The location of Remonin's army had not been moved, but the area was larger.
The military area was centered around the small hill that Li Du had seen last time and expanded.
The last time he was here, the hill was surrounded by rugged terrain. Now there were more than a dozen excavators and road rollers working to flatten the terrain.
The helicopter landed on a large open space. The ground was covered with a red carpet, and soldiers in Mozambique uniforms stood on one side. When Li Du and Sophie got off the helicopter, the conductor waved the baton in his hand and a loud military music started playing.
The treatment this time was better than Li Du's first time. It was more formal, and there was even a red carpet to walk on.
However, the red carpet looked fine from afar, but it looked dirty up close. Li Du wondered where Remonin had found it.
Remonin had changed into his military uniform, and there were gold stars on his shoulders. He shook hands with Li Du and grinned. "Welcome, Li, welcome to my military area with your wife!"
There were many differences between the two meetings. Li Du had come alone the last time. This time, he had brought Sophie, and it was more formal. It was the first meeting between the two partners.
Sophie and Remonin shook hands, and Brother Wolf and the others came down.
Remonin stared at the three of them and asked Li Du enviously, "How much do you earn as a bodyguard?"
Li Du said, "Tens of thousands of dollars a month. Why? Are you interested in them? "
Remonin said helplessly, "Of course I'm interested. I want to find a group of good soldiers to train my soldiers and be their instructors, but I don't have that much money."
They had only met for a few words, and Remonin had already brought up the main topic. It was all about money.
Li Du himself was short of money, so he did not respond. He just smiled and nodded to show that he understood.
Remonin did not say much either. After all, he was now an important leader of the country's military force, and he had to put on airs.
Next, it was the military parade.
Compared to the last time, the scale of the parade was bigger. Remonin had probably brought out all his veterans. There were also helicopter escorts and pickup trucks with machine guns.
Finally, there were four armored vehicles. They were painted green and had eight large black tires. The entire body was wedge-shaped. They were about two meters tall, two and a half meters wide, and seven meters long. They looked quite domineering as they drove slowly.
Seeing these armored vehicles, Li Du looked at Remonin in surprise. Remonin said proudly, "Just watch, there are more good things."
Li Du said, "Didn't you say that your Department of Defense did not allocate any resources to you?"
Remonin said vaguely, "Indeed, they didn't transfer much, but they did give me some things. They can't really let me be a commander without an army, right? I have to defend the southwest territory of the country. "
Li Du did not ask any more questions. Remonin would definitely not tell him everything about himself. They would always keep a trump card for themselves.
He was not a military fan and did not know much about these tanks, so he asked Brother Wolf, who was beside him.
Brother Wolf whispered in his ear, "This is a BTR-152 armored personnel carrier. Commander Remonin has been bullied by the Department of Defense. These things have long been obsolete."
"The BTR-152 was in service from the 1950s to the early 1970s. It was one of the earliest armored infantry vehicles of the Soviet Union. It was replaced by the BTR-60 infantry vehicle in the 1970s and has long been eliminated from the world battlefield."
"I remember that the armor of this tank is only 13 millimeters thick. Some parts of the armor are 4 millimeters thick. The total combat weight is about 9 tons. The maximum speed is 75 kilometers per hour. The weapon is a 7.62 millimeter machine gun …"
Brother Wolf, who was such a serious person, almost laughed out loud. "Let's put it this way. Our Iron Knight would be better than this armored vehicle if it were welded with a layer of steel plate."
There was also a cannon behind the armored vehicle, which was pulled by a pickup truck. After seeing it, Li Du felt that it was really funny. Was this thing pulled out to be funny?
He had only seen this kind of cannon in some old movies. It was the kind of old cannon that had two wheels supporting the barrel, with a metal plate in between the wheels. It needed to be pulled by a horse to move it.
Li Du asked Brother Wolf, "This is also an old thing from the 50s and 60s, right?"
Brother Wolf's eyes almost popped out. He said, "This, this, this is the M1942 76mm howitzer? Sh * t! This thing still exists in the world? Boss, you guessed wrong. This is not something from the 50s or 60s. This was used during World War II! "
He told Li Du that this howitzer was produced in 1942 and used until the end of World War II.
In fact, even during World War II, this gun was not popular because it was not even enough to deal with the German Tiger 1 tank, Panther tank, and Type IV H tank. Therefore, many production lines were used to make the more effective 57 millimeter ZIS-2 anti-tank gun.
There were a lot of cannons, a total of eight. Eight pickup trucks drove past. Remonin puffed out his chest with a proud expression on his face.
To him, these weapons were his trump card.
Come to think of it, this guy used to be a tribal leader. His most powerful weapon was the anti-aircraft machine gun in the pickup truck. Other than that, he had no other heavy weapons.
Although the armored vehicles and cannons were very primitive and ancient, they were heavy weapons. With these heavy weapons, his army would be invincible in the surrounding tribes.
Li Du could not have higher expectations of Remonin. In fact, the entire national defense weapons of Mozambique were trash that the Soviet Union had eliminated.
These artillery armored vehicles were given to them free of charge by the Soviet Union to support the construction of a third country. In fact, they were used to dispose of the things that were thrown away.
Poor Mozambique gave these things to poor people. In their eyes, these things were also good things. Until now, the related weapons production lines that the Soviet Union had given them were still in use.
After the parade, Li Du could not speak for a long time. Remonin was very happy, thinking that his weapons had shocked him.
He smiled and said, "Li, forgive me for not telling you in advance about my real strength. I wanted to give you a surprise."
Li Du's mouth twitched twice. "What a big surprise!"
Remonin brought them to their residence. On the way, Li Du could not help but ask, "Commander, the Ministry of National Defense only gave you these weapons? No missiles, self-propelled artillery, tanks, and the like? "
"I have to buy them with my own money," Remonin said bitterly.
Li Du was shocked. "What? Doesn't your military belong to the Ministry of National Defense? "
Remonin said helplessly, "Of course it does. But, to be honest, Li, there is some corruption in our country. If the military wants to develop, I have to feed them. Only then will they be willing to give me weapons."
Li Du said, "What weapons do you have?"
"T-54 tanks, BRDM-1 armored reconnaissance vehicles, BMP-1 infantry fighting vehicles, anti-tank missiles, recoilless guns, and even Mi-8 helicopters!" Remonin said excitedly.
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