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PLA scientists propose a plan to destroy US carrier groups from 3,000km away
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Mentor showed the way to a wannabe actor

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Over the years, John Woo has redefined the way the world sees action movies and his style has been copied by everyone from Quentin Tarantino (Reservoir Dogs) to Ridley Scott (Gladiator). But it so easily could never have been.

Woo says Chang Cheh (right), the Hong Kong film industry legend who died on Friday, was the man who steered him in the right direction. 'When I was about 20 ... 21 years old and I was working for him, I was a hippie,' Woo explains. 'I had long hair and I loved the whole kind of art scene, I was really artistic. Like a lot of young people I had no real future, I didn't know what I wanted to do, which way I should go. I was worried and a bit lost. But I had never dreamed of being a film director; I thought I would be an actor.

'Chang was working on a new project and he needed a third lead behind David Chiang and Ti Lung.

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PLA scientists propose a plan to destroy US carrier groups from 3,000km away

China’s military proposes a strategy to attack out-of-reach American military assets as distance becomes a shield

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Aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71) moored pier side at Naval Base Guam in Micronesia. The US military has quietly pulled its most precious military assets away from Asian coasts, beyond the reach of most conventional missiles. Photo: US Navy/AFP
Stephen Chenin Beijing
As the United States quietly pulls its most precious military assets away from the coasts of Asia, they are falling back to places like Guam in Micronesia, a US island territory far beyond the reach of most conventional missiles.
It sounds like a retreat but for the Chinese military it is actually a much trickier problem. In modern warfare, distance can become a shield and dispersion a weapon.

This is the puzzle a team of Chinese defence scientists has been solving. Their answer, published openly in a peer‑reviewed journal, offers a step‑by‑step guide on how to destroy a US carrier group from 3,000km (1,865 miles) away, precisely the distance from Shanghai to Guam.

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Chinese team flags life-threatening ‘glaring weakness’ in Nasa’s Artemis programme

Researchers say China’s lunar lander has three backup engines, unlike US design which relies on one main power source

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A Chinese team has flagged a “glaring weakness” in Nasa’s Artemis programme which could be life threatening. Photo: Reuters
Stephen Chenin Beijing
In the 21st century race to the moon, there is a question that engineers must ask: what happens when the main engine fails?

China and the United States are answering this in contrasting ways. Their answers could reveal the value they place on human life.

From the Apollo Lunar Module in the 1960s to Nasa’s new Orion spacecraft for the Artemis programme, the American architecture relies on a single, powerful main engine to do the heavy lifting.

On the descent stage, one main engine controls the entire fall from lunar orbit to the surface. On the ascent stage, one main engine is the only ticket home.

If that one engine fails, there is no backup. This design, to quote a peer-reviewed paper published in the journal Chinese Space Science and Technology in March, “contains some glaring weaknesses”.

The Chinese lunar lander puts its faith not in one main engine, but in four.
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