China hails bilateral ties with Iran

Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Zhai Jun says he believes political cooperation between his country and the Islamic Republic of Iran will continue to grow.

Zhai Jun said on Monday that the leaders of the two nations have been actively involved in a constant trust-building process, IRNA reported. 

Meeting with Iran's Ambassador to China Mehdi Safari in Beijing, the Chinese official praised Iran's remarkable achievements over the past three decades since the victory of the Islamic revolution. 

The Iranian ambassador also confirmed that the trade volume between the two sides exceeded $30 billion in 2010 and expressed optimism that the figure would reach $50 billion by the end of the current year. 

Earlier in February, Chairman of the Sino-Iranian Chamber of Commerce Asadollah Asgaroladi said the volume of Iran's trade with China has reached $38 billion, up from $7 billion 10 years ago. 

He said the direct trade between the two countries currently stands at $29 billion, a figure that would reach $38 billion taking into account indirect Iran-China trade through the UAE, Afghanistan and Pakistan.


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China Eyes U.S. Defense Contracts
Hoping to Compete on Cost, Stealth-Jet Maker AVIC Teams With Tiny U.S. Firm; Any Bid Likely to Draw Fierce Resistance

BEIJING—The maker of China's new stealth fighter jet has teamed up with a tiny, unprofitable California company to try to launch bids for U.S. defense contracts, possibly including one to supply Chinese helicopters to replace the aging Marine One fleet used by the president, according to people involved in the partnership.

Any Chinese bids for this or another contract under discussion would be certain to meet intense political resistance and would appear to have very little chance of success given mounting U.S. concern about China's military power and long-term strategic goals, and the often-prohibitive opposition in the past to Chinese attempts to enter other strategic U.S. sectors, such as energy and telecommunications.

However, the fact that state-run China Aviation Industry Corp., known as AVIC, is even considering bids for these contracts, which industry insiders expect to be awarded in the next two to three years, reflects the rapid development and lofty ambitions of China's aerospace industry.

Pie in the Sky AVIC Milestones


1998 First flight of the J-10, China's first indigenous fighter jet

2003 First flight of the Z-10 attack helicopter

2007Unveiling of the J-11B, the Chinese version of Russia's Su-27

2009The L-15 trainer jet displayed for the first time overseas at Dubai Air Show

2010AC-313 helicopter makes its first flight.

AVIC has been in talks for more than a year with California-based U.S. Aerospace Inc. about offering the AC-313—China's largest domestically produced helicopter—as the next generation of Marine One, the people involved in the partnership say.

They say the two companies have also been discussing putting forward AVIC's new L-15 trainer jet as a candidate to replace the U.S. Air Force's fleet of Northrop T-38s, which entered service 50 years ago and on which American fighter pilots learn skills such as how to fly at supersonic speeds.

That contract is expected to be one of the most lucrative military aviation contracts this decade, with the U.S. likely to buy about 400 and other allied countries about 600 more as the jet will become the standard for training pilots to fly the U.S. F-22 and F-35 stealth fighters.

AVIC already supplies civilian aircraft components to U.S. companies, but U.S. officials and lawmakers have expressed concern about U.S. technology being diverted to AVIC's military arm through such cooperation.

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FROM NEW ZCIENTIST

Has China's new jet launched a stealth arms race?

China's first flight test of its new high-tech J-20 stealth military jet on 11 January has drawn a lot of attention, particularly because it came during the visit of US defence secretary Robert Gates. What it means is another question, and the answers are complex.

Military analysts had known China was developing a combat plane in the class of the US F-22 Raptor stealth fighter, but they had not expected it to make its first appearance in December, Aviation Week and Space Technology reported. Several high-speed ground tests, in which the craft's front wheel rose off the ground, preceded the first flight.

China has released videos of the new jet on the ground, taking off, and landing at Chengdu. The New York Times quoted a Hong Kong analyst as saying the plane flew for 15 minutes over the airfield. With two distinctive angled tail fins like those of the F-22, it's clearly intended to be stealthy. The Times also reports it is intended carry missiles and fly long distances when refuelled in the air.

The demonstration worries some analysts because it's the first aircraft to challenge the performance of the F-22, the top of the US air force's fleet. "We have become accustomed to a world where our air power is dominant," Rand Corporation analyst Roger Cliff told Newsweek.

"But that dominance is now in question." Once the J-20 is deployed, in that scenario, US top guns would lose their high-performance stealth advantage and no longer rule the skies.

No so fast, says Aviation Week. New, more powerful radars using active electronically scaled arrays can pick up fainter and fainter targets, and are fast catching up to stealth technology. "Anti-stealth will bring into question all stealth designs," it says, hinting that the US may already have airborne radars able to spot stealth aircraft.


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FROM ECANADANOW
China Sends Troops Into North Korea


China used to have a presence in North Korea and the last of those troops left in 1994. Now word has come that a deal being Beijing and Pyongyang has made it so the Chinese will have a troop presence back in North Korea.

South Korean officials have been on high alert and according to North Korean officials, they have stated that they have been in a state of war with South Korea and the United States. This is what is being believed to be the reason that China has come back to the North.

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FROM TELEGRAPH BLOGS

It is generally estimated that there are some 80,000 – 100,000 public protests a year in China, many of them violent and most never reported. I don’t know how useful a measure of true discontent this figure is – after covering India for four years, I expect they have many more – but one recent protest reported in a Chinese newspaper, Guizhou Metropolis Daily, catches my eye.
The paper reports that a group of Chinese middle school children (aged 15-18) trashed their school cafeteria, smashing windows, breaking tables and (as the pictures show) generally laying waste to the place. The students – the school has 4,000, of whom two-thirds live in school during the week – were persuaded to back to their dormitories only after the police rushed to the café 20 minutes after the rampage began.

I’ve heard of student grumbles in China – about everything from lack of jobs to being forced to give up their summer holidays to attend the parade for the 60th Anniversary of Communist Party rule – but nothing like this. The official cause of the riot, if that’s not too strong a word, was put down to rising prices in the school cafeteria which was sub-contracted to a private company. The price of a litre of hot water had risen by 3p, the price of all dishes, by 5p.

Guizhou, a centre for coal mining and agriculture, is one of China’s poorest provinces which might partly explain the extreme reaction (China is in the grip of food price inflation) but I find it hard to believe that was the sole cause. An administrator at the Liupanshui city No.2 School, whom we spoke to today, said the revolt was also partly due to the “strict management of the students”, since the school is run on almost military lines.


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FROM FOX NEWS (!)

A blogger reckons he may have solved the mystery over the vapor trail spotted off the southern coast of California on Monday.

On his blog "Time to Think," Liem Bahneman on Wednesday pinpointed America West Flight 808 as the likely cause -- backing up an explanation offered by a senior military official to Fox News Channel that the contrail caught on video by a news helicopter “was more likely caused by an airplane than anything else."

Bahneman wonders if he is the first to call it: "I did a lot of extrapolation of what flights could be at the right position (off the coast) at the right altitude (for contrail formation) and came down to two possibilities: UPS Flight 902 (UPS902) or America West Flight 808 (AWE808)."

He concluded: "As I was researching tonight (24 hours later), I realized that today's (Tuesday's) AWE808 current position (at around 4:50 p.m.) was almost the same as it was the day of the incident. I quickly pulled up a Newport Beach webcam and found that (apparently) AWE808 was making an identical contrail, 24 hours later!"

Bahneman cited another blog, ContrailScience.com, which lists a wealth of other details about jet airplane contrails. The blogger behind that site agreed with Bahneman, telling FoxNews.com that "the plane is flying directly TOWARD you, so it starts below the horizon. The contrail at the horizon is far away, maybe 50-100 miles behind the plane, and has been spread out by the wind, creating the illusion that it's closer."

The Department of Defense said Wednesday that it was satisfied the event was likely caused by an airplane. 

"With all the information that we have gathered over the last day and a half about this condensation trail off the coast of southern California on Monday night, both within the DoD and other U.S. government agencies, we have no information to suggest this was anything other than a contrail caused by an aircraft," said Col. David Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman.

"As stated yesterday, NORAD and USNORTHCOM determined that there was no threat to the U.S. homeland."

Lapan said that in the mind of the DoD this case is closed.

Lapan said the government looked at lots of data sources other than the CBS news tape. He would not get into the details of what those data sources were, but said that evidence helped determine this was most likely an aircraft. But most importantly, it was the response from all other government agencies saying they did not launch anything that convinced them this was likely an aircraft.

"The Department of Defense, after gathering info over the last 36 hours from within the Department of Defense and other U.S. government agencies, is satisfied the contrail was likely caused by an aircraft." 

But which flight? Todd Lehmacher, a spokesman for US Airways, could not confirm that Flight 808 was responsible for the vapor trail, though he did confirm details of the flight. 

"Flight 808 did depart Honolulu at 9:53 a.m. yesterday morning local Honolulu time and arrived at Phoenix at 7:04 p.m.," Lehmacher told FoxNews.com, and the plane did travel along the planned route between those two destinations, he said. But that isn't conclusive evidence, Lehmacher stated.

"I can confirm that our aircraft traversed that route yesterday, but you'd need to talk to someone who's more versed in atmospheric conditions," Lehmacher said. Ian Gregor, a spokesman for the FAA, agreed with Lehmacher's diagnosis. 

"We can't determine the exact source of the contrail because we don't know its location, trajectory or altitude," he told FoxNews.com. "Remember, we did a radar replay of an area based on MEDIA REPORTS of the location of the contrail, not on any precise location of the contrail."

These are just a handful of the blogs that have been weighing in on the matter, however. From space fanatics to conspiracy theorists to unrelated mommy blogs, the blogosphere has been working overtime in its hive efforts to solve the issue.

UniverseToday supports the plane theory, noting that "the Boeing Co. every so often will deploy aircraft from San Nicolas Island. These flights are part of an anti-missile laser testing program. However, the company has announced that it had nothing in the air on Monday."