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Lockheed's reasoning as to why they should set the parameters
regarding what should be developed, when and in what order is simple; if today’s fourth generation jet fighter
is the best there is, then surely a fifth generation jet fighter is
bound to be better,
right? And we should be building it, right? So let's get
started now, before it's needed.
Why now? Because without developing something to replace
what already exists, how are military
aircraft manufacturers like Lockheed going to make money?
“The exact characteristics of fifth-generation jet fighters are controversial
and vague, with Lockheed Martin defining them as having all-aspect stealth even
when armed, low probability of intercept radar (LPIR),
high-performance airframes, advanced avionics features, and highly integrated
computer systems capable of networking with other elements within the
battlespace for situation awareness.”Wikipedia
Reference
Why is Lockheed making this decision instead of the U.S. Air Force? Because if
they, Lockheed, get to decide what to develop, then they get to focus on those
things that are the most profitable for them.
The same is true when it comes to military communication systems.
The collusion and corruption is palpable. Despite our government’s best efforts to specify those technology areas that it
wants to see development take place in, technology companies and manufacturers
are fighting the idea of letting the US military, or our government, make the
strategic innovation leadership decisions that are needed in order to push the
envelope in military technology and national security forward.
Does this trouble you? Then sit down while you read this, because reports are
now beginning to circulate that say that the real reason corporate America isn't
interested in, as an example, letting the DoD
determine the prioritization of product and program development in advanced
technology areas, is that by doing so they could find themselves precluded from
using the data they develop on these projects later on,
when they do business with China. More to the point, they might even find
themselves barred from doing
business with China at all, because of their knowledge of the results of the
advanced research they did on behalf of the DoD. This kind of knowledge, plus
knowledge of how the U.S. military might apply the technology being acquired, as
well as its impact on U.S. military readiness, could easily cause a U.S.
manufacturer or developer to be prohibited from selling its products to China. And since for companies like this
profitability
comes before national defense, it is better to simply avoid such entanglements
than lose money because of them. Simply put, the profits to be made from working
with China are much more important to American businesses than losing access to
that market because of U.S. government regulations.
You already see this kind of thinking in the data and software application
development arenas. Does it also exist in the military aircraft industry? How
about military communication, of the kind that can be used both in the military
and civilian world? Like quantum communication systems?
Search though you may, you will be hard pressed to find an American company
saying things like this in public. Of course they wouldn't. In public they would
simply explain away their desire not to do business with the U.S. government and
DoD by saying that the Pentagon's procurement system is much too complicated.
So there you have it: those who need most to
drive strategic decisions on national defense issues, like the U.S. Army Signal
Corps when it comes to communication, have effectively been shut out of the
system, and
relegated to the past. The DoD and Washington itself can’t control these kinds of issues, so
how is an American Army branch like the Signal Corps ever going to do it? The
result is that for all practical purposes no
one is driving the quest to build a better, more effective, more secure, more reliable
form of
cyber communication… military or otherwise.
But that’s not the case in China. In China’s case the military’s
Quantum Space Satellite branch is driving the equation; and they intend to prove their case,
to the world, that they have developed a new quantum level means to communicate, this July. At that time they will launch the satellite they have
built and put it into orbit. Once operational it will complete China's growing
quantum communications network, which includes a 2,000-kilometer-long quantum
driven glass fiber optic network between Beijing and Shanghai.
Success for
Chinese cyber-spies stealing secrets relating to the US military’s F-35 stealth
jet, the building of a Chinese clone of this warplane, China’s hi-tech military
advancements such as their development of the world’s fastest supercomputer
based on stolen technology, a hypersonic weapons program, world leading armed
ground robotics, and now this soon-to-launch unhackable quantum communications
satellite… it all makes one wonder – where the hell are our leaders, and why the
hell has the Signal Corps devolved from being strategic thinkers and leaders
into an ineffective branch of tactical pawns doing the bidding of the civilian
companies that train them?
Maybe it’s time for the U. S.
Army Signal Corps to go back to its roots, and find people with scrambled eggs
on their visors who understand that America needs communication leadership, and that
they—the leaders of the U. S. Army Signal Corps—need to define the communication
road that our military and country should be following,
instead of just following the road laid out by those that determine their
retirement benefits.
Editor's Note: Be sure to read the Update to this
story at the bottom of this page.
Background Material
Most military cryptography is
based on the use of an encryption key (such as a numbers pad), which, when
applied to an encryption algorithm, can be used to decrypt or encrypt a message.
Quantum cryptography draws its strength from its ability to create secure
methods of encryption. It depends on the quantum level particles that make up
our universe, objects which are inherently both unstable and uncertain things,
which in turn seem able to simultaneously exist in more than one place, as well
as more than one state of being.
Unique to quantum particles, they hold a
property that allows them to choose what state they are in and how they will
behave, based on who, how and what bumps into them. This trait also exists
whenever something tries to measure a quantum particle’s properties. Quantum
cryptography draws its strength from this weirdness, especially as it applies to
something called Quantum Entanglement.
Quantum Entanglement is the act of fusing
two or more particles into complementary “quantum states,” which in effect
allow the state of a set of quantum particles to form an encryption key that
can be used to encrypt a message. Quantum Entanglement thus forms the basis of a
“quantum key.” What makes quantum keys unbreakable is the fact that attempts to
read them, as alluded to earlier, will cause the quantum state they exist in to
collapse, thus making the message unreadable as well as revealing to the
originating party the attempt to break the code.
Quantum encryption takes
advantage of this feature, using it to detect would-be eavesdroppers, as well as
protecting the message itself from being decrypted. Further to this, the
complexity of quantum mechanics itself makes it virtually impossible to reverse
engineer a quantum key generated through Quantum Entanglement.
Quantum keys are
thus theoretically impossible to crack by even quantum computing.
Notwithstanding all of this, it is important to note that even quantum secured
communication is not perfectly secure. Quantum secured communication, like other
forms of encryption, is vulnerable to denial of service attacks, physically
tampering with the quantum communications device, as well as the most basic of
all security failures: human failures in operational security and/or the
impersonation of the sender. For a more scientific view of this topic, please
download the PDF document on quantum communications via satellite. Click this
icon to do so:
More Background Material
Quantum
information technology has become a reality: quantum cryptography. This
ultra-secure way of sending messages is based on the fundamental postulate that
measuring a quantum state will alter it. Thus, if we encode messages in
individual quantum states, such as the phase of photons whizzing down an optical
fiber, an eavesdropper who tries to intercept the message cannot avoid changing
it. We can therefore test if the message has been read before it reaches the
intended recipient—something that is impossible using classical signals.
In quantum communications, the objective is to send information using single
photons or pairs of photons, which are encoded in specific quantum states along
the classical optical fiber network. A given quantum state, called a qubit
(quantum bit of information corresponding to the classical 0 and 1), can be
encoded on a single photon, for example by using the polarization of the photon,
or by using a pair of entangled photons, or by still more complex schemes
allowing to teleport a quantum state from one location to the other.
The emerging field of quantum communication will rely on the same fibres and
thus wavelengths used in "Classical Telecom". However the classical laser pulses
will be replaced by single photons. Therefore, the future of Quantum
Communication will strongly depend on the availability of efficient, low-noise
single photon detectors at telecom wavelengths.
While you are boning up on this topic, enjoy this video too...
Length: 00:04:46
Update – 1 September 2016
Well, the Chinese are certainly not sitting on their laurels. As we predicted,
this month (August 2016) China launched a Quantum Satellite in a bid to create a
platform able to provide truly secure military communications. This is a major
step in China's effort to not only be at the forefront of quantum research, but
also create a completely new, secure method of transmitting information.
Using this satellite platform, Chinese researchers hope to be able to beam
communications from space to earth via the use of quantum
entanglement. As we said in our article above, quantum entanglement employs
photons, or particles of light, where the actions of one photon are reflected in
the other, regardless of the distance between them. If a workable system can be
developed to control this process, this method of communication could prove to be the
most secure in the world, completely invulnerable to hacking.
Scientists and security
experts in many countries are studying the technology, but not here in the U.S.
Worse, our military doesn't seem to be even aware of this new form of
communication. With all of the hacks that are going on, including hacks of both
data and software applications from the NSA, one would think this would be a
high priority.
The Chinese satellite is expected to circle the earth every 90 minutes after
entering orbit at an altitude of about 310 miles. With most of China's efforts
being run by the equivalent of the Chinese military Signal Corps, China’s many high-tech scientific
endeavors, including its ambitious
space program, have enormous backing from the central government.
As an example, the country’s 13th five-year economic plan, just announced in
March, listed quantum technology as a focal point for research and development.
Yet again, America doesn't even seem to know this form of communication exists,
let alone our military (groups from Canada, Japan, Italy and Singapore are also
conducting quantum space experiments).
For novice readers of our website, traditional communications satellites send signals using radio waves.
A
quantum communication satellite however uses a crystal that produces a pair of entangled
photons whose properties remain entwined even as one is transmitted over a
large distance. Messages can be sent by manipulating these properties. As
important, when it comes to trying to hack into a quantum communication link any tinkering with
the corresponding quantum state of the communications
would be detectable, which is why the method is secure. At its most basic form
then, two parties can
communicate secretly, safe in the knowledge that any eavesdropping attempt would
be immediately known and could be prevented.
For a good yet very simple explanation of how all of the science behind quantum
entanglement works, read this article by the online website Quartz.
Watch the video below from the New York Times for a 30 second summary of the
Chinese satellite's mission:
00:00:39
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