.
The author concludes this year's last military commentary with the words of an old comrade I know: "It is a great thing to have the courage to renew oneself. Only when there is a constant influx of fresh blood, can our party, our country, and our army flourish and always strive for the top!”