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Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

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441–450 of 482 posts

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#441

Congrats to my country! After a lot bad news around car industry, a good hope for another heavy industrial branch.

If Isar will get a large scale commitment from the government(s) to launch the OneWeb 2.0 constellation, as the European alternative to US, Chinese and Russian systems, they may well become a major launch provider. And of course they are already working on a much larger reusable rocket.

Although the original OneWeb satellites were assembled in the USA, they were developed in Europe and the components were always sourced predominantly from Europe, Canada, and Africa, with only some parts produced by the European companies in the USA, and even fewer parts sourced from the US companies. It is a very European satellite.

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#442

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have there been other rocket launches from continental Europe?

> Have there been other rocket launches from continental Europe? Continental Europe? yes. The Russian's Plesetsk Cosmodrome is well within the boundaries of the European continent. Continental Europe outside of Russian influence? no.

But also: European Union? Yes, French Guyana is a regular administrative part of France and a EU territory.

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Belgian here. I think Trump definitely pushes allies away much faster than ever anticipated, that's probably the only achievement from the current administration. The alliance still stands, but it's hard to trust the US when the current president is constantly praising violent dictators and doesn't seem to grasp the concept of laws/rules + tries to blame everyone else + threatens to invade EU countries + the requirem…

Germany is the country where AfD is about to win big. Good friends you're choosing there. China has it's own launchers which shows it's decoupling from Europe now. It's over for Europe as countries race to be independent from them.

If AfD about to win BIG? Or are you just skimming the headlines?

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Musk was raised affluent in apartheid-era South Africa, his father had some connection to Zambian emerald trading/mining, and Musk's companies have benefited enormously from public contracts and policy. He's not stupid.

Musk has benefited enormously from public contracts and policy, but all the questionable ones are in Tesla (and especially originally solarcity, but that got folded into Tesla). The government contracts that made SpaceX were all open bid, where SpaceX bid an better solution than anything that any of the established companies did, at literally half the price. Falcon 9 was a massive gift to the US government, in that i…

all the questionable ones are in Tesla

Let's not also forget that NASDAQ changed the rules right before listing SpaceX... resulting in forced index fund procurement of sinking equity. Not sure how 'public policy' that is (arguably separate), but in reality global prime market listing rules are pretty high-significance effectively Federal or even international monetary policy. Well done Elon! Can't fault you for execution!

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dont worry the US will hoodwink Europe back into be a compliant vassal of the Empire in a few years when they elect a democrat who pretends to be liberal and acting in good faith, probably AOC(ia).

Why is this downvoted? This is exactly how US foreign policy works. The only difference with Trump is that he says things out loud. This is 100% what is going to happen. US foreign policy relies on deception and decade long plans. The big plans are ruling the Middle East and squash opposition (Libya, Egypt, Syria, Iraq done, Iran pending). To that end Russia had to be kept busy, therefore the Ukraine proxy war, which…

   > Even with the Greenland annexation threats there are Democrats who think it wouldn't be a bad idea, but you should not say it out loud.
If you were talking about like, Iraq in 2003 you'd be correct to point out that majority being opposed doesn't mean the entire party was blameless.

This is probably the worst example you could have used to make this point about aggressive US foreign policy having support across party lines. There is absolutely no constituency within the Democrats that have ever wanted this because it came entirely from the fevered mind of Trump and the parody edition of Bush's neocons in the current admin.

The combo of 1. negative polarization and 2. being completely pointless and accomplishing nothing makes this about as unpopular of an idea you could find among Democrats, in public or private.

Iran is also a bad choice to include in your list considering Obama was responsible for the JCPOA.

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#446
post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Definitely far from my expertise but I think you're contradicting yourself. I am talking about the formalization that is specifically the modern European Union. You are talking as if it's some inevitable consequence of earlier efforts. > Europeans who created the EU knew about balance of power geopolitics so well, they created this slow bureaucratic mess specifically to stop Germany and France sliding back into the s…

The modern EU was a decades-long journey, heavily informed by the geopolitical realities of constant horrific European wars, that this person has clearly laid out for you. I don’t understand what you’re trying to argue or achieve anymore. The EU has clear predecessor initiatives and organizations that lead to its current form. Just like territories became states in the US, or the League of Nations lead to the UN. Thi…

The only thing I am trying to achieve is accuracy.

History of everything is a long journey. The OP made a comment re: the EU specifically which I thought was off. And at least so far in this thread my reply seems to have been more accurate.

> Europeans who created the EU knew about balance of power geopolitics so well, they created this slow bureaucratic mess specifically to stop Germany and France sliding back into the same old lethal habit. While clumsy positioning between the US and China is a headache in the present moment for Europe, compared to a tedious Union Europeans prefer reawakenings of 1914 in their backyard. Well at least so far.

This statement isn't talking about "the decades long journey Europe has gone through informed by wars". It is very specifically talking about the creation of the EU (and e.g. its slow bureaucratic mess which are an attribute of the modern EU). I have yet to see any actual support to the idea that the specific step of the formation modern (of the) EU was indeed primarily about Germany and France sliding back into war and that a "slow bureaucratic mess" was the intentional vehicle here. As someone who has lived through these events I have my perspective and it's fine for others to have a different perspective. But if that is the case then I'm still to see that in this thread.

You are painting a picture as if a geographic region inevitably drifts towards the EU, the UN, the USA, etc. This just feels like total nonsense to me to be blunt. These are decisions taken at the time for various specific reasons. Sometimes they go one way. Sometimes a different way. The countries that formed the EU and decided to adopt one currency and open borders (amongst other decisions) took that step for a reason. It was not inevitable. There are and were many other paths forward. And Germany and France going to war, as far as I recall, was not part of the discussion at the time (1992-ish).

Is current day Europe and the EU a product of a history. I mean duh. That was not the point the OP was making.

EDIT: I can see why this would be a sensitive topic for present day Europeans and how the rise of nationalism is a possible threat to the modern day EU. There's definitely ample motivation to paint a certain picture here and tell a certain story. Present day EU was not a given. It passed by a very small margin. Then there was Brexit. It's not a given that there would be more wars in Europe without the EU. Europeans can do what's best for them. Again, my main reason for jumping in is that the comment didn't agree with my memory of the time when all of this was happening, so it feels like a modern day rewriting of what Europe was actually like in the 90's.

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot more barriers to things in the real world. China has been dedicating immense effort and brainpower to cloning SpaceX, and they're still not especially close. I think a lot of us (certainly including myself) have no intuition for why this is, because we live in the software world where if you see something that is done then cloning it is generally just a matter of time and effort. But there's certainly…

> because we live in the software world where if you see something that is done then cloning it is generally just a matter of time and effort. But there's certainly some 'secret sauce' at SpaceX that does not seem easy to replicate In software, thanks mostly to the open-source movement, we all have access to the same materials and manufacturing processes. In manufacturing, there are huge differences in materials and…

To be clear, it was NASA that was unwilling to have a ground landing on the abort engines.

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#448

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because you invest in it doesn't mean you end up with hugely cheap and scalable launch. Europe has already invested far more in rocket then SpaceX did and isn't close. If your capital efficiency is far lower, it might not be inexpensive. If you can get the scale because you don't have payloads, its going to be more expensive. There is a incredibly long road between 'rocket can land' and 'cheap and scalable launc…

SpaceX was founded on making launches cheap. Arianespace only recently decided to develop reusable launch systems. Up to SpaceX demonstrating it was possible, the dominant approach to cheap launches was in making the expendable rocket cheap to manufacture. Nobody needs to be reminded the shuttle promised cheap access to space and failed at that.

But SpaceX built a cheaper launcher to manufacture as well as gaining reuse. There was no one making an expendable cheaper rocket before SpaceX either.

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#449

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, they've had a space agency, but the only launchers are expensive legacy vehicles. This launch is a move towards lower cost and more frequent launches, that in the US are provided by SpaceX.

Ariane 5 was the cheapest option available for a long time, now they're a bit behind. But the ESA is now working on reusable rockets too, it seems, with their Themis program.

No, Soyuz was the cheapest option, but they took themselves out of the running.

Re: Private German rocket makes history, reaches orbit from European soil

#450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is this downvoted? This is exactly how US foreign policy works. The only difference with Trump is that he says things out loud. This is 100% what is going to happen. US foreign policy relies on deception and decade long plans. The big plans are ruling the Middle East and squash opposition (Libya, Egypt, Syria, Iraq done, Iran pending). To that end Russia had to be kept busy, therefore the Ukraine proxy war, which…

Russia had to be kept busy, therefore Ukraine proxy war No one made Russia invade Ukraine, this is simply the centuries old russian imperialism against Ukraine. Also, Syria being in that list is silly. The Syrian opposition aren't vassals of the US. The US was never too keen to help them.

your statements are wildly misinformed, you can't make claims about geopoltics because you've read a few delusional reddit threads. The US was extremely active in supporting the Syrian opposition, we literally funded the entire operation, like what reality are you living in.

Your opinion on Russia/Ukraine is clearly skewed by NATO propaganda, which I wouldn't blame you for, most people have had their minds colonized by NATO propaganda, after all, NATO has a literal newsletter called "Cognitive Warfare" where they candidly brag about it.

https://www.act.nato.int/activities/cognitive-warfare/

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