China has always adopted the strategy of learning from advanced models and absorbing the advantages of the East and the West in military equipment. However, when we introduced a field air defense equipment in the 80s of the last century, we fell into the trap of foreign manufacturers, and the equipment purchased did not meet our needs, resulting in us spending more than 100 million dollars in foreign exchange, which made people feel very nervous.
The Type 59 57 mm anti-aircraft gun is still widely popular decades later, becoming a leader in the field air defense and rapid-fire ** system, which makes people feel that the original choice was wise.
Some buyers even expressed regret that they could not seize the $100 million opportunity. This equipment, known as an "evergreen," is the prototype of the 35-mm field anti-aircraft artillery series widely used by the army, navy, and air force of our army today, the Swiss GDF-002 twin 35mm antiaircraft gun.
The GDF-005 is a classic of the Swiss anti-aircraft artillery family and an upgraded version of the GDF-002 model. Since the use of aircraft in World War I, countries have developed new equipment to counter this disregard for ground defenses, including machine guns, rifles, pistols, flare guns, bombs, shells and grenades, etc., to strike and dispel fighters to prevent them from continuously harassing and bombing positions, thereby demoralizing both warring sides.
With the continuous strengthening of ground anti-aircraft firepower, the performance of fighters is also improving, and the iteration speed of relevant models is also accelerating, and anti-aircraft firepower is developing in the direction of high rate of fire and high power.
Among them, the classic 20mm Erlikon FF cannon of the Swiss Erikon company achieved many victories in the field of air defense rapid-fire equipment of the Axis and the Allies during World War II with its outstanding performance, and won numerous orders and scientific cooperation contracts.
With stable orders and cooperation in advanced technology, the 20mm Erlikon FF cannon quickly achieved a leading position in the field of field air defense, occupied a dominant position in the Western anti-aircraft artillery market for a long time, and influenced the research and development of new anti-aircraft artillery in many countries, including the United States.
In the 80s of the last century, when Sino-Western relations were improving, in order to meet the growing demand for field air defense, our army made a special trip to the West to seek an advanced anti-aircraft artillery, and finally chose the 35-mm anti-aircraft gun 90kdc manufactured by the Erlikon company.
Although our equipment system was influenced by Soviet-style equipment, and the front-line troops were equipped with anti-aircraft artillery of various calibers, the leading position of the Erlikon company in the Western world made the 35-mm anti-aircraft gun 90kdc the best choice.
With the development of the times, the Type 59 100-mm anti-aircraft gun has been unable to meet the needs of modern warfare because its design is mostly in the early days of the Cold War. For example, although the power of the 57-mm anti-aircraft guns used to carry out air defense tasks along the southeast coast and other places after the founding of the People's Republic of China has reached the technical and tactical targets, due to their insufficient service and passage capacity, they can only be used as anti-aircraft firepower for key defensive targets, and cannot follow the troops in a rapid mobile deployment on the front line.
Although the PLA is already equipped with 37mm anti-aircraft guns and old fire control systems, this old rapid-fire anti-aircraft firepower is inadequate in the face of new, increasingly upgraded fighters.
In order to solve this problem, China began the development of a modern anti-aircraft artillery project several years ago. However, due to the limitations of industrial level and technical concepts, many projects have been slow to progress and have failed to achieve the expected goals.
Fortunately, after the gradual warming of relations between the West and China, the technical exchanges between the two sides have become closer, which provides the possibility of upgrading the level of military equipment.
In the 80s of the last century, China expressed its willingness to cooperate with Western countries, attracting anti-aircraft artillery manufacturers such as Sweden's Bofors and Switzerland's Erlikon to participate in the bidding.
In the end, China was attracted by the technology of Erikon in Switzerland, and in 1987 sent a special delegation to Switzerland to purchase artillery suitable for field air defense.
In the search for the best equipment for the honeymoon period in the West, our country finally chose the GDF-002 type 35-mm twin-towed anti-aircraft gun. Although this anti-aircraft gun was born in 1959, after the modernization of the Erlikon company in the 80s, it already had 67 tons of weight and anti-aircraft Guardian radar fire control system.
The anti-aircraft gun has a theoretical rate of fire of up to 1,100 rounds per minute and is equipped with a muzzle velocimeter that precisely adjusts the firing deviation. In terms of fire response, it can be in 4Shoot in 5 seconds, effectively dealing with flying targets within a range of up to 4,000 meters and up to 3,000 meters.