North Korea Hopes To Plant Flag On The Moon Within 10 Years (ap.org) 215
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Associated Press: In an interview with The Associated Press, a senior official at North Korea's version of NASA said international sanctions won't stop the country from launching more satellites by 2020, and that he hopes to see the North Korean flag on the moon within the next 10 years. "Even though the U.S. and its allies try to block our space development, our aerospace scientists will conquer space and definitely plant the flag of the DPRK on the moon," said Hyon Kwang Il, director of the scientific research department of North Korea's National Aerospace Development Administration. An unmanned, no-frills North Korean moon mission in the not-too-distant future isn't as far-fetched as it might seem. Outside experts say it's ambitious, but conceivable. While the U.S. is the only country to have conducted manned lunar missions, other nations have sent unmanned spacecraft there and have in that sense planted their flags. Hyon said the current five-year plan, at the order of leader Kim Jong Un, focuses on launching more Earth observation satellites and what would be its first geostationary communications satellite -- which, technologically, would be a major step forward. He said universities are also expanding programs to train rocket scientists. "We are planning to develop the Earth observation satellites and to solve communications problems by developing geostationary satellites. All of this work will be the basis for the flight to the moon," Hyon said on July 28, adding that he personally would like to see that happen "within 10 years' time." Meanwhile, North Korea's southern neighbors are planning a similar mission to place a probe in orbit around the moon and a small lander and rover on the surface of the moon by 2020.
if by "plant" (Score:2, Funny)
they mean crashing a probe with a flag on it into the moon, well then ,yes, it may be possible! :)
I look forward to the flyby photos of the site later
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No. Not even that.
We're still talking about building a rocket that can reach escape velocity. That's FAR away from their current ability of "getting stuff somehow somewhere near the edge of the atmosphere before it disintegrates".
Re:if by "plant" (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:if by "plant" (Score:4, Informative)
They've tried to get some russian rocket stuff from their brother country in cuba. They failed. [reuters.com]
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They can buy stuff from the Russians just like we do.
This sort of thing isn't hard anymore. The key technologies (advanced materials, computer-aided design and manufacturing, computer guidance systems) are so widely available, and cheap now that even the idea of an embargo or blockade is ridiculous. I just searched for "inconel 718" (a key superalloy used for many aerospace parts) on Alibaba and 19,658 results came back. I wouldn't put chinese materials in my rocket engine, but for the DPRK they will probably work fine. The only obstacle in designing and
Re:if by "plant" (Score:5, Informative)
Even getting something to the point where it could launch a harpoon that would unfurl a flag on the Moon is insanely hard. I'd be very surprised if a company that has about a 50% chance of its short-range missiles exploding on the launchpad and has only just managed to put something vaguely in LEO (and not in its intended orbit) would be able to get there in 10 years.
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Super interesting. I didn't realize GPS and communication satellites are so far away. In fact, if I had guessed, I would have assumed that the ISS is "so far" away to avoid the orbit of satellites.
Re:if by "plant" (Score:5, Informative)
You have to remember that about 99% of the rocket burn you do to get into any orbit is SIDEWAYS.
To just get out of the atmosphere, straight up, is quite cheap - you can do it with a simple sounding rocket - even a balloon assisted one. It takes about 2000 m/s^2 of acceleration from 0 to get above the atmosphere. Then you fall straight back down.
To actually orbit you need to move sideways - fast enough that at the height you're aiming for you are basically falling off the edge of the earth constantly. The 100km figure is the Karman line, that's the point where the air is too thin to use an aircraft, the rocket power you would need to get enough speed to get lift out of wings is high enough that you would have flown without wings. The actual atmosphere however extends to about 140km - anywhere below that air drag will bring your craft down in days or hours. To orbit at 150km you need to accelarate by about 7400m/s^2 - that's a lot more, and nearly all of it is horizontal acceleration.
To get into a higher orbit you have to increase your acceleration. Typically this is done in two burns - you start at the lowest point in your orbit and burn - which raises the highest point (this manner minimizes energy and fuel needs). Then orbit to the new high point and do another burn there to raise the low point until you are circularized.
And all that is without considering timing, you can't just aim at the moon and burn, you are trying to get an orbit that intersect it's orbit and time it so you arrive at the intersecting point at the same time the moon does (nobody wants to spend weeks in orbit waiting for a close encounter).
And those numbers are based on an equatorial launch into an equatorial orbit - but the moon isn't in an equatorial orbit, it's inclined by almost 30 degrees - and launching into an inclined orbit costs MORE fuel.
Now on top of all this - nearly all rockets can only be ignited once. It is only the most advanced rockets that can be fired more than once, and then often only 3 or 4 times and real rockets usually have no throttle control. So with anything but the most cutting edge rockets you need a new rocket (which you have to carry along) for every orbital adjustment. A lunar intersect (not even landing) is at least 3 major orbital manoeuvres.
Now these days we have some more advanced technologies. For orbital adjustment we usually use rockets that are pressure-fed with infinite ignitions - using very cheap and light fuel - they can't get you into space but can steer you once you're there. They are also very hard to build and very weak - so your burns are slow. They often use the same fuel as the mono-propellant steering thrusters you use just to adjust your orientation before burning.
Then consider there are many dozens of different rocket fuels - all with their pros and cons. Some are self-igniting (which you need for infinite burns rockets) but generally extremely toxic and quite hazardous if not expertly handled (which is what you get from things that ignite themselves), for launching you need high-thrust fuels like kerolox (Russian rockets mostly use kerolox first stages) or Ethanol (US first stages were mostly ethanol based) but those are heavy and takes ridiculous engineering to get the best bang for buck. Then you have your most efficient fuels which are the ultra low-density stuff like hydrogen but those are cryogenic and that means that even with heat-shielded tanks they bleed off once out of the freezer, so you have to use them quickly or they evaporate.
And through all this there is the tyranny of the rocket equation. Without going into too much detail - the simple answer is that the acceleration you can get out of a given mass of fuel goes down exponentially as the mass goes up. So to lift you need fuel, to lift further you need more fuel but to lift that fuel you need even more fuel - and you get less and less out of each kilogram you add. This is why space exploration uses multiple stages - you burn a bunch of fuel and drop the empty tank and r
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I'm out of mod points, but that was very informative, thanks. Some of it I knew, e.g. multiple stages, but your last sentence says it all. It doesn't matter how badly you want something, if nature/physics says no, then all you can do is stamp your foot and execute some generals.
They seem to think that getting to the moon just takes a bigger version of what they've already got, i.e. barely functioning missiles.
BTW did anyone see the recent bonhams "space history" auction? It included a shuttle guidance compu
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"It doesn't matter how badly you want something, if nature/physics says no, then all you can do is stamp your foot and execute some generals."
Lies and slander! Nothing is beyond our Dear Leader! He will crush the necks of these vile imperialist oppressors, so-called "Nature" and "Physics", by launching the nuclear missiles that he has personally and lovingly assembled out of the People's natural and inviolable plutonium reserves.
On the other hand, the brave intelligent correct man who points out how foolish it is to wish for the People to escape Earth and colonize Mars is brave and intelligent and correct. Why would anyone want to leave Earth?
Re:if by "plant" (Score:4, Insightful)
Umm, no. You have to increase your SPEED (not velocity, just the magnitude of velocity) relative to the ground.
Assuming a horizontal burn, of course. If you change the direction of the velocity vector to nearly vertical without change the magnitude of the velocity vector, you'll also reach a higher orbit.
Assuming, of course, in both cases, a second burn to make your new orbit circular when you get as high as you want to get.
That said, if should be noted that deltaV required to reach LEO is more than half that required to reach the Moon. Or Mars, for that matter. It only takes a few hundred extra m/s to reach Mars than Luna....
As a well-known scifi writer once said, LEO is halfway to anywhere....
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>> To get into a higher orbit you have to increase your acceleration.
> Umm, no. You have to increase your SPEED (not velocity, just the magnitude of velocity) relative to the ground.
You're right, I put that clumsily. What I meant was you need more acceleration than you need to just get into orbit. Which would be better put as "you need to increase your orbit from there".
>Assuming a horizontal burn, of course. If you change the direction of the velocity vector to nearly vertical without change th
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Umm, no. Acceleration (the rate of change of velocity) is pretty much irrelevant except to overcome Earth's gravity.
What you need is more deltaV (which is NOT acceleration, though I've seen scifi where the author made that mistake). Starting from LEO, an acceleration of 1 mm/s^2 will get you to GEO if you do it long enough. Just as an acceleration of 1km/s^2 will if you want a very short burn.
Once you're in LEO, accelerati
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Now you're just arguing for its own sake. We all know the difference between acceleration and velocity. Since V is the time integral of A, the way you get V is by applying A for a period of time. "More acceleration" to get into a higher orbit is not an incorrect concept.
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Yes, actually it is. DeltaV is NOT acceleration. What you need to get into a higher orbit is "more deltaV", NOT "more acceleration". Yes, you need to accelerate. But the magnitude (and "higher acceleration" certainly suggests the magnitude of the acceleration, not the duration of same) isn't terribly important beyond a few special cases.
Note that you seem to be making the same error of usage that that scifi writer I mentioned ea
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...7400m/s^2 of deltaV...
You keep mixing up velocity and acceleration. Delta V is literally a "change in velocity" and has units of m/s. It is calculated as (final velocity, m/s) - (initial velocity, m/s).
The only time in space travel (using orbital mechanics) that acceleration is important is when timing is critical because you are directly counteracting a decelerating force, as with gravity in a vertical burn or drag in an atmosphere. Timing may also be important when your desired burn time is longer than your burn window, but t
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"To orbit at 150km you need to accelarate by about 7400m/s^2 - that's a lot more, and nearly all of it is horizontal acceleration."
What rocket do we have that can pull 740 gees?
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I skimmed most of what you wrote, but if Kim Jong-un just want to "plant" a flag with an impactor the Russians did this in 1959, with a rocket far more primitive and 1/10th the size of Saturn V. Their latest rocket test is roughly the equivalent of a Falcon 1 from 2008, even North Korea can get a rocket in orbit these days so rocket science isn't quite living up to its reputation. Two years later in 2010 the Falcon 9 launched which would actually be overkill for the task, so can North Korea do in ten years
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Yup. Space is not the final frontier, it's mostly a big amount of nothing with a few tiny, insignificant rocks in between.
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Well, yes, but in the end, you needn't get both legs up in a moonshot, so to speak. It's enough to raise your apogee to hit the moon, no need to do the same for your perigee (which is of course mandatory for having a satellite in an orbit). But generally you're of course correct.
And, well, saying that just 'cause you can't even get something reliably into a LEO means you can't put something on the moon in 10 years is a bit much considering that the US did just that. Of course, we're talking about a global s
Re:if by "plant" (Score:4, Interesting)
Easier for them than for us. They know it can be done, and they know what the easy/hard parts of the process require. And the computers they're using are several orders of magnitude more powerful than we used to do Apollo (remember, your smartphone is several orders of magnitude more powerful than the computers aboard Apollo, as well as being several orders of magnitude smaller). For that matter, materials science has improved vastly, and they can take advantage of that extra knowledge as well.
And, as an aside, remember when "computer" was a job description, not a piece of hardware (hence the old phrase "electronic computer" to distinguish between the machine and the person it replaced)? Nuclear weapons and the first real rockets were developed with computers (the job), not computers (the machine) - NK won't have to go through that hassle....
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But on the down side it does set your program back a bit if you routinely execute everyone who fucks up or doesn't praise Dear Leader enough. Then there's the constant shortage of pretty much everything, the fact that no sensible country wants to touch you with a ten foot pole and the lack of people with relevant education.
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Well, yes, but in the end, you needn't get both legs up in a moonshot, so to speak.
I just imagined some poor lucky North Korean astronaut having both legs amputated to save on weight for the moon trip.
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They could do it with help. Buy some space on a Chinese or Russian mission. Or just buy a whole rocket. Or the tech they need to build their own. Or just the expertise. There are lots of options to make it easier, but of course they have to deal with everyone else not wanting them to have ICBMs.
Makes sense (Score:2)
Re:Makes sense (Score:4, Funny)
Its an excuse (Score:5, Informative)
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Its an excuse to test lots of long range missiles incapable of carrying large and heavy warheads
Re: Its an excuse (Score:5, Informative)
Well,no.
Mercury and Gemini flew atop the Redstone, Atlas, and Titan missiles. Which we'd already tested more than enough before they were accepted into service as ICBMs (IRBM for Redstone), well before they were ever used as space launchers.
Saturn, the booster for Apollo, was a purely civilian vehicle - it was never used as an ICBM, and by the time it was in use, ICBM warheads were small enough that we didn't need something capable of putting 100T+ into LEO as an ICBM.
Realistically, it would be more accurate to say our ICBM programs were used as testbeds for our space programs, not the other way around....
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The USSR did toy with the idea of using the N-1 to carry the Tsar-bomb 100 megaton device. It could have also been used as a way to deploy orbital weapons platforms to drop nukes from orbit. But the USSR and the US have signed a treaty to prevent that.
http://www.russianspaceweb.com... [russianspaceweb.com]
I do not know if many people are old enough to remember Johnny Carson's or Karnak routine but it comes to mind seeing this post.
"Food, indoor plumbing, and sanity"
"Name three things that North Korea needs more than landing men
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... it would be only logical for someone else to step up.
After all its only one small step for a man
Not just a flag, surely! (Score:5, Funny)
I propose planting Kim Jong-un on the moon.
Re:Not just a flag, surely! (Score:5, Funny)
I propose planting Kim Jong-un on the moon.
I propose planting the flag up Kim Jong-un's moon.
There are probably some jokes hidden in this topic about the "Moonies" ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] ), but nobody here is old enough to remember them.
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Kim Yong Un has no moon.
Haven't you heard ? His body is evolved to extract 100% of the energy from food and since there is no waste, he does not have a butthole.
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He also doesn't shit. He explodes when he reaches 40.
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Old GDR joke:
Worker1: Comrade! The Russians are on the moon!
Worker2: All of them?
Worker1: Erh... no.
Worker2: Then why the hell do you wake me up before it's quitting time?
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Sure, the moon is okay... (Score:5, Funny)
But it's kind of a let-down after they put a man on the sun [theonion.com].
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Can't we just moon North Korea? I mean, that would at least be doable within 10 years.
Wow (Score:2)
It's like the Soviet Union, back from the dead!
Not because it's easy, (Score:3)
but because our Great Leader has no clue how hard it is.
That's a translation error (Score:3)
They were commenting on Dear Leader's fantastic weight, were saying the he would moon the world and stick the flag where the sun doesn't shine.
Eh, why bother (Score:3)
Just don't, but say you did.
The real reason for the announcement (Score:5, Funny)
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The South Korean probe will construct a proxy pylon with which to warp in zealots and stalkers for a four warpgate rush.
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At which point they will instead decide to colonize Jupiter, so dear leader will have plenty of room for his ever expanding waistline!
They'll be lucky (Score:2)
Remedial Astronomy 101: The moon, a liberal myth (Score:4, Funny)
It amazes me that so many allegedly "educated" people have fallen so quickly and so hard for a fraudulent fabrication of such laughable proportions. The very idea that a gigantic ball of rock happens to orbit our planet, showing itself in neat, four-week cycles -- with the same side facing us all the time -- is ludicrous. Furthermore, it is an insult to common sense and a damnable affront to intellectual honesty and integrity. That people actually believe it is evidence that the liberals have wrested the last vestiges of control of our public school system from decent, God-fearing Americans (as if any further evidence was needed! Daddy's Roommate? God Almighty!)
Documentaries such as Enemy of the State have accurately portrayed the elaborate, byzantine network of surveillance satellites that the liberals have sent into space to spy on law-abiding Americans. Equipped with technology developed by Handgun Control, Inc., these satellites have the ability to detect firearms from hundreds of kilometers up. That's right, neighbors .. the next time you're out in the backyard exercising your Second Amendment rights, the liberals will see it! These satellites are sensitive enough to tell the difference between a Colt .45 and a .38 Special! And when they detect you with a firearm, their computers cross-reference the address to figure out your name, and then an enormous database housed at Berkeley is updated with information about you.
Of course, this all works fine during the day, but what about at night? Even the liberals can't control the rotation of the Earth to prevent nightfall from setting in (only Joshua was able to ask for that particular favor!) That's where the "moon" comes in. Powered by nuclear reactors, the "moon" is nothing more than an enormous balloon, emitting trillions of candlepower of gun-revealing light. Piloted by key members of the liberal community, the "moon" is strategically moved across the country, pointing out those who dare to make use of their God-given rights at night!
Yes, I know this probably sounds paranoid and preposterous, but consider this. Despite what the revisionist historians tell you, there is no mention of the "moon" anywhere in literature or historical documents -- anywhere -- before 1950. That is when it was initially launched. When President Josef Kennedy, at the State of the Union address, proclaimed "We choose to go to the moon", he may as well have said "We choose to go to the weather balloon." The subsequent faking of a "moon" landing on national TV was the first step in a long history of the erosion of our constitutional rights by leftists in this country. No longer can we hide from our government when the sun goes down.
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I really like your theory but what do those spy satellites do when the sky is clouded? Can I then exercise my second amendment rights without being spied upon?
Also, there are 41 bible verses about the moon [knowing-jesus.com]. What about those? Were they fabricated?
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Put there to test your faith. Duh.
What would it take... (Score:2)
Dear amateur rocket scientists, I have a mission for you.
Please calculate: what would it take to fire a ballistic flag of, say, 2 kilos, from a cannon or railgun on earth, in order to land it on the moon? Would it be technically feasible to beat the North-Koreans to this with a Kickstarter project? ;)
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Required muzzle velocity would be about 11100 m/s. Which is rather more than twice as high as any cannon/railgun ever made.
And really, why bother. Design a rocket that can go from LEO to Lunar impact, then pay SpaceX to put it on top of one of their "previously used" Falcon 9 first stages (for the big discount. and did everyone notice that they testfired one of those previously used first stages with a full-power burn as long as the normal launch burn? And are planning on reusing one of the other four
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Isn't that actual escape velocity? Our flag doesn't need to escape Earth's gravity; it only needs to get far enough for the Moon's gravity to take over and the Moon is well within Earth's gravity well.
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Two things:
1) I rounded a bit. On purpose.
2) Escape speed from the ground: 11175 m/s.
Actual horizontal speed required from the ground to reach Luna's orbit (which is 384400 km, about): 10992 m/s. Ignoring atmosphere, of course.
Note that that second number is only 183 m/s slower than the first.
As to "getting far enough for the Moon's gravity to take over". You can design a path that does that. It requires a midcourse burn, which doesn't fit within the definition of a "cannon". And it saves you
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I assume you're well aware that a gravity well is asymptotic and has no "outer edge" at all.
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You assume correctly. But since I was responding to someone who used the phrase "well within Earth's gravity well", I felt it necessary to use terms similar to his.
Note, by the by, that when you're in free fall (most of the time in space unless you're using an ion drive or something similar), the only thing that really matters when defining "the outer edge" or "well within" a gravity well is how close you are to escape speed (note that "escape velocity" is misleading in some ways - the only way the direct
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You can laugh (Score:2)
You can laugh, but their space program is already testing advanced boosters [imgur.com].
Communication satellite? (Score:2)
Which Moon (Score:2)
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Its Korea, are we sure he doesn't have a crush on Sung myung moon, and planting flag means ......
... forcing her to ingest silver nitrate and *censored* into *REALLY, REALLY CENSORED*. ;)
P.S. Sorry, I had to. Uncontrollable.
Tested and successful method (Score:2)
I think a child-like behavioral response is due if they en bother with it...
They will announce that a flag has been planted and bask in their glory. The rest of the world will not acknowledge; basically just ignore like they haven't even heard about it. If mentioned, response is, "Huh? What are you talking about?"
Let them bask in their loss of "capital" or whatever Korean monies are measured on. They should know by now that the world plays daily on a "game" to assure life. This is, please pardon exampl
Prepare Yourself (Score:2)
For the eventual photo of Kim Jung Un actually planting the flag personally on the moon.
He won't be wearing a spacesuit however. Being a god he doesn't require air, but he occasionally breaths so that he might feel closer to his subjects...
The launch vehicle will be named "Pegasus" because it will be an actual Pegasus that Kim Jung Un tamed using his natural charisma.
Or at least have a photo of them doing it. (Score:2)
Yeah, photoshop is probably a lot cheaper than a real manned moon shot.
Yeah right. (Score:2)
This is coming from a country that struggles to launch two missiles simutaneously without one undergoing RUD.
It's not even like the Rodong is new technology, it's basically a stretched version of the Scud B (SS-1), which itself has been in service since 1964. Not just that, North Korea has had since the mid 1980s to get it to work.
Wager: (Score:2)
Contingency wager: Another five bucks says once they've claimed the Moon as their property, they announce plans to build a colony (read as: military base) on the Moon.
Didn't they already do this? (Score:2)
I mean, I saw last year articles that said they had done this from their news agency
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... resides.
For us mortals: Resides is a fancy word for "is chillin' at"
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It's be more ridiculous if they indicated their geostationary satellite would hover over Pyongyang at an altitude of 200 km to reduce latency. That'd be ridiculous. But it's not so hard to get payload in orbit, even high orbit.
But so far, they don't even seem to be able to successfully test a ballistic missile; so although you classify it as "not so hard", apparently it is too hard for the NK at this point.
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You never know when you can end getting some weirdass fetishist after you.
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I think North Korea has better odds than you. But in both cases, the odds would only improve if you throw a tonne of money at the problem.
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Sadly we know you will share the fate of Saljut 2 and remain unmanned.
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It's been a major earner there for many years.
Re:Me too (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, even if it seems ludicrous now, we shouldn't be blind to the fact that even these things are getting easier. In the early 60es, who would have thought it remotely likely that even China or India would have a space program? Progress works that way, often; when I was at high school, owning a computer was an impossible dream, yet now you can't get away from them - they are everywhere and they seem trivial. To paraphrase Terry Pratchett, people strive for decades to conquer a mountain, but a few years after it's been done, you'll have grannies strolling up there for a picnic. No doubt North Korea will manage to plant their flag on the moon; in today's context it is no longer an immodest proposition for a country.
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Back in that time, it seemed even less likely that private companies would start space programs because everyone knew that Wall Street only looked ahead to the next quarter and that long-term thinking was for governments only.
Wall Street yes, but not Silicon Valley.
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Back in that time, it seemed even less likely that private companies would start space programs because everyone knew that Wall Street only looked ahead to the next quarter and that long-term thinking was for governments only.
Wall Street yes, but not Silicon Valley.
Wall street was quite a different place at that time. It wasn't until the late 70's that we became obsessed with short term profit over long term sustainability.
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No doubt North Korea will manage to plant their flag on the moon; in today's context it is no longer an immodest proposition for a country.
I sincerely doubt this will ever happen.
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True but the big issue is that building large rockets is still pretty hard. It is not like a computer where you can buy the parts cheap. CAD and simulation help but you still have to make the big and precise metal parts.
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Not a chance. No ICBM could reach the moon, let alone land without causing a massive explosive crash. There is simply no way you can get to the moon from earth with a single stage rocket.
Maybe some non-rocket based technology, but if it's a rocket it will have to be multi-stage - and need steering abilities to do orbital manuevers. You can't just aim a rocket at the moon and fire, the moon orbits, it won't BE there by the time your rocket gets there and your rocket will simply run out of fuel eventually and
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A good thing that ICBMs actually use multiple stages, then.
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It should be noted that ALL ICBMs are multi stage. Some MRBMs and SRBMs are single stage. Even closest like the Atlas where considered 1 1/2 stage while the SS-6 used boosters and a core which are also considered multi stage rocket.
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So in other words, Atlas, the canonical, original US ICBM, which wasn't even two stages, was "multi stage" in your mind. Never mind that all of the motors were started together at the moment of launch. And "some" MRBMs means basically all the original IRBMs, like the Jupiter and Thor. They were straight single-stage, single-motor.
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IRBMs are not ICBMs.
And If you can find me a single reference to the Atlas being a single stage rocket I would love to see it. Even the Space Shuttle is not considered a single stage or an SSTO and all of it's motors fire at once.
So no ICBM is a single stage. Martin was looking into making one but it never got past the drawing board.
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Why would anybody VOLUNTEER to be Tailor's next album ?
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No, that was just an unofficial communique from a former NK army general that li'l Kim should go where the sun doesn't shine.
He was promptly fired. Out of a cannon.
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First, just because there is technology that is more advanced than what the US had in 69 doesn't mean that they have it. Second, even having it doesn't mean they have any kind of idea how to use it.
Rocket science is pretty hard. No, not the theory, that's easy, but actually building that stuff. These things don't grow on trees... not that this would aid NK, admittedly, but you get the idea. There is a LOT of try and error involved. Just look at how many tries it took to get something into orbit. The theory
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Rocket science is pretty hard. No, not the theory, that's easy, but actually building that stuff.
Wouldn't that be rocket engineering, not rocket science?
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What other crazy claims have we heard from North Korea? Let's list a few of them here:...
Sorry to ask, but which one of those does the showing of huge banquet rooms _that are completely empty of people_, with the staff of about 5 women moving foods and drinks from one table to another like it's a happenin' place, reference? If none, please consider adding something to the tune of "Live puppet shows masked as real-life events to take part in", or something to that ilk. :)
BTW, when I saw video documentaries on that all it really got from me was, *blink*, *pause......*, *long blink*, *eyebrow rai
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It usually doesn't take 10 years to photoshop a picture
They can't afford Photoshop. They found a cracked version of GIMP, but they're having some problems running on the Commodore 128 they found in a Salvation Army dumpster.
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North Korea has a long way to go. They barely succeeding in launching a rocket after several failures. I'd give it 25 to 30 years before they perfect something than can exit the earths atmosphere, and maintain a trajectory course to the moon with a possibility of successfully landing a flag on our lunar neighbor.
Oh, man.. Or fail to leave the atmosphere and completely accidentally redirect itself toward the U.S. for a completely coincidental heading that would bring it down on the west coast, erroneously losing all safety mechanisms and triggering its fusion bomb materials that were meant to do nothing but put a big enough hole on the surface of the moon for [their] really, really HUGE flag. Complete accident!!! Innocent!
I wish I were completely joking... But I'm sure the DoD thought of it right away and is prep
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Maybe they've been reading Clancy novels - this was exactly how Japan (in Debt of Honour) tested their secretly developed missile system, by faking 1st stage separation.
Clancy & Dale Brown have a lot to answer for - after giving AQ the concept for 9/11. /s
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Maybe they've been reading Clancy novels - this was exactly how Japan (in Debt of Honour) tested their secretly developed missile system, by faking 1st stage separation.
Clancy & Dale Brown have a lot to answer for - after giving AQ the concept for 9/11. /s
ACK
Lesen ist verboten!!! Or is that only for the tools..er toys.. er citizens...er uh... what do they call them over there? It's not sheep or slaves. Perhaps citizens in the Matrix? Matrices/Matrizens/Meople?
PSH