China to buy Eurofighters?

"Kevin Brooks" wrote in message
t...
----- Original Message -----
From: "Keith Willshaw"
Newsgroups: rec.aviation.military
Sent: Wednesday, December 03, 2003 8:11 AM
Subject: China to buy Eurofighters?



"tscottme" wrote in message
...
Scott Ferrin wrote in message
...



In my opinion selling them top of the line stuff is the height of
stupidity. It doesn't take a brain surgeon to figure out what the
situation is going to be with China and the West in ten to fifteen
years.

What makes you think the Europeans don't want the next problem for the
US to be as bad as possible? They have no hope of exceeding the US
unless a full-scale war devastates the US. The fact that it helps
communists is a happy coincidence.


In fact there is no prospect of the ban being lifted anytime soon.
While the French Government and some corporate bodies
have pressed for it the EU itself has stated that it has no
plans to lift the embargo and even if it did has stated that
other agreements controlling the arms trade would prevent
such deliveries taking place.



There is a GAO report dating from 1998 that states that the current EU
embargo does not enjoy a common interpretation; what makes you think that
these "other" controls will have any real impact?


The fact that arms sales have not taken place would
seem a good indicator. Tje same GAO report you cite states

"GAO found no instances of EU members entering into new
agreements to sell China lethal military items after 1989, although some
delivered lethal and nonlethal military items to China during the
1990s--apparently in connection with pre-embargo agreements"

It also points out

"since 1989, the President has issued waivers to:
(a) allow the delivery to China of military items valued at $36.3
million to close out the U.S. government's pre-1989 defense agreements
with China; and (b) license commercial military exports valued at over
$312 million--primarily commercial satellite and encryption items"

In other words there is little to chhose here.



In fact the main suppliers of high tech weaponry to China
have been Israel and Russia and even the USA supplied
dual use technology supposedly for satellite launching
that is believed to have been used in the Chinese
missile program. Finally of course we miust recall that Boeing has a
large operation in China, publically states that it supports
the one China policy and Condit is president of the
US China business council.

You are sort of ignoring reality here a bit, Keith. You seem to have
forgotten the UK (like those "peaceful" Searchwater radars that were
agreed
for sale?), French (everything from Crotale to the licensed helicopters
that
form the basis for the only real attack helo that the PLAAF has, the
WZ-9),

Searchwater as I'm sure you recall is hardly the most modern radar
in the world but I'll agree that the decision was unwise but the Crotale
sale
(and that of Aspide) took place before 1989, at a time when the US was
also happy to sell arms to China.

Italy (Aspide and current attempts to sell Grifo for the PRC's new fighter
programs). Yes, the US has (pre-89) sold some very limited weapons to the
PRC, and likely, despite some attempt to control it through the contract
conditions, some of the past satellite assistance did yield some support
to
the PLA missile program. But if you are going to hang the US for that,
just
what the heck do you consider the recent news that the EU and the PRC are
hopping into the same bed with Gallileo? *That* program is going to have
more impact on PRC military programs than did the old US tech transfers.


I'm not planning on hanging anybody, rather it seems apposite to
point out that other nations including the US and Israel have
sold China technology that is rather more sensitive and directly
related to weapons production.

Lets not forget what your GAO report also says

"Russia and the Middle East have provided
almost 90 percent of China's imported military items
during this period"

Israel being the main middle eastern player.

Hell the Israelis sold China one of the best Air to Air missile
systems in the world and one that included significant amounts of
US technology.

As for Galileo its a satnav system that is being set up as a
civilian enterprise and will be run as a commercial
organisation. How is that different from Boeing setting up
shop build commercial aircraft in China ?

I'd argue that tying China in to dependency on such an International
system is a plus not a minus if we are considering collective
security.

Keith