nt (Gordon) wrote in message ...
If they were really
interested in scientific advances, they would continue with their
launch business and join the ISS effort, instead of repeating the
feats of others forty years after the fact.

Absolutely agree. Kicking in to the ISS, offering their services in heavy
lifting, etc., would gain them far more than this Gagarin-esque flight and a
near duplicate of early Soviet space plans. I think this flight was a
monumental achievement for the PRC, but the postflight interview with the
Taikonaut seemed a blast from the past, with party slogans and embedded phrases
that show their program is under the Communist banner, intended to spread their
message into the reaches of space. That is sad, and I think it detracts from
the accomplishment of the Chinese people.

v/r
Gordon

Yep. I can't help but believe that despite all the hype we continually
see about the "new" China, it remains a bit too firmly embedded in the
old Maoist past. Their progress in their launch capabilities has been
very impressive--but this little sideshow did nothing to impress
anyone with any degree of understanding of the field, and instead was
obviously focused solely at their own teeming masses--domestic
propoganda writ large. They sent a man into space, but at what cost?
For gosh sakes, we (the rest of the world) still look to them as the
breeding place for the various influenza strains, courtesy of their
still living in too close a proximity to their danged ducks and
pigs--better if they had spent part of this latest investment on their
nascent commercial launch business, and the rest on keeping things
like SAR's from erupting in the first place.

Brooks