Slashdot Mirror
India and US to Cooperate in Space Exploration
p1234 writes "India and the US plan to cooperate in the exploration and use of outer space. India's first mission to the moon, Chandrayaan-1, is scheduled to be launched later this year. This is the culmination of long-term planning on both sides of the Atlantic. Apart from India's moon mission, Nair said a probe of Mars by India was very much on the agenda.'Our scientific community would like to see what new things we can find. It is not just for the sake of sending a probe to Mars. Yes, we have an agenda by 2012, by then we should have a Mars mission.'"
This is a great opportunity for both countries to share the best scientists on both sides. This mission http://www.isro.org/chandrayaan/htmls/about_chandrayaan.htm is very critical and challenging for Indian scientists. They need every help they can get to pull this. In the past, when US denied supercomputing facilities, Indian went and reinvented the wheel http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/2906865.stm (although the effort was worth it).With relations improving between two countries, it will be foolish and immature not to accomplish.
This effort will NOT face any opposition like the Nuclear deal. The nuclear deal went down the drain because the stupid "left" politicians played the "Indian congress government is surrendering to US" card. They also threatened to withdraw their support which would have collapsed the Congress ruling party http://www.heritage.org/Research/AsiaandthePacific/wm1688.cfm. This time, they will make sure this deal is made and take the bragging rights for landing India on the moon. Yes, the Indian politics is screwed up. But they are not fools to let this deal go away.