The competition between China and the United States in science and technology has always been a topic that the American media is tired of, and recently they have been eyeing the progress of the construction of the timing system of the two countries.
"The United States and China are waging a new race in space and on Earth for a fundamental resource: time. But the United States is losing out on this race. The New York Times published an article on March 27 saying that navigation satellite timing signals have become the foundation of the global economy, but with the increasing threat to satellites, the United States' over-reliance on satellite timing is at risk. In this field where the United States is lagging behind, China is building the world's largest, most advanced and most accurate timing system, not only building backup signal sources in space, but also focusing on building a long-distance time signal transmission system on the ground, so that some American insiders sighed: What we Americans say to do, the Chinese have done.
Beijing Time Monitoring System of the National Time Service Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (taken on February 7, 2022). Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Zhang Bowen
"GPS in the United States, Beidou in China, Galileo in Europe, and GLONASSS in Russia are all important sources of time, and time is the cornerstone of most navigation methods. The New York Times writes that a world without satellite signals is a near-blind world, and that satellites that provide GPS are like clocks in space, and their signals have become the basis of the global economy, essential for telecommunications, emergency phone services and financial transactions, as well as for drivers and lost pedestrians.
"But with the rapid militarization of space and the intrusion of satellite signals on Earth, satellite positioning services are becoming more and more vulnerable. The article then stirred up the topic of space threats, saying that several major powers in the world have developed technologies to jam space signals, and that China, the United States, Russia, and India have all tested anti-satellite weapons -- "Russia may deploy nuclear weapons in space" and "one of China's satellites has a robotic arm that can destroy or move other satellites." Under such circumstances, retired US generals once called satellites "fat and juicy" targets.
In fact, this argument is not new. In January of this year, the U.S. Space Force released a space competition assessment report that said that China and Russia are testing and developing anti-satellite weapons to deny, destroy or destroy satellites and space services. In this regard, the spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry stressed that the United States has been repeatedly hyping up the "theory of China's outer space threat" for a long time and slandering and smearing China, but it is just looking for an excuse to expand its outer air power and maintain military hegemony.
In the opinion of the New York Times, the United States is in danger in the face of the above "threats".
According to the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, some of the most critical civilian system designs are based on the erroneous assumption that satellite signals are always there. This dependence can have extremely serious consequences. A recent report from the United Kingdom showed that a one-week outage of all satellite signals would cost the British economy nearly $9.7 billion. An earlier report estimated that the U.S. economy was losing $1 billion a day — and that was just five years ago.
The National Timing Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences receives satellite timing signals through ground signal receiving antennas/Xi'an Daily
Unlike China, the United States has no satellite positioning alternatives for civilians once existing GPS satellite signals are destroyed in space or on land, the article says. Despite being aware of these risks, the United States is still years away from having a reliable alternative to civilian time sources and navigation systems.
The Obama administration proposed a plan in 2010 that experts had hoped would create a satellite backup system, but the plan never materialized. Ten years later, former President Trump said in an executive order he issued that jamming or manipulating satellite signals poses a threat to national security. But he did not propose alternatives, nor did he provide funds for the protection of infrastructure.
The Biden administration is bidding private companies to come up with technological solutions, but widespread adoption of these technologies could take years.
In January, the U.S. government and several private companies tested an improved version of the Loran system (LORAN for long-range navigation) using the Coast Guard's radio towers, which uses radio towers to transmit long-range time signals, but U.S. companies have no interest in operating the system without government funding, so the Coast Guard intends to dispose of all eight transmission stations.
"It's like oxygen, you won't notice it until it's gone. Thad W. Allen, head of the U.S. National Advisory Council on Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing and a former commander of the Coast Guard, said, "The government is only aware of the problem, but it doesn't address it." ”
"Where the United States is lagging behind, China is making progress in building what they call the world's largest, most advanced, and most accurate timing system. The New York Times noted that China is building hundreds of timing stations on land and laying 20,000 kilometers of fiber optic cables underground, according to Chinese planning documents, state media reports and academic papers. This infrastructure provides timing and navigation services without relying on the Beidou satellite system. China also plans to launch more satellites as backup sources.
In addition, China has retained and upgraded the Roland system, which provides time signals for eastern and central China, and extends coverage to coastal Taiwan and parts of Japan. Construction is underway to expand the system to the west.
"What we Americans say to do, the Chinese have done. Dana Goward, president of the Resilient Navigation and Timing (RNT) Foundation, said, "They are firmly on a path to not relying on space." ”
At 10:49 on May 17, 2023, the mainland successfully launched the 56th Beidou navigation satellite/Visual China with a Long March-3B carrier rocket at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center
According to Xinhua News Agency, on September 10 last year, the Dunhuang Timing Station Project of the mainland's high-precision ground-based timing system started construction in Dunhuang City, Gansu Province. Experts said that this marks a key step for the mainland to promote long-wave timing signals to achieve national soil coverage and improve the safety and reliability of time use in important areas.
As a major national scientific and technological infrastructure, the high-precision ground-based timing system has been included in the "Outline of the 14th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the People's Republic of China and the Long-Range Objectives Through the Year 2035". This system makes use of the existing communication optical fiber resources in the mainland, lays about 300 optical fiber time and frequency transmission nodes, builds a total length of about 20,000 kilometers, connects the country's major cities and key users of the optical fiber time and frequency transmission backbone network, and at the same time adds and builds three enhanced Roland timing stations in the western region to achieve national soil coverage of long-wave timing signals.
According to reports, the enhanced Roland timing station is currently the most reliable ground-based long-wave timing method. By constructing three long-wave timing stations in Korla in Xinjiang, Dunhuang in Gansu and Nagqu in Tibet, the mainland can achieve nationwide coverage of long-wave timing signals by combining with the existing long-wave timing systems. At the same time, through differential technology, the long-wave timing accuracy can be improved to the order of 100 nanoseconds, reaching the international leading level.
"Relying on the construction of a high-precision ground-based timing system, combined with the Beidou satellite navigation timing system and the high-precision time and frequency experiment system of the space station, the mainland will take the lead in building a unique national timing system in the world that is three-dimensionally crossed, mutually reinforcing and integrated with each other. Zhang Shougang, director of the National Time Service Center and chief scientist of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said.
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