Japan Launches Two New Spy Satellites 76
According to the Daily Yomiuri, "Japan launched two satellites on Jan. 27 to strengthen its surveillance capabilities, including keeping a closer eye on North Korea which has vowed to stage another nuclear test. One of them was a radar-equipped unit to complete a system of surveillance satellites that will allow Tokyo to monitor any place in the world at least once a day. The other was a demonstration satellite to collect data for research and development." The Defense News version of the story says "Japan developed a plan to use several satellites as one group to gather intelligence in the late 1990s as a response to a long-range missile launch by Pyongyang in 1998. The space agency has said the radar satellite would be used for information-gathering, including data following Japan’s 2011 quake and tsunami, but did not mention North Korea by name."
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Go ahead, cross that Rubicon - it won't hurt - much.
You won't con me with rubies. ;)
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Go ahead, cross that Rubicon - it won't hurt - much.
You won't con me with rubies. ;)
Then perhaps rubles will do? Come along, comrade, there is much to be done!
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Was it the Koreans ?
Or was it the Japanese ?
Senator Blutarsky said it was the Germans. Are you saying a US senator would be either lying or wrong?
ARGUS-IS 1.8 gigapixel camera (Score:5, Informative)
A single drone can cover a 25 sq mi area with 6" resolution. This video is incredible in that it gives you a detailed peek at what is possible from a single aircraft and the amount of data-processing that can be done in real time.
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Check this video of new spy technology for drones and presumably spy satellites: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=e95_1359267780 [liveleak.com] A single drone can cover a 25 sq mi area with 6" resolution. This video is incredible in that it gives you a detailed peek at what is possible from a single aircraft and the amount of data-processing that can be done in real time.
This is a drone, but can a spy satellite obtain such realtime data in this resolution? I am yet to see an example of that.
Re:ARGUS-IS 1.8 gigapixel camera (Score:5, Informative)
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Not sure how anti Sat launches, or what Japan could do with the info over and above what the French would sell em.
Perhaps it was they wanted daily shots of China and NK and the cost was high, enough to justify building thei
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A law which only applies to US companies.
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There's no clear indication in the video that any processing (beyond possibly creating the mosaic, which is pretty straightforward computationally) is taking place in real time. They talk about ARGUS, but they're pretty cagey about differentiating between the front end on the UAV and the back end on the ground. (And there's no immediate w
North Korea? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:North Korea? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:North Korea? (Score:5, Interesting)
China had a cult of personality but it didn't work, so they reverted to the earlier system prior to the republic (which also didn't work), but without an emperor. A complex order of bureaucrats runs things in China today just like it has for thousands of years. Communism is just a facade. Heck, they could still have an emperor if they wanted and things would be almost exactly the same.
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So how long have you been a member of the KKK?
Because if you disagree with Obama, or just so happen to not like the color tie he chooses to wear, you instantly receive your custom bath robe and lifetime membership card.
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Often people don't have an intelligent rebuttal to say so they fall back on ad hominems.
"How long have you been in the KKK?"
"Go back to Stormfront!"
"Go back to screwing your sister, redneck!"
It is an attempt to silence dissent. Unfortunately it works far too often.
If this doesn't work they'll resort to screaming over you and forum sliding, typically with mindless drivel.
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How did things change when Obama took over from Bush? Herr Bush had his own cult. It was a multi-teired cult, with military industrial people on the inner circle, oil industry in the second circle, bankers in the third circle, and the fourth circle was composed of any rich idiot who cared to worship Bush and his war machinery. And, the whole republican party invited every imbecile who was frightened of the terr'ists to sit on the outer fringes to worship Bush.
If we're going to compare the cults, I can fo
Re:North Korea? (Score:5, Informative)
That's one way to look at it. Another way to look at it is to think of China as a country run by engineers. The current president Hu Jintao is a hydraulic engineer and the next guy in line Xi Jinping is a chemical engineer and Jiang Zemin who was president before Hu Jintao was an electrical engineer. The next couple of guys in line in the politburo are economists and engineers.
Once you realize that China is run by engineers a lot of what China is doing begins to make sense in a sort of intuitive way if you're a tech person yourself.
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Meanwhile, the U.S. is run by career politicians and lawyers.
I'm not sure which is worse, quite frankly. While I'm partial to engineers myself, most of them are not very good when it comes to dealing with unpredictable systems like people.
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If North Korea is not a threat then surely China wouldn't be either. Admittedly the Chinese seem to hold a grudge for a very long time over the Nanking Massacre, but I cannot imagine them attacking Japan.
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If North Korea is not a threat then surely China wouldn't be either. Admittedly the Chinese seem to hold a grudge for a very long time over the Nanking Massacre, but I cannot imagine them attacking Japan.
Fable and history are merely tools of statecraft. The decision to go to war or not with anyone has much more to do with resources and trade routes than anything sentimental. As long as China is getting its way, and Japan does not become weak, Japan is safe. But at a certain point China will outgrow its current situation and will find it necessary to make territorial gains in order to keep growing, or something will get in its way, like the US. When that happens both sides will come up with a narrative that
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I think China's most immediate goal is the Republic of China (Taiwan). That's a thorn in their side.
Re:North Korea? (Score:4, Interesting)
China's most immediate goal is southern Siberia. China severely lacks farmable land, and the russians have a lot of it unused. Both are conducting military excercises in the area. Russia, though, knows that it can not stand against China by it's own, so is seeking admission into NATO; the USA knows that it does not want to help Russia and is thus seeking withdrawal from NATO. This is also a part of why USA is leaving the Atlantic and focusing on the Pacific now. For the Russians it would probably make most sense to go Alaska on Siberia, but their imperial pride might not be willing to do in under pressure.
China's second immediate goal is a possible attack from Japan, not that it would be much of a problem. Of course they would not attack Japan by themselves, nothing to gain there. But they are pawning Japan in another game. Remember when USA was giving crap to China because China "artificially" keeps its currency cheap? China was doing it by buying up massive amounts of USD, basic stuff. When the amount of crap they recieved became too high, they outsourced it to Japan. Started to buy up yen instead. The price of yen rising, Japan losing it's export power, all of their big companies going bust. Japan is doing it's best to cheapen the yen by buying up USD themselves, (following the Chinese masterplan) but they can not match the Chinese wallet. So the Japanese economy, already in a standstill for decades, is now on the brink of collapse. And they might be crazy enough to go kamikaze on the Great Wall of China.
But the dance around Taiwan? I do not think so. They are too small to pose any real threat, but they work wonders as an enemy to point at for rallying up masses. They also work wonders as a diplomatic taboo, a card that will move mountains if played well.
Re:North Korea?: Ok, so... (Score:3, Interesting)
>China's second immediate goal is a possible attack from Japan, not that it would be much of a problem.
>Of course they would not attack Japan by themselves, nothing to gain there.
>But they are pawning Japan in another game. Remember when USA was giving crap to China because China "artificially" keeps its currency cheap?
>China was doing it by buying up massive amounts of USD, basic stuff. When the amount of crap they recieved became too high, they outsourced it to Japan.
China HAD to "buy" USD, th
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Not sure if troll or not, but I'll just say that the world does not run on face-value thinking like that. We need to go deeper :H
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You are projecting American thinking on to the Chinese. They don't want to grab land from Russia, and they don't fear imminent attack from Japan (whose constitution forbids them from doing it anyway). What they care about is protecting themselves both militarily and economically, and which the US takes as a threat to itself.
And by the way, Japan is doing okay. Not brilliant, but not on the edge of economic disaster either. There is no hint what so ever from any major political faction, and certainly not the
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A land grab is mostly necessary for the Chinese. It is protecting themselves economically - they need to feed their people. They currently have a severe lack of farmland, and buying from the world market is only going to cost more and more. Also it will be necessary for internal stability, their people's expectations for a living standard are rising, based on both growing wages and more information about the status quo outside of China.
Concerning Japan: what do you think this row in the autumn was about: ht [bbc.co.uk]
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It wasn't about farm land.
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Lost territory is lost territory, those islands are not the only ones China has been focusing on, but they are the only ones that matter to Western Media due to Japanese and American ties.
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You are projecting American thinking on to the Chinese. They don't want to grab land from Russia, and they don't fear imminent attack from Japan (whose constitution forbids them from doing it anyway). What they care about is protecting themselves both militarily and economically, and which the US takes as a threat to itself.
His information on China wanting to grab land from Russia isn't wrong, it is just outdated. They did in fact want to grab land from Russia. China had a long running border dispute with Russia. They actually came to blows over it in the 1960s. The dispute was only settled in 2004 when Russia gave them what they wanted in exchange for closer economic ties and an easing of tensions. So at this time I don't think there going to be any problem there.
China's military spending is far beyond what is required to m
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Tom Clancy (Score:2)
Sounds like a summary for the next Tom Clancy novel.
May god have mercy on us all!
Soon to be available at every book selling shop in every airport in the world.
Just need to insert "Clark" and/or rainbow 6 (Seal team 6 perhaps?! Hmm maybe not, I hear Disney's got the rights now for 175 years)...
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Troll much? I think Japan keeping an eye on their neighbors is simple prudence. One is nursing a grudge from WWII and the other is bat shit crazy.
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And Japan?
Still dreaming of their "Empire of the Rising Sun"?
Re:North Korea? (Score:4, Interesting)
I think that there is not any zeal for expansionist policy in the postwar generation. There is still plenty of cultural/racial prejudice in Japan, but that doesn't always equate with empire building.
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There's a lot of "young farts" and "middle aged farts" thinking the same thing. Make no mistake, while Japan being a classic East Asian country with extreme interests in keeping their face and therefore only aim to show their "civilized" side to the outside world, the nationalist pride is present and going stronger then ever after WW2 defeat. Look no further then Japanese PMs visiting Yasukuni shrine in spite of massive problems this causes to their foreign relations. They simply have to do this, because if
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That's the nature of a representative government. Everyone gets a say in it.
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That is dramatically incorrect. In many democratic countries, even large minorities get no say in it. You must be a minority that has a position of a decider, a minority with ties to extremely wealthy individuals or families that are willing to support politicians or a minority with something else important to give to politicians to matter.
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If minorities have no say then it's not a democratic country. Democratic implies that everyone has a vote ya know? In the US the Bible Belt has a large influence because they vote. That's the way democracies are designed.
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You seem to have this idealist image of what democracy is, that is about as removed from reality as USSR's "communism".
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I don't know, it seems to work the way it's designed most of the time. It's not perfect but unless you're far removed from a mainstream viewpoint it's not too bad.
Re:North Korea? (Score:4, Insightful)
You are correct, and even the people like Ishihara who lives through those "good old days" also lived through the aftermath of WW2 and the suffering that the country had to endure. Since then there has been a strong pacifist movement in Japan. A few years back the government was talking about removing the non-aggression clause from the constitution but it was a very unpopular policy. Japanese people mostly recognize how good peace has been to them and how much better off they are now than they would ever have been under the old system, even if they had won.
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In other words: they are a very traditional Western country in spite of being located in Far East.
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If you want to compare Japan to a western country such as Germany, where having a supreme leader being able to run the country into a massive war, to kill as many innocents as possible and established a "empire", then sure.
Want to compare it to other Western countries, even ones with expansionist histories. Not so much.
Re:North Korea? (Score:4, Interesting)
NK is essentially an arm of China. One has to understand that China has a lot of control over what NK does due to leadership ties, and NK has traditionally served as an agent of Chinese interests when really shoddy stuff has to be done.
That in addition to the old animosity that most Koreans, North or South have for Japanese and the fact that NK has a very strong spying presence in Japan to the point of kidnapping japanese to get them to teach japanese customs and culture to their agents, NK is a very credible threat to Japan, and far greater threat then China in short term.
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Re:Unbelievable (Score:5, Insightful)
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Sorry, NK is not the enemy of the U.S. They may be an enemy of U.S. interests, but you should read "U.S. interests" as "things the very wealthy and very powerful want but cannot get without government intervention" so for laymen like ourselves, NK is a non-issue.
The enemy of the U.S. people are the corporations and special interests that control the government. Until people start realizing this, they'll just continue to get hit with the fallout from the U.S. government protecting its "interests."
We have always been at war with Eastasia. (Score:1)