Chapter 1287

Schmidt is an ordinary oil and gas field engineer who was sent to Mogadishu, the capital, for a $30 billion oil and gas development agreement between ExxonMobil and the Somali authorities.

Although he had made all kinds of preparations before coming here, the level of dilapidation here finally exceeded his expectation.

He once read in a travel magazine that before the civil war it was called the White Pearl of the Indian Ocean.

Now, there are only ruins left in some historical buildings. The bullet holes on the walls are clearly visible. Most of the roads are potholes, and the whole city is almost green. As long as one mouth, one can eat a belly of sand.

It's not just greening that's being criticized.

Because of the local special culture, there is no bar here, and drinking at will will will be punished by flogging.

Although their executives tried to help them win the privilege of drinking without being whipped, the privilege was limited to the staff dormitories, and the variety and quantity were quite limited, which made people can't be happy.

Therefore, the only entertainment for these expatriate employees here is to buy the latest newspaper, sit in the coffee shop near the company's residence, consume the air conditioner that the local people can't afford, drink the hand-made coffee priced in US dollars, and spend the whole afternoon.

It doesn't matter what kind of newspaper it is.

Whether it's BBC or playboy, just have words, because life here is so boring.

As usual, Schmidt came to the cafe, ordered a cup of black coffee that was too bad to drink for an afternoon, and then sat down in a safe place far from the window with the newspaper.

Just as he was preparing to start today's newspaper reading, he was stunned for a moment.

[elwag's victory! Somalia's regular army won the victory! ]

what the hell?

April Fool's Day joke?

No, it's only half a year.

At the moment of reading the headlines in the newspaper, Schmidt's first reaction was that there must be something wrong.

He is clear about the combat effectiveness of the regular Somali army. Even though he has received the training of officers from all countries, he is still quite savage in fighting. It can be said that there is no sense of disobedience to replace a rifle with a spear that can shoot fire.

In contrast, the enemy they face is the pirate who makes ZF all over the world headache, the devil who survived in the elimination and test of blood and fire in the past decade.

In the face of such enemies, let alone them, even if the U.S. aircraft carrier is invited here, it will not be able to completely eliminate them, let alone the Somali army, which can not even gather several tanks.

With disbelief, he looked down the newspaper, but it didn't matter. His eyes were glued to the newspaper's pictures.

To be exact, that's four sets of pictures.

Two of them were a "black coffin" suspended by a parachute, probably photographed by some kind of professional remote camera.

The other two pictures are of the drones flying out of the black coffin in the foreground, and the smoke from a bomb shed hidden behind the hills.

At the moment when I saw these equipment, SMIT's heart can be sure that the Somali authorities must have invited foreign aid.

These indigenous people in East Africa may not even see what UAVs look like, how can they use high-tech equipment that even the US military does not have a large-scale array.

Sure enough, when he read down the line, he soon found the answer between the lines.

"With the support of the Chinese side, the ZF forces in Somalia launched the largest offensive in the elwag area occupied by armed elements this year. In terms of fighting against the Chinese side, they sent at least 100 aerial bombs to the battlefield, destroyed more than 20 ammunition depots, and armed elements controlled more than 10 outposts."

"At the same time, our reporter learned that in the fight against China, a small UAV suspected of being controlled by AI and automatically identifying and attacking the armed elements has been invested. This kind of UAV is highly similar to the logistics UAV currently being promoted in Shenzhen stock market, and it is uncertain whether it comes from the same enterprise... "

"At present, the battlefield has been turned from open areas to street battles, and many armed leaders have been killed. According to a spokesman for the Somali authorities, the armed forces active in the area have been unable to maintain control of the area, and the ZF forces are recovering villages and towns previously controlled by armed elements. It is expected that the Dong disorder will last until the end of the year. This newspaper reminds foreign employees working in the local area to pay attention to travel safety. "

"In addition, our reporter has consulted the US military base in Ethiopia and asked for more information about the air raid. However, at present, the head of the military base did not disclose the type of aircraft involved in the air attack, and where the air attack came from, and refused to give an answer to the more detailed content. "

“…… God. "

How can the Americans help China keep secrets?

The sun just came out to the West!

In any case, Schmidt would not believe that those American troops would keep their mouths shut for the Chinese to launch air strikes. If they knew, they would like the whole world to know.So there is only one possibility

So far, they haven't found enough evidence to prove who launched the air strike and where it came from.

Just as his face gradually changed from doubt to disbelief, several other foreign employees whispered their opinions behind him.

It's a coincidence that what they are discussing is exactly the same thing that he can't think of to doubt life.

"Have you read yesterday's news? Did the Somali ZF win? "

"Do you want to see it? I'm talking about it on twitter today! Many people say that China has used some terrible secret weapons. I heard that the bodyguard in our camp said that his great nephew who served in the camp had participated in the battle. They were ready to fight the militants to the death, but they went in and collected the bodies of the militants. "

Said, the man with beard on his chin can't help smashing his tongue, as if he was the person who experienced the battle, and continued with a heavy tone.

"You don't want to see that picture It's like hell. "

"What do you think that secret weapon might be?"

"I don't know, but many people say it's an Orbital Weapon If it's a fighter or a bomber, it's impossible to fly so far or escape the radar of the US military base! "

Listening to the comments of several foreign employees behind him, Schmidt fell into silence, and after a long time, he always squeezed out a word.

"It's crazy..."

Orbital weapons?

Completely avoiding US radar?

This is ridiculous!

Let's just say that ZF of Somalia has won an epic victory with the help of aliens!

After reading the newspaper in his hand, he saw that it was not early and that Schmidt had drunk the last bit of coffee in his cup, left the waiter a dollar tip and stood up from his seat.

The streets are full of cheers and celebrations. Local people gather in groups, like celebrating and welcoming something.

For this dead city, this scene is as unreal as if it came from another world.

Although curious about what happened to celebrate, Schmidt did not dare to go to the local people, because his skin color was too harsh for the local people, and it was easy to be regarded as a fat sheep

In the next few days, strange things happened one after another.

First they moved to a Chinese construction company next door, then an oil company, then an import and export trading company

Later, there were more and more Chinese people in the neighborhood, opening supermarkets, clothing stores and even franchised bars.

Yes, it's a bar.

This made SMIT envious.

Although their executives have tried to bribe local officials to see if they can find a way to open an American style bar to entertain their employees, those officials promised when they collected the money, but when they were ready to open the bar, they suddenly turned around and didn't recognize people.

I don't know what those Chinese used to bribe them, but they actually bowed their heads to the principles.

Interestingly, however, those Chinese employees seem to be less interested in bars. They are the only American and European employees who work for shell and ExxonMobil.

Of course, this includes Schmidt himself.

Although jealousy is to jealousy, there is nothing wrong with wine.

But then something happened that annoyed Schmidt. One day, he suddenly found that the wine that the Chinese sold to them was twice as expensive as the wine they sold to their employees.

When he questioned the bartender, he received only one answer, "the reason for exchange rate", and there was no more explanation.

This is killing people!

Although the heart qi is not good, but finally Schmidt can only bite teeth to recognize.

No way. Who wants this bar?

Thanks to the Chinese who are praised by the local people, even though they are not liked by him very much, at least he has more fun in his life. He doesn't need to drink coffee and read newspapers like an old man anymore.

In the next week, it became more and more interesting.

There are more and more Chinese faces nearby, which seems to be a Chinatown.

Later, Schmidt learned from several British oil workers that the Chinese construction companies were preparing to send an engineering team to the elwag area to rebuild the city recovered by the ZF army.

Now SMIT is more and more convinced that the Somali authorities must have made some kind of hidden deal with the Chinese side, and contracted all the reconstruction work in that area to the Chinese people.

But Schmidt still couldn't understand.

Is there anything of value there except stone and sand?There is no point in bringing order to cacti and camels.

And frankly, a chaotic Somalia can help the world at least consume part of its surplus ammunition and feed at least 20000 families who depend on it for a living.

While drinking in the bar yesterday, he also heard a well-known arms broker complain that the Chinese construction workers took their jobs, and the compensation paid to them by several arms giants, such as Lockheed Martin, was sharply reduced. Now they have to give up their hard won "market" and go to more dangerous Central Africa.

When they said that, their eyes sparkled with excitement, just like the navigator of the 16th century.

It is said that the food crisis is breaking out there, and wars among tribes and warlords are continuing.

Although they are not as "rich" as Somali pirates, there are still diamonds, gold mines and oil that have not been mined. Every inch of land there is full of the smell of carrion - or the smell of money.

Before the Chinese open up the market there, they can make a lot of money.

Drinking, the arms broker with a face full of vicissitudes fell asleep.

Schmidt didn't disturb his dream, but he was worrying about something and drinking.

Now it's not just that newspaper. There are more and more things that he can't think about.

Vaguely, he felt that the logic of the world was quietly changing.

He couldn't describe the feeling, but felt vaguely that the change seemed to have started a long time ago, but even he had been affected recently.

For example, you can sit here and drink.

For example, you can stay outside the dormitory until 10 p.m In order to protect the Chinese people, the local military and police stationed at least three times more police forces here. In the past, they would occasionally encounter robbers. Now as long as they don't walk out of this street, they can hardly see the shadow of a local person.

However, there is no way to think about it.

After all, there seem to be so many things that small people like him can witness with their eyes