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China to Deploy Secure GPS by 2010
hackingbear writes "Unsatisfied by the reliance on American GPS navigation systems and not feeling much security joining the European Galileo system, China will expand its 4-satellite Beidou navigation system to a full-fledged, competitive, and encrypted system by 2010."
and will Tibet be in the correct location?
One of the big concerns about the Chinese system is interference with the US and European GPS systems, and up until now there haven't been any set specs to start a meaningful discussion over.
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Too bad most of the satellites will be knocked out of orbit by all the debris their last little stunt in orbit left behind.
And will this mean that my take-away will be delivered on time and, importantly, to the correct address? I hope so!
Great, now they can spread peace and harmony more precisely, +/- 1m.
I have the feeling the expansion of this system has an ulterior motive. I'm sure they're right, from their point of view, about the other GPS networks. I don't doubt them. I do doubt their good intentions though. A new "feature" of their expanded GPS network will probably be to tell the police exactly where the user is. It might even end up mandatory. I know I probably sound a little extreme, and for all I know, I could be wrong. I'm just not very trusting of any government. The UK is becoming an Orwellian surveillance state, America is getting "Real ID" or something. I don't know much about it. Here in Australia, various government factions keep pushing for a national ID card, disguising it under various names to try and fool the sheep, or "voters", as we prefer to be known. I just wouldn't put it past a country that is known to heavily censor the internet and spy on citizens' internet use, to basically microchip everyone to know exactly where they are. Why stake out the house of a dissident, when they can track his movements and arrest everyone involved with them, without lifting a finger and exposing their domestic spies?
Admit it. You post strawman arguments as AC so you get modded Insightful for refuting them, rather than Troll
Quite obviously this is because in times of war, the Chinese could find themselves locked out of either the US or EU systems. If they are going to tightly integrate GPS capabilites into military units - a no brainer - they want to have a closed system that noone can pull the plug on come WW3.
As my philsophical opponents say so often "This is'nt rocket science".
Who says it should be global? As information given in the wikipage, the satellites are on the geostationary orbit. can't we have networks of different positioning system? such as global cell phone networks, satellite Tvs, phones, internet that we have today? if geostationary satellites can provide better and more focused service in that region why not use more of them to improve precision? and why don't we have GPS towers like cell phone towers that we have? why not integrate GPS capability into those cell towers? perhaps radio towers? and electric grids? In crowded cities, it might worth a lot. haven't we all cruise through lakes and across buildings? and get lost on that same block over and over? and wouldn't it be far from now to actually get to use new GPS technologies? it is always military who gets it first until much better one comes out?
No way around it, too much military equipment needs this these days. No one in China doubts that the USA would shut them out of the GPS at the slightest confrontation and the EU is a weakling and would crawl under American pressure. Unfortunatly that will mean that soon India will need it's own system as well since they also don't trust the USA very much. (USA has been funding pakistan through all the wars they had)
I know how PGP works down to the algorithmic level, yet I can't break into somebody else's PGP-secured data.
I was about to say 13256278887989457651018865901401704640, but it appears this number is private property.
I can see why they won't trust the American system, but why not the nicer European system? Is there something in Galileo that won't fit their communist dictatorship agenda?
This is yet another lame move from the Chinese government. Instead of trying to reduce their huge inequality, or at least improving the quality of life for the billion living in poverty, they waste their relatively modest budget duplicating efforts just because they want to play big, as if they were some sort of Europe or USA. The problem is, people aren't dying of hunger in Europe or the USA. This is the same crap the USSR (and today's Russia, to a lesser extent) did.
I was about to say 13256278887989457651018865901401704640, but it appears this number is private property.
Lack of ability on your part does not mean lack of ability for others.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Like the US system. And the EU system. Both of which have provision for encrypted signals that only those with the key (i.e. the military) can decrypt, while providing less accurate data "unencrypted". Except that the US turned their encryption off a few years back, but neither the EU or the US have said that they wouldn't turn encryption on "in troubled times". The EU initially considered doing without this but it ended up getting included too in a roundabout way.
Not so much "bad" as a waste of time. The unencrypted accuracy is still very useful for most purposes, and there are historical records of the US system being scuppered so that over certain parts of the globe at certain times, even the unencrypted signal was deliberately highly inaccurate but the military knew how to "compensate" for the bad data using a key. However, if China are doing this to stop the effects of a US/EU turnoff from affecting them, this is pretty much vital, I would say. The rest of the world's GPS has exactly the same features, so I don't see how China are doing anything "bad" by this. That's not to say that their overall motives are good, but no worse than the EU/US.
Actually I found an interesting article on this. The French invented a trick to make sure that the US would be unable to jam Galileo in a warzone. US allies like the UK and the Eastern Europeans forced them to not do this and so the Chinese decided to make their own fork.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/643/1 According to an article in last week's Space News, the Europeans and the US are disturbed by China's planned Compass military satellite navigation system. The Chinese are going to try to do to both America's GPS 3 and Europe's Galileo systems what the Europeans, under French leadership, tried to do to the US. Europe originally planned to neutralize the military advantage of the US system by putting their signal on a frequency so close to the US M-code one that any attempt to jam their signal would interfere with the US system's operation: a neat trick that was aimed at giving France a de facto veto over all US military operations. The rest of Europe didn't care to follow France into a conflict of this kind with the US so they forced France to swallow an agreement on this (See "Whatâ(TM)s the frequency, Jacques?", The Space Review, March 1, 2004)
China's existing Beidou navigation network is a clumsy system based on three satellites, (two operational and one reserve) in geosynchronous orbit, launched between 2000 and 2003. Its military uses have been limited, but it is suspected that they include providing guidance for the ICBMs China has aimed at US targets. Above all, this system has given China hands-on operational experience with satellite navigation hardware. Combined with the sophisticated science and engineering data they have been able to obtain from Europe, they are now in a position to begin work on their own military satellite navigation system. Australia, the US, Japan, and India can thank the good folks at ESA and the EU for the subsequent increased instabilityâ"or worseâ"in the region. Kind of scary isn't it that China is spending billions building something which is only useful if they fight a major war with the US.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
First, China is a very proud nation and as such will not allow itself to be dependent on any other nation for services it can provide itself. They also are trying to express themselves on the world stage as a world power and mostly do this by repeating the same technological achievements other countries of similar stature already have done. Its kind of like a rite of passage.
As for the population, China really is two distinct countries when it comes to its people. Now I know you can divide up the population into various ethnic groups but it comes down to you are either part of the Communist system or your not. So you have a couple hundred million in the one camp, with all the benefits of modern life, and then the rest who are still essentially not much more progressed since the the beginning of the last century.
The problem is, China really could not give a rats ass what you, I, or the world thinks. Any attempt to tell them and they take it as an insult. The big concerns going forward are not what happens to China's people but what China attempts with its neighbors. This makes the GPS development interesting in that it increases their threat capability. Considering the fact that its nearly a monthly exercise their threats against Taiwan take on even more seriousness with this expanded capability. This allows them to accurately deliver weapons to targets far beyond their borders. This means they can simply ignore the pleas of the world should they decide to finally address Taiwan in a military manner. It provides a good threat projection versus the US as well.
We can hope they will use the technology to better the lives of their people but unless you part of the first group in China I doubt they can or want to. Simply put the numbers are too large and the territorial issues are extreme in many cases. Combine this with the fact many would just preferred to be left alone and its hard to imagine why the government would bother unless national interest were at stake.
China doesn't want to play big, they already are. They simply want the respect they feel they are not getting. The Olympics were a gesture by some feel good misdirected people on the world stage made to China. Unfortunately China didn't care about all the supposed conditions these people attached, they saw it only as a means to elevate their status in the world and redirect some attention from the unsavory side of their activities. Unfortunately too many in the world are willing to go along. Unfortunately too many people like to vilify the US for things that in China get a pass. Perhaps its because at least with the US there is a chance of changing the behavior.
My friend came back from China teaching English there for a few years, even with a native as a wife. Go figure, anyway what China has a problem with is that many of these highly educated young people don't want to stay. His view was that all this modern conveniences and such were like a bribe to keep the people the nation's leaders need to keep the country going. Basically buy the people off with shiny stuff.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
With this new system things are getting pretty ridiculous. Enough countries have shown that they now have the ability to launch a GPS style system that no one is going to be able to disable all the available systems and there will be no military advantage on either side.
Kind of scary isn't it that China is spending billions building something which is only useful if they fight a major war with the US.I'm hoping for someone to just open up the systems properly so we can get away from the waste of money this is becoming.
Also, stop the scare mongering. By your logic the US's ability to jam the civilian GPS signal and keep the military one is only useful if they want to fight a major war with China.
Nope. The US system has selective availability turned off, and all new US GPS satellites don't even have SA functionality, so they can't turn it back on later.
"Difference is the US is setting the state so Iraq has political and economic self-determination."
The US is ensuring that the economic output of Iraq benefits primarily the US. Iraq was economically, politically and even socially better off under Saddam than it is now, unless you measure welfare in a method that doesn't include death rates, disease proliferation, violent political instability and economic trauma.
As for South Korea, South Korean industry benefits the US, which is why the US allows SK self-determination. That would change in a heartbeat were SK to decide to align themselves more closely with, say Europe. Also, it's a single isolated example. Lets look at US intervention in Nicaragua, Panama, Vietnam, Chile, Haiti, and El-Salvador. Now ask yourself what is the most likely outcome for Iraq and Afghanistan.
If you think the US is attempting to provide a better life for the populations of foreign nations rather than ensure that its own commercial interests are made incumbent in those nations, then you're living in a Fox News televised fantasy world.
The Iraq occupation is about ensuring that when the dust settles, the Iraqi industry is dominated by US contractors and businesses so that the lions share of the profits from that economy are under US control. Not to mention that the businesses in charge of Iraqi oil will be beholden to US corporate assets.
Time for a wake up call, my friend.
I hate printers.
This was inevitable. I remember, about a year back, in India, over a beer, discussing the defense scenario with a colleague who was an engineer/researcher with the Indian Navy for about 20 years. His words -- "What we need is a secure GPS system soon. We all know the American version is civilian and of course they can shut it down whenever they want. It is a major desirable in your defense program." I think the Chinese too think the same way. They just came up with it. I would not be surprised if India announced the same within half a decade.
It is what it is. A desirable in the military program. Period.
Strange that this kind of stupid scaremongering gets modded up - oh, what am I talking about, this is slashdot.
/. every time this is brought up, but you might as well get used to it, because it will come back to haunt us for years to come.
So China choose to rely on their own stuff, just like the Europeans, because in their view America doesn't seem like a very reliable partner; and who can blame them, after nearly 8 years of Bush and the neocons? I realize that it pisses a lot of people off on
And what is that nonsense about "it showed them how to build their own"? As if they aren't fully capable of thinking on their own. As far as I can see they entered into that partnership in good faith, and left when they had reason to feel that their good faith has been betrayed. There are many good reasons why China would want a closer partnership with Europe - one of them of being that they can see their advantage in having the US marginalised a bit, of course. And as things look at the moment, that can't be all bad either; the world needs a better balance of power, and the US could do with a bit of humble pie.
So the EU were planning on pissing off the US? It wouldn't surprise me, actually, but I don't think they are considering declaring war on the US just yet.
Simple military tactics - make sure your weapons and systems are under your control. Make sure they are redundant enough to survive a war. Make sure your enemies can't interfere even via the intervention of other nations. Make sure that political decisions don't get your only source of GPS information turned off.
I don't think that scaremongering over a GPS system that is identical in function and capability to other existing systems is justified. China does a lot worse things every day that are more deserving of concern. An independent GPS system isn't anything that doesn't already exist, isn't something that the US couldn't remove or cripple if war was declared, has several million legitimate uses and provides extra levels of redundancy that entire continents have been striving for for years.
No, if we were talking about actual weapons (e.g. a gps-guided nuclear bomb), then you would have a point and a lot of the above isn't relevant. But in that case, it's the bomb that's the problem, not the GPS.
The US' GPS system is dated and on the verge of becoming unreliable. Many of the sats are well past their anticipated lifes. Two of the US sats are expected to fail in the next year or two. Several missions to replace these sats have been pushed back or scrubbed over the years.
Right now, one of the sats has been coming up and down over this past year. IIRC, it is one of the sats past its prime and is high on the list of anticipated failures.
Frankly, the US needs new sats and the technology can be significantly improved. It is hard to imagine any country wanting to use the US' system when there is so much room for improvement, resolution, time precision, encryption, and associated military advancements (over the air encrypted rekeying/synchronization, etc).
Not to mention, it is foolish, from a national security perspective, to not be in control of such an important military technology.
If for no other reason, all of the countries creating their own GPS system are showing the world they are not stupid. Find me a person that believes the US would depend on a China controlled GPS system for much of its military capability and I will show you a moron. A country needs no other reason.
Excellent post! Informed, pragmatic rationalism based on facts - uncommon in /. discussions about international affairs.
See also a very informative article from the Atlantic Monthly: How We Would Fight China by Robert Kaplan, an experienced journalist covering U.S. foreign affairs and the military. Detailed description of China's current military, with short- and long-term views of their military growth.
A tiny exceprt: (please keep in mind that Kaplan isn't advocating for confrontation, but doing a thorough analysis of what might happen if foolish politicians get us into such a mess).
" At the moment the challenges posed by a rising China may seem slight, even nonexistent. The U.S. Navy's warships have a collective "full-load displacement" of 2.86 million tons; the rest of the world's warships combined add up to only 3.04 million tons. The Chinese navy's warships have a full-load displacement of only 263,064 tons. The United States deploys twenty-four of the world's thirty-four aircraft carriers; the Chinese deploy none (a principal reason why they couldn't mount a rescue effort after the tsunami)."
"China has committed itself to significant military spending, but its navy and air force will not be able to match ours for some decades. The Chinese are therefore not going to do us the favor of engaging in conventional air and naval battles, like those fought in the Pacific during World War II...Instead the Chinese will approach us asymmetrically...But the Chinese are poised to show us the high end of the art. That is the threat."
"There are many ways in which the Chinese could use their less advanced military to achieve a sort of political-strategic parity with us. According to one former submarine commander and naval strategist I talked to, the Chinese have been poring over every detail of our recent wars in the Balkans and the Persian Gulf, and they fully understand just how much our military power depends on naval projection--that is, on the ability of a carrier battle group to get within proximity of, say, Iraq, and fire a missile at a target deep inside the country. To adapt, the Chinese are putting their fiber-optic systems underground and moving defense capabilities deep into western China, out of naval missile range--all the while developing an offensive strategy based on missiles designed to be capable of striking that supreme icon of American wealth and power, the aircraft carrier. The effect of a single Chinese cruise missile's hitting a U.S. carrier, even if it did not sink the ship, would be politically and psychologically catastrophic, akin to al-Qaeda's attacks on the Twin Towers. China is focusing on missiles and submarines as a way to humiliate us in specific encounters. Their long-range-missile program should deeply concern U.S. policymakers."
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Also from the Atlantic Monthly:
Superiority Complex - Why America's growing nuclear supremacy may make war with China more likely Again, detailed anaylsis of possible flashpoints and the resulting warfare. Section title: "Strategic Implications of the Nuclear Imbalance"
The Beidou system returns time after after a query from a terminal. They can only handle so many requests a minute. On the other hand US and Euro system continually broadcast time and location information.