Engineering News

[article's final paragraph]:

" The question, of course, is who will be first to (teleport-into) orbit. The Europeans have a space agency that could be persuaded to test this idea but they won't be in a hurry. China is currently showing great ambition in space and will want to show off its technological prowess. Both have the wherewithall to pull off this next step. _ The contrast with the US couldn't be clearer."

Like, 'Duh'...(!) My own impression is that we have stolen from (our) future generations to finance big-time research and development, and then given-away all that knowledge to other countries so that they could leap-frog past us without themselves having to go into debt for it. WE will be paying for this for generations to come...

Yet ... there was, is, and will always remain the 1 eternal hope.

... and, perhaps, with a bit of grace, we will one-day get to use what 'they' have begun to accomplish, to sligshot back into position as 'world-leaders'.

You don't think they'll ever come to the point where they're humble enough to admit:

"If we see farther, it is only because we are standing on the shoulders of giants?"