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China's Quantum Radar Could Detect Stealth Planes, Missiles (popsci.com)

hackingbear shares a report from Popular Science: China Electronics Technology Group Corporation (CETC), China's foremost military electronics company, announced that its groundbreaking quantum radar has achieved capability of tracking high altitude objects, likely by increasing the coherence time entangled photons. CETC envisions that its quantum radar will be used in the stratosphere to track objects in "the upper atmosphere and beyond" (including space). Quantum can identify the position, radar cross section, speed, direction and even "observe" on the composition of the target such as differentiating between an actual nuclear warhead against inflatable decoys. [...] Importantly, attempts to spoof the quantum radar would be easily noticed since any attempt to alter or duplicate the entangled photons would be detected by the radar. The news is an important illustration of a larger trend of Chinese advancement in the new, crucial area of quantum research. Other notable projects in China's quantum technology include the Micius satellite, and advances by Alibaba and the Chinese University of Science and Technology in a world record of entangling 18 photons (a quantum supercomputer would require about 50 entangled photons), such that China arguably leads the world in quantum technologies.

194 comments

  1. Well, that's great, but by He+Who+Has+No+Name · · Score: 1

    I suspect it's not JASSM-ER-proof.

    1. Re: Well, that's great, but by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Why would you suspect that? Detection at an extreme early phase (think pre-launch even) allows for an unprecedented strategic window for countermeasures.

      If what you're saying is, "who cares if they can detect is at unprecedented distances and time-frames, our JASSM's are unstoppable" you're repeating an oft-made military blunder. Never fall back on your last presumed advantage when all others have been obviously stripped away. It's likely you simply aren't aware that your last advantage has (also) already been eliminated.

      If they've cracked quantum detection, don't be so confident about simple kinetic countermeasures -- let alone asymmetric tactics.

    2. Re: Well, that's great, but by Pikoro · · Score: 4, Funny

      As opposed to the other classic military blunder: “Never go in against a Sicilian, when death is on the line!”

      --
      "Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
    3. Re: Well, that's great, but by Errol+backfiring · · Score: 5, Funny

      (think pre-launch even)

      You mean by following the enemy president's twitter account?

      --
      Nae king! Nae laird! Nae yurrupiean pressedent! We willna be fooled again!
    4. Re: Well, that's great, but by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Inconceivable!

    5. Re: Well, that's great, but by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think that you meant to say, "Never get involved in a land war in Asia"

  2. We must stay competitive! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    We should implement Blockchain RADAR immediately as a response to this newfangled Quantum RADAR.

    1. Re:We must stay competitive! by phantomfive · · Score: 4, Funny

      We should implement Blockchain RADAR immediately as a response to this newfangled Quantum RADAR.

      I know your idea sounds ridiculous on the surface, but if you use deep learning, you can put it in a div with Javascript. You couldn't before, but WebAssembly makes it possible. That's the advantage of Chinese hypertext.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    2. Re:We must stay competitive! by VeryFluffyBunny · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Meanwhile, congress and the stable genius in the Whitehouse are effectively reducing funding in the sciences and education. Pretty soon, the USA won't have enough people with the knowledge and skills to implement stuff like blockchain RADAR, let alone find out what stuff like Quantum RADAR is and how it works.

      --
      Debate is a form of harassment. Do not question my truth.
    3. Re:We must stay competitive! by gtall · · Score: 1, Insightful

      I very much doubt the Chinese have quantum radar, however devaluing science in the U.S. is an active administration policy. Science produces facts, anathema Republicans and the Evangelical nutjobs who have sold their souls to him. And science doesn't sit well with many Democrats either.

    4. Re:We must stay competitive! by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

      We should implement Blockchain RADAR immediately as a response to this newfangled Quantum RADAR.

      At the very least it should have AI embedded and be made of carbon nanotubes.

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
    5. Re:We must stay competitive! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Science produces facts

      Righto.

      anathema Republicans and the Evangelical nutjobs

      I'll wait.

      And science doesn't sit well with many Democrats either.

      Because patience is a virtue. Thank you for pointing out the bipartisan buttfucking of science.

      Naturally, our effect on the planet's climate concerns me far more than a bunch of retards screaming that gender is a magic unicorn that isn't informed by genetics... But any motherfucker telling you the left embraces science is trying to sell you something.

    6. Re:We must stay competitive! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There is no biological basis for gender.
      Men and women are the exact same.
      There is no biological basis for race.
      Organic is more healthy and better for the environment.
      GMO is unhealthy and causes cancer.
      Vaccine causes autism.

      Seems like the Democrats and the yuppy left are just as happy (if not more) to disregard science for their ideology.

    7. Re:We must stay competitive! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's a pretty bias assumption. The worlds greatest scientists have all been men of faith. Some of the best schools in the country are religious based or founded on christian principles. The problem is quite the opposite. Not enough religious principles in schooling has caused a downfall in our education system. Instead we have cry baby rooms on college campuses these days. We coddle our young and they grow up to be whining crying SJW's.

    8. Re:We must stay competitive! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      NASA just received 20.7 billion in funding from the Republicans. The Obama Democrats never gave that much to NASA. See liberals mouthing off non facts all the time. You can pretty much tell a liberal in the room when you hear them speak because they spew non facts and emotional garbage out their mouths.

    9. Re:We must stay competitive! by the_archer666 · · Score: 1

      It is vital that NATO understands the implications of Quantum Radar technology on gender and feelings that emerge in the autoethnographic self of top level quantum radar LGBTQ*X scientists.

    10. Re:We must stay competitive! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just so ya know, I'm still watching, and this is the old phantomfive I'm used to and it made me happy. Stay away from politics. They seem bad for your mental well being.

  3. Add a Sci-Fi word ... by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 2
    • China: Oh, boy. W-what's wrong, Rick? Is it the quantum radar or something?
    • Rick: "Quantum radar"? Jesus, China. You can't just add a [burp]-- Sci-Fi word to a word and hope it means something.
      Huh, looks like something's wrong with the microverse battery.
      We're gonna have to go inside.
    --
    It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
    1. Re: Add a Sci-Fi word ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      *"Aw, geez, rick..."

      FTFY

  4. Interferometry not quantum by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    They get two coherent photons, bounce one of a plane, receive it again and compare it to the original photon to see what's changed.

    Obviously it's not 'quantum entanglement' anything, because if it was, the BOUNCED PHOTON AND COMPARISON PHOTON WOULD ALSO CHANGE by fuzzy action at a distance.

    Sort of the exact opposite, since you need the original photon to not change to match the bounced photon. So if entanglement actually worked, this system wouldn't work.

    Sounds like Interferometry 101.

    1. Re:Interferometry not quantum by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sounds like BS. Figure in magnetosphere and solar flares
      Radar may work fine above 2.4Ghz - as long as its not raining and cloud free.
      You may notice your satellite signal fades out or fails when it rains - Military has the same issue - above 2.4 ghz. Pesently USA holds the record for sheer ship bourne power.
      That is also a sign of awesome USA jamming capability, and a threat to any birds or insects flying into the microwave cone of death. Deckswabbers as well.
      LIDAR is interesting, but again line of sight is important. The concerned scientists brigade has summed up the truth: In a shooting war both sides will loose. And a trade war is probably no different, loose loose. Yeah, the Chinese loose face whem making things up like this.

    2. Re:Interferometry not quantum by vtcodger · · Score: 1

      I'm real shaky on quantum entanglement, but I think this would work by sending one entangled photon off never to be seen again and determining presence of an object and its distance from the time delay between firing the photon off and its mate changing state. Can that work in concept? Yes, I think probably it can.

      Can it work in practice using today's technology. I doubt it.

      Does it offer any advantage over conventional radar? Maybe, but my initial impression is that it is probably a complicated way to do what can be done without quantum entanglement. The one thing it would do is defeat jamming from transmitters operating on the radar's frequency. But I think such jamming is very hard to do (because radar signals can be 'chirped' and the jammer has to mimic the chirp pattern). Also such jamming is probably not healthy for the jammer which could presumably be passively tracked and attacked using its own transmissions.

      I haven't worked around radar/ABM stuff for decades. Any input from those with more recent experience?

      --
      You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
    3. Re:Interferometry not quantum by vtcodger · · Score: 1

      On second thought, a quantum radar working by observing the entangled photon retained at the radar tranmitter, could conceptually provide detection of stealth platforms that become stealthy by absorbing incoming photons and/or deflecting incoming signals off toward anywhere other than the radar's antenna.

      --
      You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
    4. Re:Interferometry not quantum by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In a shooting war both sides will loose.

      I dunno about you, but if a shooting war starts, at least a few people are going to have loose stools.

      Yeah, the Chinese loose face

      If his face is loose, why don't you tell him to tighten it up?

      Here is a hint you stupid cunt: lose != loose.

    5. Re: Interferometry not quantum by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      While more amusing than most of the homophone errors which are relatively common, you knew what he meant you fucking twat.

    6. Re:Interferometry not quantum by Baloroth · · Score: 2

      I'm real shaky on quantum entanglement, but I think this would work by sending one entangled photon off never to be seen again and determining presence of an object and its distance from the time delay between firing the photon off and its mate changing state.

      No, that's just not how quantum entanglement works. How it works is you have two objects, in this case photons. Each of these photons has two possible relevant states, call them A and B (the state usually used for entanglement is the quantum spin, which for a photon is +1 or -1). Now you entangle them together, and you have two photons each in a superposition of states A and B, but in such a way that you know if you measure photon 1 and find it in A, you then know that photon 2 will be in state B (at that moment, if the two photons are still entangled). But now that you've measured them, they cease to be entangled: you can change the state of photon 1 to B and photon 2 will remain completely unchanged. No information can be transferred between the two photons. You don't even know (from measuring photon 1) if the two photons are still entangled together: it could be the entanglement was broken long ago, and then photon 2 could be in any state after measuring photon 1.

      Another important point: it isn't the case that photon 1 was already in state A when you made the measurement: it really was neither in state A or B, but a state of superposition between the two. It collapsed into one or the other states when you made the measurement (there's no way prior to making the measurement which it will collapse into, either), and that collapse also causes the collapse of photon 2 into the other state. That collapse is the "spooky action at a distance", not any kind of changing one of the photons to manipulate the other (which you cannot do).

      In short, measuring the photon you keep at the radar station doesn't really tell you anything at all about the other photon you sent out, unless you actually make a measurement of that photon somehow. If you get the photon back and can measure it, then maybe the quantum entanglement can be useful... but not reflecting photons back to the radar is exactly how most stealth technology works.

      --
      "None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
    7. Re:Interferometry not quantum by ath1901 · · Score: 1

      You make a good point, but backwards. Quantum entanglement is typically very sensitive and easily destroyed. The interaction between the photon and the target would probably destroy any entanglement unless the target was a very good mirror. So, it is the opposite of fuzzy action at a distance. The partner photon back at base is undisturbed but any quantum correlations with the photon that was sent to the target is destroyed so you just get a classical radar.

      I have a hard time guessing how "quantum" would help a radar but I also know nothing about modern radar research. Without any details on how it works, I am sceptic about the quantum designation. Unless quantum effects are used inside the machine itself (which is a nice controlled space). That could be doable.

  5. "pLoLs" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    just take regular radar circa ww2 if allied or well soviet radars up to till today and gasp you'll see stealth planes... accuracy suffers bit... but theyre not stealth at all..

    1. Re:"pLoLs" by Joce640k · · Score: 2

      Sure, but they look very different. I heard that's it's hard to distinguish a stealth aircraft from a large bird (eg. a seagull) because of the much-reduced radar profile.

      The fact that the 'seagull' is flying at Mach 2 is a bit of a giveaway though.

      --
      No sig today...
    2. Re:"pLoLs" by CryptoBear · · Score: 1

      Pfft, TFW you're a seagull that *can't* fly at mach 2...

  6. Gee, then I guess that it's a good thing that by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    we did practice problems on this back in Physics 2 several years ago. Stern-Gerlach to the rescue again. Really, not a problem in theory or practice for quite a while.

  7. Relevancy by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Why would China brag about this new advanced technology, telling the world that a "quantum radar" is indeed possible? To mislead westerners? If they really achieved such amazing military weaponry success, wouldn't they better keep silent? Or maybe China is simply aware of their superiority in quantum fields, which is more worrying..

    --
    Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    1. Re: Relevancy by DatbeDank · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Exactly and this is precisely a Chinese cultural trait that will bite them in the ass.

      You never let your enemy know your position. The Americans have war toys out there that haven't seen the light of day. Some generals are super eager to use them on an enemy.

      Take the stealth fighters of the late 80s for example. They didn't come out out no of the wood work until an actual battle happened during Desert Storm.

      The Chinese are bluffing because of the trade war and trying to spread FUD. They're screwed and they know it.

      Irony: when your enemy is screwing up, dont correct him. Keep showing off your military tech while we keep ours locked up and super secret, itching to add another 100 years to their century of shame.

    2. Re:Relevancy by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Why would China brag about this new advanced technology, telling the world that a "quantum radar" is indeed possible?

      China has no interest in an actual military confrontation. They want deference, so perception of strength is more important than reality, and bragging about new military tech makes sense.

    3. Re: Relevancy by Camembert · · Score: 1

      Not sure why you refer to a Chinese century of shame.
      I currently live in Hong Kong and often am for work in mainland China.
      The dynamism, professionalism and quality orientation of chinese industry is obvious. I meet many talented, industrious professionals who absolutely deserve their success.

    4. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why is it worrying that China are going from rice fields to high tech? Oh right, because everyone on the planet is an enemy in your mind.

      Come back with your paranoid insinuations when China actually start launching wars against smaller countries that can't defend themselves, like Europe and America have been doing.

      China is the most peaceful superpower the world has ever seen, but in your tiny head they are an enemy...

    5. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Don't worry about it, he is projecting his own weaknesses on others. It is part of trumper syndrome (tm)

      The adherence to a leader who lies continually IS the cultural trait that will drag America into a century of shame

    6. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The key to killing a country is to bankrupt it by driving its inflation rate. By disclosing, the US military will respond by building countermeasures that will cost a lot of GDP.

    7. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You couldn't say anything intelligent, could you?

      It's people like you, paid writers or people who get their worldview from CNN with hysteria and hate,
      that push people away from the left/DNC.

    8. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Donald Trump will follow his steps with North Korea and usher peace into the world! Our Dear Leader trump will show the way to prosperity, and help us win the friendship and honor of the Chinese! There is nothing we can't do when we fall behind him and follow his footsteps one after another! Dear leader Trump is the dog's meow! We all love him, and those who insult him are hiding their will for the dear great leader.

    9. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Take the stealth fighters of the late 80s for example. They didn't come out out no of the wood work until an actual battle happened during Desert Storm."

      FighterS, plural? The F-117 was known about...

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    10. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      a leader who lies continually

      Every politician ever.

    11. Re:Relevancy by Megol · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Any intelligent state have no interest in "military confrontation" (read: war).

    12. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      this post earns you +5 on your citizen score

    13. Re:Relevancy by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Why wouldn't they tell everyone? "Don't try to attack us, we have advanced defence systems that can detect your decoy missiles and track the real ones."

      Russia did the same with its announcement that it has hypersonic long range missiles and drone sub nukes that can't be stopped by any existing system. Both China and the US demonstrated their ability to shoot down satellites.

      And anyway, it's not like they could keep it a secret for very long. The US is presumably working on the same tech, and has a good idea of what the quantum radar test sites would look like on spy satellite photos.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    14. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      You never let your enemy know your position.

      Just tell them your velocity.

    15. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      but what about the USA?

    16. Re:Relevancy by thegarbz · · Score: 2

      Why would China brag about this new advanced technology, telling the world that a "quantum radar" is indeed possible?

      We are not actively in any war with China other than a war of words. This isn't anything uniquely Chinese. Major US and other allied military advances are featured constantly on the likes of discovery channel. A radar that is able to detect steal planes? That featured in my electromagnetism course at university in incredible detail including the exact ranges at which it operates and the area that it covers in our country.

      Keeping very detailed military secrets gives you a great edge during an active war. Bragging about your military gives you an edge in preventing someone attacking you from the onset.

    17. Re: Relevancy by thegarbz · · Score: 2

      They didn't come out out no of the wood work until an actual battle happened during Desert Storm.

      There's a big difference in tactics between an actual war and in peace time. In peace time you brag about your superiority. In war time you use it as a surprise.

    18. Re: Relevancy by butzwonker · · Score: 2

      So what, your butthurt reply is relatively irrelevant, as is the Chinese propaganda. Both the US and China are major nuclear powers, it's hard to find a realistic scenario in which a major conventional conflict wouldn't escalate into mutual nuclear destruction. Maybe in Taiwan or some regional conflict about minor islands? Other than that, MAD makes these advanced conventional military toys pointless for homeland defence, which kind of reveals why they are developed - projecting force and showing off one's national dick.

    19. Re:Relevancy by sad_ · · Score: 1

      the answer is, as always... it depends.

      some things you keep secret, others you make public. this isn't a weapon as such, but rather a defense system, that could be one reason to make it public.
      just look at the cold war, where US and USSR were keeping as many things secret from eachother as they revealed.

      --
      On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
    20. Re:Relevancy by jythie · · Score: 2

      Think of it not in terms of what "China" wants or will benefit by, and more in terms of the individual careers of the people involved in the announcement.

    21. Re:Relevancy by Orgasmatron · · Score: 0, Troll

      Sun Tzu says to appear strong where you are weak.

      They are hoping that Obama will rise from the grave and surrender the west Pacific to them.

      --
      See that "Preview" button?
    22. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Isn't it obvious? They are soon selling you quantum radars for all your commercial needs. Who wouldn't want to detect those drug containers already in the air?

    23. Re: Relevancy by Gilgaron · · Score: 1

      You brag about the superiority of the stuff they know you have e.g. drones and smart munitions. Not the stuff you have no reason to believe they know you have, like those stealth helicopters or whatever they were.

    24. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sounds like you suffer from TDS yourself.

    25. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Found the mother fracking WU MAO.

      All the smart people are trying to get out of China, or are smuggling legit baby formula back into the mainland for RMB.

      China is a sh i t show. Can't flush the toilet paper but they have quantum radar.. lol sure.

    26. Re:Relevancy by sinij · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Reagan have done the same thing with Star Wars program. BS and infeasible plans to make USSR waste time on a dead-end research.

      This is just like that.

    27. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm sure Nepal and Tibet would beg to differ with you.

    28. Re: Relevancy by sinij · · Score: 1

      Millions dead, poverty, and started rebuilding by making cheap goods for the West. If not for Nixon's mistake, China still would be a third-word country.

    29. Re:Relevancy by idji · · Score: 1

      It is well know that China closely collaborates with Anton Seilinger (inventer of teleportation) at the Viennese Academy of Sciences. They have entangled photons between Beijing and Vienna.

    30. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      yeh the f117 was such a great plane until well it got shot down, and then they were mass retired.

      Some super tech those stealth planes...

    31. Re: Relevancy by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      You're missing one, the stuff you don't have but you're making them think you do.

      And also I would argue that no one is doing the first thing you say. It's amazing the amount of cutting edge military development which shows up on discovery channel at present. The vast majority of secret projects and technologies are iterations of something existing. There's a big element of showing your enemies that you are technically superior and thus they shouldn't even try and oppose you.

    32. Re:Relevancy by jbmartin6 · · Score: 1

      "intelligent state" is an oxymoron

      --
      This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
    33. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exactly and this is precisely a Chinese cultural trait that will bite them in the ass.

      You never let your enemy know your position. The Americans have war toys out there that haven't seen the light of day. Some generals are super eager to use them on an enemy.

      Take the stealth fighters of the late 80s for example. They didn't come out out no of the wood work until an actual battle happened during Desert Storm.

      The Chinese are bluffing because of the trade war and trying to spread FUD. They're screwed and they know it.

      Irony: when your enemy is screwing up, dont correct him. Keep showing off your military tech while we keep ours locked up and super secret, itching to add another 100 years to their century of shame.

      Yup, trying to get the RINO chicken littles and socialist retards to freak out and create an autistic screeching storm behind enemy lines (the US) in an attempt to get politicians to lean on Trump to stop the tariffs.

      It won't work.

    34. Re:Relevancy by jbmartin6 · · Score: 2

      hahah I like it. Makes me think of all the countries around China that would send a gift and a "yes you are our emperor" letter, and then go on about their business. But the dynasty would add them to the map and claim this was the extent of their empire.

      --
      This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
    35. Re:Relevancy by Zontar_Thing_From_Ve · · Score: 1

      Why wouldn't they tell everyone? "Don't try to attack us, we have advanced defence systems that can detect your decoy missiles and track the real ones."

      Russia did the same with its announcement that it has hypersonic long range missiles and drone sub nukes that can't be stopped by any existing system. Both China and the US demonstrated their ability to shoot down satellites.

      That's not exactly why Russia did that. First of all, they lie so much that you really can't take anything they say at face value. The hypersonic missile stuff could be true, but you and I aren't in a position to know for sure. They are, however, convinced that the West in general or the US specifically are looking for a way to nuke them and kill them all without any retaliation, so lying about hypersonic missiles could just be an attempt to keep the US from killing them as soon as it can do so. Now I don't believe for a minute that the US really wants to nuke Russia and kill them all, but I definitely do think that Putin and his cronies think they do want just that. And honestly, if Russia had hypersonic missiles for real, I'm not convinced that they wouldn't use them to attack the US first to "stop" the US from this mythical attack they fear.

      As Spock said, military secrets are the most fleeting of all. I'm sure that today's stealth planes will eventually be able to be seen by some kind of radar. The Chinese might really have it. If not now, they probably will soon enough. And then they may be enhances to break that radar and then counter-enhancements to fix the break and so on.

    36. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      By disclosing, the US military will respond by building countermeasures that will cost a lot of GDP.

      That will be paid for by issuing US Treasury notes that will be bought by...China.

    37. Re: Relevancy by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 1

      Until someone builds a sufficiently strong ICBM shield.

      --
      Your ad here. Ask me how!
    38. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's an actual thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_of_humiliation

    39. Re:Relevancy by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Any intelligent state have no interest in "military confrontation" (read: war).

      States don't have intelligence. They are made up of people, who not only have the intelligence, but also have their own agendas. And for some of those people, it is a successful strategy to foment war, because they have ways to profit from it. That's not unintelligent behavior, just sociopathic.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    40. Re:Relevancy by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

      Now I don't believe for a minute that the US really wants to nuke Russia and kill them all, but I definitely do think that Putin and his cronies think they do want just that.

      Putin and his cronies are not as dumb as you think they are. If they were, they wouldn't be in power. The goal is profit at others' expense, and nuking Russia isn't profitable. Conventional warfare might be, but both the USA and Russia understand that making war on the others' soil would likely escalate to a nuclear conflict, so these two nations have instead been fighting proxy wars in other countries. This demonstrates a clear willingness to avoid extensive property damage. You can't use those pretty palaces as vacation homes if you reduce them to radioactive cinders, and the USA's primary value is in its land.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    41. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      China is the most peaceful superpower the world has ever seen, but in your tiny head they are an enemy...

      Oh really? Except when it involves other weaker countryâ(TM)s territorial waters and islands in the South China Sea? They havenâ(TM)t started building airstrips on Japanâ(TM)s islands... yet.

    42. Re: Relevancy by William+Baric · · Score: 1

      It depends if your goal is to discourage a bellicose enemy to start a war, or if you are the bellicose party and hope to win a war.

      There are three ways to control the world : military power, economic power, and cultural power. The US is still, by far, the first military power, but its cultural power has crumbled since the 90s, and it will soon lose its place as the first economic power to the Chinese. Because of that, it would be logical for the US to rely more and more on its military power to maintain its domination over the world. This bullshit about a "quantum radar" is simply because the Chinese are trying to restrain the use of military power from the US in order for them to achieve domination over the world through economic power.

    43. Re:Relevancy by hey! · · Score: 1

      Sometimes a weapon works best if it achieves its effect without being used. Naval theorists call this "fleet in being" -- achieving sea control without leaving port simply by being there. But that's only effective if the enemy is aware your unbeatable super-dreadnought exists and believes it is where you want them to believe.

      Likewise, imagine the US-Soviet conflict if the Soviet Union had been unaware of the existence of the US nuclear stockpile. Sure, it would be better if the Soviets had certain misconceptions about that arsenal (e.g. how precisely it could be delivered), but it was critically important that they accurately understood the size and destructive power of the thing.

      Strategy is about imposing behavioral constraints on your opponent, and a completely-in-the-dark opponent can't be controlled at all. Of course you can't believe what a rival says because misinformation is so strategically useful; however the truth often serves as well or better than a lie.

      While you do want to control what a rival believes if you can, it's naive and simplistic to believe that a more ignorant opponent is always the better option. Likewise it's a mistake to believe that weakening your opponent is always a good idea.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
    44. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      By far the largest export of the US is culture. I am not sure what you mean that our cultural power has crumbled since the 90s. Maybe waned but certainly not crumbled.

    45. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Found the mother fucker WindBourne.

    46. Re:Relevancy by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      Re "Why would China brag about this new advanced technology, telling the world that a "quantum radar" is indeed possible?'"

      So that every CIA and MI6 spy in China starts asking questions, looking terms up on their gov/mil computer system.
      US and UK "tourists", "teachers", "social media" video makers and "embassy" staff wondering around China change their routine to contact spies deep in China for new information on "quantum".
      The spies start to show in the bait they take and in what they ask about.

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    47. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, keeping silent is never good. I'm from a country that had nukes in secret for over 30 years. Then government changed significantly, new guys decided to make some money in their pockets, contacted the US and sold the nukes... now the country doesn't have nukes. Announcing it publicly prevents internal traitors from destroying it.

    48. Re:Relevancy by William+Baric · · Score: 1

      I remember all the nice presentation in the 80s about Reagan's SDI. Turned out the vast majority of it was utter bullshit. The reality is the US lie at least as much as Russia about its weapon technology.

      In the case hypersonic missiles, I believe Russia will very soon have them. Maybe not in 2020 like Putin said, but still very soon. Also, since I'm not American (I live in Canada), I tend to view the US as the bellicose country in the world, not Russia. I do believe the US might be tempted to attack Russia as the Sino-Russian alliance is becoming a major threat for the US world domination.

      Considering the first thing a government must do before a war is to rally its population, I'd say that the best clue for a possible American attack is the constant anti-Russian rhetoric in the US since Obama. There is no such anti-American rhetoric in Russia.

    49. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They like to brag / boast about their capabilities yet, none of it has ever been tested in a combat environment. Ever.
      Some of their claims are just downright ludicrous. ( The Laser Rifle from a few days ago is a good example )

      China is the poster child for the saying " Paper Tiger ".

      If their military hardware is of the same quality standards as most of their exports are, the world has little to worry about.

    50. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The world watches our movies, adopts our words, eats our McDonaldâ(TM)s. An American can go almost anywhere and feel comfortable if not downright at home. The global culture war was over a long time ago. We are not all citizens of the world unless you consider it an American world. Victory with no shots fired. You are an American without even realizing it.

      OTOH few Americans know much about the rest of world. We do not need to. The master does not need to know about the slaves.

    51. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It was known, but nobody knew what it looked like, how it operated, or anything much more about it other than "it exists." I probably built twenty of the F-19 model kit. When the real stealth finally was revealed, it was so different from what the assumptions were about it as to make the model kit laughable.

      Reference material

    52. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The only military threat to China could be US or Russia. War on that scale is very unlikely, and with even army sizes - nobody would be winner. They actually know that neither Russia nor US would attack them because of the same reasons.

      So, by showing off their new tech, they just show their dominance to smaller neighbour countries (perhaps some having bought stealth fighters), and if they have it ready - it will still take years for other countries to catch up or even decades to produce new tech for more stealth. Even more, the only countries that could actually catch up would be US or Russia (which aren't considered enemy anyway)

    53. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How old are you? Were you an adult in the 80s? The leftist pro-USSR America hating media told us SDI could never work but what is so hard about tracking a large projectile over huge distances with known speed and trajectory and hitting it with something?

      You must be a millennial.

    54. Re:Relevancy by EnsilZah · · Score: 2

      Dr. Strangelove: Of course, the whole point of a Doomsday Machine is lost, if you *keep* it a *secret*! Why didn't you tell the world, EH?

      Ambassador de Sadesky: It was to be announced at the Party Congress on Monday. As you know, the Premier loves surprises.

    55. Re:Relevancy by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      If China or Russia identifies all US ICBM launch sites, and submarines, aircraft carriers... they then perform an simultaneous attack on all of that - ok a few might escape, and China might lose a few million people, but they would win. No?

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    56. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Did you forgot Tibet?

    57. Re: Relevancy by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      In peace time you brag about your superiority. In war time you use it as a surprise.

      Hmm, in this case we're talking about amazingly innovative and ultra scientifically challenging weaponry. A "we did it" show off gives the other parties a huge clue: it's possible then, feasible using today's technos, let's do it!

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    58. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Give them your exact velocity, and you are absolutely safe.

    59. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Any intelligent state will know that using war / military confrontation, they can take a lot of money and/or land from another state. Tell me Napoleon wasn't intelligent. Tell me the USA didn't benefit from the Panama Canal. Tell me the English built an empire out of stupidity. Crimea, Iraq, same story, different place.

      I think a key piece of information your statement is missing, is that no state has an interest in military conflict _with another nuclear power_. However lots of cold war plays will certainly be made. Which is what this probably is, in the unlikely scenario this isn't pseudoscience / media misinformation.

    60. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      True, but stupid ones have such interest if the lobbyists that pull their strings tell them to.

    61. Re:Relevancy by times05 · · Score: 1

      I agree with most of what you say, US does appear bellicose, also unstable and without sense of direction (maybe direction changes constantly ex: support Taliban against Russia then later be against it. Saddam Hussein was taught in US military academies, we all know how he ended. Make a deal with Iran, break a deal with Iran. Assad is good, then a few years later suddenly Syrian government is bad. This constant cycle of past friends becoming enemies later. No consistency whatsoever.)

      However having followed Russian news for the last 4 years or so, there is now quite a bit of Anti American rhetoric in Russian media. Which was not the case before, Russians actually had very positive attitudes towards the west in general before that.

      By the way, one major difference is that this rhetoric is not official on politician level on Russian side, unlike their counterparts in US(or the West in general). Russian politicians tend to behave extremely professional unlike their American counterparts. American politicians and talking heads often become hysterical foaming at the mouth publicly with what should in any civilized society be considered hate speech. Somehow no one notices, because apparently hate speech directed against Russia is accepted.. even encouraged. On the other hand say anything good about Russia and suddenly you're a Russian troll or paid by Kremlin. If history is any

    62. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You are right, but it is unintelligent if you look at it from the (very theoretical) point of view of a state looking for what's best for its citizens.

    63. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More projection from a State TV viewer

    64. Re:Relevancy by HeckRuler · · Score: 1

      Any intelligent state will know that using war / military confrontation, they can take a lot of money and/or land from another state.

      Not really true anymore. Unless you can depend upon the conquered people being cool with their new overlords, it's way more expensive to have troops play policeman and suppress an area. Things might change in the future, but wars are hideously expensive these days and you don't get much out of them. At best you "show the world you're a tough guy" and that, in theory, helps with political negotiations.

      Certain businessmen get a hell of a lot of money though, no matter how the war goes, so you'll always have war-hawks. Ignore those greedy murderous war-profiteers.

    65. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No.

    66. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why do I know about multiple generations of american stealth jets?

    67. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But it's quantum, It can give a positive and a false positive at the same time so it can never be wrong.

    68. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Putin and his cronies are not as dumb as you think they are. If they were, they wouldn't be in power.

      Same for Trump drinkypoo?

    69. Re:Relevancy by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      Napoleon didn't have to worry about thermonuclear weapons. The economics of war has drastically changed since Waterloo.

    70. Re: Relevancy by Areyoukiddingme · · Score: 1

      The leftist pro-USSR America hating media told us SDI could never work but what is so hard about tracking a large projectile over huge distances with known speed and trajectory and hitting it with something?

      Lots of things, the biggest being sheer speed. ICBM payloads are moving very fast when they reenter. Hitting fast things is hard. The second biggest is, you DON'T know the speed and trajectory. You have an approximation, in a cloud of countermeasures. Do you even know that you're targeting a real warhead? Maybe not. Lastly, say you are targeting a real warhead. Can you kill it? Because of the speed problem, SDI's idea was to use gigantic lasers. Lasers so big that no normal energy source could power them up in the time required to react (because warheads are fast). Physics got in the way of every part of SDI.

      These days there are lasers which are notably more efficient than those available in the 80s, but they're still not good enough, and the energy systems aren't powerful enough, to actually produce successful laser-based kills of a warhead in transit, even with considerable advanced warning.

      Quite aside from the Outer Space Treaty which makes all of SDI illegal anyway.

    71. Re: Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      > I meet many talented, industrious professionals who absolutely deserve their success.

      The Chinese people are great. Their government, on the other hand, has rivers of blood on its hands. It should not be trusted, at all, under any circumstances.

    72. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Any intelligent state have no interest in "military confrontation" (read: war).

      Practically, no.

      To the victor goes the spoil

      If short-term turmoil and losses result in long-term gain, war can be indeed a worthwhile investment. While war is frowned upon, history has shown repeatedly that victors may amass, for lack of a better term, treasure. Of course, the application of such treasure is paramount to the victor's sustained relative-superiority.

      Ideology and practicality are often divorced. In other words, war may sound like shit, and that's because it often is, but it is still pursued because of its practical nature. Defeat war's practicality, and you will defeat war.

    73. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Explain WWI?

    74. Re:Relevancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A state is only as intelligent as its citizens, so for some countries it may be an oxymoron. Not for all, though.

  8. "increasing the coherence time entangled photons"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This phrase MEANS NOTHING:

        "likely by increasing the coherence time entangled photons"

    EDITORS, EDIT !!!

  9. Re:"increasing the coherence time entangled photon by tehcyder · · Score: 2

    EDITORS, EDIT !!!

    YMBNH.

    --
    To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
  10. How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Their Lazer Rifle

    turned out to be a lie.

    How can we believe in the lies provided by China

    1. Re:How can we believe them? by Narcocide · · Score: 1

      Perhaps we are playing "Two Lies, One Truth?"

    2. Re:How can we believe them? by Joce640k · · Score: 1

      How can we believe in the lies provided by China

      Why wouldn't you believe them? The Chinese lies are in direct proportion to the institutional dumbing-down of America.

      --
      No sig today...
    3. Re: How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Kind of like the US' "Star Wars" program that could shoot down balistic missiles with lasers? Don't believe anyone. But act as if they might be telling the truth.

    4. Re:How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Because China has a history of academic fraud.
      You should already take science news in the West with a pinch of salt, but when it comes to Chinese tech news, make it a spoon of salt. Of course that does not mean they can't have some bona fide science there.

    5. Re: How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      the hit rate on the testbed was Bad. but the system worked, especially given short cycle times. if they kept it up to date and were using today's tracking and control systems to target it, it'd be probably be horrifyingly fast and accurate.

      But nobody would outright admit to that. Because having a high success missile defense defeats MAD, and can trigger preemptive attacks based on the failure of MAD.

    6. Re:How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A spoon? LOL try a shovel.. nay a truckload.

      I mean this is the same country that alters the AQI measurements and banned Winnie the Pooh.

      So to think that they have anything remotely capable of what they claim, without, you know PROOF (not just a research paper) if laughable.

    7. Re:How can we believe them? by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Perhaps we are playing "Two Lies, One Truth?"

      Perhaps... but, I'm not sure what they gain announcing these technologies- unless it's to set our researchers in a tizzy.

      If you really have technology to detect stealth planes on radar- why let the world know that- you've just lost your ace in the hole.

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
    8. Re:How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      A spoon? LOL try a shovel.. nay a truckload.

      I mean this is the same country that alters the AQI measurements and banned Winnie the Pooh.

      So to think that they have anything remotely capable of what they claim, without, you know PROOF (not just a research paper) if laughable.

      You'd ban someone too if you knew he had a habit of running off into the woods without any pants, with a baby pig, while carrying a jar of honey.

    9. Re: How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To make the American public afraid and manipulate our elections of course. China would love to end the trade war the easy way.

    10. Re:How can we believe them? by rtb61 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Obviously it is more about claiming developments in quantum technology, than stealth aircraft. To detect stealth aircraft all you need is high accuracy weather radar. You do not look for the aircraft, you look for it's impact on the atmosphere, pressure wave, changes in water density in the atmosphere and the exhaust itself. For searching this is far superior, because it presents a much, much larger target, a huge target. You don't see the plane but you see a very suspicious polluted cloud moving at hundreds of kilometre an hour, with out any regard to wind patterns and presenting a shock wave. How big a target, I'll bet it would be the best way to do over the horizon radar, not targeting the plane at all, just it's impact on the atmosphere, likely making over the horizon far easier and extend it's range far, far beyond line of site.

      So in reality stealthy planes are only stealthy if they don't move or start their engines and of course any plane is stealthy if it hides in a hanger. So why is everyone still paying for brand new stealthy, cough, cough, aircraft, the lust for profit and corruption. It's not like they don't know this and have not been aware of it for years, but when there is a buck in it for the military industrial complex, expect lies and the truth to be buried.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    11. Re:How can we believe them? by Joce640k · · Score: 2

      So to think that they have anything remotely capable of what they claim, without, you know PROOF (not just a research paper) if laughable.

      That doesn't matter. All that matters is:
      a) Trump voters will believe it (and demand action!)
      b) Some department in the US Military will "believe" it (and ask for more funding...)

      --
      No sig today...
    12. Re:How can we believe them? by mr.mctibbs · · Score: 2

      It makes perfect sense if their strategic aim is to deter aggression from an over-confident superpower by raising the known materiel and thus political cost.

    13. Re: How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Fraud/No Fraud/exaggeration.... I'm still upgrading my tinfoil hat.

    14. Re:How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      These are not lies; this is propaganda. China is damn good at psyops and propaganda.

      Realistically, they have 128 or so qubits lying around with a hush-hush supercomputer. Will this allow for detection to let them figure out which warhead in a MIRV is real versus fake? Probably not. However, because there is nothing keeping them from getting their psyops crap directly to the eyes and ears of the US and European populace, they can make up stuff including city-wide prismatic spheres which can keep out everything but a rod of cancellation or multiple wish spells.

      China is on the ropes with the trade war. They have a lot to lose. So, they are fighting back via cyber avenues, which work extremely well, because the US press loves passing on anti-US rhetoric to further demoralize the American people, even if it is false.

    15. Re:How can we believe them? by liquid_schwartz · · Score: 1

      Perhaps... but, I'm not sure what they gain announcing these technologies- unless it's to set our researchers in a tizzy.

      If you really have technology to detect stealth planes on radar- why let the world know that- you've just lost your ace in the hole.

      This being China they will convince us they have it, we develop it, then they copy it. That will get them what they want in the longer run and for much cheaper.

    16. Re: How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      TDS: this is why you lose so many elections. Keep it up. The winning is delicious.

    17. Re:How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Detection does not equal an ability to target the aircraft. All stealth aircraft need to accomplish is to break some step in the "kill chain" between detection and a weapon arriving on target. Simply being detected without providing quality targeting information is not enough to obviate stealth aircraft. Also, your suggestion requires very precise information; likely weather radar cannot provide that resolution and detail. Even if it could, that's a massive amount of computing power required to monitor the entire border region of a target area 24/7/365 and twice on Sundays.

      And weather radars are large, stationary, and easy to destroy before sending in the aircraft. There are other radar arrays that can detect, but not target, stealth aircraft; they have the same faults. Stealth aircraft are designed to get closer to military radars than non-stealth equivalents. They are not invisible and it's always possible new detection technology will force changes in stealth technology. The point is not invisibility, the point is being able to penetrate enemy air defenses more reliably than previously possible.

    18. Re:How can we believe them? by HeckRuler · · Score: 2

      The point?

      . . . I'm not really even sure what the point is anymore. Theoretically, they're weapons of war. A saber to rattle to keep our enemies at bay. If shit hits the fan these things will be used to make strikes against Russia and China and their assets. But.... not really because if shits hitting the fan, nukes are flying, and no one gives a shit about planes. But they're fun to rattle and wave around. Whole generations of stealth planes are never utilized against the targets they're made to thwart.

      So if not developed nations, we can use them to kick the shit out of developing nations. So far EVERY god damned time we've done that it's been a clusterfuck that I wish we hadn't. The europeans had success bombing the Balklans back into peace. Are there ANY others?

      Cruise missles are expensive, but cheaper unless you've got a bunch of stuff you want blown up.

      Ship destroyers are hyper-sonic missles.

      Close air support and local surveillance are about 20 seconds from being taken over by drones that are cheap enough you might as well call them decoys. I expect to hear more stories about people launching million dollar missiles at targets that cost ~$1000. oh hey, would you look at that. Hot off the press.

      Surveillance? Spy planes evolved to be so fast and fly so high that they're in orbit now and we call them satellites.

      I think we were so caught up in the arms race during the cold war that "making a better fighter jet" is just an expected thing we do now. There are simply too many people afraid of the concept of "not having the best plane". We no longer have ships with the biggest cannon, we gave up on battleships. So what's the point of these planes? At this point too many people have jobs tied to this whole thing to simply shut it down. I like Ike, and he said it best: "we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military–industrial complex". On the other hand... hey, a lot of scientific and technical advancement comes from that limitless funding that is national defense budget. Quantum radar, for instance.

    19. Re:How can we believe them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Simply being detected without providing quality targeting information is not enough to obviate stealth aircraft.

      Step 1: Send missile to beginning of atmospheric disturbance area.
      Step 2: Use visual spectrum to identify and engage.

      Visual processing is so trivial these days that hobbyists can do it on a raspberry pi with a webcam. Good luck making your plane invisible to a missile made with the best military cameras and visual processors money can buy. Not to mention we already have had for many years rocket artillery that can audibly identify and engage an entire armored line automatically. Not hard to adapt that technology.

      Only a fool wouldn't believe this technology doesn't already exist. We have been fighting goat herders so there is no incentive to put it into production.

    20. Re:How can we believe them? by Shotgun · · Score: 1

      And yet, it was Trump DETRACTORS who got so but-hurt when he started talking about pulling our troops our of South Korea and cancelling war games, citing the unnecessary expense.

      --
      Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
      Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
    21. Re:How can we believe them? by ath1901 · · Score: 1

      If you know you will be attacked soon, keep it secret.
      If you do not expect to be attacked, boast about it loudly to let everyone know how much it would cost to attack.

    22. Re: How can we believe them? by zaphirplane · · Score: 1

      Ask reagan about Star Wars

  11. Russia by Iamthecheese · · Score: 1

    Ordinarily I would dismiss this as a deliberate distraction from stuff China can actually do. But I recall numerous examples from the Cold War between the US and Russia where the US poo-poo'd Russian abilities, but after the cold war ended it turned out Russian abilities really were superior. I'm not inclined to dismiss this out-of-hand no matter how science fictiony it sounds.

    --
    If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
    1. Re:Russia by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 1

      While I find what you're saying plausible, do you have any sources you can point to.

      --
      Your ad here. Ask me how!
    2. Re:Russia by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      But I recall numerous examples from the Cold War between the US and Russia where the US poo-poo'd Russian abilities, but after the cold war ended it turned out Russian abilities really were superior

      I don't. I recall reading about many cases in which Germany had superior technology in WWII, and I recall that during the cold war Russia had to make cardboard tanks to make it look like they had a military which could resist an incursion by the USA for more than a few hours. Perhaps you're conflating the two?

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    3. Re:Russia by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You are too dumb to understand Maskirovka.

  12. I must be stupid by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    because I don't understand the practical difference between "quantum" radar and regular radar. The linked Popular Science explains the difference as regular radar reflects photons and the quantum radar bounces photons (from the target). Hmmm. I actually DO understand that a QR can't (theoretically) be spoofed by active countermeasures (since it should filter out non-entangled photons), but other than that, what's the difference? (I also understand that some of the quantum entanglement stuff may eventually lead to more sensitive detectors - but there are more practical ways to increase S/N in fixed ground based systems, I'd guess....

  13. Smells like BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I am a researcher in the quantum communication area. Admittedly I can only judge by the poorly written Pop Science article, but the whole thing triggers my BS detector.

    "the coherence time entangled photons", "Quantum can identify..." - bad grammar is already a red flag.

    The whole "spoofing can be detected" sounds like someone made some confusion with QKD (quantum key distribution), a completely unrelated application of quantum technology.

    Finally, "a quantum supercomputer would require about 50 entangled photons"... Seriously, this is nonsense. I can't even.

    1. Re:Smells like BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My theory is it is clickbait to get people to react to the combination of "Quantum" and "being able to detect both the position and its velocity"
          -- signed: The Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

    2. Re:Smells like BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's probably just a shit translation from whatever source it came from. Go to the source, get a proper translation instead of 'chinglish' and then make an informed 'guess'

    3. Re:Smells like BS by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      Think of a spy for China in the US, UK looking over the mil contractors who are getting ready for action against China.
      The NSA and GCHQ will be tracking all traditional communications methods a spy could use to get large amounts of information back to China.
      Huge real time datasets surrounding readiness and disposition of US, UK locations and changed contractor movements.

      The main interest to China is the location of all translators the UK can trust in any generation that can be contacted for UK/GCHQ mil work.
      Its a set list and both the UK and China know machine translation is not what is needed.

      The "radar" is the spy network China has in place in the UK, USA deep in the contractor/translator sector.
      The "quantum" part is the new secure message system that gets past the NSA, GCHQ back to China giving them the needed early warning.
      That the GCHQ has called up all its translators needed to work on all communications to use on information from China.

      China studied the US and UK methods during the Koran war. How the UK had the mil translators ready for any new languages.
      China and Korea was not a new problem for the UK as they had a global collection/translation network.
      How the USA had to learn Korean and how to understand more than Russian, German and French.

      Quantum will protect China as a way to get spy mil information back to China in time.

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    4. Re:Smells like BS by hdyoung · · Score: 1

      To the quantum researcher - how would the quantum entanglement even be an advantage?

      Ok, so I can see how entanglement could avoid spoofing. Any other source of photons to the detector would be un-entangled and that could be detected. So, you can't fool the system. I'll give it that.

      How could this allow analysis of target composition? It doesn't seem that any photon-material interaction would be any different, comparing standard or quantum radar.

      How could this detect stealth any better than a standard radar? The reflection/absorption of a stealth craft does its job and prevents photons from getting back to the radar detector, conventional or quantum notwithstanding.

    5. Re:Smells like BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bad grammar could just be due to the fact that English isn't the first language of the scientists. So that's not necessarily a reliable indicator. And the supercomputer quote sounds like it's just bad science reporting.

      But I still think it's bullshit for simple practicality reasons: detecting individual photons in the radio spectrum is monumentally difficult. Doing it at great distance would be a monumental challenge. And they'd need to entangle far, far more than 18 to have a chance of detecting a single return photon.

      Finally, it's questionable that entanglement has anything at all to offer here because the interactions with the detected objects will likely destroy any entanglement.

    6. Re:Smells like BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Maybe they improved detector sensitivity by indirect detection. Or something similarly quantized thingy, which can't be put in a vehicle at this point due to size and noise. That's my non-expert opinion, and I'm sticking to it!

  14. The whole thing is BS by Viol8 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Quantum entanglement has only been demonstrated in labs or down shielded cables with high frequency EM , ie light. Not with radio waves and not in the outdoor enviroment. It sounds like someone in the chinese Ministry of Propaganda has slung together a load of terminology picked at random from an undergrad physics book to try and impress. Plus as others have said, if it really worked it would be about as top secret as you can get.

    1. Re:The whole thing is BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

      I tend to agree with the BS perception, but entanglement has been used in outdoor environment, and it is in fact not all that hard. The problem here is an increasing number of sensational announcements out of the quantum area that seemed to become more and more the norm even from supposedly respectable institutions - and the Chinese have by no means a monopoly for quantum BS. But they seem particularly susceptible to the bussines model of the sensationalist journals of the Nature franchise and the like that nurtures PR shit like this

    2. Re:The whole thing is BS by CaffeinatedBacon · · Score: 1

      Doesn't from space down to Earth count as an outdoor environment?

    3. Re:The whole thing is BS by tommeke100 · · Score: 1

      but but but, their satellite has 18 entangled photons...That's almost halfway from building a quantum supercomputer that requires 50.
      If they build 3 such satellites they could entangle the whole world.

    4. Re:The whole thing is BS by sanjosanjo · · Score: 1

      This article says that China has sent entangled particles from ground to a satellite: http://www.sciencemag.org/news...

    5. Re:The whole thing is BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Quantum entanglement has only been demonstrated in labs or down shielded cables with high frequency EM , ie light. Not with radio waves and not in the outdoor enviroment.

      Oh, yeah? Already 11 years ago...

      Quantum Spookiness Spans 144 km across the Canary Islands
      The reach of the spooky quantum link called entanglement keeps getting longer. A team has transmitted entangled photons some 144 kilometers (89 miles) between La Palma and Tenerife, two of Spain's Canary Islands off the coast of Morocco. Physicist Anton Zeilinger of the University of Vienna, the group's leader, presented the results to his colleagues this week at the American Physical Society conference. The distance achieved is 10 times farther than entangled photons have ever flown through the air.

    6. Re:The whole thing is BS by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      That's different. The idea is you have a bunch of entangled particles in the satellite and on the ground, then trigger a mass measurement of many to generate a one time crypto pad. Then send the encrypted data which is uncrackable unless someone steals the pad, which doesn't even exist until they need to send the satellite data.

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    7. Re:The whole thing is BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, the only place outside the asylem is where Wonko the Sane lives, everywhere else is "inside".

    8. Re:The whole thing is BS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To be fair, if they hooked that up to a downward facing RADAR and the encrypted message was "I saw a plane!!1!", that would technically be detecting a plane with RADAR and transmitting it over a Quantum channel. The claim that they'd be able to identify imposter signals would be true because of the quantum one-time pad, and it's at least plausible that B2's and F117's stealth degrades enough when viewed directly from above that they might be detectable by such a system (they were designed to defeat ground based stations and they tech they use is sensitive to the angle on incident with the RADAR as they scatter rather than absorb most of the signal).

  15. stealth planes are obsolete anyway by captbollocks · · Score: 2

    The Russians have been able to spot them for years using "radar" that looks at disturbances in background radiation.

    Anyway, why send a $1bn plane in to drop bombs when a cluster of supersonic or hypersonic missiles will do exactly the same thing for a few $m a piece.

    1. Re:stealth planes are obsolete anyway by hey! · · Score: 1

      It's probably not true that stealth is obsolete -- yet. Stealth was never quite as good as people were sold on it being, as a kind of invisibility cloak. Even if a radar can detect a stealth aircraft, that doesn't mean you can shoot it down with radar-guided missiles. Even if it is possible to shoot down a stealth aircraft with radar-guided missiles, it doesn't mean that you'll be able to do it as often.

      So I think the issue of stealth comes to this question: does cost of stealth -- in dollars, complexity, and performance limitations -- outweigh the benefits?

      That's dependent on the state of stealth counter-measures, which everyone including us is working on. Our work on counter-measures may be why Russia just canceled the Su-57; it wasn't far enough ahead of the curve to cost justify. That might not be the case for our stealth technology yet, but even if it were we'd never cancel the F35. American defense contractors are too politically powerful.

      And that gets to the problem of using hypersonic missiles that are supposed to cost a few million apiece. If that's the plan, by the time they're ready they'll cost tens if not hundreds of millions. If a defense contractor is successful at making a system indispensable to US military plans, they face no real consequences to cost overruns. If we think we have to have it, we'll pay for it no matter how much it costs.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  16. arguably leads the world in quantum technologies by YrWrstNtmr · · Score: 1

    So, 30 years from an actual deployable hardware solution.
    Got it.

  17. I think you missed the critical concept... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Start with a pair of *entangled* photons, send one out to potentially bounce off an object, and wait for possible return -- and measure the random polarization or whatever of the first photon, and measure the polarization of the reflected photon. If you observe a high fraction of correlations in these measurements, you know your transmitted photons actually hit an object, and are not *generated* by countermeasures. There is no practical way for an opponent to spoof a reflection, because only you have the entangled second photon to verify that the first photon originated from you! It's genius!

    1. Re:I think you missed the critical concept... by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      That is clever but most stealth is minimizing reflectivity, amd trying to look like a bird flock on top of it.

      Can one generate photons of a particilar polarization or other quantum measurement? Read a stastical mixture of what's hitting you, then, in your broadcast ECM make sure your particles have that mixture, whatever else you're doing with them.

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  18. Deterrence by sjbe · · Score: 2

    Why would China brag about this new advanced technology, telling the world that a "quantum radar" is indeed possible?

    Let's assume this technology actually exists and works more or less as indicated. If you have a technology to plan to use as a deterrent, there is no point in keeping it a secret from the people you are trying to deter. A credible threat forces the other party to adjust their behavior. Keeping a weapon secret that you plant to user for deterrence is likely to be counterproductive.

    Now let's say that they don't have this technology and are bluffing. If they can get the other party to react to a non-existent threat then that has value as well. Of course the downside is if your bluff gets called. Say what you want about the US military but they are pretty good at what they do and getting them to bite on this if it isn't true is going to be challenging.

  19. It's mounted on a blimp... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Baaahaahahaaaaha!!!

  20. Re:"increasing the coherence time entangled photon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm not, but it feels like Groundhog Day :-(

    Captcha: "annoyed"

  21. Don't hide everything by sjbe · · Score: 2

    You never let your enemy know your position.

    No, you let them know your position when it is useful to let them know your position. You keep it a secret when that is more useful. There are times for each approach. If you are trying to deter an aggressor from attacking in the first place you don't keep it a secret that attacking you would be a bad idea. A deterrence kept a secret isn't a deterrence at all.

    You are quite right that many times it is useful to not show your full capabilities. But sometimes it is more valuable to let some information be known.

    The Chinese are bluffing because of the trade war and trying to spread FUD. They're screwed and they know it.

    Screwed? Not likely. Only delusional idiots like our president actually believe that a pointless trade war will benefit the US and hurt China. It's going to hurt both sides without any likely upside to anyone. And this has literally nothing to do with that unless you think the trade war is going to turn into a shooting war. Pray that doesn't come to pass.

    1. Re:Don't hide everything by hey! · · Score: 1

      On the trade war, it's important to be clear about who the participants in the war are and what their role is. It's not the US vs. China; it's the US government against the Chinese government, with the Chinese government playing the game with the assets of the Chinese nation.

      It's not that the Communist Party is immune to popular economic pain, but the time scales of political effect are assymetrical. The party can afford to play a longer (although not indefinitely prolonged) game than US politicians can.

      This is a bit like invading Russia. It's a truism that invading Russia is a bad idea; like most truisms it's only true some of the time. Sure there are historical examples of disastrous invasions, but there are just as many examples of successful invasions. Success depends on how strong the internal Russian government was at the the time you choose to attack.

      A trade war with the PRC isn't an intrinsically bad idea; it's a matter of timing. It's just like invading Russia: sometimes you can pull it off, other times you can't.

      --
      Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
    2. Re:Don't hide everything by painandgreed · · Score: 1

      On the trade war, it's important to be clear about who the participants in the war are and what their role is. It's not the US vs. China; it's the US government against the Chinese government...

      Currently, it's looking like the US government against the rest of the world's economy. Tariffs against China, Canada, EU, and Mexico. We didn't join TPP. Certainly not trading with Russia. Looks like the US is not just playing chicken with China, but the rest of the world. We'll just have to deal, whereas everybody else can make up any trade with each other.

  22. You need to work on your technical lingo. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Maybe a few years more education would help you. What are you smoking? It smells to high heaven. (That's where the stealth fighters fly)

  23. "Kuang Grade Mark Eleven penetration program" by Type44Q · · Score: 1

    That's the advantage of Chinese hypertext.

    Maelcum produced a white lump of foam slightly smaller than Case's head, fished a pearl-handled switchblade on a green nylon lanyard out of the hip pocket of his tattered shorts and carefully slit the plastic. He extracted a rectangular object and passed it to Case. `Thas part some gun, mon?'

    `No,' Case said, turning it over, `but it's a weapon. It's virus.'

    `Not on thisboy tug, mon,' Maelcum said firmly, reaching for the steel cassette.

    `A program. Virus program. Can't get into you, can't even get into your software. I've got to interface it through the deck, before it can work on anything...'

    `What is this thing?' he asked the Hosaka. `Parcel for me.'

    `Data transfer from Bockris Systems GmbH, Frankfurt, advises, under coded transmission, that content of shipment is Kuang Grade Mark Eleven penetration program. Bockris further advises that interface with Ono-Sendai Cyberspace 7 is entirely compatible and yields optimal penetration capabilities, particularly with regard to existing military systems...'

    He slotted the Chinese virus, paused, then drove it home.

    `Okay,' he said, `we're on..."

    `Christ on a crutch,' the Flatline said, `take a look at this.'

    The Chinese virus was unfolding around them. Polychrome shadow, countless translucent layers shifting and recombining. Protean, enormous, it towered above them, blotting out the void. `Big mother,' the Flatline said.

    1. Re:"Kuang Grade Mark Eleven penetration program" by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      Oh.....I think I just failed the Turing Test. Or the Hollywood Screenwriter test. Maybe those are the same thing.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    2. Re:"Kuang Grade Mark Eleven penetration program" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You jack your dick to real human beings instead of cartoon futas (google it not at work). That's why you didn't understand.

  24. Ummmmm.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    How can an entangled virtual photon be any better at distinguishing between a F-35 and a pelican than a boring old conventional radar?

  25. Re:Smells like SCIgen by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Maybe something made by https://pdos.csail.mit.edu/archive/scigen/ ?

  26. Stolen by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If it’s real they stole it from us.

  27. Canadian Research by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1
  28. stolen tech by schematix · · Score: 2

    the US govt developed this tech 40 years ago. the chinese stole the technology and just now figured out how to kind of make it work. they sell a home version on aliexpress for cheap, but it'll only last two uses before breaking. but you can throw it away and buy another.

    --
    Scott
  29. Quantum Stealth by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Quantum Stealth beats quantum radar. What's next in the future technology tree?

    1. Re:Quantum Stealth by times05 · · Score: 1

      Quantum Torpedoes

  30. I think I've seen this before. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Did China just re-align their deflector array to emit a quantum burst?

  31. Destroying the incoming still might be hard by Streetlight · · Score: 1

    Knowing where something is, what it is and where it's going may be a lot easier than destroying it. Someone may be able to develop methods for fooling the detection, blocking it or overwhelming it with false information.

    --
    In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell
  32. Remote quantrol by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

    In Soviet China, quantums entangle YOU!

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  33. Can't we just jam this radar by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Clearly there is a precedent
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvf38cnmO_k

  34. This is not the Radar we should be worried about by hAckz0r · · Score: 1

    This next one is, or at least a radar base on this principal. The Chinese are the ones doing this particular experiment, so they are likely ahead of the pack already.

    Here is the basis for my concept:
    Cao, Y., Li, Y.-H., Cao, Z., Yin, J., Chen, Y.-A., Yin, H.-L., Pan, J.-W. (2017).
    Direct counterfactual communication via quantum Zeno effect.
    Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 5.
    http://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.16...

    Basically, you set up a special inferometer where one channel *could* theoretically propagate to the target (Alice->Bob) and potentially reflect back, while the other channel is actually measured (Alice->Alice). The changes on the target side (e.g. Bobs remote configuration) then changes the measured value as seen on the originating side (Alice), but no photons are physically required nor measured propagating to the target! In essence, you now have a radar that does not radiate, thus it isn't giving away your position. It is able to sense changes on the other side using no actual photons. Its a stealth radar, and perfect for my next basement F-35 upgrade project.

    Any investors out there?

  35. Trade wars are idiotic by sjbe · · Score: 2

    On the trade war, it's important to be clear about who the participants in the war are and what their role is. It's not the US vs. China; it's the US government against the Chinese government, with the Chinese government playing the game with the assets of the Chinese nation.

    It's governments playing games with OUR money. Both sides.

    This is a bit like invading Russia. It's a truism that invading Russia is a bad idea; like most truisms it's only true some of the time. Sure there are historical examples of disastrous invasions, but there are just as many examples of successful invasions.

    Name one successful invasion of Russia in the last 250 years.

    A trade war with the PRC isn't an intrinsically bad idea; it's a matter of timing.

    As a general proposition it's a terrible idea. At the end of the day the only result is going to be a lot of economic hardship for people like you and me on both sides of the ocean and elsewhere. The only time a trade war is a "good" idea is when one country is threatening a vital resource or asset. The US government should be more concerned with helping build up US business rather than trying to tear down Chinese ones.

    A trade war with the PRC isn't an intrinsically bad idea; it's a matter of timing.

    I disagree but let's assume that is true for the sake of argument. How would you know the time is right? You probably wouldn't. So basically it is huge gamble with no likely winner but a near certainty of economic hardship. And let's assume we wage a trade war all in against China. What does "victory" look like? What is the goal of these tariffs? What specific concessions is Trump trying to get from China? You'll notice that he has picked a fight without deciding on a victory condition. Anyone who starts a fight without a very specific goal for the end game is an idiot. Doubly so for someone fighting with other people's money.

  36. It was inevitable. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Thanks to our liberal policies of selling our manufacturing and know how to China it is inevitable, that they will be the next superpower and we will fall like Britain did.
    Trump attempts are most likely too little too late. Not mentioning that he is facing bonehead opposition of fools.

  37. Seriously, WTF Is Quantum Radar? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This just sounds like buzzword bingo to me.

  38. UFO Radar by devslash0 · · Score: 1

    Now we need to use it to detect those stealthy space ships passing by.

  39. anti-radar technology by neo-mkrey · · Score: 1

    Will raspberry jam still work?

  40. Chinese calendar year by the_archer666 · · Score: 1

    Okay, the chines calendar year is different from what "the west" has agreed upon. This awfully sounds like an april's fools joke.

  41. A different sort of military by The+Snazster · · Score: 1

    Most other military organizations don't talk much about scientific breakthroughs that they are either working on or have actually made, certainly not unless they have to. How odd that China's military should be so open and aboveboard about things you would think they would rather keep quiet. Is this the same country that's trying so hard to keep its people from the internet, and that has even been known to crack down on people using words like "emigration," and names like "Winnie-the-Pooh?"

  42. DNC is ensuring Trump's reelection by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The adherence to a leader who lies continually IS the cultural trait that will drag America into a century of shame

    Trump said he would be strong on immigration. He is.
    We would pull out of the Iran nuclear deal. We did.
    He would stand up to North Korea. He did. It worked.
    He would lower taxes. He did.
    He would fight for better trade deals. He is.

    Every time someone calls Trump a liar in blanket terms shows they are fully detached from reality and reinforces his base's faith in him and losing blue votes. No sane person wants to keep the company of people that can no longer tell what they want to be real from reality itself.

    Want eight years of Trump? Keep calling him a liar.

  43. BULLSHIT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    There is no way they can do that, because there is no such thing as quantium mechanics. That unproven THEORY is just that, right along with Relativity. Einstein is completely wrong and Tesla was right.

  44. Don't forget building up a tolerance to poison... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So that you can lace both glasses, drink from either, and have your opponent perish :)

  45. Decoy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If they've cracked quantum detection, don't be so confident about simple kinetic countermeasures -- let alone asymmetric tactics.

    *if* being the operative word. It is also possible that they haven't cracked quantum detection, they don't think it's practical, and they are saying they have in order to get others (notably the US) to divert military budget money into the tech. You know, like the US did with its Star Wars program a few years back.

  46. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion