October 01, 2010
National Day 2010: To the Moon and Beyond
Amid quiet celebrations for the 61st anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic the Chinese space program launched the Chang'e II lunar probe. The probe will eventually settle into a close orbit around the moon to survey a possible landing site. It will eventually either crash onto the moon or be sent into the solar system. The rocket launch was broadcast on national television and took precedence over reports of wreath laying at the Monument to the People's Heroes at the center of Tiananmen Square in the national capital.
For perspective, Russia and the USA achieved orbiting lunar modules almost a half century ago in 1966...
Labels: space program
November 18, 2009
USA to Cooperate with China in Space
An important shift in the USA federal government treatment of Beijing's space program may occur in the near future. Obama commented after his private meeting with Chinese President Hu at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing that the USA and China would "engage in cooperation in space exploration." According to Space.com the heads of each nations's space agencies will exchange visits next year. There is no word from NASA on these developments but if they occur it could set the stage for real interaction on space instead of the pointless rivalry in place today. What is needed is for China to be brought into the International Space Station rather than build a space station of their own. The ban on Chinese participation is purely political at the behest of suprisingly few politicians (Republican Dana Rohrabacher of Orange County, Calfiornia) and lobbying interests (Lockheed-Martin)....
Labels: foreign relations, politics, space program
November 02, 2009
Tsien Hsue-Shen Dead at 98
Tsien Hsue-Shen or (pinyin) Qian Xuesen known as the father of China's missile program has died in Beijing at 98. A world expert physicist, Qian's long and eventful life was turned completely upside-down when he became a victim of Senator Joseph McCarthy's witch hunt against alleged Red Chinese communist spies in America. A detailed obituary can be found here (link). Some highlights of Qian's fascinating life include:
- 1935: Qian Xuesen (usually printed Tsien Hsue-Shen) leaves Shanghai for graduate studies at MIT and later, at the urging of renowned rocket scientist Theodor Von Karman, himself only recently arrived in the USA from Hungary, continuing studies and research at Cal Tech. Not long afterward, Von Karmen and his collegues, including Qian, founded the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
- 1945: Qian Xuesen and Von Karmen went to Germany at the end of World War II and helped coordinate "Operation Paperclip" that brought the Nazi rocket scientists, particularly the famous Werner Von Braun, to the United States. Von Braun and his proteges had surrendered to American troops in advance of the Russian front. The Russians, however, "inherited" the production crews of the Nazi rocket and aerospace industries. The Nazi regime in Germany had by far the most advanced technology. Many of Qian's theories were tested and proven by the Nazi scientists. Qian assimililated much of the Nazi expertise and quickly became the foremost theoritician in rocket and jet propulsion in the USA.
- 1950: Both the USA and the Soviet Union were actively experimenting with modified Nazi V-2 rocket designs with many successful launches. By 1950 the USA had established what would become the Cape Kennedy space center in Florida. At the same time, the USA and China entered a long period of bitterness over the collapse of the USA backed regime headed by Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek and the victory of the Communist Party in China. A sudden and still little-understood chain of events led to the Korean War, the creation of a protectorate for the failed Chiang government, and an anti-communist hysteria that would ultimately engulf the USA. A victim of this unhappy period was Qian Xuesen who became a virtual prisoner after he was accused of being a communist conspirator.
- 1955: Qian Xuesen is deported to the People's Republic of China. He is welcomed as a hero and quickly put in charge of China's rocket programs.
For more check out the Sinomania! page on the Chinese space programs....
Labels: missiles, space program, technology
September 24, 2008
China Space Program Accelerates
While it may be the 1930s again in Washington and New York, for urban Chinese it's the go-go Sixties with pop culture celebrating the advances of the Chinese space program (at left, the "Shenzhou VII" mobile phone).
On Thursday, the Shenzhou VII will lift off into orbit around Earth and test new advances in made-in-China space technology including a spacesuit for China's first ever spacewalk, air-locks, and rocket improvements. The lift-off will be broadcast live in a show of confidence in the Chinese space program.
Labels: missile defense, shenzhou, space program, spacewalk
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