"Michael Shirley" wrote in message
newsp.ucwkbqu5ra3qj7@schooner-blue...
On Mon, 16 Jun 2008 02:56:13 -0700, William Black
wrote:


"Michael Shirley" wrote in message
newsp.uctgnu05ra3qj7@schooner-blue...
On Sat, 14 Jun 2008 23:59:33 -0700, Zombywoof
wrote:


I saw some footage of one of GM's plants in China a few weeks back and
when I saw the level of automation and the high throughput, my stomach
went into a knot. It won't take much to retool for military production.

But it'll probably take a level of project management and technical
sophistication that isn't available in great quantities in China.

Today, no, but that state of affairs won't last for long.


The factories may be in China but they're designed in the West, and the
skills for designing such a factory, and the management of the processes
used, aren't available to the Chinese in any great quantity.

That's why they're making Blu Ray players and not top of the range
avionics
for export.

The technologies aren't that different.

That'll change. As it is, when Rockwell-Garmin sold em modern GPS
technology back during the Clinton Administration and Boeing did the same
with the ring laser gyro autopilot during the same time frame, that made
me sick too. It buys the Chinese time to get good at things, while
extending the usefulness of weapons that might not otherwise be up to
scratch. Both of those avionics systems went into the Qing-5, a 1958
design for a tactical nuclear strike fighter that was supposed to be able
to do what the early model F-105s could. That plane was utterly obsolete
until we upgraded their NAV/ATTACK systems for them.

It's not the technologies.

They don't actually matter.

It's the project management techniques that allow you to change direction in
a reasonable time frame.

These are skills is very short supply just about everywhere, and look like
remaining so for the next decade or so.

Indian project managers leave India after graduation in droves, mainly to
work in the USA.

Indian companies hire US companies to do this sort of work for them because
they can't recruit any people locally. This leads to the rather odd
situation where Indian engineers leave India for a few months and then
return, but working for a foreign company at foreign wages.

China will get the same problem.

--
William Black


I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Barbeques on fire by the chalets past the castle headland
I watched the gift shops glitter in the darkness off the Newborough gate
All these moments will be lost in time, like icecream on the beach
Time for tea.