Space exploration in the 21st century – who will go forth?



The Russian Mir Space Station

In April 2011, it is 50 years since a Russian cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space. Since then progress was rapid, in full Cold-War fervour, only 8 years separated Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landing on the surface of the moon. Although the moon landings handed a temporary victory to the US, the Soviet Union dominated spaceflight for the next decade (the seventies) with pioneering missions to the first space stations Salyut and Mir to experiment on the effects of long periods in space.

In a new film called First Orbit original footage of Yuri Gagarin's 108-minute voyage is spliced together with new shots of the exact route he would have taken, filmed by an astronaut on board the International Space Station. The station's orbit was specially changed to mirror the Russian's 1961 flight path. The film was released on 12 April to mark the 50th anniversary. Below is a trailer of the film:

US Space Exploration

Gagarin's solo mission signaled an early milestone in a Cold War space race between the former Soviet Union and the US. Eventually, NASA caught up and raced ahead, landing a dozen men on the moon as part of the Apollo program between 1969 and 1972. The US really began to lead the space race with the launch of its Space Shuttle Programme in 1981. The US was the Space Leader by the early 1990s. But the risk and cost were so great, the US retreated. The Cold War ended, and the Soviet Union dissolved into member states. As one of the surviving states, Russia inherited the Soviet strides in space and joined with the US, Europe, Japan and Canada to forge the 15-nation space station.

NASA's decision to retire the 30-year old shuttle fleet without a replacement in sight to continue the human push beyond Low-Earth-Orbit to explore the Solar System has not been popular - the last shuttle mission is due to launch in July 2011. Many working within the US Space Industry disagree with the US decision to cancel the Constellation Program that set out to do just that, and many are not happy that US astronauts will have to rely on the Russian Soyuz capsules to reach the International Space Station for the foreseeable future. The video below shows a new initiative called Why Space Matters recently launched to communicate the wider benefits of space exploration to the US public.

Russian Space Exploration

In the 21^st century, Russian President, Medvedev, stated that the country's space programme will remain a key government priority, but sceptics say the nation has done virtually nothing to develop a successor to the 43-year-old Soyuz spaceship. Russia has used the Soyuz and Progress spacecraft, whose designs date back to the 1960s, to send an increasing number of crew and cargo to their Space Stations and now to the International Space Station.

Russia announced recently three objectives for its space programme: it would test a next-generation spacecraft, build a new cosmodrome and consider a manned mission to Mars after 2035 and after new nuclear engines are developed.

Russian officials have set the tentative launch of a new spacecraft to replace Soyuz for 2015, but cosmonauts and industry watchers have said its development has barely begun. Russia will need to make at least 15 successful unmanned launches of the new craft, named Rus, before it can carry crew into orbit.

Russia is also due to start building a new launch pad in Russia's Far East in 2011, called Vostochny. Officials have said the first launches from Vostochny are expected in 2015. Russia still uses the Soviet-built Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan for all its manned space flights and a large share of its satellite launches. Baikonur is where the history of space exploration began. The first space satellite, "Sputnik," was launched from there in 1957, as was the first manned space flight with Yuri Gagarin in 1961. Since then, over 1,200 spacecraft have been launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

However despite the positive political announcements, the Chief of the Russian Space Agency said on the anniversary of Yuri Gangarin's first space flight that the Russian Space Agency's current budget was not enough to finance breakthrough projects and that China might soon overtake Russian space technology.

Chinese Space Exploration

General Xu Qiliang, the Commander of the People’s Liberation Army Air Force believes space exploration is critical to China’s national security interests. His views reflect the Chinese government’s growing interest in space exploration and the development of space technology. China’s space program has made significant progress over the past decade. China is scheduled to start building its own space station in 2011 with the launch of an unmanned module named Tiangong-1(天宫一号).

China has collaborated mostly with other emerging economies on its space technology, especially Russia and Brazil. Russia is working with China to help the Chinese refine their Shenzhou manned vehicles (based on the Russian Soyuz design). China has also purchased spacesuit designs from Russia.



 

The new Chinese Space Station Tiangong -1

天宫一号 means "Heavenly Palace"


Tiangong -1 (天宫一号) is the first module of an unmanned space station that is expected to launch in the second half of 2011. The Tiangong -1 space module is expected to carry out China's first space docking with the Shenzhou-8 spacecraft, allowing for the building of the Space Station.

China now has the technology to be able to reach into outer space with its unmanned spacecraft and since 2003, for humans to enter space too. By operating at the highest level of space activities China has confirmed its potential place as a new 'Space Power' in the 21st Century. China too will inevitably have to reach a view on the value of its space program compared to its high costs and the potential likelihood of dramatic failure set against Chinese priorities for space exploration.

No matter who goes forth to explore the Solar System, humankind's thirst for a greater understanding of 'space' and our solar system means the world will be eagerly watching new space exploration and awaiting the new discoveries to come.

The Biggest Container Ships the World has ever seen

 

Artist’s impression of the new colossal “Triple E” container ship

Source: Maersk



Maersk Line, a Danish shipper, announced in February 2011 that it had ordered ten new colossal container ships. The new ships known as “Triple-E” ships will carry 18,000 boxes each, that is 2,500 more than the biggest container ship currently in service also operated by Maersk. The new vessels will come into service in 2013.

The new ships will sail the trade routes between Asia and Europe, arriving in Europe packed with Chinese-made TVs and fridges but sailing back much lighter. Container shipping rates are rising and global trade is predicted to grow by 6-8% this year. Some believe global trade in shipping could grow even further— Clarksons—the world’s biggest shipbroker, is predicting growth of around 10%.

From the 1990s and into the first decade of the 21^st century the volume of container cargo traded through the world’s biggest container ports has increased nearly sixfold as globalisation has taken hold.

Twenty years ago more than half of the top 20 container ports were in the US or Europe. Now, Asia's strength as an exporter is in evidence in the location of the top container ports. Singapore now has the top spot. 14 of the top 20 container ports are now in Asia, with eight in China. The below chart from the Economist's recent survey of container ports charts the changes of the last 20 years:

Invention of the container ship

The first container ship voyage took place on 26 April 1956, the ship was an oil tanker whose deck had been strengthened to accommodate 58 well-filled boxes each some 30ft (9 metres) long. The boxes were shipped down the east coast of the US into the Gulf of Mexico and on to Houston. They survived the journey. They were not swept unrecoverably into the sea, as some doubters had predicted.

Trade was ready for a new mode of transport. The savings made by moving freight from roads to sea were huge. For centuries the trade of the world had depended on there being a vast labour force at every port to handle goods in manageable quantities. Container shipping required less dock labour and as a result savings of as much as 25% could be passed on to the shippers. As containerisation spread around the world, ships were turned round more quickly with even more savings.

By the 40th anniversary of container shipping in 1996, around 90% of world trade was moving in containers on specially designed ships. At that time Bill Clinton correctly proclaimed that container ships were aiding to “fuel the world’s economy”.

Since then Container ships have continued to grow and grow.

But container ships are still slow

Some fast ships have been developed, but these are mostly passenger ferries. The big container ships that carry most of the world's long-haul manufactured exports (by weight) travel at 23 knots (26.5 miles an hour) at best, and barely 17 knots in heavy weather.

The jet age that sank passenger liners has so far failed to take hold on the ocean. The Boeing 707 jet transformed aviation because it could fly faster, farther and higher than propeller-driven aircraft, clear of storms and turbulence.

Ever since the Vikings built their longboats it has been accepted that the way to move quickly across water is to have long, thin boats. This is because the faster a ship travels, the more water it drags along with it. Not only does this drag consume much energy, it causes high-speed vessels to squat low in the water, pulled down behind the “captive wave” at the bow. Propellers vibrate at high speeds, causing shocks that can break hulls. Hydrofoils that lift the hull out of the water and use water jets are fine for passenger ferries, but not for big, heavy container ships.

In the 21st century, container cargo of cars, tractors, cookers and washing machines still travel at about the speed of a running man. It takes a ship full of car parts a week or more to cross the Atlantic and around three weeks to go from Asia to Europe. The next challenge will be to design a faster colossal vessel capable of carrying 18,000 containers but at a much greater speed. Surely with such high inter-continental trade forecasts between Asia and the US and Europe, the incentives to develop a new high-speed container ship have never been better.

The Arctic in the 21st Century - a New Polar Frontier

Arctic Ocean Ice Breaker

In April 2010 Russian President Medvedev paid a state visit to Norway. The highlight of this visit was a surprise announcement – after 40 years of negotiations – an agreement on the division of a disputed zone in the Arctic Ocean into roughly equal parts for Russia and Norway. A newly agreed Arctic maritime delimitation line was announced accompanied by treaty provisions for new rules and procedures to ensure responsible management of natural resources. The disputed territory measured 175,000 sq km which is equivalent to about half of the land territory of Norway.

Map of Arctic Region Boundaries

Experts believe that the oil potential of the formerly disputed parts of the Arctic Ocean could be more than 5 bn metric tonnes of oil – 10-times Saudi Arabia's production potential and still larger gas reserves 10,000 bn cubic metres of natural gas – five times Norway's proven reserves. But experts argue the high cost and inaccessibility of these resources mean large-scale development of these resources could be years away.

Russian interests in the Arctic

Russia has long held an interest in the Arctic. Indeed, Russia underlined the importance of the Arctic by declaring its plans to make the Arctic Region its primary resource base by 2020 in its 2009 Arctic Strategy. PM Putin visited Russia's Arctic territory shortly after President Medvedec's visit to Norway last year, where he proclaimed the Arctic's importance was in “Russia's deepest geopolitical interests”. Russia sees itself along with Norway as the two “principle Arctic countries” although it reluctantly acknowledges the need for cooperation with the other Arctic countries: US, Canada and Denmark.

However Russia's political ambitions are not reflected by its technical and financial reality. Russia badly needs international technical expertise to implement cutting-edge projects in such difficult acreage, and money to begin exploration in the offshore Russian Arctic. Hence the recently announced deal in January this year between the British company BP and the Russian company Rosneft to work together to extract oil from above Russia's Arctic Circle. The deal recognises the importance of BP's geological know-how with BP swapping a 5pc stake in itself for a 9.5pc share of Rosenef.

Chinese interests in the Arctic

China is not an Arctic state. Nor does it have an official Arctic Strategy yet. Nevertheless it is increasingly active and vocal on the international stage on issues concerning the region.

In recent years China has been trying to bolster its position in the Arctic by seeking observer status on the Arctic Council (which was denied). China has also emphasized the rule of law in the Arctic. In an article in the Asia Times, in February 2011, Rear Admiral Yin Zhin was quoted saying:

“The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the North Pole and surrounding areas are the commonwealth of the world’s people and do not belong to any one country… China must play an indispensable role in Arctic exploration as we have one-fifth of the world’s population.”

Chinese oil companies are not yet in a position where they can offer technical expertise. But in the near future, it is highly possible that China could become a major player in the Arctic by financing Russian activities in the region.

Environmentally Sensitive Arctic

It is estimated that the Arctic region holds 25pc of the world’s oil and 9pc of the world’s coal and it is one of the last remaining regions that has not been mined for resources.

Many believe the sensitive Arctic environment is the last place that should be drilled for oil because the risks just aren't worth it. In July 2010, Environmental NGOs called for moratorium on new offshore drilling in the environmentally sensitive Arctic. The calls for a moratorium echo growing concerns across the Arctic that industry needs to prove Arctic oil development will not cause catastrophic damage to the Arctic environment. A US environmental NGO, the Pew Foundation, recently published this video about the risks of Arctic exploration:

What is the future for the Arctic?

In the 21^st century, the Arctic is fast becoming a new Geo-strategic region in natural energy resources, as competition for its massive untapped reserves of oil, gas and coal heats up.

The presence of natural resources has increased the incentives for Arctic countries to settle old maritime territorial claims, largely because no private company will invest without them. But the process of deciding who owns what is aided by international law but often not fully resolved. As a consequence, we should expect much competition and jostling in the foreseeable future among the 5 Arctic countries and their investors as they stake their claims to the Arctic's wealth of natural resources.

But it is also worthwhile remembering that resources are not always mined because they are there but rather because the price is right or because the politics are right (preferably both). The key issue in large parts of the Arctic will be to understand the political risks and whether the necessary long-term investments in infrastructure are made in this previously unexploited polar region.

Airships of the Future – a revolution in airfreight?

Artist's impression of an Airship of the future

Airships are a means of transport few have taken seriously since the German Hindenburg Zeppelin went up in flames in 1937. The new generation of Airships use helium, not flammable hydrogen. Unlike the Zeppelin aircrafts, they are not lighter than air and have an internal frame where a large fraction of their weight is carried by aerodynamic lift on the wings and hull. They also have wheels and take off and land as passenger aircrafts do.

The new airships of the 21^st century mix the concept of planes and zeppelins. They travel at slower speeds than traditional aircraft, around 200km/hr but they can carry 3 times more freight than a Boeing 747. Hence, the big idea for the new Airships is to carry cargo: heavy loads, such as turbines, or bulky ones, such as segments of oil refineries.

A cheaper way to send airfreight

Air freighting goods is currently an expensive means of transport and is usually only used for perishable goods, valuables that warrant the extra cost like pharamceuticals or more generally for goods that are subject to arriving within a time limit like newspapers.

Current trends show that geographical trade of air freighted goods is predominantly from Asia to the US and Europe. Freight planes often fly with empty holds to Asia, solely to collect goods.

If the cost of airfreight were to become much cheaper, it would be able to compete with surface transport like road and rail but with the added advantage of being able to go where road and rail infrastructure is lacking, for example, in Latin America, Asia and Africa. If this were possible, it may just provide a catalyst for rethinking what is sent by airfreight.

New Slow Airfreight Infrastructure

Perhaps the real opportunity for the new Airships in the 21st century is in developing a new Slow Airfreight Infrastructure, as a means of intercontinental transport for slow shipping freight. It would be cheaper, compared with traditional fast air transport. And it would enable airfreight to reach places with little or no road or rail infrastructure.

There may also be the potential for passenger transportation in airships if a new Slow Airfreight Infrastructure were to be built. It could be adapted as a cheaper means for passenger travel too. It would be a means of travel, not as fast as traditional passenger air travel but surely much faster than travelling overland in Latin America and Africa to connect cities within a continent.

One of the most recent projects is spearheaded by Lockheed Martin. Their first experimental Airship is due to fly in 2012. Below is a video of their proposed new Airship:

A New Wall on the US-Mexico Border, for what purpose?

 

A recently constructed section of the US-Mexico Border Wall between Yuma, Arizona
and Calexico, California. The new barrier between the US and Mexico stands 15 feet tall
and sits on top of the sand so it can be lifted by a machine and repositioned whenever the
 migrating desert dunes begin to bury it.

Since 2005 the US Government has been building a US-Mexico Border Wall. The US-Mexican border follows the Rio Bravo through the rough terrain of the Big Bend and through the once busy trading posts of Presidio/Ojinaga and on to the El Paso/Ciudad Juárez twin cities (on each side of the border) established as the "Passage to the North" between the mountain ranges, from there, the river gives way to the new wall.

The primary purpose of the Great Wall of China was not to keep out people, who could scale the Wall, but to insure that semi-nomadic people on the outside of the Wall could not cross with their horses or return easily with stolen property.

The Great Wall of China

Borders and Walls

A border marks the place where adjacent jurisdictions meet. This combined conjunction and separation of national laws and customs creates a zone in which movements of people and goods are greatly regulated, highly examined and sometimes hidden. Commerce attains a higher importance on both sides of the border. Smuggling, legal and illegal immigration, add to a picture of accentuated concern with the trade in goods and the flow of people.

The border is an environment of opportunity. Individuals find work enforcing or avoiding the laws that regulate movement and goods. Companies use national differences in labour and regulations to pursue their advantage. Borders thrive on difference and people and institutions come there to exploit niches.

The New US-Mexico Border Wall

By building a wall along the border, the psychological barrier between two different jurisdictions is physically manifest as a structure that seeks to distinguish and separate the two sides.

The US-Mexico border has frequently been transited in history for the mutual advantage of both countries. For example, during the Second World War, when the US was badly lacking in labour, it  launched a programme to encourage large migrations of Mexican workers to the US to work legally as contract labourers for seasonal work. In more recent times, since the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) labour unions of Mexican farmers, service employees, and oil workers now organise maquiladora workers at the assembly plants on the Mexican side of the border.

What purpose does the wall serve?

 

Diagram of US proposed enforcement of the “Virtual Wall”

The Obama administration has been under intense pressure to beef up security on the border to prevent the recent increase in drug-related violence in Mexico spilling into the US. One of the ways to do this was through "virtual policing" of the wall by lining the border between the US and Mexico with cameras and radar towers as shown in the diagram above. This was supposed to be a cost effective way of policing the wall.

However, in February 2011, the Obama administration finally pulled the plug on what was known as the "Virtual Wall". After spending more than $1 billion on the scheme, the US Department of Homeland Security was forced to admit that it was a "complete failure". But building of the physical wall still continues. Since 2005, the Wall covers around half of the 2000-mile US-Mexico border.

Even so, it is not clear what purpose the wall serves. It can be easily scaled within 20 seconds by a person as shown in YouTube videos. The US Government (without cameras and radar) will not have the resources to police all 2,000-miles of the Border Wall. Earlier on this year there were reports that people were using medieval catapults to thwart it. Smugglers trying to get their goods across the wall were trying a new approach – a medieval tribuchet catapult installed on a flatbed towed by a sports utility vehicle to launch projectiles across the new wall. This only serves to illustrate that human innovation will not be stifled by a wall. People will constantly seek out new ways for goods and people to go under, over and around it.

The US-Mexico Border Wall seems to lack a clear purpose compared with the Great Wall of China which was built with a clear primary purpose, to ensure those outside could not easily cross and get back across with stolen property. In the 21st century, the US and Mexico's economies are highly dependent on each other. They are not enemies where one is stealing from the other. Instead, they are trading partners within NAFTA. Mexico sends the lion's share of its exports to the US. Mexico is the second-largest export market for the US and it is the US' third-largest trading partner. Mexico also supplies US companies with much human capital both within Mexican borders and across the border in neighbouring US states. It would appear that erecting a wall has more to do with an 'imagined fear' than a real need to protect against maruading intruders from the South.

The Turkic Peoples – who are they?



The mountain ranges of Central Asia with tribal horsemen

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 a broad buffer zone where Europe meets Asia, mostly straddled by Turkic populations was re-discovered. Turkic-populated lands have not drawn intense Western interest since the rivalries of 19th century empires.

Five hundred years ago, Turkic people ruled much of Eurasia. The Turkic dynasties held sway over India, Persia, North Africa, the Balkans, Russia and parts of China. Arab caliphs hired tough Turkic fighters as mercenaries for the armies of Islam from the 7th century onwards, and soon afterwards Turkic warriors became the military backbone of the Muslim world. From the tenth through the fourteenth centuries, Turco-Mongolian horseback fighters and their families spread westwards across the Middle East under conquerors such as the Genghis Khan.

Khazak Nomadic family tents in 21^st century

The Turkic people account for around 140 million people worldwide. Their several nations constitute one of the ten largest language groups in the world, and their biggest state, Turkey, has the largest economy and army between Europe and India. Turkey and the five new mainly-Turkic states of Eurasia - Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and the Kyrgyz Republic are becoming increasingly important again in the 21^st century.

During the 19^th and 20^th centuries Turkic ascendancy ended but the Turkic people remained. Turkic customs, language and identity has remained throughout these lands despite Soviet rule. The Turkish language and its dialects is still a rite of passage for the traveller who wishes to trade along the ancient Silk Road from Iran to the Western provinces of China.

A new 21^st Century Power Game in Central Asia

Central Asia has become an area of increasing strategic competition to secure access to the region's oil and energy resources. China, Russia, US, India, Pakistan, Iran and Turkey are locked in a tightly contested competition.

China has been building new security relationships to match its growing economic ties with the Central Asian countries through the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, a six-member group founded in 2001 that includes Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. China has committed itself for the first time to a regional collective security agreement focused on enforcement of borders. Beijing has already conducted joint military maneuvers with Kyrgyzstan.

The United States has not been absent from this competition, having acquired a military base, known as Camp Stronghold Freedom, in Uzbekistan, as well as a presence in Afghanistan.

Trade between China and Kazakhstan has increased substantially as China's economy has become more dominant regionally, but Russia still remains a significant trading partner too. The Russians are trying to set up an OPEC-like cartel to tie down gas in Central Asia.

China has been seeking to increase its influence in a part of the world long dominated by its historic rival, Russia. Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan have followed the Kazakh example in looking toward China, rather than to Western-dominated international financial institutions, for development funding and economic thinking. China's politics and central planning policies have a strong appeal for many of the former Soviet republics of the region.

Government in Central Asian Republics

The Central Asian Republics are largely ruled by autocrats and strong men to varying degrees. The regimes generally restrict the freedom of speech, put down any opposition fiercely and fix elections. Uzbekistan, the most populous has been ruled by Islam Karimov, Nursultan Nazarbayev has ruled Kazakhstan, both since 1989. Emomali Rakhmon has run Tajikstan since 1992. Turkmenistan had a colourful dictator known as Turkmenbashi (Head of the Turkmans) until 1996. Only Kyrgyzstan has the region's first experiment in parliamentary democracy since last year.

There has also been conflict in recent years in China's most far-western province, Xinjiang between the Uighur people and the Chinese Government. The Uighur people whose Turkic language and Islamic faith draw them toward kinsmen in Kazakhstan and other Central Asian Republics have been seeking a Turkic leader and their independence from China.

It is unclear if the Turkic peoples will re-assert themselves to play a leading role, again, in the 21^st century, although what is clear is that they are a large group of people, 140 million people worldwide, not to be underestimated, that will form an important part in shaping the region that lies between Europe and Asia, the lands they have inhabited for centuries.

Africa's Newest Country – South Sudan is due to be born in July 2011

 

Khartoum, a thriving African metropolis where the

Blue Nile meets the White Nile in 2011

On 9 July 2011, South Sudan is due to be born as a new African country. The Sudanese recently voted in a UN referendum to separate into two different countries. Sudan has been troubled with civil war particularly in the South Darfur region in a struggle between different ethnic groups to control the country's energy resources and some have even gone so far as to claim that this may have been the world's first 'Climate Change war'. For many there is relief and hope that a division of the country may finally bring peace.

But what will this split mean geographically and trade-wise for the newly created South Sudan.



 

Map of division of Sudan

 The yellow line marks the bounds of the new South Sudan

No sea access

For a start the new country will become landlocked losing its access to the Red Sea and more importantly its direct access to Port Sudan. Over the last decade, Port Sudan has received considerable Chinese investment. Its port operations have been beefed up and turned into a modern port facility able to process the most up-to-date technology in cargo ships.

Khartoum remains in the north


The historic capital and trading city of Khartoum built at the meeting of the Blue Nile (source in Ethiopia) with the White Nile (source in Uganda) will no longer be within its borders. In recent years, Khartoum has flourished once again as an important trade centre on the Nile River. Much Chinese investment is going into building infrastructure; a new bridge across the White Nile, a sparkling new airport and much new office space and hotels.

Much of the recent boom in Khartoum is due to the building of an oil pipeline to transport oil from the southern oil fields to Port Sudan that passes through Khartoum. When the export pipeline came online in 1998, oil exports increased greatly from a meagre 20-30 barrels a day to upward of 350 barrels a day from 2004 onwards.

The new administrative capital for South Sudan will be Juba, a city too located on the Nile (the White Nile), north of Uganda, but lacking the strategic resonance of Khartoum.

What about the oil fields

Oil is the major revenue generator for Sudan, in 2009 it brought in more than 90% of foreign earnings. Around 75% of the oil reserve will be located in South Sudan. But the oil pipe that transports the oil to the Port Sudan will be controlled by the North as shown in the map above.

This does not bode well for South Sudan as has often been demonstrated in other parts of the world, those who control the pipeline often benefit from a position of power. Moreover the Southern Sudan provinces and the North already have a history of squabbling over the price of oil and their respective shares of profits under the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement.

China in Sudan

China's economic and human presence in Africa has continued to rise over the last decade. In fact, China is the biggest and most active player in Sudan. It has a 40% interest in the oil fields. It has also recently announced that it has entered into a $1.2 billion contract to build a new airport in Khartoum capable of handling aircraft as large as the Airbus A380 that will open in 2012. In recent years, the number of Chinese expatriates working for Chinese companies on big infrastructure projects in Sudan has increased. Small merchants, traders, and others too have joined the large company workers in Sudan, attracted by business opportunities for independent entrepreneurs. They have established Chinese restaurants and other amenities for the workers of the large companies. They have become an anchor for the large Chinese community in Sudan.

What will happen in July

One of the first big tasks for the new South Sudan Government will be to agree with the Khartoum-based Government, a new set of administrative conditions for ongoing oil export. The existing arrangement between the North and the South will expire in July 2011.

However, with the loss of direct access to Port Sudan within its borders, South Sudan is said to be already exploring alternative options with neighbouring countries Kenya and Uganda to export its energy resources. These include a proposal for a new oil pipeline to Kenya (although this is not thought to be viable as it would need to go uphill and would be very costly) and a possible rail link going through Uganda and on to Kenya. China has expressed reservations about the cost-effectiveness of the proposed routes. But there is speculation that Russia may be interested in investing in the largely untapped gas resources that the country holds. Experts agree that there is also considerable scope to increase oil production in South Sudan.

The next few months will be busy as final arrangements are completed for the arrival of Africa's newest country. The Geo Trade Blog will continue to follow events in Khartoum and in South Sudan.

The Power Vacuum left from the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1922 - almost 100 years later

 

Map of Ottoman Empire - at its greatest extension it included

Turkey, Egypt, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Macedonia, Hungary, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria,

parts of Arabia and much of the coastal strip of North Africa

The Ottoman Empire (1301-1922) was the one of the largest and longest lasting empires in history. It was an empire inspired and sustained by Islam, and Islamic institutions. It replaced the Byzantine Empire as the major power in the Eastern Mediterranean. The Ottoman Empire reached its height under Suleiman the Magnificent (reigned 1520-66), when it expanded to cover the Balkans and Hungary, and reached the gates of Vienna.

When the Ottoman Empire eventually fell in 1922, it left behind, predictably, an immense power vacuum. But less expected is that close to a 100 years later in the 21^st century, we are still feeling the effects of an ongoing power vacuum re-adjustment process.

The ongoing power vacuum is illustrated by the sheer number of major conflicts in recent decades that have broken out within the confines of the former Ottoman Empire geographical area. The Balkan wars in Bosnia/Serbia and Kosovo in the 1990s, Algerian civil war 1991-2002, the war for Kuwait in 1990 -1991, the invasion of Iraq from 2003, the second Palestinian intifida 2000-2005, the Lebanon war in 2006, the Gaza war in 2009, and most recently the Tunisian uprisings at the end of 2010 leading to the ousting of President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in January 2010. Followed closely by the Egyptian uprisings that also ousted President Hosni Mubarak, in Feburay 2011. Uprisings have spread across the Middle East and North Africa countries to Algeria, Libya (on the brink of civil war), Yemen, Jordan, Bahrain, Oman, Iraq and to a lesser degree Saudi Arabia in February and March 2011.

November 2011 Update

Since publishing this post in March 2011, the countries occupying the territory of the old Ottoman empire have begun to look even shakier. On the one hand, the UN Security Council approved Resolution 1973, applying for the first time, the new UN concept "responsability to protect" within the UN Human Security Framework prevailing over national sovereignty has been enacted. This led to the NATO-led campaign which saw Muammar Gadaffi unseated and later killed. The NATO campaign officially ended on 31 October 2011. On the other hand, Tunisia has recently celebrated its first free elections with an Islamist party winning around 40pc of the vote. Egypt is soon to celebrate its first free elections with the Islamist parties expected to do well there too. Finally, Syria has become a bloodbath with its Leader, Mr Assad refusing to leave power.

Meanwhile Turkey's Prime Minister Erdogan, after his election victory in June 2011, has begun to implement a new "activist" foreign policy, which has prompted some commentators to proclaim "that the Ottoman's are coming back". Turkey was caught unprepared for the Arab Spring. Moreover the Western Balkan countries, who are mostly actively seeking EU Membership -Bosnia, Serbia, Kosovo, Albania and Macedonia- have also begun to hedge their bets with a modern Turkey awash with cash ready to invest in major new airports and other big infrastructure projects on their soil. In the words of the Turkish Foreign Minister, a new "Golden Age" of the Balkans with Turkey at the head is getting underway. The power vacuum appears to be no further resolved after the Arab Spring developments.

Why did the Ottoman Empire maintain power for so long

There were many reasons why the Ottoman Empire was so successful. It was highly centralised, power was always transferred to a single person, and not split between rival princes. This meant the Ottoman Empire was successfully ruled by a single family for 7 centuries. Religion was incorporated in the state structure, and the Sultan was regarded as "the protector of Islam".  It was highly pragmatic, taking the best ideas from other cultures and making them their own. It had a very strong military base with a slave-based army, good expertise in developing gunpowder as a military tool and a strong military ethos pervaded the whole administration.

Constantinople which had been at the heart of the Byzantine Empire, was conquered in 1453 by the Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II. It was made the capital of the Ottoman Empire and renamed, Istanbul – the 'city of Islam'. Istanbul became not only a political and military capital, but because of its position at the junction of Europe, Africa, and Asia, one of the great trade centres of the world.

Since the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1922 – why is there still such a vacuum of power

Perhaps the answer to this question lies in the fact that what in the 21^st century we call “the Arab world” is a big and amorphous thing, and arguably not one thing at all. It is more likely a collection of different ethnicities, with confessional and sectarian differences that did not matter when they formed part of a greater empire. This is equally true of the Balkans which contained many different fragments.

The Economist in a recent article described the political instability of the Arab world as being connected to further problem: the missing glue of nationhood.

“Many years ago an Egyptian diplomat, Tahsin Bashir, called the new Arab states of the Middle East “tribes with flags” (though he exempted Egypt). His point still holds. In countries as different as Lebanon and Iraq, ethnic, confessional or sectarian differences have thwarted programmes of nation-building. That is why Iraq fell apart into Sunni, Shia and Kurdish fragments after the removal of Saddam despite decades of patriotic indoctrination. Syria could follow suit if the minority Alawi sect of the ruling Assad family were somehow to lose control of this largely Sunni country. Sudan has seen not one but two civil wars between its Arab-dominated centre and the non-Arab minorities in its south and west.”

Until the question of how to re-structure the old Ottoman Empire geographical region is resolved, an ongoing battle for power looks likely to continue in the foreseeable future. Perhaps we might have seen an earlier resolution and re-ordering to reduce the power vacuum if the region had not been home to around 75 per cent of the world's oil resources which powers the modern world. This has inevitably led to greater intervention from world powers to guarantee a vital strategic resource for their peoples and has not made it any easier for the re-ordering process to take place within this context.

China's new Iron Silk Road – High-Speed Rail across Asia and Europe by 2025

Map of Ancient Silk Road

Less than two years after China's first high-speed railway went into operation, China plans to construct a high-speed railway system that will travel across Asia and Europe by 2025. The project will involve 17 nations.

China’s new rail network is a 21st-century, high-tech marvel. Its forerunners go back to the 18th century, when the British consolidated their imperial power with railways in India. Russia followed suit as its own empire grew, completing the Trans-Caspian railway from Turkmenistan to the Caspian port Krasnovodsk in 1889, and the Trans-Aral Railway from Central Asia through Kazakhstan to the Russian heartland. Indeed, China’s network is the first transcontinental project in Asia since Russia finished the Trans-Siberian Railway, from European Russia to Vladivostok, in 1916. The difference in the China project is that it is more extensive than all those projects put together.

China's new Iron Silk Road, High-Speed Rail Network

Southern route - Kunming in Yunnan Province, Southwest China and runs south, as far as Singapore passing through Myanmar, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia.

Western route - Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in northwest China with Germany passing through Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Pakistan, Iran and Turkey

Northern route - City of Heilongjiang in northern China with South-Eastern Europe through Russia

Even by Chinese standards, the plans seem mind-boggling. The first long-distance line inside China, linking inland Wuhan to coastal Guangzhou, opened in December 2010, hitting top speeds of 350kph, faster than the speediest trains of Europe or Japan. Beijing hopes to have 800 bullet trains running across China by 2013 and, soon after that, across the border. Two networks will connect China to Europe—with terminuses in London and Berlin—and a third will link to Vietnam, Thailand, Burma, Malaysia, and Singapore. Chinese engineers have begun work in Burma, and Beijing says Central and Eastern European countries are keen for the building to start. The planned rail deals will vastly improve China’s ability to transport crucial energy resources from suppliers in developing countries.

China will obtain major benefits from this ground-breaking project, which will carry mostly cargo transportation. The second route will serve as a new "Silk Road" for China's western regions. It will bring tremendous trade opportunities and wealth to under-developed Central Asia which has been outside the global economy for centuries. It will enable China to tap into opportunities and resources from the resource-rich Central Asian region reducing dependence on other overseas suppliers. It would also provide a direct route for natural resources especially oil and gas, from Myanmar, Iran and Russia.

Nations along the three planned routes are being offered all kinds of lures to agree to the high-speed lines. Cash-poor Burma's high-speed rail network is being built in exchange for raw materials for export to China, such as lithium. Central Asian economies that pump gas and oil to China are also being given financial assistance. So China might just be able to pull it off.

The new Iron Silk Road would also provide China with direct access to Middle East and Eastern Europe without using the sea lanes. This would mean that China could depend less on the narrow and congested Malacca Straits and the Indian Ocean and South China Sea. It would also mean that China would not come up against competition with the US who controls and guarantees security of the sea lane trade routes in Asia.

There are still many challenges to overcome such as discrepancies in track gauge, line direction and expense allocations are under discussion with the related countries.

However it seems that boarding a High-Speed Train in Beijing and arriving in London 2 days later may yet become a reality in 2025.

Trains of up to 1000km per hour within 10-15 years

China has already developed high speed trains to a remarkable speed of 350 km per hour. It has the fastest high speed train network in the world. But China is continuing to experiment with High-Speed Train velocity and its aim is to deliver trains with speeds of 500 km per hour in less than 5 years time (2015).

Engineers and scientists are continually working to develop even faster trains with speeds of up to 1,000 km per hour that would be operational in 10 -15 years time. If that happens, China will revolutionize the whole transport industry.

With trains travelling at such speeds new innovations for boarding and alighting will also be necessary as suggested in the video above.

Space Air Travel – the new frontier. If NZ and Australia were only 2 hours away



Virgin Galactic SpaceShip Two craft

The history of spaceflight is short and until recently, largely uninnovative. Nazi scientist Wernher von Braun helped develop the basic technology, which involved using large amounts of liquid fuel to push large weights to escape velocity. This technique lasted throughout the cold war and beyond.

Today, Virgin Galactic is trying to buck the trend. Its SpaceShip Two craft, designed by Scaled Composites, is essentially a glider with a rocket attached. Carried aloft by a subsonic aircraft, it is launched in the air and then the rocket carries it to 109km (just over the 'Karman Line' which delineates suborbital flight from atmospheric flight). Then it glides back to earth, completing the three-hour mission.

But perhaps the real story here is the potential to apply this technology to inter-continental space travel around the Earth. Experts say that by travelling into near-Earth orbit, the length of inter-continental flights could be cut dramatically, so a flight from London to Sydney could last just two hours.

Imagine what it would mean if the Asia Pacific region were to be within commuting distance for passenger travel to Europe, US, Latin American and Africa. It would dramatically change the notion of time and space in such a way that we have not known since the invention of telegraph technology that modernised the world in the 19^th century by breaching time and space.

Inter-continental space travel would bring the world geographically closer and would eliminate the distance barrier for the world's most isolated countries like New Zealand. In elapsed time travelling New Zealand would be as close to London as Northern European countries. It would bring continents together.

For the first time we are closer than ever to this becoming a reality in the 21^st century.

What has happened so far

The construction of the World's first facility for commercial space travel in the Rio Grande valley of New Mexico is nearing completion. Spaceport America is the first of its kind in the world. Virgin Galactic has signed up to be the anchor tenant for 20 years and has dedicated hundreds of millions of US dollars to developing the technology.

The inauguration of the world's first spaceway (that is runway for space air travel) at the world's first commercial built spaceport was held in Autumn last year.



Spaceport America - the world's first Spaceport for commercial
space travel

Virgin Galactic's Sir Richard Branson said at the event “...the last few weeks have been some of the most exciting in Virgin Galactic’s development. Our spaceship is flying beautifully and will soon be making powered flights, propelled by our new hybrid rocket motor, which is also making excellent progress in its own test program...we are seeing unprecedented numbers of people coming forward to secure their reservations for this incredible experience.”

It is still unclear when Virgin Galactic will make it's first flight into space but the Geo Trade blog will continue to monitor progress on the first space flights closely and will keep you updated on all developments on near-Earth orbit inter-continental flights.

Photos Source: Courtesy of the Virgin Galactic website