India Test-Fires Cryogenic Rocket Engine

alphakappa writes "Wired News reports that India has successfully testfired a cryogenic rocket engine that can be used to 'launch high-altitude satellites, send a man to the moon -- or build intercontinental ballistic missiles'. The rocket which typically has to fire for 12 minutes during flight was fired for 17 minutes during ground testing. So are we gonna see competition in the moon race? Remember, India has already spoken about sending a mission to the moon and it has joined the Galileo consortium along with China."

Before

[Gyan]

anyone comes out and spouts the "stolen or bought technology" meme, the Wired article says

India's bid to develop its own cryogenic engines suffered several setbacks. In 1992, Russia agreed to give India the technology but reversed the decision after Moscow signed the Missile Technology Control Regime with the United States. Washington objected to giving India the technology because of its potential use for nuclear missiles.

Russia later agreed to sell fully built engines, without passing on the technology, to India.

India developed a rudimentary form of its cryogenic technology in 2001 and several tests were held after that to fine-tune it.

Re:Before

[Anonymous Coward]

No need for the stolen "theme", I am glad that they are able to develop their own rocket technology... which I guess that means they no longer need the economic aid, right?

Just like China I guess, they can send people in orbit... I guess they no longer need foreign monetary aid.

As far as I can see, it is all good news now. It is gonna save us a bunch of money now, oh wait...

Re:Before

[javiercero]

No, you are confusing trade deficit with actual debt. India and China sell more to the rest of the world than they buy from the Western nations, since they both have very protectionistic markets. However both countries have hughe loans against those same western countries. So think of it as your neighbor who has a store, he sells a lot of stuff to you, you can not sell much to him/her.... and yet you have to give him/her large chuncks of money as loans since he/she claims to live under poverty (and you do n

Re:Before

[javiercero]

Again you do not seem to understand debt in loans, vs debt put on your currency.

The US and other Western and Asian powers put debt against their currencies in the form of bonds. I.e. you get IOUs, and you get to "own" part of the economy. Much like a stock market of sort.

The loans that India and other developing countries get, are not agains their curerncies. Think of it as credit card debt.

So they are two very different types of debt. The world needs a country like the US or the EU that allow money tran

Re:an ultra nationalistic indian...(proud of that!

[javiercero]

I am afraid that your nationalistic blind got the best of you. You are comparing apples to oranges, but I will bite. 1. The crime rates in India are rather high too. 2. The sound logic of your government to enter an arms race with Pakistan ove a piece os sh*t land known as Kashmir. Whoah... Is the world supposed to be impressed over your handling of affairs. 3. What is the poverty level in India darling, before you come and critizise another nation's economy as "unstable" better take a look at India's ec

Re:Before

[good soldier svejk]

Actually, based on these Treasury Department figures [ustreas.gov], I calculate the foreign held percentage of US Treasury securities at about 21%. Another 41% of the public debt is held by the federal government itself (in the Social Security, Medicare and Highway trust funds). The Treasury Department publishes lots of good data about the public debt [treas.gov]on the web.

From the first link you can see that China controls about 8.6% of the foreign debt, trailing the UK (9.8%) and Japan (33%).

Now here's a question. If Federa

Re:Before

[Anonymous Coward]

Why steal? A significant of the students in US science and engineering programs are Indian, and I don't know how many are from China. It's funny, the US will "teach a man to fish" in countries that it bitches about IP theft, and will "give a man a fish" to 3rd world countries who really need some sort of economic base. Dumbasses.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Before

[Artifakt]

Yes, but its disingenious of us to claim to be be charitable when we are actually expecting a nice return on our investment.

Re:Before

[twiddlingbits]

I assume you have never heard of reverse engineering? You can bet they did some of that! I also suspect they have hired a few unemployed Russian rocket engineers. If you want to get there fast you pay for outside knowledge, and learn from the masters. To go from "rudimentary" to what they have now in 2ish years isn't possible without some expert advice.

Re:Before

[MoP030]

Before anyone comes out and spouts the "stolen or bought technology" meme

...we should recall the meme that US and Soviet rockets are based on German rockets (further developed by German scientists).

Re:Before

[tealover]

Yeah, it was bad timing for the Germans. If they had waited a couple of years to begin WW2, they probably would have had usable rocket technology which may have changed the course of the war.

Thankfully, Hitler was an egotist and pushed thousands of German intellectuals out of Germany and to America and other Allied nations.

Re:Before

[ninejaguar]

A significant number of German scientists were captured by the now defunct Soviets. They were immediately put to work to fight the cold war.

You may even remember that half of Germany belonged to the Soviets until the 90's. There was a little something called the Berlin wall that separated communist Germany from democratic Germany.

= 9J =

Re:Before

[ninejaguar]

"No."

No? No what? You appear to have repeated what I stated, but that's ok. For further information regarding the Soviet-bound East Germany, visit here [wikipedia.org] and here [nationbynation.com].

For further information about captured German scientists working to build Soviet rocket technology, read this [russianspaceweb.com].

= 9J =

Re:Before

[mikerich]

US rockets - yes. Russian rockets - no. they developed them by themselves

The Americans got the vast majority of the V2 development team and hardware; they then demolished the production lines which fell inside the Soviet sector of Germany.

Sergei Korolev and his team were sent to Germany to review the wreckage, they retrieved plenty of information which they put to good use in the R1 which was a Soviet copy of the V2.

Best wishes,
Mike.

Re:Before

[axxackall]

Before that there was the RGD team headed by Tsiolkovky with sucessful flights in 1930x. Later, right after WW2, Soviets used the chance to kidnap some German scientists, but I heard the rumor (inside Soviet space research secret labs) that those German scientists did not really helped by remaking V-2 blueprints. If Germans would not have been kidnapped, then Soviets would just have to sponsor further reseach and development of the original RGD seria.

Re:Before

[LWATCDR]

The Chinese developed solid fuel rockets. The US built the first Liquid Fueled rocket. Actually one American built the first Liquid fueled rocket and that was Robert Goddard.
One of the the great Myths of the modern age is that the US space program dependeded on German technology. Not really. Many inovations where native. The only real decendant of the V2 programs that was the US used was the Redstone.
The Russians also used a few V2s to jump start there programs but again they went there own way pretty quic

Re:Before

[mesocyclone]

How do you explain the fact that Huntsville, Alabama (home of the rocketry program) has German Hill [so named for the German rocket scientists who lived there]? A number of German scientists were very influential in the early rocketry program through Apollo at least.

moon race? nah...

[Barbarian]

So are we gonna see competition in the moon race?

No, we're just going to see India launch a few satelites to show that they can (because if you can launch a satelite, you can build ICBM's), I doubt they will want to go to the moon.

Re:moon race? nah...

[Brahmastra]

This ICBM nonsense seems to be floating all over the place. Only a bloody idiot would use a cryogenic engine for an ICBM. You don't need to build a god damned geostationery satellite launch vehicle to build an ICBM. India's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle which has been operational for many years now can easily be converted to an operational ICBM. Cryogenic engines just add the need for a lot more ground facilities for a launch. There just isn't a need for an ICBM since China and Pakistan are right next door to India. The attitude seems to be.. "oh India's launching satellites? It must be for something bad." Get over it assholes.

Re:moon race? nah...

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets also be realistic here; the only place India would want to hit with an ICBM is Pakistan, and they already have more conventional rockets which are plenty capable of doing that.

This rocket is just because they can, and no doubt also an attempt to attract international investment. After all, this is a great adverstisment for the education standards of your workforce if you're able to achieve complex technological goals like this.

Why just Pakistan?

[bj8rn]

India has the second largest population in the world. They have nuclear weapons and are capable of building ICBM-s to carry those nukes. Now, why in the world should Pakistan be the only place they want to hit with those nukes, if they have the means to for more? Why not take on China or the Muslim world? I think the rocket is a way of showing the rest of the world that India is a player, too.

Re:Why just Pakistan?

[bj8rn]

I wasn't saying that India would want to attack those all those other countries. I was just saying that by showing that they have the capability to do some real harm to others, India would gain more influence in the world. Which would keep others from messing with them.

As for being peace-loving, that's what everybody says themselves to be.

Um, have you read the paper in the last 10 years?

[Dr. Spork]

India has tested 5 nuclear bombs already. China has been testing bombs for decades. And as far as who's politically capable of a first (nuclear) strike, the list goes:

1. USA (fucking scary, but read the doc's!)
2. (far behind) Israel
3. (even bigger gap) India
4. (tie) Pakistan, France, China, N. Korea

Re:Um, have you read the paper in the last 10 year

[mesocyclone]

One more potential use has come to my attention since I wrote the article above.

From here [cdi.org] we see a threatened (12/5/2002) Russian use (apparently of nuclear weapons) to destroy the population of Chechnya:

Question: Shamil Basayev is threatening Russia with nuclear terrorism. Should we be frightened?

Answer: If Chechen terrorists attempt to seize a nuclear power station or spread radioactive materials to pollute the air and land, it will amount to proclaiming a nuclear war on Russia. The reply will be ruth

Re:Um, have you read the paper in the last 10 year

[mesocyclone]

India is at the top of the list because of the instability of Pakistan. It does not mean that India is especially aggressive or desires to make such an attack.

However, given the instability of Pakistan, it is possible that India will find it necessary to enact a counter-force strike against Pakistan for its own survival, in conditions where Pakistan is taken over by Isamic fundamentalists of a certain stripe. I do not know if such a strike is practical, however, in which case India would instead be forced

Re:Um, have you read the paper in the last 10 year

[mesocyclone]

India would first-strike Pakistan if they calculated (either correctly or not) that an Al Qaeda/Taliban style regime would represent too much of a threat, and that the first strike would be effective.

In the case of WW-II, it may be that the only reason that Germany did not use toxic weapons was that Hitler had personally been gassed in WW-I and thus chose not to use them.

Furthermore, WW-I had shown that gas weapons were not that effective if both sides used them. Saddam used them more effectively against

Re:Um, have you read the paper in the last 10 year

[mesocyclone]

Iran's #2 mullah, Rafsanjani, has indeed said he is willing to sacrifice millions in order to destroy Israel. Pakistan is a different situation. The biggest danger to the US with Pakistan is that an Islamist takeover would result in nukes which could be given to terrorists, and which might be detonated anonymously in the US, with the source unknown (was it Pakistan? Iran? North Korea? stolen Russian Nuke?).

Perhaps indeed India would not perceive the threat to itself as high enough to instantly attack, in w

Re:Why just Pakistan?

[lommer]

Wow, the historical ignorance displayed in this post is astounding:

The ONLY reason nuclear war didn't break out during those years was because a. we'd have volatilized them and b. the Russians were never quite sure their equipment would actually work. Furthermore, they knew that we were highly unlikely to ever fire the first shot.

Please post some sources for this opinion - it's highly unconventional and conflicts with the generally accepted historical view. The Russians were actually fairly confident in

Re:Why just Pakistan?

[demachina]

Odds are the next country to use nuclear weapons will be the same country that first and last used them, the U.S. The Bush administration has decided it would be a good idea to develop new, small, tacticial nukes to use on bunkers and have managed to fund it. Many in Congress are appalled and put constraints on the funding, R&D only, as well as a stipulation that Congress has to authorize deployment of these weapons. But once the ball gets rolling in a government that favors preemptive warfare you ha

Re:Why just Pakistan?

[swissmonkey]

You just missed a number of facts.

1) The Russians would have volatilized you too, you might want to check what their nuclear arsenal looked like, you'll be surprised
2) India already has nuclear weapons and proved it
3) China has nuclear weapons since more than 20 years
4) These 3 countries don't really give a damn about what's happening in the Middle East, they're not involved at any level and have never been in any of the previous middle eastern wars.

India and Pakistan have been on brink of war last year w

20 years

[ArcSecond]

More like 12. Unless you are counting that period where they were the "Evil Empire" that required Star Wars in the first place. *That* would have been 20 years ago.

Re:moon race? nah...

[rbbs]

Call me pedantic but, you don't fire Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles at neighbouring countries...

Re:moon race? nah...

[satyap]

This rocket is just because they can, and no doubt also an attempt to attract international investment. After all, this is a great adverstisment for the education standards of your workforce if you're able to achieve complex technological goals like this.

After all, that's the same reason why NASA exists.

Re:moon race? nah...

[ikeleib]

Of course, they do have a lingering border dispute with China as well. [cia.gov]

Distance between New Delhi and Islamabad: 406 miles (653 km) [indo.com]

Distance between New Delhi and Beijing: 2341 miles (3768 km) [indo.com]

None of the USA's current fleet of ICBM's (AFAIK) use cryogenic motors for their primary stages. However, previous generations certianly did, (Redstone, Titan, etc)

Although this rocket may very well be intended for civilian or commercial service, I think that it is also to demonstrate to the world India's contin

Re:moon race? nah...

[bluGill]

IIRC, Inda's public statements are to the effect that they are more worried about China than Pakistan. Sure the war with Pakistan is hotter, but in the end they claim to see Pakistan as a threat they can deal with, without using nukes. China is a much harder threat to deal with. Pakistan has said essentially the same thing: China is a bigger threat than India.

Having talked to a few people from each of the above I'd agree. The Chinese are used to being brainwashed and controled in some areas that makes

Re:moon race? nah...

[mikerich]

Lets also be realistic here; the only place India would want to hit with an ICBM is Pakistan, and they already have more conventional rockets which are plenty capable of doing that.

Not quite. India and China have had an ongoing border dispute for many years now. The two countries view one another with suspicion and are engaged in an arms race.

Best wishes,
Mike.

Maybe not

[tqft]

Strategically Pakistan is a dead end for end India - no energy resources, strategic position/commodities and lots of friends who would get angry (including 100+m people internal to India). And Pakistan can also hit back.

Who has all this stuff that India will want and need and will be dumped by their friends if India grab for it?

Look at a map.

Why has India being building a blue water navy?

Where could they go with it?

Australia. Unless you think India wants to take on another 100+m Muslims by annexing I

Re:Maybe not

[tqft]

The theory is if Indonesia removed enough of its army from internal "policing" duties to invade Australia, by the time they mounted the invasion the internal revolts would have shattered Indonesia's war fighting abilities.

Indonesia is not likely to be an integrated and cohesive nation for a long time yet.

Korolev and the leaking oxygen line

[Latent Heat]

James Harford's "Korolev" talks about how Korolev held out for a kerosene-LOX (cryogenic usually means LH2, but LOX is cryogenic enough) ICBM while everyone else wanted to go with the storable UDMH-N2O4 fueled rocket, which Korolev disliked for the very corrosive and toxic chemicals, and which resulted in a horrific accident in which Nedelin, the military guy in charge of ICBM's and many workers died.

Anyway, how do you keep a kerosene-LOX rocket on the pad on any kind of alert status (i.e. able to launch in some time less than several days of prep)? The idea was to keep it plugged in to a supply of LOX so as LOX boils off, you pump in more. In a test, they had a leak on a LOX feed line to the rocket, so one of the technicians, like, whipped it out and took aim at the leak -- that froze over and plugged the leak. I work with a fellow whose favorite expression is "running around peeing on all of those problems" and here is where someone did it for real.

New arms race?

[KingKaneOfNod]

I think not. The IC in ICBM is inter-continental - however India's rivalry has always been with Pakistan, who are on the same continent (thus no ICBM required for nuclear destruction). So hopefully this won't bother Pakistan at all.

Re:New arms race?

[Anonymous Coward]

Inter-Curry Ballistic Missile?

~~~

am i the only one confused ?

[kettlehead]

"manned mission to the moon...."
Am i the only one confused. Indias moon ambitions were said to be restricted to only firing a unmanned galileo type mission to the moon. Which is pretty simple considering that they were planning to use the existing GSLV(Geo-Stationary Launch Vehicle) set-up. Why the sudden shift to a manned mission? A manned mission to the moon will never happen in India because of a number of reasons most notably the fact that we spend peanuts on space, compare isro's(indian space research org.) budget to NASA.

Also i thought GSLV - the satellite launch vehicle was totally indigenously built, Though WIRED seems to claim that the engine was Russian!
Anyway i think its a great achievement considering the amount India spends on space research.

Re:am i the only one confused ?

[fox2mike]

Every other component of the GSLV was built in India. The Cryo engine came from Russia.

why the shift?

[mikeee]

Same reason the US did such a useless thing, to keep up with the communists (Chinese, in this case).

It wasn't all that long ago China and India fought a small border war; their relations are not particularly friendly.

Re:why the shift?

[Glock27]

Same reason the US did such a useless thing

Excuse me, but are you referring to the Apollo program as "useless"? If so, you are a fool.

In terms of long-term scientific and technological returns, the Apollo program in particular, and NASA in general have been some of the most well-spent gummint dollars in history.

It is also very hard to put a value on even one smart child who is inspired to do something great. I have never seen anything more inspirational in my life than the first man setting foot on th

Re:why the shift?

[bluGill]

Compare the benifit of Apollo to the benifit from spending all those dollars in some other way. Of course this can only be done in fiction, but I maintain that those dollars would have been more productive spent elsewhere.

Re:why the shift?

[the_mad_poster]

Ok, where?

Re:am i the only one confused ?

[donutello]

The actual quote is:

Sharma said the technology was "crucial to the ultimate moon shot," alluding to India's plan to send a manned mission to the moon before 2015.

It sounds like it's the journalist who concluded that the "moon shot" was about sending a man to the moon instead of just a satellite.

Never attribute to malice what can just as easily be accounted for by bad journalism.

Moonshot?

[jabberjaw]

So are we gonna see competition in the moon race?
Perhaps we should wait until India has actually placed someone in orbit before talking about a moonshot? I am all for an increase in competition when it comes to space, but aren't we getting a wee bit ahead of ourselves?

Re:Moonshot?

[Brahmastra]

The moon mission India is planning will be unmanned.. Don't think there are plans of a manned mission.

Re:Moonshot?

[sznupi]

I don't see why we shouldn't talk abuout moon mission - Apollo project was also announced long before US put it's first man into space.

Tech support

[Anonymous Coward]

Is this because Dell wants a tech support center on the Moon?

Astronauts ? ...

[cheekymonkey_68]

Maybe this will increase the chances of NASA outsourcing their Astronauts to India ;)

I, for one

[Gothmolly]

welcome our new cryogenic Indian overlords.

Re:I, for one

[Scrameustache]

welcome our new cryogenic Indian overlords.

KHAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNN!!!!!!! [imdb.com]

I don't! ;- )

A rimshot for me an my friend...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know about the 'pun', but you certainly put the 'jab' in 'punjab'.

great news!

[davejenkins]

prices for thowing things into orbit will only come down when there is some straightforward competition. It is good to see more players in the field, and it is good to see various technologies tried-- I doubt this is the most efficient, but let them give it a shot.

Rocketry is yes-- rocket science-- but certainly within the grasp of "second tier" tech nations like China, India, Brazil, and Korea.

Re:great news!

[twiddlingbits]

Brazil isn't there yet, the latest attempt (about 3-4 months) ago blew up on the pad during a countdown rehearsal. That accident killed a number of scientists and trained workers and set them back a bit. When India and China get the high reliability rockets sure as the ones the Russians, US and France have then we'll have true competition. I guess in a few years we'll see Rocket Scientist jobs outsourced to Inida ;) I'm all for cheaper access to space provided by commercial enterprises if that means we can

Re:great news!

[suitti]

We have straitforward competition already, more or less. Arian, Proton, H2, Long March, Taurus, Pegasus, Titan, Atlas, Delta, Shuttle, etc.

Lots of countries restrict export of payloads, leading to restriction of competition.

One problem is that there aren't enough paying payloads to support these launchers.

The biggest lifters, Saturn V and Energia have been discontinued - despite economy of scale. The shuttle has enjoyed continued funding despite high cost. The ISS would have been MUCH cheaper if lif

India and Pakistan walk into a bar...

[RealProgrammer]

I: We will be having giant-sized moon rocket now.

P: You think you are becoming big shot with moon rocket now?

I: We are becoming superpower now.

P: You are not now.

I: We are too now.

P: We will be building bigger rocket now.

I: You are not now.

O: We are too now.

I: All of your bases are belonging to us now.

Re:India and Pakistan walk into a bar...

[KoolDude]

P: We will be building bigger rocket now.

I: You are not now.

O: We are too now.


I for India, P for Pakistan, O for... Osama ?

Cool!

[Tim]

Now we can outsource our space program!

ha, ha, BSoD firecrackers.

[twitter]

An AC worries about space outsourcing:

Lockheed even provided technical assistance that happens to improve the reliability of chinese ICBM's

Lockheed makes great hardware, but there is no need to fear. China bought into Microsoft's Shared Source nonsense, so their ICBMs will need frequent reboots and will more than likely be disabled by some worm written by a 13 year old Samoan.

And yet another competitor enters the race.

[Anonymous Coward]

The change is kinda interesting. Countries pouring their resources into science and exploration instead of another arms race (but it only takes one nation to start the whole thing again and if it happens there will be several players).

Spin offs include environmental technologies which never would have been developed. Smarter more exotic materials. Massive raw protein potential. Getting things to mars or even low earth orbit is alot easier from the moon then from earth. so on, so forth, etc.

ICBM ???

[Crashmarik]

Not unless they want an incredibly slow to prepare and obvious missile fleet.

The problem with cryogenic fueled rocket engines is that you have to fuel them before you fire them. Filling a missile fleet with LOX takes time and if anyone notices gives them ample opportunity to preemptively strike.

Re:ICBM ???

[Anonymous Coward]

The U.S. missile fleet is all solid fueled. So is the Russian fleet. Even the boomers carry solid fueled missiles. You want to try and fuel missiles in a hardened silo ? Good luck

Re:ICBM ???

[twiddlingbits]

The USA did it for years with the Titan ICBM. I work with a guy who commanded a silo, and they used LOX and Nitrogen Tetroxide as fuel. He knew the folks who were killed in the explosion of a Titan in it's silo in Rock, KS due to a refueling problem. The CURRENT ICBMs are all solid fueled which is obviously much safer to handle.

Go India!

[jafiwam]

Hey, come on... put a large number of talented people in a large economy with a culture valuing education and industriousness and you need to expect them to excel at stuff like this.

Though I am a little confused as to why they would focus on cryogenic engines rather than the other way... ignoring a valuable natural resource and all. They should have made a curry engine instead, which has way more lifting power than a LOX and H engine could ever have if what it does to my gut is any idication...

Race to the Moon? What?

[AsnFkr]

I coulda swore that we already won that one. I guess it's true, don't belive what you learn in school these days.

volatile != explosive

[Euler]

From the article:

"A cryogenic missile cannot be fired at a moment's notice. The fuel cannot be stored in a rocket indefinitely because it is highly explosive, so a missile would have to be fueled before launching."

Huh?! Cryogenic fuels are volatile, meaning the fuel will eventually all evaporate. But not explosive while just sitting in the tank.
Volatile does not mean explosive!

India's moon mission

[metamatic]

Now all they need is a spinach farm the size of Jupiter, and they'll be able to corner the market in green cheese palak paneer.

Light the flames

[psylent]

ok, let's look at this one bullet at a time

1. How come no one has started talking about feeding the poor and increasing literacy levels? They have? Oh look, ye wise learned ones. Do you think that space research is only to leave the surface with just adventure in mind? Satellites beam educational programmes to community televisions. They map our natural resources and planners can optimize utilization. It is a society very different from other countries so accept it. There is no benefit measuring other cultures using the same yardstick. It works for us, be happy. There are deficiencies in our society too and corrective programmes have a lot of inertia.
2. The caste system is officially abolished. It worked for the society at one point of time as described in the "Laws of Manu" (yes our history goes back quite a bit, might not be very well documented but good enough for scholars to study) and it doesnt work in today's society and we try to adapt. Politicians exploit this issue too like all other issues to line their pocket but lets not discuss politics. Women always had freedom in our society, the issues of sati and purdah were because of influences on society due to twists and turns of history, I am not (and maybe most of you are not) historians and we do not have the expertise of analysing this in detail. What is more interesting is the reverse backlash that is taking place. Some communities that have traditionally been oppressed had been assigned quotas (supposed to be in place for a few decades) to raise the average level. This worked for sometime however currently I feel that this is going overboard. Once a structure is in place, it is very difficult to dismantle it (eg: the USA is supposed to be free of racial hatred, dude I am an Indian living here in the US and I know how much of that is true).
3. Most of you would just link India to outsourcing and look at this forum as a sounding board for your pent up frustration. If it works to calm you down then it is good for you. This is slashdot, I realise that it is highly US centric. This is a byproduct of capitalism so I have nothing to add. I dont like it either when people lose jobs here and jobs are shipped to other countries. Solution I can propose before I go and grab breakfast: add value to what you are doing, it will help (doesnt sound right, does it?).

all the best

[jdkane]

or build intercontinental ballistic missiles'

I love the fact that we had to throw in an obligatory terrorism threat. Ah, the mind-set of the public....

Anyway, more power to them. I think everybody should have an equal chance to go into space.

Nobody is going to build a cyrogenic ICBM

[Animats]

The US tried that in the 1950s. Atlas ICBMs were deployed from 1969 to 1965, but those missiles were replaced with solid fuel ICBMs as soon as it was possible to do so. Atlas boosters are still used as launchers, but their ICBM career was short.

Cyrogenic ICBMs are first-strike weapons. It takes so long to prep and fuel them that they're useless as a retaliation weapon. The opposition's ICBMs will land on your silos first. Keeping a cyrogenic system at a high state of readiness for years on end is difficult.

The Cuban missile crisis is sometimes said to have occured because the US put cyrogenic ICBMs in Turkey, aimed at the Soviet Union. That looked like the US was planning a first strike on Moscow. The Soviet Union had to respond to that threat.

(Decades later, interviews with the Soviet officials who made that decision revealed that most of them didn't look at it that way, but that's another issue. The communication-by-strategic-threat thing never worked as some of the gurus of deterrence thought it did. The most famous example of such miscommunication was that Kennedy's advisers thought the Soviet missile base in Cuba was deliberately laid out just like the ones in Russia so that the US would recognize it as a threat. Years later, the Red Army colonel in charge of building the base was asked about this, and said "No, we just did it that way because that's what the field manual said to do." All the military personnel present nodded in understanding.)

So it's a launcher, not an ICBM.

Re:Nobody is going to build a cyrogenic ICBM

[lommer]

Actually, there is significant evidence that points to the American deployment of Jupiter missiles in Turkey as the cause of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Kruschev never publicly admitted it, and frequently gave multiple different vague reasons for the USSR's nuclear involvement in Cuba. Years after the crisis, it was revealed that in order to get the Russians to back down, Kennedy agreed to remove the missiles from turkey within a year or two. This was one of the Russian's chief demands, but Kennedy insisted that it not be publicly revealed so that he could be seen as a public hero who was tough on the Russians for the upcoming election.

The other leading cause for the Cuban Missile Crisis was the missile gap. A number of other factors definitely contributed, so much so that there isn't really historical agreement on the subject at all.

Re:Nobody is going to build a cyrogenic ICBM

[mesocyclone]

Another important aspect of the Cuban missile crisis is that when it came to a showdown, Fidel Castro demanded that the Russians launch the missiles against the US, which the Russians wisely refused to do.

This is the same Fidel Castro that peaceniks the world over fawn over.

Kennedy lost a lot in the missile crisis. In order to resolve the crisis, the US had to agree not to ever attack Cuba, and had to remove the missiles from Turkey. Russia lost only a quick attempt to emplace missiles near the US.

Re:Nobody is going to build a cyrogenic ICBM

[good soldier svejk]

The US tried that in the 1950s. Atlas ICBMs were deployed from 1969 to 1965, but those missiles were replaced with solid fuel ICBMs as soon as it was possible to do so. Atlas boosters are still used as launchers, but their ICBM career was short.

Although the first generation Atlas and Titan ICBM's were phased out by 1965, the US continued to operate the liquid fuel Titan II until 1987. SAC actually introduced Titan II two years after the solid fuel Minuteman series. Although more difficult and dangerous to

Moon race -- it's about time for another one

[AJWM]

It's been 30 years since anybody went to the Moon. We're about due.

Consider the early history of Antarctic exploration -- there was the "South Pole Race" in the 1909-1912 era (Shackleton, who didn't quite make it, then the real race between Amundsen and Scott), then essentially nothing (except for the Byrd aerial expeditions in the 30s) for about 35 years until the US Navy's Operation Highjump after WWII and then full-time permanent bases since IGY in 1957.

I for one welcome our new Selenite overl^W^W^W^W

actually...

[acehole]

It does have to do with freezing of sorts, because the gases that are required for fuel oxygen and hydrogen (as well as a mixture of others) are gaseous in normal atmospheric conditions. They are required to be cooled down to a liquid state, hence the name "cryogenic rocket engine".

Re:actually... (+a URL)

[trystanu]

A nice article on Cryogenic Rocket engines is available here [rotor.com] .

Re:actually...

[fox2mike]

To be precise, the range of temperatures (of the Oxy-Hydrogen mixture) varies from -200 degrees celcius (on the ground, uptil launch & ignition of the Cryo Stage) to about +3000 degrees Celcius during the actual burn time of the stage.

Re:Cryogenic?

[corrie]

Chrono is time.

Cryo is freeze.

Re:not the moon

[TomV]

I was listening to a debate about outsourcing on BBC Radio the other night, and they pointed out that in Bangalore there's a lot of worry about all the call centre backroom IT jobs getting outsourced to China, where the costs are so low that India can't possibly compete.

I agree that the Moon isn't the *real* purpose of the Indian space programme, but, just as with the US 30 years ago, aiming high helps to hit the lower targets, like comsats, earth imaging and so forth, not to mention the huge boost to national self-esteem and all the benefits that can bring in sheer morale terms - when you've got to the Moon, what challenge can you honestly say is too big to even attempt?

Re:not the moon

[Patrik_AKA_RedX]

not to mention the huge boost to national self-esteem

As if The Greatest Nation On Earth needed that!

Re:not the moon

[frodo from middle ea]

when you've got to the Moon, what challenge can you honestly say is too big to even attempt?

Hmm, let me see, from India's perspective , the bigger challanges are ....

Poverty :- The country's wealth is divided by the 90-10 rule. i.e. 10% of the population has 90% of the wealth.
Illiteracy :- More than 50%. And since being literate means being able to sign your name, the actual figures could be as high as 70-75%
Rampant Political/Economical and Social Corruption :- Forget the politicians , I can't get my mail if I don't tip my postman.
Infrastructure :- One of the world's worst . So much Red tape everywhere.
Transportation and Safety :- Barring major cities, public transport is a mess and not every one can afford their own vehicle. Road/Rail accidents account for most no. of deaths in the country.
Disaster Recovery:- No set plans and procedures for natural disaster recovery from floods , famines, fires etc. People are left at the mercy of nature and rehabilitation is a joke.

I am not a westerner trying to judge india, I am an indian , humbly pointing out what our top priorities should be.

Re:not the moon

[ErikZ]

I was thinking the same thing. But the wheels have been put in motion. At this point it's more productive to make sure things work smoothly.

Re:not the moon

[Scrameustache]

I am not a westerner trying to judge india, I am an indian , humbly pointing out what our top priorities should be.

I am a westerner and will now judge india in a burst of hubris:
I think India should also work on its leprosy poblem...and the plague.

Seriously, for a country to simultaniously have atomic weapons and diseases from the middle ages...that's scary.

Then again, there's been an increase in syphilis in the states lately...that's more 19th century than middle ages, but nobody's perfect.

/rant

Re:not the moon

[justins]

Poverty :- The country's wealth is divided by the 90-10 rule. i.e. 10% of the population has 90% of the wealth.

Wow! If that's your definition of a serious poverty problem we'd better get to work fixing America, too.

Re:not the moon

[frodo from middle ea]

Well , its similar in some aspects and not in many. When you say poverty in USA, it's meaning could vary from living in the streets of NY, to living on minimum wage jobs, living on social security etc.

When we say poverty in india, we mean being unable to provide oneself even with daily bread.

There is no govt. program (at least one that works), to educate, support or at the least feed the really really poor indians. Any money generated thru welfare organizations is socked up internally by politicians and o

Re:not the moon

[The Cydonian]

Hmm, let me see, from India's perspective , the bigger challanges are ....

Perhaps you wanted to say "an Indian's perspective" as opposed to "India's perspective". Surely, you don't claim to represent all of India, do you?

Poverty :- The country's wealth is divided by the 90-10 rule. i.e. 10% of the population has 90% of the wealth.

With all due respects, you weren't talking about poverty, but wealth distribution. The US, as a matter of fact, has a much worse wealth distribution than India; I believe th

Re:not the moon

[Vendekkai]

I am an Indian, too. Where do you guys get these stats?

1. Wealth distribution. 90% of the _world's_ wealth is in the hands of 10% of its population. It applies for the US, too. What led to this irrelevant stat - oh, poverty. Yes poverty is a problem. But if you look at recent economic indicators, the proportion living below the poverty line has fallen from 36 per cent ten years ago to 27 per cent. That's economic empowerment for you, 90 million people (one-third of the USA population) coming over the pover

Re:not the moon

[mntgomery]

Not to mention the benefits of the first Quik-E-Mart on the ISS!

If I had mod points...

[GoofyBoy]

... I would mod that post as "Sad but true".

Re:Abu

[VampireByte]

Do you mean Apu from the Simpons?

Re:Abu

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow how smart! Mentioning "Apu" in ever India related story is getting to be as old as the stupid overlord shit

The government should try to solve that problem...

[Futurepower(R)]

It's utterly true. The Indian constitution tries to dismantle the caste system. However, the caste system still is a huge problem in India. The government should try to solve that problem rather than make cryogenic rockets, in my opinion.

Re:The government should try to solve that problem

[sujan]

Thats why, pack up, go there and educate those people.

Yeah, according to you, close all those schools that are doing these researches, maybe even stop educating people, and somehow do this magic trick that will make the caste system go away.

How will the government 'dismantle' caste system?

Re:The government should try to solve that problem

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean... like the way the US should try to develop humanity and understanding, instead of launching phony wars for political and economic gain? ;)

We've all got our issues, but progress is still progress.

Re:The government should try to solve that problem

[satyap]

However, the caste system still is a huge problem in India. The government should try to solve that problem rather than make cryogenic rockets, in my opinion.

Yes, because governments can only do one thing at a time, right?