Posted on 10/20/2003 2:07:02 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
BEIJING (AP) -- The fighter pilot who made China's first trip into space last week has been promoted, the official Xinhua News Agency said Monday amid efforts by the communist government to make Lt. Col. Yang Liwei a national hero.
Yang's promotion to full colonel was approved several weeks ago, but his superiors did not tell him until after he returned Thursday from his 21 1/2-hour space flight, Xinhua said.
"The promotion decision was made for his excellent performance as a member of the team during recent years," the agency said.
However, it said, "His superiors decided not to inform Yang of the decision as they thought it might affect his mood as the manned space mission was approaching."
Yang's identity was not disclosed by the secretive, military-linked space program until after his Shenzhou 5 capsule blasted off Wednesday from a base in China's desert northweBut since then, he has been the subject of intense publicity by the communist government's propaganda machine, which lauds him on television and in newspapers as a symbol of the successes of China's military and ruling party.
Yang "became an instant hero in China" following his flight, Xinhua said.
Yang, 38, was flown back to Beijing hours after his touchdown Thursday in China's northern grasslands, though there has been no sign yet when he might appear in public.
State television has repeatedly shown scenes of Yang in training, working in his space capsule and talking to his wife and 8-year-old son from orbit.
"Yang had a happy and tranquil childhood," Xinhua said. "He was intelligent as a child and a good team leader of his playmates, his parents recalled. Yang won many prizes in math competitions."
The report said Yang was a straight-A student at military college after joining the air force of the People's Liberation Army in 1983. It said that after becoming a fighter pilot, he "rated the elite" of his military division.
Yang was one of three finalists for the space flight. They were part of a 14-member astronaut corps, picked from among 1,500 military pilots.
Su Shuangning, director-general of the astronaut program, described Yang as sober-minded and with a "superb capability for self-control," Xinhua said.
Also Monday, Xinhua added to disclosures by the newly confident space program about its technology, reporting that Yang was aided by an "electronic secretary" with an artificial voice.
The machine recorded the speed, altitude and other data about Yang's flight and could give "short, clear ... mezzo-soprano voice instructions" if anything was out of the ordinary, Xinhua said. It did not say whether Yang received any such alerts in flight.
Space program officials said last week that China intends to launch its next Shenzhou flight within two years and plans eventually to have a permanently manned space station.
In other words, students, if you study hard, you too can be a hero and fly in space. The Chinese media blitz is meant to spur nationalism and excellence in studies. This is exactly what our leaders need to hear. When we do exciting things in space, students will work to excel in their studies. Right now NASA spends money trying to convince students how exciting space is. It looks a bit like, when you can't do, you teach.
Where are our heroes? Where is our inspiration? NASA depends on Russia to fly our astronauts. Shameful. Where is our space program? What is the GOAL? It's time to return to the Moon and learn to live and work off planet. When we have that goal we again will have the right stuff. Searching for life isn't going to make it happen, national security and economic concerns will.
Will the Space Race Move East?***If China is able to meet these goals, or even make reasonable progress toward them, it will have proved that its membership in the "space club" is no fluke. China's efforts to put a man into space, the Pentagon said in a report last August, "almost certainly will contribute to improved military space systems in the 2010-2020 time frame."
Beijing's foray into space should not come as a surprise. As the Soviet Union's pioneering example teaches, Communist governments are willing to invest heavily in assets that can be centrally controlled. In the autocrat's calculus, rocketing a man into orbit is less risky than sending a pilot up in an armed fighter or bomber plane, because while a pilot might defect or turn his weapons toward home, an astronaut has little to no control over the vessel in which he travels.
The Chinese government's obsession with control extends beyond the mission itself: it also limits information about the program. Can anyone imagine the United States government training 14 astronauts over at least five years and not identifying the lone voyager until the week of his launching? What would be the outcry if NASA misled the country about where the spacecraft would land, disclosing the true location of the site only shortly before its first use?
The contrast is stark between the relatively open space program of the United States - it is cooperating with 15 countries on the International Space Station - and China's clandestine approach.
Sending a man into space is a notable achievement. But this feat should not obscure the important political differences that continue to divide China from the United States. Amid calls for joint scientific or commercial ventures in space to improve Chinese-American relations, officials in Washington should consider what kind of cooperation is appropriate with a regime that does not share the United States' tradition of freedom and respect for human rights.***
I'd hate for our children to have to be left thinking: "Maybe some day I'll grow up to be a Communist slave and achieve great things for the Motherland..."
Although the thought suits her just fine...
"That's President Clinton. Screw it up and I'll have your kneecaps broken..."
Spot on. No valedictorians, no recess, no patriotism, no God. Nothing to inspire, just historical revision and shame. But all must "feel" they have self-esteem and "All must have prizes." It's a sham and the chickens are coming home to roost.
***Is there anything we can do about all this? One thing only. We must understand clearly that there will be lasting peace in East Asia when, and only when, China abandons her atavistic fantasies of imperial hegemony, withdraws her armies from the 2 million square miles of other people's territory they currently occupy, and gets herself a democratic government under a rule of law. Until that day comes, if it ever does, the danger of war will be a constant in relations between China and the world beyond the Wall, as recent events in the South China Sea have illustrated. Free nations, under the indispensable leadership of the United States, must in the meantime struggle to maintain peace, using the one, single, and only method that wretched humanity, in all its millennia of experience, has so far been able to devise for that purpose: Qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum. *** Source
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