New Questions About U.S. Intelligence on China

As part of our ongoing research on Chinese military space programs, we analyzed the March 2005 report Challenges to U.S. Space Superiority by the National Air and Space Intelligence Center (NASIC). While this report makes few specific claims about the capabilities of particular countries, it highlights a quote about Chinese anti-satellite development attributed to someone at a Chinese military facility.

By locating the original Chinese-language source of this quote, we found that it does not represent an official or authoritative source. Worse, an examination of the original Chinese shows that the quote is mistranslated in ways that significantly change its meaning.

Our intent is not to assess the issue of whether or not China is developing or fielding ASAT weapons, but to gain insight into the quality of U.S. intelligence on this issue. Our analysis raises questions about the quality of the information on which the Department of Defense relies for its assessments of Chinese military capabilities.