These Chinese researchers at Shangdong University wrote How to Break MD5 and Other Hash Functions. I don't think it is wise to underestimate just how good Chinese research can be.
Article from today about how Asian countries are begining to focus on product design and development.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/bw/20051213/bs_bw/id20051212254640
I didn't say they are not as intelligent, nor did I suggest that their research "couldn't be good."
But I think it's ironic that you cite a mathematical hacking article about tearing down something created in the West, not creating something, and funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, a government entity run directly by bureacratic cadres. I'm not talking about basic research that our own government finances haphazardly by its own bureaucrats...I'm talking about the real engines of innovation....give me the Chinese story of their own Apple, Microsoft, powered aviation, anything that started a whole new industry.
When I ask chinese what they think is great that their society has created, they talk about gunpowder for crying out loud! It's so cliche I can't even believe they're serious.
Who is the first chinese version Bell, Gates, Edison, Lear, Salk, Jobs, Goodyear, Eastman, Hewlett or Packard that comes to your mind? How bout recent Oppenheimer or Einstein that have emigrated to China to "sell-out?"
Is America blessed with its history of innovation because the government bureaucrats made good policy decisions? Is China suddenly going to reverse millenia of history by simply implementing a couple of 5-year plans? Or is there something inherently different about the two systems and cultures that encourage and discourage advances?
This is not my theory, by the way. I've just co-opted it from people like Chang's "The Coming Collapse of China" and others and my own personal experiences. We may all be wrong, and if America can no longer compete with a corrupt regime like the PRC, then we don't deserve to lead anymore.