OT: Do the French have spy satellites?

Nope, it's the contrary. Well, at least that's what I thought when I saw all the "Liberty fries" talks here and there...

Thing is, maybe the satellites are not available right now. Or maybe they are not as good above sea... Only the military knows.

Or maybe the return of one?

Might just be the French don't have the payload bus for a big enough mirror, but they do have good sats, even private ones:

Steve

OBones wrote in news:4a24bde9$0$15316$ snipped-for-privacy@news.free.fr:

the French,US and Brits could send subs out to listen for the pings of the black boxes,if they haven't already.

they already know the approximate route.

No the USA hate the French more.

I don't know actually. I'm sure they have the capability.

Yes, Sarkosy and Obama want to 'buddy up' together.

Graham

-- due to the hugely increased level of spam please make the obvious adjustment to my email address

Not really, although the French aren't quite so willing to be outright lap-dogs as e.g. the UK.

A lot of people in the UK have the same perception of France, even though the UK's atomic weapons program is entirely dependent upon French uranium (which they probably wouldn't be providing if relations were really as strained as the tabloids often like to pretend).

They have plenty of spy satellites (although nowhere near as many as the US), as well as various scientific earth-observation satellites. It may be that they're interested in a specific capability, e.g. satellites which are particularly suited to looking at the sea bed. Or it may be purely a PR gesture.

Quite ! Maybe no-one stopped to think who made the Statue of Liberty ? What a goof !

They already know the crash site to within a few 10s of km. Debris spotted already.

Graham

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They were right !

Graham

due to the hugely increased level of spam please make the obvious adjustment to my email address

The French actually like Americans quite a lot. They knew that going into Iraq was a dumb idea and said so. The US reached by calling "french fries" "freedom fries". Strangely there was no move at the time to rename german chocolate cake which makes about as much sense.

Yes they do. Like the US, they call them things like weather satellites and science experiments. You can even buy pictures from them. They blur the image and sell them on the open market.

Yes France is quite advanced. They spend more time on things like eating and sleeping and lighting cars on fire than Americans but when they are not doing that, they spend some time on advanced technology.

Is there a Lafayette in your state or a Lafayette St. in your town? Back when this place was getting its start, the french helped out. The founding forepersons were no strangers to France.

" The Ariane 5 rocket is the primary launcher of the ESA. Its maximum estimated payload is 6?10 tons to GTO and up to 21 tons to LEO. "

Graham

-- due to the hugely increased level of spam please make the obvious adjustment to my email address

There was a rogue element that was annoyed when Jacques Chirac's infamous midnight flights and bribes to African members of the UN Security Council back-stabbed our last efforts at diplomacy with Iraq, dividing the world, delighting Saddam, and leaving only military options.[1]

The rest were grateful for an ally's economic interests thrusting us toward/into a possibly unnecessary war.

Cheers, James Arthur ~~~~ [1] e.g.

I for one am forever grateful. They helped when we needed it most. Why, but for the French, today we'd all be speaking...English.

Grins, James Arthur

James Arthur wrote in news:iOeVl.364$ snipped-for-privacy@nwrddc01.gnilink.net:

that would be "the King's English".

Oh that's fine. I'm wishing Pelosi put up more of a fight when Bush convinced Congress to go to war with Iraq though. And this from a recent convert from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party. :D

Likely. Thanks.

Michael

We don't even have a high-speed train yet. :(

There's a Lafayette in the California Bay Area, about 100 miles south of where I am.

That reminds me - during Hurricane Katrina, folks in New Orleans were waving signs saying "Chirac Buy Us Back!"

Michael

Honestly, medias from everywhere are pretty bad, but some are worse.

Hey, are you serious, or is it a joke ?

:-)

Americans do keep on landing at CDG airport (without crashing) French won't shun them, because you just can't shun Americans,

- it would upset them - so they just run screaming.

Seriously, what makes you think that Frenchies don't like Americans ? BTW, do you think that Americans like France, and/or French people ?

Arf arf, that's a good one, unfortunately I guess that France don't have enough money for that !

Serious. I believe we tried (I wasn't born yet, I mean "we" as Americans), discovered it would cost too much, and developed the Boeing 747 instead. French did it as a joint effort with the British, right?

The military has its own supersonic jets, SR-71 to be sure, but we had no public supersonic transport. Hey, we don't even have anything like the TGV here. Amtrak is as good as it gets. :(

Ouch.

I just guessed they (you?) didn't. Lots of folks/coworkers here make fun of the French, and I asked them why. They gave no good reason.

I'd be thrilled to meet and speak with a French person over here. We have French friends in Lyons (a physicist). I even took 4 years of French in high school. Just inquiring what perceptions are over there.

Thanks,

Michael

Yes, the British did the seats, and the French everything else ;-)

I can't believe that.

Well, USA is a large country, so you have many airports, maybe you don't need TGVs ? Sounds quite logical to me.

I was joking - to run screaming would would upset them as well. (joking again, sorry I can't help)

I can't dislike someone I don't know. Can you ?

One thing I can say for sure is that you broadcast all the time an image like "WE are the good guys", taking over the World "to help" - very intrusive, uh ? If I remember well, Douglas Adams said that America is like a teenager with an armed gun ... see the picture ?

On the other hand, you can bet that every country can see the evidence of your power to do things, organization, money, science, (to mention just a few) and all on a large scale.

It's like everywhere, you have to make fun of someone *else* I thought that Americans made fun of every non-Americans ?

As you guessed, I'm French - and I'm not going to apologize ;-) So what do you think of this country and the people there ?

When our media shows us anything French, it's generally French people criticizing us. Certainly never anyone favorable.

Yes, and yes.

Cheers, James Arthur