Quote:
|
1. I do not think the Chinese are a wonderful democracy.
|
Good food, though.
Quote:
|
2. I understand the PLA runs the show with their space program. It will therefore be of military character from the word go.
|
Oh, yeah. Count on that one.
The moon is not the worry, nor is merely holding the high ground (so to speak). Near Earth orbital access is the worry. The US military just announced the development of orbital weapons platforms, and the Chinese leaders read the newspapers...
I'm not concerned with China trying to deny access. I'm worried about what China, having stated clearly and without ambiguity that they consider war with the US to be "inevitable", is going to park up there. It's not something I lie awake about, but it's something to watch, and it's something that US companies have no business enabling. Personally, I would have gone beyond fines and prosecuted the individual executives who gave the go ahead for the tech transfers.
Quote:
|
What I am getting at is that the actual transfer of technology in and of itself may not be as big a deal as we think. The internal politics of China and US, and how that relates to the rest of the world is a big deal. There are plenty of potential areas of conflict with China-- but I think space is pretty far down the list of immediate concerns.
|
Earth orbit is the ultimate strategic location. Simple kinetic energy weapons become practical, for example.
Quote:
|
Then there is money. There may be lots of cool new stuff on the drawing board in Beijing, but if it costs too much then it won't get funded. If it needs tons of some material that is unavailable except from hostile countries, then it probably won't get funded either. Satellite launch costs tend to be pretty constant -- take a look at Globalstar's annual reports or the ones from Iridium before they went under.
|
The avantage of an authoritarian system: you don't have to worry about profits. There's no General Accounting Office looking over your shoulder. There's no federal employee unions making sure the pay scales are proper and vacation time is adequate.
There no voters to stop you from wasting all that money on the The Glorious People's Science (wink wink) Research Station in lurking about in MEO. The flat-black stealth coatings and IR radiance supression are just for thermal regulation, honest. 8)
Quote:
|
So develpoing the empirical knowledge base would be just as expensive for anyone else as it was for the US and Russia, if done from scratch, no?
|
It's hard to compare cost structure, really. The Russians accomplished some amazing things on limited budgets because, as with China, they could point people at something and order them to do it and maybe they'd avoid extended holiday in Siberia (or Laogai camps in the case of China).
And, actually, this is a fine argument against tech transfers. Why make it easier?
Quote:
|
Anyway, trell me if I am nuts. But I think that rather than naive, I am someone who thinks that different countries have conflicts and interests that often play out in ways nobody expects.
|
Nah, you're OK. Just more optimistic than I can ever be. We're just shooting the astro-breeze here.