China: Crash of Chinese Surveillance Plane Hurts Effort on Warning System

NYT ^ | 06/07/06 | JOSEPH KAHN

[TigerLikesRooster]

June 7, 2006

Crash of Chinese Surveillance Plane Hurts Effort on Warning System

By JOSEPH KAHN

BEIJING, June 6 — China's efforts to field an early-warning aircraft that could help it project power far beyond its borders, and challenge American intervention in any conflict with Taiwan, were dealt at least a temporary blow by the crash of a surveillance aircraft on Sunday, defense specialists in the region said.

The aircraft, described by two government-controlled newspapers in Hong Kong as a Chinese-made airborne warning and control system, or Awacs, plane, slammed into a hillside in central Anhui Province, killing all 40 technicians and crew members on board.

The crash was described as one of the worst disasters in the history of the Chinese Air Force. The Chinese news media said that Guo Boxiong, a top military official in Beijing, was supervising the investigation into the accident.

The two Hong Kong newspapers, Ta Kung Pao and Wen Wei Po, carried articles on Monday that described the crash in more detail than did the rest of the Chinese news media. They did not identify the model of the plane, but regional experts suggested that it was most likely the KJ-2000, an early-warning aircraft that was developed using mostly technology developed in China.

In addition to the loss of the aircraft, one of four of its kind that China has built, experts said the deaths of the 40 people on board, including 35 electronics and avionics technicians, could hinder one of China's most pressing military modernization programs.

[thinking]

do you really believe that news report....do really think that China, with a population of billion people, would be handicapped, by the lose of 40 people, give me a break...IMHO, you are an example of the parrot society, repeating what you hear on the TV, or read

[Truthsearcher]

Rationality determines how one achieve one's goals, it does not determine what one's goals are. If one's goal is to maintain power and control, then the best means to maintain power and control becomes the most rational choice of actions. .

So iff nationlism becomes the CCP's only justification for their reins on power and control, then they will choose that over economic prosperity any day. After all, what good would economic prosperity for China do for them if they lose control? This is the government that starved 30 million of its own people to death. The well being of the Chinese people means nothing to them.

[sinoguy]

well,I studied for 4 years in a university owned by CHinese NATIONAL COMMISSION OF DEFENCE SICENCE & TECH.
Many of my classmates work for Chinese arsenals now.

I learnt about the new from them .the lost platform is not KJ2000 but a variation of Y8.

of course,there are always backup for the the technicians lost in the accidents.
but IMHO,it is still a heavy loss.

[thinking]

Yes, well, thanks for bringing us up-to-date, that Chinese science is dependent, on a handful of technicians and engineers...IMHO, that is crap, but then again, if 1000s of trained engineers are working in foreign countries collecting intelligence, it could well be, that, there are only a few at home....