China vows to push ahead with its first manned space flight

Space Daily ^ | Feb. 3, 2003 | Agence France-Presse

[The Duke]

Control of the high ground has always been a tremendous advantage. Also, notice from this article that the Chinese are going directly to a shuttle program, rather than evolving through the "space capsule" stage. That's pretty sobering too.

Hey, any bets on how closely it resembles the US shuttle?

[brityank]

Hey, any bets on how closely it resembles the US shuttle?

And we will probably not have anyone aboard the ISS, if past experience with launch delays are any indication. Whatever they haven't gotten from clinton, they can lift from there. </tinfoil-hat>

[Bobby777]

"China will launch its first manned space shuttle this year,"

is this a bad translation for a 'manned capsule' or are these guys claiming they have a reusable orbiter?

[Bobby777]

Wasn't Atlantis scheduled to leave Vandenberg AFT for a polar orbit shortly after the Challenger disaster? (and the polar orbit mission was scrubbed) ...

[Bobby777]

Vandenberg AFT s/b Vandenberg AFB ... typo ...

[spetznaz]

Also, notice from this article that the Chinese are going directly to a shuttle program, rather than evolving through the "space capsule" stage. That's pretty sobering too. Hey, any bets on how closely it resembles the US shuttle?

Personally i believe it will be the next evolution of their 'Lomg March' rocket systems and not a legit 'shuttle' like the Columbia and Atlantis. The Chinese will probably launch the Taikonauts (US: Astronaut; Russia: Cosmonaut; China: Taikonaut) on an adapted Long March rocket system.

Here is a gif. of the long march series:

However the Chinese do have a shuttle program on line, and they were already doing advanced tests on it in wind tunnels in the mid-nineties. I have not managed to get its name yet but here is picture of what it will look like.

As for shuttle designs from other nations the Europeans have been working for over a decade on an advamced design next-generation shuttle system, and there are many photos of some of the concepts, but they do not have the money to go any further.

India was looking at some concepts for itself (with a military leaning) but they decided to abandon it for spy satellite systems that they should start putting up within the next 2 years (i.e to spy on China with relative safety since flying planes over China is a major problem due to the S-300-clone SAM system ...against Pakistan they can still fly high altitude planes with impunity ).

The Soviet Union did have a working Shuttle design called the Buran (it means Blizzard), and it looked like a doppelganger of a NASA shuttle. The reason they worked on it was because they were afraid the NASA shuttles could be used for war, and thus they wanted something similar. Sadly for them the Buran was extremely expensive for the Soviet coffers and it only made one flight to space (the flight was done solely by computers) before further flights were halted (today if you go to Gorky park you can ahve lunch in it since it is now a restaraunt). Buran was one of the reasons the Soviets ran out of cash (the other major reason was their quest to keep up with US submarine technology).

Here is a photograph of the Buran (in the pic it is already a restaraunt):

Currently the only country that seems to ahve the funds and the will to work on a shuttle STS program is China ....which seems extremely focussed on having access to space (they have had 73 space launches already, but still have to have a manned space flight).

The Columbia disaster may alter my last statement (at least i hope it makes more funding available for NASA), but that remains to be seen......

However one advantage China has over the US (and Russia and Europe) is that they can do this at an extremely cheap cost, yet have systems that work pretty well. They may not have the sigma quality levels of US systems but they seem to have better results than European Arienne (sp) systems ...which i find particularly hilarious (but then again i am a pretty strange character and my sense of humor is a tad bit twisted). Anyways that is a major advantage the Chi-Comms have, and who knows what technological 'assistance' the US and Russia helped it with.

Remember the US 'helped' China with warhead miniturization and advanced guidance technology (read the Chinese stole or bribed to get it), while the Russians 'were kind enough' to assist the Chinese with their new advanced Topol-M missile (again the Chinese stole or bribed)! Maybe their space tech was also due to some 'friendly one-sided exchange' with the US and Russia.

There are days i feel China is just a parasite that feeds to its North (Russia) and to its East (the USA).

Before someone posts i should have said 'West' when referring to the US remember the West coast of the US is closer to China, and the West coast of the US (California) is to the East of China.

[spetznaz]

P.S: To see the pictures that did not show up just right-click on them and chose 'show picture.' The picture should then be observable.

Sorry for that.

[onedoug]

Vandenberg was certainly in the cards prior to the Challenger accident, presumably for better access to polar orbits, and hence, military missions.

I followed the mission mentioned in #s 8 & 20 fairly keenly though, curious as to what it may have been about. I was struck at launch by its exceptionally wide roll maneuver, which sure seemed to aim it further north. There was a lot of speculation by the media that it was to release a classified payload. And maybe it did. But that landing too, seemed quite unusual. I yet wonder that there wasn't something pretty heavy in there.

Conversely though, I don't think there's been such a highly classified mission since. But having and continuing that kind of access to orbit has yet got to be militarily important. I don't think capitalism has permeated the Chinese psyche quite so deeply yet to consider it primary to their applications.

[swarthyguy]

Good. A shock to the system is the only thing that'll wake America up.

Much like Sputnik.

A Chinaman space walking. And then the full enormity of squandering a three decade plus advantage in space faring will befall the public.

[metesky]

Thanks to our fliend Birry Crinton we have pletty good technorogy.

[BlazingArizona]

No, this is why we should stop shopping at WalMart.

If we chicken out, then I say more power to the Chinese. I would love to see them colonize Mars while the meek inherit the Earth.

[swarthyguy]

Weird, I never got this ping