From: Spudboy100@aol.com
Date: Sun Apr 27 2003 - 01:41:54 MDT
<A HREF="http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.05/view.html?pg=4">http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.05/view.html?pg=4>
By Bruce Sterling
<<India and China are comers with a lot to prove to the world, and especially
Since India demonstrated its bomb in 1998, the Chinese have been increasingly
Nuclear India versus nuclear China is Kennedy versus Kruschev, and Reagan
China has openly declared its desire to colonize the moon. The world's most
As Russia once did, China has a strong technical advantage. It already owns a
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: Sun Apr 27 2003 - 01:53:36 MDT
to each other. Their rivalry has roots. In a 1962 shooting war, China grabbed
some real estate in the Kashmir region and sent India's army reeling. India
never forgot the affront, and the dispute still smolders today.
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.
versus Gorbachev, all over again. Now, as then, a space race is a sexy
alternative to nuclear annihilation.
populous nation is unlikely to build lunar settlements, but that's not the
point. China's motive lies not in constructing a lunar Hong Kong, but rather
in luring India into a loud public competition. Later this year, if all goes
as planned, China will become the third country to send a citizen into space.
An orbiting taikonaut will be even more impressive if American shuttles are
stuck in their hangars while the misnamed International Space Station limps
along with a skeleton crew.
chunk of the commercial space-launch business. But India has a decent shot at
victory as well. It doesn't have China's manufacturing know-how, but it's
rapidly becoming the world's software back office.>>