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Space Science

Asia's Space Race: China vs. India 344

Posted by timothy from the let's-not-fight-it-out-please dept.
securitas writes "London-based military historian and commentator Gwynne Dyer writes about Asia's developing space race with plans from China and India to land people on the Moon, previously mentioned on Slashdot in China's case. In April India announced it will send an unmanned probe to the Moon by 2005 and a manned mission by 2015. Critics say it's a waste of time and money for India to pursue the goal. Meanwhile, Russian space experts are quietly helping China in what is seen as a growing alliance and a somewhat alarmist op-ed piece from the Washington Times worries about China's 21st century space dominance and monopolization of strategic resources like H3, used in nuclear fusion."
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Asia's Space Race: China vs. India More

Asia's Space Race: China vs. India

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  • Right (Score:3, Funny)

    by SpanishInquisition ( 127269 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:19PM (#6268028) Homepage Journal
    What Aliens really need is SARS?
    • From what I've seen of Aliens, most suffer from SARS:

      Shiny Almond-shaped Retina Syndrome
      • Right. Aliens created SARS. That's the whole problem. They're taking over by infecting our society with it. Pretty soon, we'll all be one of them.

      • Re:Right (Score:3, Funny)

        by jo42 ( 227475 )
        ...that describes the 'Aliens' that brought it to Canada from China...

    • That's right, H.G. Wells.

    • What we really needs is another Space Race (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Dukeofshadows ( 607689 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @07:00PM (#6269616) Journal
      This allows the two emerging superpowers of Asia to compete in ways other than an arms race or international satellite countries. I'd like to see this culminate in a Mars race between the US, China, India, Europe, Japan, and perhaps Russia (or at least as part of another team). Competition between space programs drove them to the cutting edge so much faster than would have been possible otherwise, or as Buzz Aldrin said "it was like transplanting a decade from the 21st century into the 20th". Technology will benefit, new technologies will develop, and we just might gain the knowledge needed to get off our little cradle in case of emergency. Lord knows that if someone other than the US gets beyond the moon first we will probably get stirred into action, especially if someone like Bush is in office. With the shuttle program out of whack, we could use a good kick in the pants for our own program anyway.

  • just what we need.. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by rkz ( 667993 )
    This is exactly whats needed to kick nasa into shape!

    • Re:just what we need.. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by NetCAM ( 40537 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:40PM (#6268141)
      Yea, cept it aint going happen. The Bush administration is hell bent on destroying the environment, casting away alliances 40+ years in the making, starting wars, continuing to lose a war on drugs that makes the rich richer and the poor poorer while locking up thousands of people for non-viloent crimes.

      I doubt Nasa or and science/space related issues even come close to becoming part of their agenda unless a tradegy happens like the Columbia accident happens.

      America will wakeup and rush back into the space arena only when it suits the politicans politically and financially and by then it will be to late. JFK did a good thing by creating the goal of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely. Its a shame that the politicans and american publics support for that program died after that happened.

      • in my humble opinion, the parent post, although a flamebait and itself flamey, is unfortunately true.

        I would believe that the politicians do need to wake up. it's not that destroying the terrorist is bad, but it's time to review that why there are terrorists, are they simply shitty pimpy-faced nerd that hates the whole world? probably not. they are there because of something.

        they hate large nations (e.g. China on those liberation parties, America on those in asia minor & arabian regions) because the l

  • One good thing.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Hogwash McFly ( 678207 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:23PM (#6268051)
    When you take your holiday to the moon in twenty years time you'll be spoilt for choice when it comes to takeout/takeaway food. Chow mein or curry? It's always a dilemma for me...

  • US in the new Space race (Score:3, Insightful)

    by bsharitt ( 580506 ) <(moc.ttirahs) (ta) (tegdirb)> on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:23PM (#6268056) Journal
    I wonder if there is enough public interest for the government to enter this new space race. The American side of the race may involve private venture.

  • I'm glad to see China and Russia get over their differences in a productive, co-operative venture such as this. The world needs to work together as a whole. Remember, we're all the same species! :-)

    I know it's offtopic, but I'm feeling philosophical this afternoon...

    • Re:Co-operation is the way to go! (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Can't say I agree with that, sorry. We probably wouldn't even have got the moon yet if the American's hadn't been competing *against* the Soviets. Humans work best when under pressure, so it's either compete against each other or stagnate.

    • Re:Co-operation is the way to go! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Jeremiah Cornelius ( 137 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @03:04PM (#6268240) Homepage Journal
      It'll be a come-uppance for the "market-always-determines-the-best-solution-crowd" to see these state-sponsored ventures dominating comercial use of space-exploration, while the "Market Solutions" stop somewhere around Dish Network.
    • Hate to sound cynical, but I can see people uniting under one banner on planet earth only to become nationalistic about that, and use it as an excuse to bust up life on other planets...

  • Finally (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Dashmon ( 669814 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:27PM (#6268073)
    Finally some global interest in spacefaring. As long as only one nation has any interest in space stuff, there's never going to be any substantial new developments. That, and the US really doesn't have any right to be the sole ruler up there (although it's our (europe's) own fault, as we just let the US lead every mission and all research). I hope europe, asia, and the US will working together more than they are today, in the near future.

    • Re:Finally (Score:4, Interesting)

      by mrseigen ( 518390 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:29PM (#6268084) Homepage Journal
      Hopefully, this will also shove the Yanks to get back on track for space technology, even for no reasons other than national security (I think the Americans still fear China, correct?).
      • ... in the last few weeks the US has anounced that it will be militarizing space "officially" and it won't be allowing other nations to take the high ground. There will be wars over it, cooperation is over for now. They will play act at it, that's about it.

        And it goes back to planetary population and natural resources, namely oil and freshwater. Anyone may run the numbers for themselves, projected growth rates, current planetary useage,proven reserves, yada yada, then make some assumptions. There's enough

      • Re:Finally (Score:3, Interesting)

        by DNS-and-BIND ( 461968 )
        China is no longer the "main enemy" of the U.S. Terrorism has pushed it far down the list. It was only seen as #1 during the 90s due to the lack of any viable alternatives. Heck, they're the Chinese...crappy tech, no navy, and their only ability is defending (classic blunder: getting involved in a land war in Asia). If the chicoms want to waste billions on a moon shot, more power to them. The talent is rented anyway (Russians) and frankly, they could spend the money in better areas. The sky in the Chi

    • Re:Finally (Score:5, Insightful)

      by thinmac ( 98095 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @04:11PM (#6268597) Homepage
      I hope europe, asia, and the US will working together more than they are today

      Actually, I think the lesson here is that we need to hope that they don't work together. Why did the space race in the middle of the 20th century accomplish so much? Because the US and the Russians were competing. Why is this talk of Indian and Chinese space programs spurring discussion and worry about the space program in the US? Because they signify new competition when we haven't had any in so long. What we need is competition, not cooperation; just like in business, the best situation is when there are lots of fairly equal players all at each other's throats, and monopolies (either through a single country dominating, or multiple countries working as a team) kills progress.
      • But the problem with that competition, as I said, is that it can't last. Sooner or later, one party will emerge victorious, and when that happens, it's all over again. Even worse: is space exploration is only motivated by economic interests, which is the case when competition is the main motive, more important interests will be forgotten. That's the way the market works: if you allow it to run freely, it always does what's best. For itself.

        On the other hand, if people would finally lay their bussiness inte

        • Re:Finally (Score:3, Interesting)

          by Christopher Thomas ( 11717 )
          On the other hand, if people would finally lay their bussiness interests to rest and start thinking about what's good for people, we'll be *there* in no time.

          Space exploration is not "good for people", and won't be any time soon. It's good for the _species_, in the very long term (once self-sufficient colonies are established), but if there's one thing humanity has consistently demonstrated, it's that this is not a major motivation to them.

          Joe Average will gain no direct benefit, and debatable indirect b

  • Useful stuff (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:28PM (#6268078)
    I really do hope that America and China start a new space race, especially if the prize is a useful resource rather than just patriotic pride. That way any technology that's developed as a result will be more immediately useful to the rest of us, rather than more interesting ideas waiting for applications.

    I'm not a great fan of the idea of China and America carving up the moon between them, though.
  • is always the balance of power. from the napoleonic era to the realpolitik era, to inter-war period and post war period, then cold war, it's always balance of power that acts on the world to prevent world domination.

    Powers comes and goes. Napoleon rises, and falls. Bismarck rises, and falls. The franks, then the prussians, the list goes on and on, now it comes to america, who knows if the next one is China?

    Yet i don't think china could gasp the key to victory here by having space mission that denotes quite a bit of nothing in military terms (forget the whole lot on spy satellite, they are of no significant use on a direct confrontation of two nuclear-powered countries). To me, I would be more impressed and scared off by the change to democratic (NOT the democratic party but rather democratic society-type form, i.e. humanitarian, [n.b. vegetarian eats vegetable.. so humanitarian eats.. oh nevermind.]) or there is a significant change in the government structure and the way people do business (i.e. guanxi or so.)

    enough offtopic, but here's what I want to say on space mission for china.

    <div tone="sarcastic">
    For india, I think that they better feed their crowd better before the birth mortality rate goes back to the 1930s standard. (THAT'S flamey.)
    </div>

    • Re:The major problem of the world in every century (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 22, 2003 @03:08PM (#6268260)
      I was waiting to see the first highly moderated post and it's exactly what I expected: "We're (Western nations) are #1, this means nothing." Wake up, China has a population three times the size of North America, India twice. Since you quote history, it shouldn't be difficult to uncover 19th century Euporean sentiments similar to yours regarding the US. Their complacency was proven wrong too. (The colonial similarities between old Europe and modern America are also striking, but that's a different story.)

      The Chinese and Indian people are just as smart and educated as any other, and a whole lot less comfortable and hungrier for achievment. Sit back, relax, and you'll watch them eat your lunch.

    • The policies of MAD (Score:3, Insightful)

      by gad_zuki! ( 70830 ) *
      >Powers comes and goes.

      This has been true, but has any nuclear enabled nation been overtaken in combat? Nope.

      You are absolutely correct that power comes and goes but the combo of ICBMs and Nuclear weapons means that there's a much greater certainty that the "nuclear club" will establish what Europe calls a multipolar world: many powers competiting for a greater good (like in this article) and hopefully not starting WWIII.

      Once we're all happily armed with nukes it will only be internal unrest that chan

  • There's good to come out of space. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by aerojad ( 594561 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:29PM (#6268083) Homepage Journal
    In terms of mining, minerals, resources we could acquire out there, if it takes China or whoever else to spank around the U.S. and make them realise that they'll gladly take the whole pie if we do nothing about it.. if that's what it takes to get NASA off of life support and back into space, then bring it on. The ultimate end will justify all the means.

  • This is good news for everyone. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Glowing Fish ( 155236 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:29PM (#6268085) Homepage

    It is good that India and China are competing through science, and not through arms. Honestly, I don't see how this could be a bad thing for anyone. India and China will both make new scientific discoveries, and seeing them get into space may inspire the EU, the US and Russia to increase their space efforts.


    I know lots of people are going to complain that India should be focusing their efforts on improving their living standards rather than going on wild adventures. But I don't think the one has to distract from the other. India actually has enough food to feed herself, its just a problem of social structure and education. And it is not as if the resources used for going into space make that great of a impact on the ability of India to educate its population. In economic terms, there isn't that great of a cost of space missions, because the resources that go into them can't really easily go anywhere else.

    • This could be a bad thing for those who are not fed well in India and in China (of which, the India case is more severe), if you have ever visited India yourself, you'll agree with me if you go to the towns (and not the cities) yourself.

      To a timescale of 10 years, space mission (and military research) does sort of nothing good to the society (the theory is that if NO ONE develop military, NO ONE ever would need it.); and India does NOT have enough food to feed herself, if you consider the FDA diet for them

      • Re:This is good news for everyone. (Score:4, Insightful)

        by bluGill ( 862 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @03:30PM (#6268380)

        Give a man a fish and he eats for a day, teach a man to fish and he will eat for the rest of his life.

        I don't mind helping a poor person who gets into trouble get out of trouble. However giving a poor person an endless supply of food doesn't help that poor person get richer. He may eat, but he will never contribute to socity. He ends up being a drain on resources that I would prefer to spend other places.

        The theory of space programs is they require jobs to achive. So you hire and pay some smart people, who then have money to hire other (not so smart?) people to do things, and your ecconomy improves. India has plenty of smart people who don't have good jobs, so a space program will help them out. Once they get bootstraped out of the situation they are in, they can drop the space program and go to things they would rather have. (or not, there is nothing wrong with a space program other than the money it costs, and they might come up with a good reason to keep it)

    • India and China still have nuclear weapons and everyone knows that developing heavy-lift rockets always helps your nuclear missile systems.

      While China and Russia get closer the United States and India will as well. Or maybe India and Japan.
    • I'd much rather see China and India cooperate, if only so that I could say "Chindia".

  • Oh please (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ErikZ ( 55491 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:32PM (#6268097)

    China is too risk adverse to become a major player. They'll probably get to the moon. Then the first major accident after that (loosing face) will have them scale back to the "Floating in endless circles" model the US uses.

    And when China gives up, India will bow out soon after.

    Space will be conqured by people, THEN the governments will follow.
    • Except that neither China, nor India are really as scared of loss-of-life as Europe/America. This is one of the fundamental differences Asians see when they come to America/Europe. It probably has something to do with the culture. People are ready to accept that the loss-of-life is something acceptable compared to the gain.

      When the Yang-tze flooded in China, and when a dam broke-up years ago, the death toll was in excess of 100K. Did you even hear of that? When you hear of Kashmir, you never hear of the 60

    • Re:Oh please (Score:2, Informative)

      by IroygbivU ( 534043 )
      Yeah... Just like the Chinese rocket disaster caused them to halt their space program.

      http://www.floridatoday.com/space/explore/stori e s/ 1996/032396b.htm

      (The year is 1996)

      JERUSALEM (AP) - Israeli television aired a videotape Saturday that for the first time shows the devastation caused when a Chinese rocket crashed into a village after a failed satellite launch.
      An Israeli engineer shot the footage during a business trip to China, Channel Two television said.

      The rocket veered off course two seconds afte

  • So, India should concentrate on... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Travoltus ( 110240 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:37PM (#6268127) Journal
    dire domestic matters first, eh?
    Isn't that what they said about America?
    Ever recall "Whitey on the moon"?

    India has just as legitimate a reason to go into space as China. Aside from needing the room, they have just as much right to push into the ultra modern age as the rest of us.

    Jeesh, what a bunch of racist banter.

    At least the US isn't threatened with nuclear war with India over Taiwan.

  • It is pretty alarmist (Score:3, Informative)

    by Wyatt Earp ( 1029 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:37PM (#6268130)
    "The day we were visiting, the Chinese crew was utilizing the EVA (extra-vehicular activity) building. You do not train for EVAs if you are doing simple orbital missions. EVAs are typically related to space-based construction work."

    That's just plain FUD. The US and Soviets EVA'ed for years and years before they ever did any space-based construction work.

    From Skylab to Mir the majority of space stations were assembled by docking modules togeather with minimal EVA for bolting things on.

    Ed White's Gemini EVA took place 20 years before Shuttle missions started EVAs for fixing equipment in orbit.
  • The Washington Post piece is flawed. Besides the fact that it exaggerates the importance of "space domination", if transporting H3 from the moon would be "economically feasible" I would think NASA had tried to do that already.

    Fusion isn't even plausible yet, the energy that you get out of it is (much) less than what you put in. I think the entire piece is way too far fetched and simplified.

  • Been there, Done that. (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Been there, done that with a flag up there. What China should do is to beat US in the manned mission to Mars. Then they can claim that Mars is historically theirs 100 years later and demand re-unification to the "renegade planet".

  • Is it me, or does anyone think this sounds like a game of WarCraft???

  • What is this guy on? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by panurge ( 573432 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:49PM (#6268185)
    "Third, as the nation in position to exploit moon resources, China could leapfrog the world in some important earthbound technologies. Scientists have acknowledged the usefulness of H3 in helping achieve nuclear fusion success. The moon appears to be a large source of naturally occurring H3, a commodity that would be of such value that the transport back to Earth would be economically feasible."
    When I read this, I began to wonder if it was a spoof. Yes, tritium/deuterium fusion is easier to achieve than D/D fusion. What do you think they put in H-bomb warheads? But the idea that piles of tritium lie around on the Moon waiting to be picked up and shovelled into a re-entry vehicle is, frankly, bizarre. [note to anyone who doesn't get it: yes, I do know what tritium is like. I worked with it for years, which is why I feel slightly qualified to post on this subject.]
    Can any one point to where this one came from?

    The number of H-bomb warheads in circulation demonstrates that there is not exactly a world shortage of tritium or ability to produce it; certainly as the US wasn't afraid of polluting the Colorado River, and the UK of polluting the Irish Sea, I can't imagine that the Chinese would be too worried about the side effects of massive tritium production.

    Conclusion: this is an attempt to frighten paranoid hawks into believing that the Space Race must be resumed to prevent the Chinese from laying claim to all those tritium mines on the Moon. Whereas, actually, we might be better off with some serious international negotiation on space, perhaps even some cooperation. While articles like this one reinforce Chinese paranoia about US intentions, (the author makes it clear that the US must not lose domination in space) we all surely have more to gain by trying to defuse the potential tensions in advance. Which might mean that Dubya has to rethink his approach to ripping up international agreements, but would that be a bad thing?

    • Re:What is this guy on? (Score:5, Informative)

      by RevRigel ( 90335 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @03:06PM (#6268248)
      That's a typo. The moon is an excellent source of Helium-3, which when reacted with Hydrogen-1 provides much cleaner, and more importantly, lower activation energy fusion than H3-H2 or H2-H2 fusion.
      He3 is on the moon is great quantity because the surface of the moon soaks up all the particles in the solar wind, which includes a good bit of He3.

      • Re:What is this guy on? (Score:3, Informative)

        by thue ( 121682 )
        I found a link about this: http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/helium3_0006 30.html [space.com]

      • He3 (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Christopher Thomas ( 11717 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @09:45PM (#6270424)
        The moon is an excellent source of Helium-3, which when reacted with Hydrogen-1 provides much cleaner, and more importantly, lower activation energy fusion than H3-H2 or H2-H2 fusion.

        Actually, D+T is still far easier. He3+_D_ is about on par with D+D, and more importantly produces an energetic _proton_ as the decay product. He3 will not fuse with p, as that would give you something like Li4 (no dice).

        D+T is easy but produces a boatload of neutrons, which carry away most of the reaction energy. As these aren't confined by the reactor's magnetic field, you're stuck letting the shielding material heat up and drawing power off of it with a heat engine. The reactor vessel itself rapidly degrades due to intense neutron radiation.

        You also need to produce a steady supply of T, but you can breed that from a lithium blanket, or just surround the reactor vessel with heavy water and let it breed from D.

        D+D fusion is a bit cleaner than D+T, but much harder to achieve. It produces He3+n half the time and T+p the other half. The T will react very quickly to produce He4+n, which carries away most of the energy in the neutron. If you don't have a long confinement time, you're stuck with this. If you do have a long confinement time, the He3 will burn with D to produce He4+p, which carries away a lot of the energy in the p, which stays confined, heats the plasma, and is otherwise nice.

        Summary for D+D: Only decent if you can keep it confined for a while, still releases half its energy as neutrons, much harder than D+T.

        He3+D is slightly easier than D+D, but still in the same ballpark (much harder than D+T). Most importantly, He3+D gives He4+p, so almost all of your energy ends up in charged particles. The problem is that you get D+D happening as long as there's D in the plasma, so you have to run a reactor with much more He3 than D, and still get neutrons coming out - just much less than with D+D. This means your reactor vessel lasts at least 10 times longer, your plasma heats itself, and you can use higher-efficiency methods of tapping power if you want to.

        The problem is that He3 is rare, and trying to breed it via D+D just gives you a D+D reactor, with its neutron problem.

        If there's a lot of He3 on the moon and it's relatively easily harvested, it may be a viable source of fuel. I have my doubts about this being practical (I think we'd be better off filtering it out of natural helium, though that's not a picnic either, as it's much rarer than deuterium).
    • They're not referring to tritium; they're referring to He3, a helium isotope. The solar wind has been spraying it out for billions of years, but it's too light for the Earth's atmosphere to hold. The moon has even lower gravity, but apparantly Helium 3 gets stuck in the surface rock there.

  • Bruce Sterling on the India-China space race (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Allen Varney ( 449382 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @02:49PM (#6268187) Homepage

    Bruce Sterling talked about the India/China space race in his May 2003 Wired column [wired.com]. Some extracts:

    "Nobody in the Western press takes much notice of India's space aspirations, because by Yankee standards it doesn't make sense for India to have any. Yet India launched its first missile in 1963 and its first cosmonaut in 1984. Nobody in the West thought the country would ever go nuclear, either. That was a blunder in judgment. [...]

    "Why is Gandhi's homeland trying to reach the moon when people sleep on the streets in Calcutta and AIDS gnaws the country's flesh? For the same reason the US sloughed off poverty programs to fund Apollo in the 1960s: global prestige.

    "India doesn't need long-range missiles to nuke neighbor and archrival Pakistan. For a war that intimate, bullock carts would do. The Agni III is aimed straight at world public opinion. The India-Pakistan PR skirmish is already almost over, and India is clearly winning. Every great power sweats bullets over Pakistan's bomb, but India's somehow makes that country worthy of consideration for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council. [...]

    "Since India demonstrated its bomb in 1998, the Chinese have been increasingly uneasy. China reacted to the detonation with angry demands that the international community keep India contained. When that got nowhere, China helped Pakistan go nuclear. In retrospect, that was a scary, destabilizing misstep. But now India and China are poised to continue their rivalry on safer high ground - beyond Earth's atmosphere.

    "Nuclear India versus nuclear China is Kennedy versus Kruschev, and Reagan versus Gorbachev, all over again. Now, as then, a space race is a sexy alternative to nuclear annihilation. [...]

    "Who will become top dog in South Asia? That's an open question, and there aren't many good ways to answer short of a useless massacre. A space race offers a good solution. It's a symbolic tournament that tests competing political and economic systems to their limit.

    "A decade after the end of the Cold War, good old-fashioned space programs still matter. Not for exploration's sake, but to settle new cold wars. If you doubt it, imagine this scenario: It's 2029, and a lunar mission lands at Tranquillity Base. A crew of heroic young Indians - or Chinese - quietly folds and puts away America's 60-year-old flag. If the world saw that on television, wouldn't the gesture be worth tens of billions of rupees or yuan? Of course it would."

  • This means that American tech jobs will soon be exported...to the moon!

  • Indian Ventures == PR (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 22, 2003 @03:12PM (#6268274)

    I am an Indian (note this before you start flaming or modding down) and has been following the Indian space programme and a whole lot of other programmes for quite a while, (and yes, I can claim to understand the Indian psychology more).

    In India everything of this nature are 90% for PR and public consumption and 10% realistic projects.

    This is a not stupid move either [although, it does end up foul, read on], unlike many Sladhdotters who think that India is stupidly wasting money on space, ocean, Antarctica and a whole lot of crap that are playthings for rich countries, while the people starve.

    It is a calculated risk, more money is spent on trying to keep the economy stable, trying to provide decent health etc. (The percentage of GDP spent on defence in India is much less than that of the US.) The problem is that the corruption in this area is a whole lot more than the corruption that takes place in the high-tech stuff.

    Okey, to make it short the basic ideas are:

    • Poke their hand everywhere to show that they can do what the big, technologically advanced nations can do (but it ends there... at the poking stage).
    • Keep the morale of the people up --which would be at 0 if it were not for all this euphoria enducing techo-crap.
    • Contrary to popular belief, these areas are are more difficult to swipe money from, (well, this is a relative concept), compared to the distribution of healthcare, economy (liberalisation, deregulation etc.), and food and stuff, where all the big bucks are.

    The bottomline is that it is more PR, these vision are not realistic from the financial point of view --India doesn't have the money to pull this off, nor will they be ready to take money from the food-health-economy dept. and put it here, even with domestic private investors, for the simple reason that corrupt dudes would lose the easy buck and money laundering private businessmen will lose a lot of opportunities.

    • Indian Ventures == PR (Follow Up) (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Follow-up to my post

      I think my post would be misleading, so I have to make something clear (some of it is just restating or rephrasing what I said before, but I hope it would be clearer):

      1. India does not have the technology to even send a 2-tonne satellite into geo-stationary orbit.
      2. India does not have the money that countries such as US, Japan, China or ESA has to spend on such a mission.
      3. Indian high-tech programmes tend to heavily depend on off-the-shelf components procured from abroad. The US can easil

    • I'm Indian as well, but are you suggesting that ISRO has a corruption scandal raging in its midst? That's rich.

  • The fools! You don't go into space because it's hard, you go because it's profitable. They're living in the 1960's, I tell you!

    Meanwhile, back in the USA, we debate whether we'll even be able to make a decision on what to begin replacing the low earth orbitter fleet with before they all rust apart in 20 years. I'm betting we won't (make the decision, replace them, your choice).

    As a further random thought, perhaps if we spent more looking beyond low earth orbit, we wouldn't have to spend quite as much

  • What about the Lunar Treaty? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by farrellj ( 563 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @03:54PM (#6268520) Homepage Journal
    What is the current status, and how has signed it...the Lunar Treaty gives The Moon similar status to Antartica, saying that The Moon is a common property of all people of the Earth, and any country that makes use of it's resources must share them equally with the people of the Earth. Did China sign, or are they following the US lead and ignoring treaties?

    ttyl
    Farrell
  • From the story: "electrify the nation and show the world that India is capable of taking up complex projects at the cutting edge of space research" Cutting edge for 1959, the year the Soviets landed a lunar impactor.

  • I'm happy to see (Score:3, Interesting)

    by sstory ( 538486 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @05:17PM (#6268968) Homepage
    a burgeoning competition between other states to achieve a difficult technical objective--there will be benefits for the whole world, as well as give competition for America, without which we'll be less inspired, and motivated, and such.

    But I wish the goal were not space, but cancer, or nanofabrication, or such. It would mean more to the lives of their citizens and eventually the world if they spent the money on bioengineering, medicine, genetic modification of crops, training their people in science and engineering, IT, and such. Space is a less efficient expenditure of resources, despite how cool and prestigious it is. Certain other technical objectives as the goal for the race could have greater rewards than Space.

  • Why do I get the feeling... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by crashnbur ( 127738 ) on Sunday June 22, 2003 @08:42PM (#6270144)
    ...that this is eventually going to boil down to who Russia and the US helps first/most? I hope this doesn't kick off some kind of renewed cold war / paranoia epidemic.

    Does anyone have any preference about which billion-plus nation gets their first? I tend to favor India, if for no better reason than their human rights record... Hmm.

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