70% of the world’s body armor comes from China: it is also hit by bullets, and it is better for self-use than for export
Body armor is an area that many people will pay attention to, especially in actual combat, many people will first understand the real performance of bulletproof protective gear in war. Compared with the development history of bulletproof protective gear abroad for more than 100 years, China’s understanding of bulletproof protective gear mainly comes from the Korean battlefield. During this period, the United Nations Army, headed by the U.S. Army, was equipped with a lot of bulletproof protective gear and related night vision combat equipment, which constituted a dual suppression of industry and technology. It is reported that the body armor equipped by the US military at that time was mainly M52 all-nylon body armor made of 12 layers of bullet-proof nylon. Due to poor air permeability, it is very stuffy after putting it on, so American soldiers are very resistant to this body armor.
Thanks to the European and American military’s “advocating life and freedom”, when we captured UN soldiers, we often seized a full set of bullet-proof protective gear, including the helmets they wore, which were all obtained by us. With these reference equipment, we also started the development of domestic body armor, but due to the impact of economic and industrial strength, the development of body armor during this period can only be regarded as a groping and cannot be a real start. During the Vietnam War, affected by the battle, we began to equip the front-line technical services such as car, artillery, and air defense with bullet-proof protective gear. It should be noted that during this period, European and American countries had a huge production volume of body armor. Their domestic companies worked overtime to produce new body armor and assigned them to the front line. In the 1980s, when the US-Soviet struggle for hegemony was the hottest, the technical level of European and American bulletproof vests was greatly improved.
Regrettably, however, the Soviet Union disintegrated due to internal problems, and the huge defense pressure in Europe and the United States suddenly disappeared. Under the circumstance that the pressure disappeared, Europe and the United States began to “wield a knife from the palace”, the military canceled a large number of orders, and many companies began to transform and engage in other industries to develop. Only a small number of companies still persisted. However, due to the transformation and closure of a large number of enterprises, the source of the European and American bulletproof vests has begun to alert, and the related supporting industrial chain has also lost a lot. At the same time, China’s manufacturing industry has made great progress, and the reputation of “world factory” is already a special adjective for China at this time. Under such circumstances, European and American companies first tried to import material for body armor from China, such as aramid, PE, UHMW PE, etc., began to provide European and American countries. However, no one thought that when Chinese materials began to enter European and American countries and became their main materials for the production of bulletproof vests, European and American countries accelerated the speed of “self-governing” in order to “save troubles”, and finally only retained textiles and textiles. A small number of R&D companies all import Chinese materials or simply outsource to China for production.
After the Chinese-made bulletproof protective gear was heavily equipped by the European and American armies, they were also stunned to discover that they were “Made in China”. Out of the “glass heart” mentality, they began to resist and discredit the quality of China’s defense ammunition protective equipment. In fact, the Chinese defense bomb protective gear saved their lives many times in the fierce battle. The foreign Ministry of National Defense also adopted an attitude of “ignoring” the complaints from the military. The foreign Ministry of National Defense living in the compound is thinking that the price of China’s defense ammunition protective gear is cheap. If European and American companies produce it, it costs at least US$4000 to US$5000, while Chinese companies only cost US$1000-2000. In terms of bulletproof quality, China has adopted stricter technical standards than those of Europe and America, and its pursuit of body armor is higher than that of European and American countries. If it is also hit by a bullet, the quality of China’s self-use body armor must be higher than the export version. The reason is simple. The Chinese standard requires that the dent of the body armor must be ≤25mm, and the United States requires ≤44mm. In other details, China’s standards are still strict.
The reason why China has such strict technical standards has to thank all countries in the world for their strong support. At present, China occupies 70% of the global body armor market and more than 80% of the material market. European and American soldiers shed blood and wounded on the battlefield, bringing valuable practical experience on the battlefield to China. Many people may wonder how China, as a supplier, knows these data? In fact, it is very simple. If Europe and the United States do not have the ability to produce the same set of products, they can only be handed over to China. Currently, only China, the United States and the Netherlands can fully produce this type of system. Russia needs to import materials from China, so it is not counted. Although the United States and the Netherlands can produce independently, they are expensive and the gains outweigh the losses. For this reason, these countries can only give their own experience on the battlefield, including where the most shots are, and the European and American armies will fully explain in order to allow Chinese manufacturers to improve. If they did not put forward any suggestions for improvement, it means that the design of this batch of body armor is very balanced. As for China’s own advanced body armor, it will not be provided to the outside world in the short term. If we sell advanced body armor to the outside world, it means that we have mastered the new body armor technology.
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