Nine American-made satellites have been used in efforts to strengthen Chinese military and police in the South China Sea and against social unrest domestically, going around a US law to effectively prohibit American companies from exporting satellites to China, said the Wall Street Journal.
A tenth satellite is currently under construction by Boeing Co., which would enhance China’s rival, Beidou, to the US Global Positioning System. The US law doesn’t regulate how a satellite’s bandwidth is used once the device is in space, which has allowed China to essentially rent the capacity of US-built satellites it wouldn’t be allowed to buy, a Wall Street Journal investigation found.
“It’s a serious ethical and moral problem as well as a national-security issue,” said Larry Wortzel, a former chairman of the bipartisan US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, a group that advises Congress.
You must log in to post a comment.