North Korea shows off surveillance satellite it claims it can launch North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has shown off the pariah state's first surveillance satellite. Military Reconnaissance Satellite No. 1 was showcased on Wednesday by state newswire KCNA – sadly without any details about the orbiter's capabilities. Kim declared "The successful launch of a military reconnaissance satellite is an …
Given how backwards and insular North Korea is & is perceived, it’s amazing they can develop this kind of technology in country.
Especially given all the sanctions they have imposed on them.
I’m not supporting them, just wondering how they’ve been able to achieve these things under the conditions they are subjected to.
"I’m not supporting them, just wondering how they’ve been able to achieve these things under the conditions they are subjected to."
In the case of its nuclear capability, ISTR the US helpfully published detailed plans of the UK's Magnox reactor and North Korea was all "TYVM, that'll do nicely".
Not THAT amazing I think. The US and USSR were launching surviellence satellites in the early 1960s. That was six decades ago. Basically all you need is a BIG rocket. They've got that. A ground station or two. They can build those. And a bunch of stuff you can buy on Amazon or eBay. Or, more likely their Chinese equivalents (Alibaba and Taobao?). I imagine their first attempts won't work very well or at all. The first US and Soviet attempts probably didn't work all that well either. You wouldn't be all that surprised if the NKs built a truck or car. Which they do. A few tens of thousands every year. Satellites are the next logical step for their rocket program. Personally, I'd be a lot more worried about their building cruise missiles and selling them to folks we westerners don't like (and vice versa).
Given how backwards and insular North Korea is & is perceived, it’s amazing they can develop this kind of technology in country.
The BBC podcast 'The Lazarus Heist' sheds light on this. In particular a recent episode from the second series explaining how things are procured from overseas in dubious ways, using money obtained by state-sponsored hacking.
Given how backwards and insular the USA is & is perceived*, it’s amazing they can develop this kind of technology in country. FTFY?
* 30 million (?) people in trailer parks, lack of gun control, rampant illiteracy, etc. etc.
Luckily they're not all like that and the same goes for North Korea
I find it funny that the article devotes considerable time to how badly North Korea treats its citizens and states how this does nothing for their impoverished citizens. Well you could say that about any space launch in any country really couldn't you. India receives foreign aid for example and still spends money putting probes up. Like someone up above said, I'd love to know how the heck NK manage to get this far in the first place. Although I'm sure backing from the likes of China and considerable purloining of sensitive information has something to do with it.
> ...you could say that about any space launch in any country...
Depends who they fund the work. If it is all done locally with the spending going on their own workers, or on products supplied from another DPK factory, then the funds are still sloshing around in their economy. If they're just buying it all in from China, or Iran, or wherever, then that's a different matter.
As for doing anything for impoverished citizens, that's more about how the rest of their economy (using the word advisedly) works (also advisedly).
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