Chapter 509 - 498 Diverting Attention_1

"Betrayal, this is damned, shameful betrayal!"

As soon as Sullivan entered, he saw John gesticulating wildly, with the hotline phone clearly having been displaced.

According to the schedule, he had just been on the phone with Blasiye from the UK, and it was apparent that the conversation had not been pleasant.

Two days ago, when John learned that London had submitted their bid first, he wasn’t so angry, thinking that for such a big deal, negotiating for a month or two was incredibly quick, and reaching an agreement within half a year was within the realm of normalcy; he didn’t think too much of it.

But when Blasiye announced in the House of Commons that the deal had been struck, John almost thought it was fake news.

The nuclear deal, just like that, was easily concluded?

What was even more infuriating was that the London side had generously disclosed many details of the cooperation, and only then did they realize that London had played a bait-and-switch, eagerly stepping forward to practically give away hydrogen bombs at a price so cheap it was almost free.

But—does London even have the capability to retrofit hydrogen bombs anymore?

America’s steadfast ally had easily "betrayed" them for a bit of private gain, and this was the real reason for John’s anger.

During the recent phone call with Mrs. Blasiye, even her voice could not hide the joy, because the Chinese had already agreed to execute another lunar mission by the end of this year, by which time they would send UK experts up as well.

It wasn’t until Sullivan came in that John managed to suppress his emotions and calm down, waving at him to give a report.

"Sir, I have some good news for you."

"What good news? Are we selling hydrogen bombs from our Alabama Excavator Company at two million US dollars apiece?"

"Not that," Sullivan ignored John’s sarcasm and seriously said:

"Six hours ago in the early morning, NACA completed the test of the first artificial gravitational spaceship in human history, and it is still operating well, steadily generating 0.5G of gravity. This is a major breakthrough in astronautics!"

John let out a "wow" in disbelief, half-heartedly started reading the report, but after finishing, he couldn’t help laughing out loud.

The report was filled with many "firsts," "biggest," "most advanced," "unprecedented," constantly indicating that the "Gravity Dragon" spacecraft had made history, especially as it was far ahead of the Chinese.

The "March" only generated 0.3G of gravity; "Gravity Dragon" had 0.5G, and NACA also said they could easily rise to the standard gravity of 1G, which is a far lead!

"Very good, NACA has done very well, of course, so have SpaceX and Lockheed, they are all commendable."

This success finally dispelled the gloom that had hovered over America’s aerospace for the past half year, particularly leading the Aerospace Development Committee by a large margin; John’s recent displeasure had now been completely replaced by joy.

He immediately instructed Sullivan:

"Immediately, have all newspapers and media tout this success, it’s a tremendous victory!

And we need to send people up there as soon as possible, letting American astronauts be the first to experience gravity in space!"

Sullivan immediately agreed to do so, enthusiastically discussing the FGD technology with the exuberant John, who only then changed the topic to United Mining.

Upon hearing that Luo Luo had also made a bid, Naldo and Jon quickly boarded a transatlantic flight with their team, holding discussions on the plane, which, according to Capital’s time, would not be daytime for another dozen hours or so.

"As far as I know, Russia and France have also started moving, and with those people from London playing unfair, I’m afraid our conditions might be at a disadvantage."

Sullivan was also quite dissatisfied with London’s unilateral action, believing the best outcome would be for the other four parties to unite and keep pressuring United Mining. That way, they could force them to gradually concede. London’s solo move had indeed allowed them to feast first, but what about the remaining three?

What does it mean to disrupt market order? This is it!

However, John had now calmed down and started thinking rationally. The deal was already set; disrupting United Mining’s plans was unrealistic. After all, Russia and France were very likely to side with them, and even if America strongly opposed, it would be difficult to stand against four.

Moreover, with United Mining holding the trump card of moon landings, which had significant appeal, NACA could not compete, especially since the Artemis project was already in trouble.

So the best response for me now is...

"Naldo shouldn’t be asleep yet, right? Connect me to their phone, I must change the negotiation strategy."

...

Capital.

After successfully making a deal with Luo Luo, United Mining quickly reversed the previously passive situation and began to rapidly consider how to gain the maximum benefit.

United Mining itself was actually no more than a makeshift team, just a shell with a headquarters, and except for the operator, there was nobody else; after all, the theoretical managers were holding important positions elsewhere, and the plan was to gradually get on track in one or two years.

Now it had to be temporarily operated by the Aerospace Development Committee, and even the Nuclear Industry Department and higher-ups were involved to control the specific directions, these major issues were, in essence, a play of the big players’ games of chess and exchange of interests underneath a corporate facade.

The leaders above were directly monitoring the trading movements, which showed the level of importance they placed on it.

In this situation, Lin Ju could actually afford to relax a bit and had the capacity to pay attention to his old profession.

The launch and testing of "Gravity Dragon" were quite sudden, but when NACA announced the news, it happened to be noon in Beijing, so the news quickly spread domestically.

Lin Ju immediately posted a message expressing his congratulations, and he was quite sincere.

After all, this was a truly innovative creation of American aerospace that only existed on paper and in theory before; to make it a reality so quickly was quite an impressive feat.

However, in his opinion, it always felt like a wrong path; at least he did not want to sit inside the "Gravity Dragon" at all, just thinking about it made him feel uncomfortable.

The March mission still needed eight launches to be completed, so for now, let NACA take the lead for a little while.

Just as he was engrossedly continuing to delve into the technical principles of "Gravity Dragon," Academician She walked in.

"Sir She, weren’t you at United Mining?"

"Don’t mention it."

Academician She, his clothes almost soaked with sweat, first took a cup of water and drank it before sitting down and opening the window to balance out the air conditioning in the office.

"Did you know? United Mining’s entrance was blocked, and it took quite a number of police officers to disperse those people."

"Block the entrance? Who went to block it?"

"It was those Islanders. They’re protesting that we violated their airspace a few days ago and are demanding an apology and compensation; they are also opposing the use of hydrogen bombs on the Moon.

You see, those other bidders didn’t block them but came to block us instead. Others joined in the commotion, and it took several hours to get here. Some people even got heatstroke but refused to go in to cool off with the AC."

Academician She wore an expression like an elderly person tired with metro trips and smartphone browsing as he complained, and Lin Ju also frowned deeply.

"We still have to deal with it seriously. They’re certain to stir things up online as well. We can’t let them tarnish United Mining’s reputation; the public is easily misled."

Academician She nodded in strong agreement, but then raised another point:

"But these kinds of things are difficult to manage. If we go to their officials for negotiations and they insist it’s individual actions, we can’t have control without any blind spots. It’s rather troublesome, and internationally, there are quite a few people opposed to the use of hydrogen bombs."

Concerned with the progress of space development, Lin Ju also had to seriously think. Mining with hydrogen bombs was already sensitive, and he needed to find a way to shift the focus of public opinion.

After a while, he had a preliminary idea.

"Sir She, we need to find a breakthrough with America."

"Oh?"