Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Ariane 5 Deploys French Spy Satellite

Posted by michael on from the liberty-equality-surveillance dept.

Rolo Tomasi writes "An Ariane 5 rocket successfully put the French satellite Helios 2A into orbit today. The 4.2 ton spacecraft, which cost about one billion euros, will be used for surveillance by France and other European countries."

2 of 51 comments (clear)

  1. Bad article by JaxWeb · · Score: 5, Informative

    I didn't think the article was too good. The following two are better:

    Swiss Info

    Reuters

    --
    - Jax
  2. Sorry but France was still a Monarchy... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    It's main interest was going against the Red Coats and maintaining it's Nouvelle France.

    France had it's revolution in 1789 and this is when trouble started for them as the idea of getting rid of monarchy had made the rest of Europe an ennemy of France, most of the anti French sayings heard in the UK (which you probably inherited) come from those days. Napoleon made things even worse as he had abolished the class system in both France and the territories conquered (eg: a big chunk of modern Germany) this is why he had local support in many palces and got the monarchs of Europe united against him... until of course he himself proclaimed to be an emperor.

    France went into a restauration period where "at last" monarchy was reinstaured and the prolls put back where they bellonged (in the gutter) and the republic would be instaured much later when everyone else in Europe would have one.

    So in other words, the case of using France as a defender of the republic in 1776 is blow out of the water. But the rest of it's history is quite interesting.

    It's constitution has one interesting article that is very similar to something you must know.

    Article 1: Every man is born equal in rights, rights that cannot be taken away..yada yada yada..

    See it says "born equal in rights" not "just born equal". That, much later on, would have to have a serious impact on some issues on race for instance. Napoleon had a black officer, a metisse wife and that officer is no one less than Alexandre Dumas's father... you know, the writer.

    It's just too bad that all those things ended. The pendulum swung the other way in the century to come and you ended up with things like the Dreyfuss affair where it was clear that err.. not "everyone is born equal" in right apparently.

    All this to prove that it's the people that make the country, not the dates, or the scriptures. France ot the US can both show marvels or horrors, if it's people want it.