China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

[Spartacus]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

"1421 - The Year That China Discovered The World", Gavin Menzies.

That fleet was called back, scuttled, and the ship yards burned because it was out of harmony with China's insular heritage. It was a brief spark which supports my point that this really is unprecedented.

heh ... shows what happens when you draw conclusions after reading 20 pages, and try to recall everything a year later.

Thanks for your observations on the RE.

There really does seem to be a disconnect somewhere.

[konj]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

Yep, a formerly massive migration became a trickle. Was passing through Dubai a couple of weeks ago. It was refreshing to see little traffic at 9:00pm compared to havoc of a couple of years ago. My daughter liked the Dubai Fountain. Asked to stay for a second show (runs every 20 min). The second show had a bit of a glitch and interrupted in the middle. A water bill was not paid on time?

The ever-famous Dubai Mall was a bit crowdy though, all gazillion square feet of it. Noticed that some escalators did not work. The sharks inside the mall aquarium looked impressive too. But then a leak happened a week after...

[touchring]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

"1421 - The Year That China Discovered The World", Gavin Menzies.

That fleet was called back, scuttled, and the ship yards burned because it was out of harmony with China's insular heritage. It was a brief spark which supports my point that this really is unprecedented.

There was such a massive fleet in history, that has traveled to the Middle East, Africa and possibly even to Europe, but to say that it has traveled to the Americas is really a wild speculation to generate the curiosity of American readers.

Firstly, they are a diplomatic fleet - not an exploring fleet. Secondly, they are just traveling along established trade routes that African and Middle Eastern traders had been using for hundreds of years. They probably even had Arab, Persian and Indian traders on their fleet helping with translation and navigation.

Even if they had the capability to across the Pacific or Atlantic, there is no reason to do so.

Having said these, I'm not discounting the possibility that some Chinese explorer (a small fleet) or trader had wondered off to the Americas during that time.

[Rajiv]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

Then there was this conundrum - tomato seeds in a old chinese tomb 2000 year old han dinasty that was opened.

[*T*]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

And another one -- cocaine in the Pharoah's tomb

[Aetius Romulous]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

Gavin Menzies is a retired American submarine commander. He used his knowledge of the oceans to calculate things like drift, winds, and water levels to estimate landing points along the route. He built a pretty substantial case based on the physics of the sea and the dynamic properties of Chinese sailing technology. Fascinating and compelling. An exceptional read.

On a parallel vein and independently, Paul Chiasson has done some basic archeology in Nova Scotia in his book "The Island of Seven Cities", and proposes that the Chinese had left the remains of a fishing community at Cape Bretton I believe. Again, fascinating.

One of the things that is becoming clear to Western historians is that our historiography has been sadly biased for a few generations. Now that bias is eroding and there are all kinds of surprising things that are coming to light, from the work of people like Menzies, Chiasson, and others like Antony Beevor ,who is dropping bomb shells from recently open Soviet records of WWII, through to incredibale archeological discoveries that are rewriting how we view history.

Recently I did piece on one of these sensational finds, "Gobekli Tepe: A subtle Admonition form the Gods" about an incredible set of buildings from the Neolithic era - an era where there were not supposed to be advanced building and social technologies. Really an interesting read.

[blazespinnaker]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

Non starter.

How do you secure 10K worth of track?

Talk about soft targets..

Well, I guess they could throw in a camera every 100 M. Nah.. I just don't see it.

[Aetius Romulous]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

Well, it is a freaking out sized engineering project if true. And underway inside ten years? Yikes.

It is a show stopper.

[touchring]

Re: China to Finance London - New Delhi - Peking High Speed Rail System

Non starter.

How do you secure 10K worth of track?

Talk about soft targets..

Well, I guess they could throw in a camera every 100 M. Nah.. I just don't see it.

how do they protect the 2000km line that goes into tibet?