Slashdot Mirror
EU Presses Ahead With Galileo GPS System
philkerr writes "The BBC is reporting that European transport ministers have agreed to the 2008 deployment of the European controlled GPS system. Costing 2.1 billion euros and creating 150,000 jobs. Is this just a pork-barrel project, or something Europe really needs to break the reliance on U.S. space technology? This was discussed on Slashdot in June when the U.S. and EU reached an agreement on its deployment."
The project is on fire.
Between GPS, GLONASS, and this new EU Galileo system, it's nice to see competition in this market... but how many do we really need?
If not, why should France/ Estonia /Germany/ other EU nation rely on a US system? I can't imagine many heads of armed forces being too happy about relying on a foreign power's system that is out of their control.
There is an issue at the moment that GPS is the de-facto standard for both consumers and business, and there isn't really any competition out there. Should the GPS system fail or be temporarily "upgraded" so that "terrorists" suddenly think they're a mile away from where they really are I don't know of an alternative that The Rest of Us (TM) can use.
You seem to have missed out the part about improving accuracy and reliability.
I couldn't give a monkey about the politics, but anything that improves the signal makes me happy.
Multi system receivers will give much greater accuracy than a single system receiver. Great news for geocachers. http://www.commlinx.com.au/GPS_GLONASS_receiver.ht m
Just imagine a triple system handheld concumer receiver unit.
RTFA. This system will operate with GPS, not just as an alternative. More satellites means better accuracy and better availability:
"More importantly from the civilian perspective, the agreement allowed the systems to be meshed seamlessly, greatly benefiting manufacturers, service providers and consumers.
Better accuracy, especially in built-up areas where the current GPS signal can be patchy, should lead to a bigger demand for positioning systems."
Geez! Because they are the GOOD guys of course!
What would be really cool is to set up some sort of dual band GPS reciever that uses both systems at the same time for never before possible accuracy.
411 Y0UR 8453 4R3 8310NG 70 U5!! -NSA
I wonder how the US would react if, say, China started blocking GPS from certain places to hold back it's enemies. Tibet for example.
Looks can be deceiving. Or CAN they?
An European GPS system isn't that bad of an idea. It's not like it's going to interfere with the US system, it might incorporate some better features like stronger signals so it's easier to get a lock (it's almost impossible in some areas of the US with my Garmin unit), and it won't be at the mercy of US's whim to scramble the signal in certain locations or disable entirely if they wanted to.
It'll be nice to have a GPS system which won't be known for routine power-play dicking around.
The US is too unstable to hold the keys to a globally relied on tech...
Someone set us up the bomb, so shine we are!
That figure does not seem right to me.
Don't worry, instead of just one precise missile they'll just fire a whole bunch of unprecise ones. Trust me "collateral damage" won't be concern for some nation like that. Or if it is China, they surely can develop a missile that as it gets closer can recognize the target by visual clues.
I am one of those who is actually working on the EGNOS ground segment (something like the USA's WAAS). The current system test bed is designed to create a position-delta to feed with the GPS signal to make positioning more exact. Once all Galileo satellites are up, we do not rely on GPS data anymore, but we can fallback if it is possible. One thing to note, Galileo has indoor positioning.
:-)
(Yes, Galileo will be a really independent system, comprising of many different parts, under civil guidance for civil uses.)
One the political side, from a developers point of view, we really want to get this thing up as fast as possible because everyone I know who is developing is really really fed up with the way the US government tries to control our scientific and especially space-research specific endeavours. Since we have developed a system that is clearly superior to anything the USA have (never mind the 20 years of operation of GPS, you could have progressed too...) we really really hate it, when we get told to stop to work on it by a foreign government. To make things clear, no we don't hate Americans. We hate the way the American government is treating us, and the more they want to sabotage our projects the better our projects will be.
The Europeans should buy it from the US with the dollar so weak at the moment it will be a steal.
Idiot, the two systems *are* designed to work together
One of the most controversial aspects of this proposal is China's involvement. Although the EU maintains that Galileo is only for civilian use, it appears that China disagrees.
Russia and China each have a 20% stake in the Galileo project, having invested 200 million euros. India has also pledged 300 million euros.
Apparently the EU has promised India that Galileo would not be denied to them in the event of anything less than "global war", making its use available during more limited military conflicts. It is hard to imagine that China has negotiated anything less.
This had led to speculation that the USA would simply shoot it down to prevent its use by hostile military powers.
The EU Referendum blog has been covering this assiduously.
+1 Insightful
If there's one thing you should remember from the comments on this topic, it is that the USA pisses a lot of people off. Instead of telling them that they should not be pissed off, maybe you need to start thinking about why people are so aggravated.
I believe that greatest difference between the US and European systems is that one is a commercial system with guaranteed availability that will allow it to be relied on because it won't be turned off or made less accurate by political decisions.
This makes it suitable for air traffic control and other applications where a system that might be switched off with no notice cannot be used.
"Again-- please grow up and realize that there are hostiles in the world, and it is a constant struggle to stay ahead."
Yeah - And the US is the most hostile of them all!
Who else believe that bombing people will make them friends.
Is this just a pork-barrel project, or something Europe really needs to break the reliance on U.S. space technology?
If you missed everything else in the last few years, how about this one reminder: "freedom fries."
All the other good reasons for it aside, that one act by congress made it very clear to all Europe that they're not dealing with adults.
You grow up. Anybody with the technology to build a missile with enough range, payload and accuracy to hit those targets effectively has the ability to make a nuclear weapon - which makes the issue of accurate targetting moot.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
No doubt the Pentagon is already offering a contract for 150 or so new anti-satellite missiles...
You must think in Russian.
Talk about expensive. According to a new budget USA is planning to put a 9.5 billion satellite system in space to watch me showing them my ass.
Terrorist instead of using an expensive GPS tracked device, use the old "visual" guidance missile (can't remmember the name), or put themselves in a truck loaded with diesel fuel and chemicals and ram it in the building they want to target. Heck Mc veigh with his truck and bombing did not need GPS. Even better , we are speaking here of people which do not qualm at dying for their cause. So they have de-facto ther best guidance system of the world : themselves. So i do not think terrorist are the key here.
I think the key is that the US military ensure they have an incredible advantage over the opposition, so degradation should be there only in case of military operation. I seriously doubt that a degradation would occurs on US soil just for anti-terrorist purpose.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
In the past the DoD has saw fit to essentially turn off GPS to civilian receivers. While the DoD might have good reasons to do this the fact remains that its control remains in the hands of an American military department.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
The amusing questions won't be asked. But I do wonder if this announcement has anything to do with the unnamed, massive, something-to-do-with-space, spending bill that even pocket Republicans don't want to support.
I forget what 8 was for.
Yeah, sure. Look, have you seen the kind of products coming out of China lately? They'd have to fire off 10 nukes, just so one of them could make it across the Pacific (well, Polar Ice cap). Hell, factor out a targetting system like GPS, and on a good day, the nuke would come within a couple miles of its target. And a nuke hitting the Atlantic instead of the White House will have little effect (water dissipates radiation rather quickly, and acts as a wonderful dampening agent). And you can be sure, that while their nukes may miss, ours won't.
By the time China gets a man on the moon or figures out how to identify a target by sight, nuclear fusion and orbital lasers will be achieved, making the discussion moot.
I am John Hurt.
Why shouldn't the Europeans find their own toilet to dump money into? Instead of using what the US already provides to them for free, they can puff their chests out on this new high tech black hole instead of spending money on shoring up their social systems. Sounds like penis envy to me.
Another cool thing about the EU's positioning system is that it can potentially be used to land commercial planes on auto-pilot. This is currently not possible with the GPS system because it's controlled by the US army. With a few year's tech advances behind us, the Galileo system should be way more accurate and predictable, making human pilots almost redundant. Perhaps in the not-too distant future we'll only need one on-boad pilot, with co-pilots assigned via remote control only when needed (i.e. when the plane is not on auto-pilot)
Go EU!
Hell no. Relying on the French is a complete waste of time as we have discovered ever since WWII. Estonia? Maybe when they have a launch vehicle and site that can make Earth orbit.
"I have started a bussiness selling rat-cage face masks. I'm logging off for good now."
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
If there's one thing you should remember from the comments on this topic, it is that the USA pisses a lot of people off. Instead of telling them that they should not be pissed off, maybe you need to start thinking about why people are so aggravated.
But this is an interesting puzzle. We (the US) spent over $10 billion to deploy a very nice global positioning system twenty years ago. Ever since then, we have provided 100% free access of one sort or another to pretty much everyone in the world.
And yet, somehow this seems to have caused quite a bit of friction. I honestly think that if the US had never allowed civilian access of any kind, there would be much less complaining about GPS.
Surely it is reasonable to bring up an old adage: "don't look a gift horse in the mouth."
Can you name a time in the last decade?
The way the US AF turns off GPS now in a region will also turn off Galileo and GLONASS as well. The idea to turn it off at the sats is old an no longer useful to the the powers that have control of the swtich. The newer stats don't even have the ability to turn on the lie factor SA.
Last time I checked, the USA did not own space. But I suppose my disagreement with the policy of the US makes me a hostile, so my opinion counts for nothing.
Well, they would probably grumble a little, then get to work on a way to figure out a way around it, just as they have been doing for decades.
Rubbish. The US military and government would throw a hissy fit, demanding this and that and threatening sanctions. Just like they've done when countires have threatened other US interests and resources in the past.
Looks can be deceiving. Or CAN they?
Dresden, Tokyo, and Hiroshima have hardly hurt our cause. Perhaps bombing does make friends?
Counterintuitive, yes?
Or, alternatively: Simply don't care that the US pisses people off. This seems to be the prefered method. Understanding is deprecated.
stuff
Why should that piss you off? As a citizen of the EU, I absolutely DO NOT want a third party to be able to accurately aim a missile at the European Parliament, at one of the national parliaments, or a nuclear power plant. These are military assets, not GPL code for the benefit of mankind (the universal GPS was a side benefit, not the purpose).
EU goal is to enlarging to East Europe and to incorporate Russia. When it will happen, we will absolutly need a totally EU controlled positioning system: Galileo.
Don't you like this economic and militar scenario? O:-)
Ciao da Villo - GPG public key available
Erm, dude. Even an Estonian wouldn't rely on an Estonian GPS system. Mostly because we all suffer from some sort of a national inferiority complex: whatever it is that Estonians do, it's shit because, well, they're Estonians.
Man is a slave because freedom is difficult, whereas slavery is easy.
Just because you've killed all of your enemies does not mean that all that remains are friends.
The US is very effective on killing enemies, but very poor on making friends. But with 10,600 nuclear warheads, who needs friends?
Oh, of course unless someone thinks that a direct assault is suicide (which it undoubtably is) and tries something a little more clandestine. Friends might be useful then.
So who controls Galileo ? Are they going to turn off galileo if a power or terrorist group uses it in a war against the US, UK, France, etc ? Funny that a poster stated that they had issues with the US GPS system because it's controlled by a foreign govt, yet as far as I see, Galileo will also be controlled by a foreign group, from my (British) POV.
My hostiles may, one day, be your friends. Or vice versa. Then the unwisdom of this agreement maybe seen.
h.
Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious
Agreed. It's their money and it's their policy. I do see the EU being a problem militarily for the US but not for some time.
I'd go on a Vegan diet but the delivery time from Vega is too long. --brownkitty
heck, they just pack a dozen of their millions-sized army into rockets and let them aim through a windows and balance :)
stuff
By comparison the UK debt is 33% of GDP and the euro countries had deficit targets they had to meet (but often fudged) to join the single currency in the first place.
The next country to suffer reversal of fortunes and crippling problems is likely to be the US: no plans as to how to deal with your deficit, big costs coming up, and no good will around the world.
Actually we need this system because we need to build a great army for Europ.
We discovered during the Iraq "big mess" that even if we are against the US there are not a lot a things we can do to prevent the US from doing what it wants. A great army will help us acheiving just that.
Some people said that the Iraq war almost killed Europ with countries like Poland, Spain and UK not agreeing with the others. This is in fact very wrong since in these countries the people were massively against the war. For this decision, the Spain governement has been overthrown during the last elections and most think that the UK government will pay in the near future too.
So we have pretty much the same vision, next year we are going to vote for a new constitution and then we'll need an army. Galileo is one step in this process.
Of course it will also have a huge impact on our economics. This will create jobs but will also allow us to sell a new kind of services, mostly in the transportation market which is about to grow enormously with the e-commerce getting bigger and bigger.
I believe the US made a mistake in not improving greatly the GPS during the 20 years of operation. Positionning is about to become a huge market and Europ has a clear advance thanks to Galileo where the US could have been so far ahead already...
Iraq: war to save the U
If your interested, there is short video on the BBC web site.
Are you a troll in a bad disguise?
China has more than enough tech to ensure their missiles make their mark. Don't make the mistake of thinking that the US is the only country in the world that has missiles that don't require monkeys to control them.
``Is this just a pork-barrel project, or something Europe really needs to break the reliance on U.S. space technology?''
IIRC, the USA allowed the EU to build this system, provided that it would be easy for the USA to disrupt it. This means that Galileo is independent in the same sense as political parties in former East Germany; do anything you want, as long as it's what I want.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
According to the spokesman one of the uses of the system is "the prevention of natural catastrophes such as flooding or fires". Yet another example of EU politicians promising the Sun and Moon but delivering nothing.
This is just a few billion Euro down the drain which could be better spent.
Ed Almos
Budapest, Hungary
The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws. - Tacitus, 56-120 A.D.
If you reread the complaints you may realize that they're not about GPS but about the US' (political) interference with Galileo.
> ... if they lose confidence and withdraw their money - its the US that goes broke.
... no good will around the world.
uhh, not really. The only way investors can get their money out is to sell off their investments to someone else. The US won't go broke but the investors certainly could.
>
geez, what else is new?
The best option is multiple systems, that way there is no single entity that can unilaterally, for whatever strategical self-interest, decide to "pull the plug" on another nation's ability to use satelite based location systems.
So yes, China would be a good one. Also Russia, Western Europe, India, Brasil and whoever else can put a satelite up there - the more the merrier.
I wouldn't trust Western Europe with the keys for one single system (and i was born and bred in these parts), just as i wouldn't trust any other single entity.
As for the strategic interest of the US, the best i can say is: though luck - the world is a lot bigger than just Kentuky and americans ain't more or less deserving than anybody else.
PS: Note that the european decision to go ahead (and spend a couple of billions on it) was most certainly influenced by an increased sense in Europe, over the last few years, that the US will throw their muscle around whenever they want, for whatever self-interest reasons, without listening to anybody else. It's like in high school - some people might fear the bully boy, some people might dislike him, some people might wanna be like him, some might even like him, but hardly anybody trusts him.
I'm quite sure there isn't a EU country that has such an enormous deficit as the US has. Face it..the US is living on credit that one day will have to be repaid.
I think you need to be examining what percentage of all government expenditure goes towards just servicing (ie, paying off the interest alone) that debt. It's a frightening proportion of all governmental income, and one which won't be falling anytime soon with GW Bush in perpetual tax cutting mode.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
China will probably put a man on the moon sooner than you think. If you have ever heard the ET colonial dreams - they are gonna push for that harder than you think.
And the US will *never* develop fusion power. The current administration wouldnt want them to, and are probably busy shelving any potential clues. Hydrocarbon based power systems are just to profitable - so the chances of a clean, safe, cheap alternative are virtually nil.
Please consider moderating the parent positively. After all clearly every penny spent on Christmas presents would do more good if spent on world peace or basic research.
China, Russia and India are coughing up nearly half the cost and it is more accurate. I know sailors are quite excited by it. There are lots more things that will be possible. In any case I believe the GPS satellites are expected to die in the foreseeable future.
It's hardly pork and it will be better. Why the fuss?
I find it bizarre that one group is saying that there is no reason for Europe to want its own GPS system and another saying that obviously the US is preparing anti satellite missiles. Why aren't people more excited by the possibilities given by a more accurate positioning system. This is news for nerds not media for megalomaniacs.
Hello? Is anyone paying any attention to what the PRC is building these days? It's getting damn near impossible to find any consumer electronics that aren't made there (kinda like Japan in the '60s and '70s). With western companies (including traitorous US ones) willing to let them have access to ever more sensitive technology do you really think they can't build high tech military gizmos? It may be bulkier and heavier but as the Soviet era space programs showed us it can still be highly effective.
The country that has the high ground of space will be in the controlling position. I hope this is not lost on the short sighted western countries.
We've owned space for nearly half a century now and have the flags to prove it :)
o nL anding/flag.jpg
http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/Shared/News2001/Mo
China has more than enough tech to ensure their missiles make their mark. Don't make the mistake of thinking that the US is the only country in the world that has missiles that don't require monkeys to control them
Only enough missles to target a small number of large cities on the US west coast. And their missile targeting was improved in accuracy with the help of the Clinton administration. But they wouldn't make a mistake of launching a nuke at the US like that, we have far more nukes for deterrence.
EU goal is to enlarging to East Europe and to incorporate Russia.
Actually, the proposed enlargement of the EU to include countries such as Ukraine is what's seriously pissing Russia off; they want to create their own trading block.
At this rate, Russia's block will consist of:-
Russia, Turkmenistan and half of Ukraine.
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
Insightful?! Just plain wrong. While the parent is just as silly, why does fear triumph?
Creating and testing nuclear weapons has proven far more difficult that making effective rockets. Wait, way am I even beginning to argue this point?
It's silly shit like this that makes me weep. Damn you red states. Damn you to Rumsfeld. Damn you for convincing the the passionate illiterate.
Also, according to the US's own figures, the UK has slighly lower unemployment than the US.
Pity about the rest of the EU, though.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
Due to the rollout of WAAS (Wide Area Augmentation System), there are a growing number of airports in the country which have GPS approaches. WAAS provides accurate enough GPS signal correction (from ground based stations) to provide full auto-land functionality for so-equipped airliners.
This is a reality _today_, and requires nothing from the Europeans, or waiting until 2008.
As a side note, directed more to the lurkers, what no one seems to consider is that there are many navigational systems which pre-date GPS. ILS and Loran signals, for example, are NOT encrypted, and do NOT have selective availability.
If you're not living on the edge, you're just taking up space!
exactly. ever heard of a 'dirty bomb'. anybody who possess requisite amounts of nuclear materials can make a dirty bomb. and any lunatic who wants to die can destroy the white houses bursting it 6 block away...
Most countries don't have "friends". Only, long term interests.
It's just the way things work.
With USA being driven into the ground, The euro is quickly replacing the dollar as the stable money. With more money flowing to Europe, they will be able to afford large ticket items. This launch will give them a shot in the arm that they need to establish their rockets and truely create a space industry.
Our (US) system has the fault that the DOD can turn it off whenever they see fit. In particualar, one of the problems that we want to go to "free skies". That is the airplanes would be free to decide how and where to travel guided by GPS. Great concept, but one huge flaw. The DOD can turn off GPS whenever they see fit. So imagine the sky filled with planes and then the GPS goes off. Ooops. Europe's system is probably the one to go to.
This bad for us dominence, but great for business, Europe, and the World as a whole.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Want a great army? Stary by not forcing citizens to join. Then give them a decent budget. Right now the combined EU can't even float a navy. No functional nuclear subs and few functional carriers.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Again-- please grow up and realize that there are hostiles in the world, and it is a constant struggle to stay ahead.
Look mate, your country may be a beacon of hope and glory from where you're standing, but for those on the outside that ain't exactly the case. Realise that.
In this world nothing is certain but death, taxes and flawed car analogies.
Just FYI, most nuke warheads are designed to detonate at low altitude, to increase the pressure damage due to an increase of the shock wave doubling on itself. See:a st.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/bomb/sfeature/mapabl
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapon
Not to say that water wouldn't still dampen some of the overpressure wave and radiation, but we're not talking about a Bikini Atoll-type explosion.
Derek
Don't Panic...
This is an important development in the world political scene. At the end of the day if there was another long term issue between the europeans and the americans the americans could really screw with people by giving them the wrong coordinates etc. Having a dual system benefits more than just the europeans as more people can use it and better satelite coverage if the systems are compatibile
Dirty bombs are a non existant threat. The US DoE among others has done research into their use, and has shown that for them to be more dangourse then a convential bomb people would have to live in the same area for 1 year, with no clean up taking place.
The information that our goverments are giving us on dirty bombs is all part of their campain of fear.
I'd bet money that the GP is from blue, or voted that way.
The French are involved in multiple bloody conflicts right now. They just don't face the wrath of an anti-American media.
y .m beki/o ry?id=2 32035
Take Ivory Coast for example. That shit ain't pretty.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/africa/11/09/ivor
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireSt
Well, I'm not a statistician, but for what I have heard the methods of calculation of unemployment in continental EU are different from US and UK.
Among other things, I'm quite certain that detainees are not considered unemployed in the US (which have by far the largest detainee population in the western world), but they are in continental Europe. I heard also that people are considered unemployed as long as they collect welfare in the US, which lasts for some time (3 years maybe?), after which one is not officially counted as "unemployed", but I'm not sure of this one.
Victims of 9/11: <3000. Traffic in the US: >30,000/y
i think thats its funny to see the US wetting itself reaslising that they arent the only ones who can build modern accurate technologies and that they are losing their monopoly
> Only enough missles to target a small number of
> large cities on the US west coast.
So? It doesn't really matter if a nation can destroy earth a bazillion times or just once, so the 10000something missiles the US have don't really matter, too.
Imagine Washington, New York and LA being hit by nuclear missiles. True, most of US territory would remain unaffected, but the effect would still be devastating.
C.M.Burns
This is not aimed at you personally, this is just another instance of how the entire human race wastes so much because of paranoid squabaling and greed. We are all suffering the "stranger danger" syndrome and want someone or something to protect us while we get on with life. I belive this will be civilisations downfall since we won't overcome our instincts before we eat ourselves (and most other species bigger than a roach) out of house and home. I don't see anyway past our warlord instincts destroying us in the near future, not because alternatives don't exist but because we have had these instincts since before we became "human". It is not that I want to belive this or think it is inevitable(add favourite doomsday story here) but rather that is what history, human behaviour and current ecological/social events indicate. The best minds on the planet paint this picture and some religions relish the idea.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Why should that piss you off? As a citizen of the US, I absolutely DO NOT want a third party to be able to accurately aim a missile at the White House, the Capitol, or a nuclear power plant. These are military assets, not GPL code for the benefit of mankind (the universal GPS was a side benefit, not the purpose).
Isn't this a bit like what RIAA wants when they are seeking to destroy P2P file sharing?
P2P file sharing has legitimate uses (sharing of non-copyrighted material) and illegal ones (sharing of copyrighted content). The RIAA wants P2P (basically) completely forbidden, because of illegal usage.
Galileo has legitimate uses (to aid navigation of civil planes, etc.) and uses that the US doesn't want to see (potentially guiding enemy missiles).
And now the US wants to indiscriminately block the Galileo signal in a large part of the world, simply because of the potential that it might be abused, but at the same time locking out ALL perfectly legitimate usage.
I see a lot of parallels here - and it's kind of interesting that tons of RIAA bashing slashdotters would now take over the same position that the RIAA does in the case of Galileo...
Dirty bombs aren't any more lethal than a regular bomb with the same amount of explosives. The "dirty" part only causes fear, not death. This means it is an ideal terrorist weapon, of course, and the best countermeasure against one is education.
Mod down posts with a "Free Mac Mini/iPod" sig, they're spam!
Mmmm, not the ol' dirty bomb myth again...
As they will be the first economy power in the world in less than 20 years, they are already the sixth, and they aim to be the first. And the United States can't do anything to avoid this from being true.
Besides, China is probably the world's most powerful military country in the world even if they don't go out of their frontiers, the thing is that they can't battle the entire world. But they could challenge EEUU without any doubt.
BTW if i don't remmember bad, China is also participating in Galileo.
Why should that piss you off? As a citizen of the US, I absolutely DO NOT want a third party to be able to accurately aim a missile at the White House, the Capitol, or a nuclear power plant. These are military assets, not GPL code for the benefit of mankind (the universal GPS was a side benefit, not the purpose).
Fine, well you can have that luxury when you give Europe something in return - eg a GPS blackspot over some of our important buildings - thats fair right?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Dum dum. J00 are teh no7 sm4rt...
France
UK
Ya dumb fuck. lol.
Is it just me who is concerned about tracking of individuals or our vehicles? I for one do not trust European governments. (or the Chinese and Russians working with them)
Anybody know the possibilities for that?
"So unmerciful is life, that everything afterwards is too late."
What pisses me off is the US's statement that they'll locally block the European system in places they don't want potential "enemies" (read, China), having accurate location tracking.
I wonder how the US would react if, say, China started blocking GPS from certain places to hold back it's enemies. Tibet for example.
Interestingly enough, most of what I have heard of the US blocking plans sounds like they want to block the Galileo signal around China.
To me, this looks like primarily commercial interests, so that they can sell GPS better in that market. If it was to eliminate the possibility of someone to attack the US guided through Galileos positioning, they would need to block the Galileo signal IN THE US (e.g. in the TARGET area, not in the SOURCE area!).
I really hope these 'agreements' havnt screwed the system up so its totally useless, as far as im concerned Europe needs the exact same benifits that the US gets in any deals, the only things that really should be agreed on are frequencies/positions so that both systems can work properly and blackspots on key US targets in return for blackspots on European targets. Apart from that, the US have to grow up and accept that theres going to be a better system out there that they don't have the keys to, and if they want any say in it then they'll have to ask nicely. I think this is a good project - Europe doesnt have any problems with the US and we'd like to keep it that way but we have to be independent too, im sure the US can understand that concept.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
... can be achived through force (eg:Japan as per another post) but history shows it is temporary. World peace can only come from taking the side of non-violence. So although I think Donald would be better suited to a career in demolition. Why would it put me at odds with a whole geographical entity? All of us fall for the "silly shit" regularly, it's our tribal nature to do so.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
They're the most powerful economy in the world! With the most powerful military. Look out!
Too bad the photo was FAKED.
Rainman recommends it.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
As a US citizens, there are days that I long for that. However, it would make a martyr of Bush, and I would rather see him in prison or recorded in the history book accuratly as the man who destroyed America.
While I agree mostly with you, I would have to say that Britain and Canada are our friends. As to everybody else, well, we really are pissing off the world. Reagan did the same, but then he worked on creating friendship after the dispute. Good example, is that after we invaded Iraq, any mature individual would have encouraged others to come in and help rebuild Iraq. Instead, we acted like a bully that had just conqueror a little weak girl. Bush II is killing us faster than he is killing Iraqis and most certainly faster than any Al Qaeida
No, that photo was NOT faked. WMD in iraq are faked. News on Foxnews is faked. Anything positive on Iraq is mostly faked. Anything on Al qaedi is faked.
But the moon shot was real. From a time, when americans were honest. Actually, in light of Tricky Dick, well more honest.
Costing 2.1 billion euros and creating 150,000 jobs.
Nicely completed sentence there, buttfuck.
Puerto Rico is a territory of the United States of America. All Puerto Ricans are United States Citizens. Ivory Coast is an Independant Sovereign country. Ivorians are not French Citizens. It is not part of France... although some imperialists might like to think so.
So, no. Your analogy is invalid.
Thats not to mention the one that decided not to give climb-power on demand and went into the trees (neatly blamed on the pilot but now back under investigation).
And the other ScareBus that decided it was best to take a nose-dive toward a shopping centre against the pilots best wishes. Luckily the computers in that one relented probably with an "Only kidding" message splashed across the EFIS display.
Oh, and don't forget that the Die-by-wire systems are there to protect you from the pilot doing anything stupid like applying too much rudder deflection and shearing the tail-off.......oh, wait, New-york, 14th Nov 2001.
I'll go with your line of seats tho.
Martin-Baker; getting you out of the sh*t since 1942.
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
In a joint statement yesterday, http://www.igeb.gov/2004-US-Russia-statement.pdf, the United States and Russian Federation announced "their commitment...to continue to provide the GPS and GLONASS civil signals appropriate for commercial, scientific and safety of life use on a continuous, worldwide basis, free of direct user fees."
:) Redundancy is good in any system.
Sounds as though they want to quench any arguement Europe may have in regards to the reinstatement of Selective Availability (although we must remember that SA was not reactivated even after/during the September 11th attacks). Not like this will make any difference though.. the EU has its heart set on implementing its own satellite navigation system - I for one will welcome the increased accuracy this will bring, especially in tight city streets where it is currently hard/impossible to get a good satellite lock("shooting the bird"). OTOH, at least it isn't American taxpayers footing the bill this time!
I wonder when receivers will be on the market which lock onto GPS & Galileo? Perhaps firmware upgrades could suffice on newer models?
If French and Germans can living togheter in EU, Ukrainian and Russians can too.
If French and Germans can trade togheter in EU, Ukrainian and Russians can too.
Just a little hint for you: http://europa.eu.int/abc/history/index_en.htm
Another hint for you: http://europa.eu.int/index_en.htm
I think a country like this can not depend on another country for all defense related aspects. Positioning system is only one of this.
At this rate, Russia's block will consist of:-
Russia, Turkmenistan and half of Ukraine.
Yes, you're right: at this rate.
Almost all old Warsaw Pact countries are in EU block.
At this rate.
Russia have raw materials, EU have techologies and finance...
Ciao da Villo - GPG public key available
Ironically enough most of the chief engineers/scientist for that achievement were not Americans but Germans. As soon as they started dying off the US has not gone back to put more "flags." :)
In very recent time, Ivory Coast was a French colony. France is still in the process of withdrawing from being its subjugator and allowing a stable government to exist there (think panama).
Puerto Rico is a territory of US (as I said). But the citizens are absolutely NOT american citizens. They are puerto ricans. In fact, they have voted several times to not be a state of the USA. They are protected by america, but they do not have the ability to vote. Nor are they taxed as we are.
So yes, the analogy is valid
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
This is an interesting argument. The US national debt is a nifty conundrum, largely because a good deal of it is owed to internal entities (eg, Social Security), and because most of the rest of it is secured to the land making up the US, or so I've read.
;).
What happens if the US defaults?
Any attempt to claim the collateral (the physical landmass making up the US) would be treated as an act of war. Going to war with the US is a bad idea, doubly-so on its own soil. The natural response would be trade penalties of all kinds, but the US is also one of the few nations on earth that is large enough and has sufficient natural resources to ride that out (oil being the obvious exception, which a strong military presence in the middle-east and a cash & carry policy could handle). Further, the pain of any embargo would be almost as great on the other side, since the US imports a substantial percentage of many countries' exports.
I find this scenario to be highly interesting (not that I think it'd be a great idea, in spite of being an american capitalist pig-dog
What do you think?
As one who considers himself to be an unemployed American, I can say with confidence that the US unemployment situation is sound.
The Americans are waging war on the Americans. To be more precise : The American High class is waging war on the American low class. They are winning : they already destroyed the middle class. The war will be over when deficit spending will catch up on itself.
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
but of course accuracy is restricted for military use only, same as the original GPS was originally
i say more satelites is better,
makes us a better target for space alien invasion
To be honest I think that the next moon landing in the vicinity should either:
Take down the American flag as a sign that the moon isn't American, or:
Take up flags of all nations and place them alongside the American flag.
How many people can read hex if only you and dead people can read hex?
The only point I intended to convey in my post was that Russia did not like the enlargement of the EU; hence their joining would seem an odd prospect.
No judgement about whether Russia and Ukraine could work within the EU *if* they both wanted to join.
I'm not sure how such a large EU would work, though. It's already pretty damn big as it is.
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xD. I really laughed with this. Plus it wouldn't be so strange if it happened... At least, as we can see on CNN
This will prove very useful for Europes war against America.
America is already losing that (economic) war, with the US Dollar losing almost 30% of it's value against the Euro.
The only way for the US to rebound is to either cut spending or to sell off assets to other countries.
At the current rate, the US dollar will have the value of a confederate dollar in a few years (quite literally).
The EU's investment in Galileo is a good one - with the financial priorities changing in the US, upgrades to GPS related to commercial users are sure to be defered.
THis could be a very good thing, as the GPS system needs an upgrade anyway.
Currently, the US is looking at possibly beginning deployment of a GPS V2.0 system, which would use the advances in technology that have occured since the system was first designed to improve the accuracy of the system - higher chip rates, better decoders, more accurate clocks on the birds themselves, and so on. The goal is to have a system that would provide centimeter accuracy to civilian receivers, and even better to military grade gear (it's not overkill, rather it is extra margin against degradation - having your accuracy degrade by an order of magnitude is not such a big deal when your accuracy is three orders of magnitude greater than you need.)
Should the Europeans deploy a system of modern design - preferably a system that is designed to be right at the hoary edge of what is feasible today - they could reap the benefits of modern technology.
www.eFax.com are spammers
Anyone with the competence to build a nuclear or biological weapon isn't going to bother with a missile. They're going to enter the country - probably perfectly legally, with valid, genuine documents, rent a house, build the weapon, and deliver it to the target in a pickup. Terrorists didn't need GPS to take out the World Trade Centre, and they won't need it to take out the White House.
Starwars (and missile defence) are so last century.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
Unless that flag has a military base hidden inside it, you can't prevent anyone else from landing, which means, sorry pal, it's there for taking.
Why don't you do a little research before you dispute what another person has posted?
they have voted several times...but they do not have the ability to vote
hehe
By the time of the moon shot the original von Braun people who did the V2 had mostly been replaced with Brits. The moon shot is often described as German technology, British brains and American money.
Of course the money was the most difficult part.
It would be amusing if someone set up a robot mission to go pick up some of the flags left behind, didn't the astronauts bring back their colours with them?
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Considering that the Russian Federation has just developed a long-range cruise missile capacity, and that China has an advanced aerospace capacity and can make cruise missiles, too, I want their missiles to miss if they're aimed at me. (The purpose of air defense, by the way, is not to shoot down enemy aircraft; it's to make them MISS.)
Tibet, I might point out, is part of China--reluctantly, but part of China, and the Chinese don't have to turn off the GPS to figure out what's there. A good topographic map and a compass will give every Chinese second lieutenant the chance to drive his convoy off the edge of a cliff, just as they do in all armies with new officers.
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Right, but it isn't 70% of GDP - it would only cost 70% of the GDP if for some crazy reason the US chose to recall all its bonds and pay them in a single year - an option the US probably doesn't even have based on the agreements behind the bonds.
If the US wanted to go cold turkey on the debt it would probably cost about 5% of GDP for a decade or two (it would probably take longer than that, but the cost would drop the whole time, so by 20 years out the interest bill is a LOT lower). By cold turkey I mean issuing no new bonds of any kind while still repaying bonds, and recalling them when it makes sense to do so and where the US has that option.
Such an action would probably also cause a drop in interest rates and increased commercial investment - since the US would no longer be a competitor in the bond market. Certainly it would be expensive for the US, but not an instant disaster.
Obviously trade between allied first-world nations is good for everyone. Nobody of any consequence in the US would advocate defaulting on the debt, and nobody in the US would want to get into a trade war with the whole world. True, the US could probably survive such a war, but over decades it would watch the worldwide standard of living pass it by.
Trade is one of the best things out there for stopping wars - assuming trading partners have a similar stake. Most of the wars of late have involved dictators since their actions are not always rational - very few rational governemnts would choose to get into a war with a major trading partner. When you look at what you stand to gain and what you stand to lose, the stakes are just too high.
However, if one of the two governments decided to shut down their system for whatever reason the other network would still work, making an unilateral action less effective.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
I'm very surprised by the military orientation of the answers.
/. seem to have an obsession about the PLA beeing the world most powerfull army).
GPS, if invented for military use, has seen its civilian use become so important that it probably surpass any war usage.
I can understand that being in war US guys would think to army first, but I expected Slashdot people to much more see the scientific and technological opportunities openned by an increase in precision and features of a positionning system.
By the way, the odds of the USA beeing in war with Russia, India or China are really low.
Those countries are much likely to be engaged in limited conflicts with smaller neighbours, than in a large scale confrontation that nobody desire.
And even if such an unlikely event happened, none of those country can match US power and particulary ICBM capacity, with or without Gallileo (even if some guys on
Most likely US pressures regarding Galileo have been more oriented against smaller countries that would use the system and are more likely targets.
What do you think?
I think without foreign oil we'd all be cannibals within 3 months.
The rest of the world has us by the balls; one is called debt, and the other is called energy. Hopefully, they won't work this out before we get rid of Bush, because we've blown any moral capital we had left on Iraq.
150,000 jobs? Doing what? Manufacturing? Installation? Sales? Answering the phone?
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Simply don't care that the US pisses people off. This seems to be the prefered method. Understanding is deprecated.
Why should we, the US, be forced put other nation's interests above our own? We may be the dominant nation, but that doesn't mean we have to cave in and support every other nation in their bid to do whatever they want. As far as blocking the Galileo system, why should we let our enemies have an advantage? It's war; it's not fair. It's not like we're blocking it for the world, but as said before, there are some targets that we'd rather not have attacked, and this system would make low-cost, very high-precision guidance systems available. Why should we have to risk it?
> Is this just a pork-barrel project, or something
> Europe really needs to break the reliance on U.S.
> space technology?
It's something the world needs. Choice is good.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Consider this. Weapon site next to civilian site. With highly accurate GPS the weapon site can be picked out.
Now a terrorist does not care about accuracy. Any old site will do and the more random the better.
Accurate GPS only helps civilians and military but terrorists do not care either way.
What do you think?
Err, perhaps no-one would lend you money anymore, and the government would be broke? With a currency spiralling out of control, and no assets (which anyone else trusted) to secure more debt against.
You can't keep printing money forever. The US would become a pariah state, more so than it is at the moment, particularly if it attempted to secure more oil by military means.
Your arrogance is surprising (Going to war with the US is a bad idea) considering the situation the US is in at the moment in Iraq. The US can't afford this war, let alone another.
Because it is OUR system, you dumbfuck. You have GPS satellites circling over our heads, so why the hell do you think you have any say in what we do with our positioning system?
I for one do not trust European governments.
Well, I for one will welcome our new European overlords.
Hopefully, in a few years when my country (Croatia) joins the EU. I believe that, as far as overlords go, we could do worse. A lot worse.
Apparently, he didn't even read the text he linked to.
Will the Galileo system require everyone to get all-new satellite navigation receivers to full take advantage of the system?
If it does, it could get pretty expensive as you'll need to buy new portable receivers, new navigation systems for motor vehicles, and new navigation systems for airplanes and boats.
Problem is he's not alone. Trust me, nukes or not, as soon as the entire world hates you, you're in serious trouble.
Are they allowed to vote for the US president?
Are they allowed to participate in congress?
What makes us an american citizen is not somebody declaring us one, but the ability to elect ALL of those that effect us. They have no representation at the federal level, and they are not allowed to vote for national level (except those that have done military service who are then granted full citienship). They have just a little bit more rights than do the Iraqis
Why don't you do a little research before you dispute what another person has posted?
150,000 jobs? Doing what?
I guess that can rougly be translated as 150,000 people will have something to do with this. Not jobs that will be created out of thin air.
Count all the people that work in all of compaines that will be doing the engineering, manufacturing, accounting, servicing, driving, consulting... On a high-tech project lasting a couple of years, with a budget like that, you can easily arrive at that figure.
A single commercial space launch of any kind probably involves thousands of people.
The USA shouldn't; and nor should Europe be forced to put the USA's interests above its own
A nuke within a "couple of miles" off its target would still vapourize the target.
Maybe 50 miles off target could safely be called a 'miss'.
Since the cold war ended, the US government doesn't feel as much need to respect the civil rights of its citizens. Who are we going to run to? Who will grant us asylum, when the US is the sole military superpower?
Please, please EU, become a military superpower, and tell Bush to take his "Hertz Doctrine" and stuff it.
The EU becoming a military superpower would be the best thing that could possibly happen for political stability and civil rights in the US.
Some people have criticised Galileo saying it is "dual use", i.e. it can be used for military applications.
But that's a nonsensical argument; all general-purpose technology has potential military uses, so if we accept the argument that Europe shouldn't develop Galileo because it is dual uise, then Europe shouldn't develop any advanced technology at all.
BTW, Israel is also a partner in Galileo; is Israel also part of a sinister evil plot to attack the USA?
Only three things are certain; death, taxes, and apocryphal quotations - Ben Franklin.
The USA will have to get used to the EU: its economy now surpasses the USA's, it continues its Borg-like growth, and it's starting to find its feet internationally.
It's just a transfer of funds from the other countries in the EU to France.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Do you really think terrorists or enemy nations need to use GPS or Galileo to attack these buildings? They didn't need it to attack the WTC or the Pentagon. Besides, there are a lot of things I don't like in the world. That doesn't give me the right to tell people that they don't have free will. Europe can put up their Galileo if they want, just like we put up GPS when we wanted. Oh, and third parties have been accurately been able to aim missiles at the white house for the last 35 years.
Seeing that the USA spends $5Billion per month on the occupation of Iraq, I think we have very little grounds to call this a "pork barrel" project. These satellites will be undeniably useful to everyone in the world. Compared to other things that $2.1B buys you, this is a great deal.
You grow up. Anybody with the technology to build a missile with enough range, payload and accuracy to hit those targets effectively has the ability to make a nuclear weapon - which makes the issue of accurate targetting moot.
Yes, YES! This is such an insightful post! We all know you don't have to target nuclear missles! Especially not at the white house! There is no nuclear bunker in there! They have no such defenses against the powerful european, chinese and russian nuclear missles! Hell we could fire one of the superior socialist missles and be off by 200 miles and it would still destroy everything and everyone! These silly Americans have been fooled by their facist propaganda to believe they are safe. They continually vote for the dictator George W Bush and we all know George W. Bush rigged the 2000 election so that SUV owners, oil companies, Republicans, white men, and the Christian Coalition could kill Muslims.
George Bush Banned my IP Address!
First, around 3 trillion dollars of the debt is intragovernment. That is, the government borrows from the money that is needed to pay the house insurance at the end of the year to pay the light bill now. All of us that have had to do this know it is a dangerous game. Although many say we can always borrow more money to extend term with creditors, this part of the debt has not been borrowed.
The rest, exceeding $4 trillion and approaching 5, is held publicly. The figures I have seen indicate that foreign ownership is approaching 50%. Now, I don't know who many of you are in debt, but if you are you know the people who you owe money to own you. It the 70's the citizens of the US own the country. Now Japan does. I am not being chauvinistic, just realistic. If we owe several billion dollars to someone, then we are not going to do a lot to piss that person off. We may act macho in the UN, or shake out fists in Iraq, but that is mostly just our temper tantrums because we cannot have everything we want.
Currently the US appears to be taxing at 15% of GDP and spending at 20%. Our lifestyle depends on other countries lending us money. We are no longer our own man.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Russia couldn't join the EU any more than the US could join Canada or China join Taiwan; it would, by definition, be the other way round.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
From what I've seen reported, the cost of paying the interest alone, in terms of federal income, is comfortably in double figures, which isn't to be laughed at.
Measuring in terms of GDP is silly, because GDP is a measure of a country's economic sector, not of how much money it has to spend. And as this debt is federal, it's federal income rather than GDP that the cost of paying it back should be measured against or, in other words, as a percentage of tax dollars in.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
yes, they do.
;)
1st. it's good to be independent (you never know when bush shuts-off the gps for non-us use)
2nd. it's good to have backups (good for the eu and the us)
3rd. it's cool
Privacy is terrorism.
As a citizen of the US, I absolutely DO NOT want a third party to be able to accurately aim a missile at the White House, the Capitol, or a nuclear power plant.
Nobody wants foreign powers to be able to aim missiles at their cities. But the US can aim and guide missiles where it pleases and is refusing to give up that capability. Therefore, there is no reason why the Europeans shouldn't be able to do the same. In fact, the US government has stated itself that it wants the Europeans to develop their own high-tech military capabilities. That includes their own GPS system, their own missiles, and other technology. And the Europeans aren't just going to pay for high tech weapons and then put them under US control.
This kind of development is inevitable anyway: Europe is becoming stronger and more independent. But the really big change will occur when India and China are starting to develop their own high-tech dual-use technologies, in particular, space technologies, and they are not going to be bound by cultural affiliations with the US.
You better get used to it now because this sort of thing is unavoidable.
However, GDP impactst the ability of a country to raise taxes. Federal income can be made much higher if it needs to be. A huge portion of the wealth in the USA is in the hands of people far above poverty levels - that wealth could be tapped without major social disaster. It wouldn't be good for the economy, but it wouldn't cause it to collapse either. And lowering the public debt probably wouldn't hurt the economy in the long run.
I'm not saying that the US debt level is a good thing. I'm just saying that if foreign nations refuse to buy bonds we won't suddenly start living in adobe houses.
Clearly all the benefits of paying off the debt are better obtained by paying it off in a sensible manner, and by restricting government spending now. If the US wanted to pay off the debt it certainly could - it just lacks political willpower at this point...
With Gallileo on the other hand, good luck getting the ruling body (by the people, for the people) to agree quick enough for it to make a difference.
And how much did the US listen to international input when deciding to invade Iraq? Cooperation goes both ways, and the US government has demonstrated that it will do whatever it pleases, no matter what the international community says. And it's not just Iraq: the US has recently ignored, violated, and abrogated lots of international treaties.
From the perspective of other nations, the US is looking increasingly untrustworthy and unreliable, and that's why they have to start building their own infrastructure.
If you don't like the way decisions are made in Europe, that's tough: Europeans don't like the way decisions are made in the US either, and there are more of them around (ditto for Indians and Chinese).
Surprisingly war is one of those things you can do without much money. It sounds backwards but think about it. North Korea affords to keep its military strong even though it is broke, and the US was able to swing to full wartime production and wage war even after the Great Depression of the 1930's.
Probably because in those cases, the government doesn't ask you to fight and build tanks, it tells you to.
Going to war with the US is still a bad idea.
Actually, a 1 megaton blast will only vaporize things out to about .6 miles, and the "completely flattened buildings" radius only goes to about 1.7 miles. A couple of miles is a MISS for a hardened target.
This is all moot, though, because ICBMs don't use GPS for guidance.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
And the newer satellites most certainly do have SA. SA was turned off (set to zero) back in 2000. At that time, the GPS Block IIR satellites were the most modern, and that is still the case. The capability still exists to reactivate SA if desired.
The next new hardware, GPS Block IIF is scheduled to begin launches in a few years. I do not know whether they also have SA capability, but I would be shocked if they did not.
The sad thing is that one even has to contemplate these issues. And the fault for that lies entirely with recent US unilateralism. A nation that wants to be the leader of the free world has responsibilities to listen to the concerns of the free world, but as Bush and other politicians have made crystal clear recently, America always comes first and they will only do what is in America's best interest. That amounts to an abdication of US leadership.
But even if the US were not adopting such hostile policies, US influence would be diminishing over the next several decades anyway: without both massive foreign borrowing and a strong dollar, the US simply cannot sustain its standard of living, let alone its huge military. But the current deficits are not sustainable: the US has to cut back while other nations pull ahead economically, and hence militarily.
Growth through acquisition may allow them to surpass the US's total GDP (they may already have), but it won't make the EU surpass the US in per-capita GDP. Because of course, as they pick up GDP they also pick up population. And the EU rate of economic growth is lower than the US and likely will remain so.
http://www.timbro.com/euvsusa/
I agree the US has to get used to the EU. The US can't make the EU go away by complaining about it. But on the other hand, I'm not sure that wildly disparate countries can be tied together economically. I think the EU will either have to cement together or break apart.
It'll be interesting to find what the future holds.
As to the original question, this seems like massive pork to me. But whatever.
Exactly. The US have piled up tons of VX nerve gas, and chemical/atomic weapons (yes, WMD by any definition) and THAT is wasting taxpayers' money, IMHO, not launching another GPS service. Some things have to be done multiple times to learn and incrementally improve the technology. It's good not to have to rely on US technology, but to have everything available locally, because this gives Europe more independence.
And about attacking: honestly, this is thank God the last thing Europeans have in mind. Our American friends are more under attack from the inside: their economy is stumbling, and there is an unprecedented loss of those values that were considered US-American (civil liberties, for instance).
Thankfully Europe is a project about peace and long-term economic strength, not about waging more unnecessary wars. By the way, if you're interested in how GPS is to be seen as a mosaic piece of a larger process of human learning, and how better navigation improves scientific progress and understanding, I recommend the book The Mapmakers (2nd ed).
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What the federal governments could do and what it will do are two different things. The fact remains that the cost of serving the deficit is higher now than it's ever been (because the deficit's higher than it's even been), which means that the proportion of tax dollars wasted on just paying that interest rather than on schools, police, etc is disproportionately high.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
Many of the posters here seem to think that the US is opposed to the Galileo system because the technology will be "better" than the current GPS system.
I don't believe that. If the US military-industrial complex was worried about superior foreign technology, they would have already bombed Toyota, Honda, Sony, etc. out of existence!
The American military is worried that a system such as Galileo allows much, much simpler creation of missile and other automatically guided weapons systems. The current GPS system supports "selective availability" where the accuracy can be deliberately degraded during times or war or other threats.
The Galileo partners should be worried that when the American military feels threatened, the usual "shoot first, ask questions later" philosophy will prevail, and the Galileo system will be jammed or destroyed to protect American interests. (At that same time, the current GPS system would be deliberately degraded or disabled.) I would bet money on that.
there are 3 kinds of people:
* those who can count
* those who can't
It is a question of receivers. And receivers are available now that are sensitive enough to work indoors.
GPS has progressed greatly in the 20 years. The mathematical models improved greatly, increaseing the accuracy of fixes (actually, compensating for the period of selective availability). Then WAAS and differential GPS came around.
GPS hasn't stood still. Honestly, if it hadn't I don't think the EU would be "surpassing" GPS right now. I mean, as far as I can tell, there's not a lot of actual innovation here, just replication. Although I'm sure changes are made to make it incompatible with current GPS receivers so that EU companies/governments (is there really a difference between the two when it comes to aerospace anyway?) can get license fees from equipment vendors.
Yeah, the thing that pains me the most is that Europeans and European countries engage in the same assholish techniques that US companies started to do a while back. I don't see a lot of benefit for humanity in this. It was bad enough when only members of one country did it.
What happens if the US defaults?
:-)
Well, shit hits the fan. The whole world economy will tank. At the moment, south-east Asia is crediting the ongoing US mad spending. Because it's Aisan goods they're buying, they have a direct economic interest. US government's hope is that the dollar will continue to slide, but in a slow, controlled fashion, so the huge $ debts won't mean as much 10 years down the line.
It's a rather large bet, it seems to me, and if Asia blinks for whatever reason, and starts demanding higher inerest rates on US treasuries, the people in the US could be in for a very rough ride.
Of course, noone will invade the US because of it, that would be silly. If someone owes you lots of money, he becomes your long-term partner, not an enemy.
I guess we'll see.
In the last year.
We actually should have sent more, but we've overstretched our military.
Haiti is not a US territory. So just retarget the analogy there.
I didn't think opinion about the EU was bad within those countries that are a part of it.
I've heard target dates from 20 to 70 before the EU goes sour and bad things happen. I can't disagree with that assesment but do not wish for it. An unstable europe is a bad thing.
I'd go on a Vegan diet but the delivery time from Vega is too long. --brownkitty
What makes you think Bush will be in power by the time the EU launches galileo? Four years is pretty quick time to get a satellite from spec to space IMO.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
I think you're missing a point.
All nuclear weapons are not equal, all targets are not equal.
Countries with decade of experience with those devices can build very efficient warheads, most of the other don't.
Most "proliferating" nuclear countries are building A bombs whose effect are far more limited and for which precision against hardened targets would matter.
But, against immobile, well known targets, they would probably use precalculated trajectories, corrected through inertial systems, that may provide good enough positionning without any satellite help.
Anyway GPS positionning is becomming commodity, like roads and railways.
Those also facilitate potential invading forces or terrorists work, but nobody would argue to have them disabled.
I think it is called "progress" but I may jus be a dreamer.
Worse than that, the value of the US dollar, like any other currency, depends on supply and demand, and demand for the dollar depends very much on the dollar being a global reserve currency due to oil mostly being priced in dollars (i.e. most countries need to buy, and maintain reserves of, US dollars to pay for Saudi etc oil priced in dollars).
Now, as is already starting to happen, when the world starts to shift to oil priced in Euros instead of dollars, then demand for the dollar will plummet and it's value will take a dive... and there's nothing the US can do about it. It's the oil producing countries that have control over what currency to price their product in...
If the US defaults on it's debt, then it's debt rating wil go to crap, and the US economy will grind to a halt as the US finds itself unable to borrow money... of course it'd be cool to see a US government forced to balance it's budget, but imagine the effect in times of war... In the last few years Bush has over-spent the budget to the tune of about $20,000 per US household ($2T total) - imagine if that was not borrowed money, but instead came out of your taxes...
Doing military service does not change their citizenship status at all. All Puerto Ricans have full citizenship.
They cannot vote for federal races because the US is a federal system whereby states are represented in Congress and the Presidency, so US citizens who do not live in a US State have no state to represent them. This is identical to the situation in Washington, D.C.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Like other countries, we can just keep borrowing to pay the interest, so defaulting is not an issue.
Like... Argentina?
Selective Availability doesn't actually work.
It did work, but several methods have been found to reduce the effect SA had to the point where it was no longer relevant.
Completely Jamming, or disabling the GPS system is the only thing which would have enough of an effect.
Seriously, 100 meters isn't off by much where you average ordanance is distributed in a 20-30 or more, radius arround your target, and that assumes some very high accuracy.
A huge number of the bloody conflicts of the later half of the 20th century are directly a result of French colonialism.
Remember the Vietnam War and Ho Chi Minh? Well, everyone knows about the US fighting him, but that was only the end of the warFrance started the war in 1945 when they tried to "reclaim" their colony in French Indochina, and continued to fight until they suffered a massive defeat in 1954. When they withdrew in 1954, they signed a cease-fire that partitioned the country into a Communist north and a pro-western but weak south, which set the stage for the subsequent war as the US allied itself with the newly-created(-by-France) South Vietnam.
During this time, there were other revolts happening in Africa, most notably the one in Madagascar, where after a bloody two-year campaign the French successfully suppressed the pro-independence forces (1947-49).
Coincidentally (or not?), 1954 was the year that tensions boiled over in Algeria, where France had been confiscating Muslim land and giving it to French settlers for decades. The Algerian National Front started a guerilla conflict, which raged until they forced a French withdrawal in 1962.
The total number of people killed by the French in these attempts to maintain colonial subjugation number in the millions.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
"The entire world hates America."
"Bush = Hitler"
Has psychology named the condition where one's hyperbole meter is stuck on '10'?
'Immature' maybe?
damaged by dogma
Rumsfeld makes one comment about "old Europe", which is entirely accurate because of falling french and german populations, and it causes a transatlantic uproar. Meanwhile, Chirac and Shroeder criss cross the globe bashing America at every possible opportunity, and we're supposed to take that. It's total BS. The best thing for America to do would be to completely withdraw from NATO and announce to the world that European security is no longer a priority, then, hop into bed with Russia. You know, that country that actually didn't cave into the Nazis the way the France did.
This is my sig.
Let Brussels do its own security and get US troops out of NATO. Instead of constantly trying to make the French happy, form a new military alliance consisting of Russia, Great Britian, and probably Poland. By the way, we'll sell Poland the h-bomb.
This is my sig.
please read this article: http://science.howstuffworks.com/dirty-bomb1.htm. its not the explosion that causes the problem, its the readiation that spreads afterwards...
Or you could stop making more hostiles.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
is the number of people who believe the world is a totally safe place, and if it isn't so, then America must have made it that way. 'US unilaterism' is another way of saying the French and Germans didn't want to invade Iraq because of oil & weapons deals they had made with Saddam.
"[T]he leader of the free world has responsibilities to listen to the concerns of the free world."
What concerns? Did you know the USA gives more in the way of (government & non-government) aid to other countries than ALL other countries combined? So if America does, as you have predicted, fall, then God help us if we had to depend on the altruism of Europe.
damaged by dogma
Yes, I know how they work. The part you're missing is that there will be so little radioactive material, spread over such a wide area, that there is no danger from it. Don't start being afraid just because the magic "nuclear" word is involved.
Mod down posts with a "Free Mac Mini/iPod" sig, they're spam!
What I don't get is why the EU had to reach an agreement with the US? The EU should just use GWB's strategy and do whatever the hell it wants.
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
EOM
Yep, the UK has a much better debt situation. Have you recently looked at Germany (64% of GDP), France (68%), Italy (106%), Spain (62%), Japan (154%), or Canada (77%)? In case you were wondering, those are most the rest of the G8. That leaves Russia (34%) and the UK (33%) as the only two not in the same boat as the US (and Russia has other problems; they're no great example of what to do).
Bullshit. V1's and v2's had accuracy enough
to hit their broad area targets and the germans
screwed the pocch with their nuke program: with
a little help. You can look back at parallel
discursions in invention that boggle the mind.
Civilizations that create accurate and fairly
sophisticated mathematical systems and fail
to devise the wheel,etc..
You don`t trust the EU, but we should trust you ?
Try this:
google: echelon or carnivore
A lot of the posts on this subject show a lack of information about GPS.
First off, it's original purpose (since the early '70s) has been to provide mid-course correction to submarine launched ballistic missiles. No matter how good the inertial tracking systems in a boomer, they still don't have an accurate enough idea of where they are located at launch. Land-based ICBMs have very accurate location information, so the trajectory is merely an exercise in astronautics. Some land-based ICBMs have special systems to make them more accurate - not by changing the calculated trajectory but to account for the vagaries of upper-atmosphere winds and other random factors. Therefore, the military threat of a GPS is making things more accurate. SLBMs, cruise missiles, gravity bombs, artillery, and unit locations all benefit from GPS. Interestingly, all but the SLBMs seem to fall within the EU promise of providing service in anything short of global war which would be yet another factor encouraging limited warfare.
GPS is inherently not accurate enough for use in Air Traffic Control. This is true even when using Precision (P-Mode) during times of no anti-civilan use jamming. The error space of a GPS position is three dimensional but not globular - it depends upon the exact geometry of the satellites used in a fix. For example, if all six or so satellites happen to be at roughly the same elevation from the receiver's viewpoint, the vertical accuracy is much lower than the horizontal accuracy.
The only way (barring use of higher frequencis) to improve accuracy is to ensure that more satellites are available at a wider variety of elevations and azimuths. Increased power will only allow the receiver to listen to satellites which it otherwise might not find, but those are at such marginally useful El/Az that they can't improve accuracty. On the other hand, increased power might overcome any EU-specific versions of the old Soviet-bloc GPS jammers.
There has been a solution to the aircraft control problem since the '80s - differential GPS. Simply placing a GPS transmitter at a known location on the ground will ensure that comparisons between the satellite transmissions and the ground station allows for super-accurate position determination. If we wanted to use GPS for automatic landings, we need only put differential GPS transmitters in Terminal Control Areas (TCAs) - which the FAA has proposed. There's absolutely nothing stopping other countries from taking this course - which is much cheaper than flying their own satellite constellation.
Finally, the whole civilian jamming mode has become moot. All it amounts to is changing the three-week Gold key on the P-Mode and advertising a slightly wrong time in Coarse (C-Mode). Thus, a civilian receiver, without the latest Gold code, can't determine the correct position information. However, time clocks are now so cheap and accurate that any hand-held system can have nearly as accurate a time as the GPS satellite (cesium clocks). Since the satellites' orbits are easily determined and known, a receiver can ignore the Gold code. The reciever knows from its own time where the satellite must be. From there it's simply a matter of doing like surveyors have been doing since the '80s and measure the wavelength of signals from the satellites.
Bottom line - at best this is an EU boondoggle, corporate welfare for EU aerospace contractors. At worst, this is an attempt to sell more robust GPS services to China, India, and Russia. The latter would not be surprising in view of EU countries' proclivity to sell any military technology to anybody.
"As a citizen of the US, I absolutely DO NOT want a third party to be able to accurately aim a missile at the White House, the Capitol, or a nuclear power plant."
I think that dropping a bomb on the Whitehouse would be a splendid thing to do. Goodbye Bush you twat
Say what!?
I knew quite a few people who worked on the Apollo program and the impression I got was the expertise was primarily American.
As for who developed the technology - some critical areas were:
Control systems theory: Bell Labs
Gimballing rocket motors: Rocketdyne
LH2 handling: AEC and Lockheed Skunk Works
LH2 engines: Pratt & Whitney, Rocketdyne
F1 engines: Rocketdyne
And don't forget that von Braun and crew learned a lot about liquid fueled rocket design from Goddard.
A Shadeless room is a brighter room.
Then why were the first nuclear weapons available in 1945 and the first ICBM's didn't become operational until 1960? Hmmm?
Short range missiles are another story - especially satellite nav equipped cruise missiles. Getting accurate inertial navigations systems is a lot more difficult than building a nuclear weapon.
A Shadeless room is a brighter room.
Missles, missles, missles, MISSILES, always missles.
This isn't directed at you or even your post. It's just a scream. Bush and Reagan, the neocons, always obsessed with missle attacks, because they never think for even a few seconds. There's so much money in building a missles "shield", and so much inbred fear of missles in U.S. citizens, that we can't think properly.
WHY a missle to deliver a nuclear bomb? Use a cruise missle instead. OR, a commuter aircraft for an airburst. Or put it on a freight train. Or a container on a cargo freighter. Or just move it around in a U-Haul. Or just have a couple dozen in subbasements of the consular offices of the [fill in feared country of your choice here], ready to detonate at any time. There could be a nuke in the Russian embassy in Washington DC, disguised as a samovar.
I don't imagine missles hitting us; I never did, even in the terrorized commie-hystera of Reagan's era. NO COUNTRY IS GOING TO FIRE A MISSLE AT THE U.S.. Get over this insanity. No one is going to insure their nation's immediate suicide! Russia isn't going to kill itself. CHINA IS NOT GOING TO FIRE A MISSLE AT THE U.S. They are doing just fine, have no impulse to eliminate their civilization by frying Los Angeles. NO, THEY ARE NOT MADMEN, EVEN IF THEY ARE COMMUNISTS. They never were!
We have lived in a continuous state of hysteria since the forties. We've sapped our GDP by funding this imaginary war for decades. A lot of people are richer for it, of course.
The only real danger of a nuclear attack has been from extra-national agencies such as Al Qaeda; but they, no matter how fearful we are of them, aren't that interested in causing the nuclear annihilation of Islamic nations, which Bush and the U.S. would certainly cause if such an attack was launched. There's no strategic reason for such an attack. 9-11 was about provoking us into doing something stupid, which we of course did, as predicted. But a nuke? Why?
There should be a name for this syndrome. A belief that everyone else in the world is suicidally insane and incomprehensible.
Already done. If/when the enemy jams GPS, the US is prepared with "pseudolites" (transmitter-equipped aircraft, aerostats, ground stations, etc.)to cover the areas where the opposition is trying to deny GPS coverage.
OK, imagining.... Oh, oooohh, oooooohhhhh.
I just came in my pants.
Funny how immigration works, then. It's OK to emigrate to the US. The US will most likely let you in. A caucasian american emigrating to Saudi Arabia? India? Sudan? Japan? Not too likely. Lots of things in the way.
Even "emigrating" to Canada has a lot of problems. Until you get Canadian citizenship (and thus, give up your US citizenship. The reverse doesn't happen, though!), you're wages are taxed heavily by Canada, the IRS also taxes you at the top tax bracket, and you're probably getting paid in $CDN to boot.
von Braun designed the Saturn 5's main engines.
2.1 billion euros divided by 150,000 people doesn't work out to very much money per person, even if you pretend 100 percent of the total will be paychecks, not parts, real estate, insurance, etc.
Much as I'd expect a country the US was at war with to try and jam/disable/shoot down GPS. They did try in Iraq, they setup little GPS jammers. Didn't work, but they did try.
I also think the concern may be the misleading development of it. The US GPS is a military project, of that there is no question at all. It was developed by the government for the military, was originally only available to the military, and the highest resolutions are still military only. Europe seems here to be claiming that Galileo is civilian only, but then some countries want it for military use and they are saying "Ok, that's cool."
Also I think you are a little confused about the "right to shoot it down". It's not that the US is saying that it'll shoot down the satalites as they are launched, they are saying that this makes it a potential target in a war. Purely civilian things aren't targets, all other concerns aside, it's a waste of muntitions to hit something that doesn't have a military use. However dual use systems are a valid target.
Likewise, if the US went to war with the EU, I would fully expect them to try and take out GPS, if they could. Never mind that it would disrupt commercial traffic, not their problem, it would be used to guide military aircraft and bombs, and thus be a target of intrest.
However the military use of GPS is it's primary stated purpose, civilian use only being receantly allowed. Galileo seems to be stated for civilian use only, but they are willing to turn a blind eye to military use.
Is there a point in there ?
http://rareformnewmedia.com/
We would certainly react and we certainly would expect a reaction from China were we to block their access to GPS. It's the nature of war, for God's sake!
What is your penile percentile?
I really wish you were wrong... but you're almost completely right.
Economists that aren't completely in political pockets agree, it's not a matter of "if" the US currency charade is going to fail, it's a matter of when.
Just another ignoramus anti-EU Brit? Certainly. The decision is taken by the _elected_ governments, including the British one, and not by "bureacrats".
And France is not, by far, the main promoter of the project, even if it has interests in it. Thanks to a not-so-stupidly-ultra-liberal policy, France manages to retain industries on its soil when Britain capitalises on "finance": French companies are major actors in both consortiums competing for the project, eventhough the financial gains will be more evenhandedly shared among EU members.
I found some data in French about the repartitions of shares in the consiortium. It is not dated unfortunately, and even maybe outdated because I cannot see anything about China, Israel or Morroco there.
"La repartition de ces gains entre les 15 pays de l'ASE a ete fixee a 17,31% chacun pour la France, l'Allemagne, l'Italie et le Royaume-Uni ; 10,14% pour l'Espagne ; 4,79% pour la Belgique ; 3,54% pour la Suisse ; 3,07% pour les Pays-Bas et 2,33% pour la Suede, pour ne citer qu'eux."
I am not Remy Mouton, unfortunately: http://remy.mouton.free.fr/art/
What everyone seems to implicitly assume is that not being able to turn the system off is a GOOD thing. That is not neccesarily so. The hard part about building a missile isn't the rocketry or the payload, it's getting the damn thing to go where you want it. Any guidance system you build for your use CAN be used by the enemy you are fighting. Lacking some way to prevent that, the whole system is a giant liability. Do you really think that if somebody was dropping missiles on european cities that the EU wouldn't shoot the damn things down themselves?
It's about 3 years until the U.S.'s intentional devaluation of the dollar and our need to borrow from the EU and China throws the U.S. into a depression, dragging everyone down with it.
An unstable U.S. with 100,000 nuclear, sorry, nukular, weapons is a very bad thing indeed.
"It did work, but several methods have been found to reduce the effect SA had to the point where it was no longer relevant."
:
It's called "differential tracking". A GPS receiver is sited as near as possible to the target, and it is linked to a RF transmitter by which it broadcasts its GPS reported position. The receiving system, knowing the exact location of the fixed receiver, cues the guidance system with the offset data. It's perfect, It's simple, It works.
Given this data, it should be rather evident that
1.There is really no need for a third (russian glonass is operational) system for precise 3d location, either civvy or military;
2. The US military cannot, even by turning off completely the GPS system, avoid homeland menace. Any sucker could have gone on top of the twin towers with a homing beacon;
The European system underestimates costs, and completely overestimates demand. Simply populating mobile phone trasmitters with GPS receivers would allow cell phone service providers, at modest cost to themselves, to sell additional precision to people via their cell phones. If they do not do so, it means that the demand simply is not there.
this whole system is a gigantic subsidy to European domestic production, since, for the points stated above, I do not see Asian electronic producers fall over themselves in trying to produce receivers for a third comer whose domestic market will be dominated by goverment demand (military mostly), and apportioned to domestic producers accordingly.
"If a boss demands loyalty, give him integrity. But if he demands integrity, give him loyalty." (John Boyd, 1927-1997)
If China had a sense of humor they'd put their flag right next to the American one ... only slightly higher.
There is a name for your syndrome ... it's call stupidity.
I ask ya!
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Not that I'm doubting you, but can you point me to a source for that?
Ta.
compared to population size, canada lets more people in than the US
Until you get Canadian citizenship (and thus, give up your US citizenship.
you dont't have to give any old citizenship to get the canadian citizenship. if your old country strips you of your citizenship when you take another one, it's not canada's problem
The reverse doesn't happen, though!), you're wages are taxed heavily by Canada, the IRS also taxes you at the top tax bracket,
many countries have treaties to prevent double taxation. afaik, there is one between canada and the US
and you're probably getting paid in $CDN to boot.
if trends continue, you might be glad ;-)
Did you know the USA gives more in the way of (government & non-government) aid to other countries than ALL other countries combined?
Your numbers are wrong. Even in terms of absolute dollars, the US had moved to first place in recent years because of a strong dollar, but even then it has given less than Japan and France together. With the weak dollar, it will probably lose that position altogether.
But absolute dollars don't matter, what matters is amount of money given relative to population size or GNP, and on both measures, the US is stingy. Furthermore, much of the US "aid" is actually political pay-offs or military aid, tied to US purchases, and is really just a subsidy in disguise.
is the number of people who believe the world is a totally safe place, and if it isn't so, then America must have made it that way.
Quite to the contrary: Europeans know first hand that the world is a dangerous place. The US population only seems to have woken up to this uncomfortable fact on 9/11 and still seems to have trouble dealing with it. If every nation started wars when there was a terrorist attack on its soil, civilization would have ended long ago.
The problem is that the US thinks it can make the world safe for its citizens, and that the US government doesn't give a damn what it is doing to other nations in the process.
When they turned it off, there were 6 sats in the existing constellation that couldn't do SA properly. Sometime in 2001 all new sats didn't even have the SA module installed since it was a big heavy bit of gear. Its one of the reasons they looked into regional jamming early on. An f4 wild weasel could jam GPS in a local area a decade ago as can AWACS and I'm willing to bet that the AWACS can also jam the others already. The USAF depends on GPS way to much to reintroduce SA and the regional jamming works very well.
"Actually, a 1 megaton blast will only vaporize things out to about .6 miles, and the "completely flattened buildings" radius only goes to about 1.7 miles. A couple of miles is a MISS for a hardened target."
Thank you. Someone understands nuclear blasts.
"This is all moot, though, because ICBMs don't use GPS for guidance."
Equally true.
I am John Hurt.
sorry, frog. i'm not going to kiss you to turn you into my princess. i'm a software engineer. i have no time for a girl
you left out the punch-line "but a talking frog is pretty cool".
No, I'm not a troll. But Chinese tech is far behind standard US tech. We've gone from making bigger bombs to smaller, more precise ones.
I am John Hurt.
1. If you think that one Rumsfeld comment was the only thing aggravating Europeans, you should switch your news source. That was just a small part of the tip of that iceberg.
2. You may also consider shifting your history supplier. Russia was actually allied with the Nazis during the first 2 years of WW2.
Why should we, the US, be forced put other nation's interests above our own?
You either do that or get killed. I don't mind, it's YOUR choice.
Let me run some names past you and see if you get it: Kursk, Stalingrad, Moscow, Kharkov, Kiev. In each of those places and countless others Russia lost more men and continued fighting the Nazis than France did prior to its surrender.
The Soviet alliance with the Nazis at the beginning of the war, a temporary affair by any historical record, is completely forgiven by the twenty million russian men and women that died fighting the Nazis during World War II. In nearly every unit of military measure the Russians bore the greatest brunt and made the deepest sacrifices in fighting the Nazis.
At the end of the day, the Russians were with the US fighting the Nazis, and the French were not. The French may have a heritage of liberty, but, the Russians, because of their sacrifices and courage, their scientific achievement, offer the potential to be a better ally and better friend than any western european power.
The point that I am trying to make, is that, having fought the cold war with the russians we as Americans learned a lot about them and in many ways have come to love them. While western Europe is barely capable of American respect (with the notable exception of the UK), the Russians have earned American respect in spades. Given that the United States and Russia were able to be fairly effective allies in World War II, one has to think, as an American, if Russia is the place for the Americans to make true alliances with, rather than the French and Germans.
This is my sig.
Actually, in all seriousness, why should the United States want to even be allied to France and Germany? Russia has proven herself as repeatedly clever, tough, and capable over the last 60 years. What have the French proven? Or the Germans? Russia has a huge landmass, a large and bright population, a stupendous record of military and scientific achievement despite extreme poverty. I'd say the Russians have it all over the Europeans. If we in the USA have to be allied to anybody overseas, I'd say we should hop into bed with the Russians. Scrap NATO, let's have US + Russia!
This is my sig.
I just used the CIA factbook for those. It's not perfect accuracy, but it's usually fairly good.
m i_m2633/is _6_14/ai_68145870
= tcm:29-1179 97-16&type=News
m l
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/
If you doubt that...
Japan:
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/
All European:
http://www.euractiv.com/Article?tcmuri
(In 2003, Spain=50%, Germany=64%, Italy=106%, France=63%, UK=39%)
Canadian Debt Clock:
http://www.ndir.com/SI/education/debt.sht
(I'm not checking the math on it, but I already know Canada has a debt problem, there are many articles on it, but none seemed to state the exact percent)
Sorry, no info handy on Russia.
Actually I thought the launcher team was dominated by Von Braun's Germans, and it was the Apollo spacecraft team that was if not dominated had a very high percentage of ex-Avro Arrow Canadian and British engineers.
:-)
Yes, the Americans supplied the money
According to Bin Laden the 9-11 attack was an attack on our economy. He has stated that his intention is to bankrupt the US not to kill every american or even a bunch of them.
That's why he attacked the world trade center.
So far it's been pretty effective. He spent maybe a 100,000 and the US spent 200 billion and virtually all of it was borrowed money. He also caused uncounted amount of economic loss to US industry.
the ripple effects of his attack are not over yet. The current deficit is already causing the dollar to drop and the interest rates to rise.
Expect an attack every five to ten years of similar magnitude until they reach their goal.
evil is as evil does
"Starwars (and missile defence) are so last century."
even nukes are so last century. It's so much easier and cheaper to wage chemical and biological warfare.
For example a terrorist could travel from canada to mexico and randomly inject cows with mad cow disease or foot and mouth disease and destroy the beef economy. A terrorist could poison the water supply of a medium size city in the midwest and cause panic all over the country. A terrorist can take out three or four bridges across the missipi and cause billions of dollars of damage. A terrorist can knock out two cranes in the los angeles port and cause a disaster for anybody who sells imported products.
No need for nukes. A little enginuity, a few buck, some fertilizer and boom lots bang for the buck.
evil is as evil does
I read somewhere on an ESA web site that the EGNOS and WAAS signals were compatible, so a GPS receiver that uses WAAS in the U.S could use EGNOS signals when in Europe?
"Now, as is already starting to happen, when the world starts to shift to oil priced in Euros instead of dollars, then demand for the dollar will plummet and it's value will take a dive... and there's nothing the US can do about it."
My you're naive.
What do you think the invasion of Iraq was about? Iraq was the first nation to trade oil in Euros instead of dollars, and with the slide in the dollar was doing very nicely out of it.
And why do you think Iran is on the Axis of Evil? It's the second nation to trade oil in euros.
What else do you think that vast US military is going to be used for? Who do you reckon is going to be game to break ranks now?
"Shoot one, educate a thousand" - Stalin
My understanding was that von Braun may have assisted in the design of the F1 engines - but the grunt work was done by Rocketdyne.
A Shadeless room is a brighter room.
When the context is international law and war, talking about rights doesn't get you far, because not much is based on them in this area.
Funny how I only ever hear that kind of thinking from Americans. If it was a universal truth about international relations, you'd expect it to be heard, well, internationally.
Mmmm, let's take Iraq as an example. Looking at the number of killed US soldiers, vs the number of killed Iraqi soldiers, it seems that the Iraqi weapons were way more precise :-). Seriously, I don't buy that "precise bombing" of the US army. How many Iraqi's were killed in Felluja?
There goes my karma down the drain .....
Browsers shouldn't have a back button!! It's all about going forward...
I suppose the CAP isn't a rip-off either?
If you believe that what the EU says has any relevance to what it does, then you're the ignaramus.Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The decisions about Galileo were agreed between the (science?) ministers of all EU countries assembled in the ad hoc Council of Ministers (yours included probably), and not by the EU Commission-of-bureaucrats.
As for your other points:
- I do not believe that a country can honestly maintain its independence without its proper agriculture and industry, and it is a pity that Britain's is fading.
- you certainly know that France respects EU competition rules better than other EU rules... As for some "competition" rules, you'll pardon me if I deem them "stupid": I am not at all pleased when I see private nuclear power plants in the UK, considering the state of your railways. And is your electricity cheaper than in France? "Free markets everywhere" has become a dogma. I hate most of those.
- the Eurofighter project? Dassault was certainly very arrogant and this is a shame. But the Rafale program seems much more successfull to me (cheaper, ready for a long time, much nicer and it flies well...). It is a collective failure and we are all paying the price (X22...).
- CAP a "rip-off"? I do not really understand your word there, but at least we are not dependent upon anybody for what we eat as we were after WWII, and that's a great strategic success.
- your last point: who do you believe? How do you make up your mind? Based on whose data? Do you trust corporate data more than state or EU data? I do not.
Galileo derives from the states will and will be privately built: does this satisfy you, or are states definitely evil?
I am not Remy Mouton, unfortunately: http://remy.mouton.free.fr/art/
EU countries' proclivity to sell any military technology to anybody
Yeah. EU sells anything to anyone, unlike everyone else, right?
Has anyone sold more weapons to more despotic dictators than USA? Anyone?
Oh well, it does tend to be humourous when those weapons get turned back on America.
Or better yet, take the American one off the flagpole, put a Chinese one in its place, and athen duct tape the american one underneath.