Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!watdragon!rose!awtron
From: awtron@rose.waterloo.edu (Andrew Tron)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Subject: Notes on BURAN (the Shuttleskiy)
Keywords: BURAN, Soviet Space Shuttle
Message-ID: <9395@watdragon.waterloo.edu>
Date: 31 Oct 88 20:20:55 GMT
Sender: daemon@watdragon.waterloo.edu
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A couple of notes on the new Soviet Space Shuttle:

1) According to a TV news report (carried on Channel 9 late news
in Toronto, Fri. Oct 28, 1988), the Soviets apparently got a lot
of technical information about the American Space Shuttle from
some scientific institute in Vienna.  The Soviets were partners
in this institute, and the information they copied was UNCLASSIFIED.
(I forgot the actual name of the institute.)  Some American space
scientists were interviewed, who were disgusted at the fact that so
much information about the Shuttle was unclassified and lying about
in an unsecure place.  Naturally, the report attributed the apparent
similarity between the two Shuttles to this fact.  (The report didn't
mention how much information was taken and how detailed this was.  If
I were the Soviet shuttle designer, I would be interested in details
of the American design, even if I had my own ideas.  So this news report
seems to be breaking the law "Correlation does not imply causation".
Now if they interviewed the designers, we might know, but there's a
snowball's chance in a supernova of that. :-))

2) Regarding the `no spysat images' problem:

In the book ``Inside the Soviet Army'' by Victor Suvorov (ex-GRU
defector), the author states that military bases are given schedules
of American spysat overflights, and orders to do conceal their activities
or show false activities.  Any commander who forgets to follow the
schedule is extremely likely to find his keester in the proverbial sling.
It would be entirely within character for the BURAN test flights to
be scheduled so that they would not be detected by American spysats.

--
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