The Chinese Military Has Used Lasers to Attack US Spy Satellites

Back in February, when the Islamic world was enraged over the Mohammed political cartoons, there was something else going on. You may not have noticed, but the Chinese were busy building a high frequency radar at the South Pole. There was some concern among analysts at the time that China could use that location as a base for anti-satellite lasers aimed at US satellites.(1)

Well, it turns out that it was a well-founded concern. Well founded because, not only has China "secretly fired powerful laser weapons designed to disable American spy satellites by 'blinding' their sensitive surveillance devices," but they have had this capability for awhile now.(2) "According to senior American officials: 'China not only has the capability, but has exercised it.' American satellites like the giant Keyhole craft have come under attack 'several times' in recent years."(3)

I have said it before and I'll say it again -- China is not our friend. Our government knows this, and yet bends over backwards trying to keep this information from We the People. The Bush Administration made the decision to keep the attacks secret "for fear that it would damage attempts to co-opt China in diplomatic offensives against North Korea and Iran."(4)

I'm sorry, Mr. Bush, but ignoring a larger threat while expending our resources fighting smaller threats is not acceptable. And to all the naysayers out there, China is a threat. In addition to their military activities, they are also engaged in very aggressive spying against the United States. "China is engaged in a large-scale espionage effort against American high-tech firms working on projects such as the multibillion-[dollar] DD(X) destroyer programme."(5) Our eagerness to trade with them, especially high-technology, will hurt us in the long run. Unfortunately, the President Bush will likely continue to let China's misbehavior go unpunished, all in the name of profit:

Peter Morici, a former chief economist for the U.S. International Trade Commission, said that President Bush is reluctant to hurt large companies such as General Electric, Caterpillar and General Motors, which are making large profits in China.(6)

I feel sorry for those companies, and for the workers, but doing business with the totalitarian, imperialist People's Republic of China has certain risks associated with it. If these companies were unaware of the risks, then they were negligent, perhaps criminally so. There are other countries like India that they can do business with. You know... countries that don't want to go around conquering people?

If the Bush Administration really cared about the U.S. economy, he would back the FairTax Bill.(7) If the FairTax passed, the United States would literally become the largest tax haven in the history of the world. We couldn't keep businesses away from our shores. In that kind of environment, we would not be economically beholden to China, which, in my opinion, is preferable to the current status quo.




______________________________

(1) The Sovereign Editor. "China Poised to Kill US Spy Satellites?" Sovereign Commentary, 2006 February 02, http://sovrealm.blogspot.com/2006/02/china-poised-to-kill-us-spy-satellites.html.
(2) Francis Harris. "Beijing secretly fires lasers to disable US satellites," Telegraph, 2006 September 26, para. 1, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/09/26/wchina226.xml.
(3) Ibid. para. 6.
(4) Ibid. para. 2.
(5) Ibid. para 13.
(6) James Rosen. "Senators may force vote on trade sanctions on China," The Herald (Rock Hill, SC), 2006 September 27, para. 13, http://www.heraldonline.com/109/story/7190.html.
(7) See: H.R. 25; S. 25; and the Americans for Fair Taxation (the FairTax) Web Site, http://www.fairtax.org/.



* * *


Technorati Tags:
News Politics News and Politics China Laser People's Republic of China PRC Chinese Agression Imperialism Espionage Chinese Espionage Bush The FairTax Fair Tax

posted by The Sovereign Editor | 10:32 AM

_____________________________________________