[extropy-chat] China competition [was Saving the Hubble]

[Terry W. Colvin]

Spike wrote:
> 
> > Wasn't Loral the company?  Perhaps merged with BOING Boeing.
> >
> > Terry
> 
> The way I heard the story, Loral accidentally
> sent China a proprietary report.  Turned out it wasn't all that
> damaging.  They paid a fine.  But the other guys were doing some
> far more serious leaking.
> 
> spike
> 
> Here ya go Terry.  Some of these are repeats:
> 
> http://bernie.house.gov/documents/articles/20030102180551.asp
> 
> http://www.satnews.com/stories2/1jan2003-1.html
> 
> http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/thisweek/2003_3_14_misp.html
> 
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/americas/2620785.stm
> 
> http://search.csmonitor.com/durable/1999/10/25/p10s1.htm
> 
> http://www.space.com/news/china_technology_030101.html
> 
> http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2003-01-02-tech-exports_x.htm
> 
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2620785.stm

Spike, thank you for these sources.  Last October I read _Year of the Rat:
How Bill Clinton Compromised U.S. Security for Chinese Cash_ by Edward
Timperlake and William C. Triplett II.  Loral and Hughes (satellite maker)
were pinged as fixing China's launcher problems.  On February 15, 1996, a
Chinese Long March 3B space launch vehicle rose, fell, and exploded onto a
local village.  Loral and Hughes solved the crash problem(s) and also
recommended other improvements.  The encoded portion of the Loral satellite
was missing from the debris returned by the Chinese.

Here are my inside book cover notes:
1.  Taiwan is safe for now.
2.  President George W. Bush cited only Iran, Iraq & North Korea as the Axis
of Evil in 2002; nothing about China.
3.  China orbited one astronaut (taichonaut) on 14 October 2003.
4.  PLA can "win" a conventional land-war in Asia.
5.  China's satellite imagery technology lags behind space launch vehicle/ICBM
technology.
6.  China's navy remains primitive although its emphasis on anti-ship missiles
is hard to counter.

Terry


-- 
"Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice


Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com >
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