"Hey, OP from Germany, why didn't you put a Swastika on there?"

Technically we stole the engineers.

I hate to tell you this but most are now

Just let me have the Schadenfreude. It's the only thing keeping me sane. :P

The formatting on this comment is terrible. Is it because of the app I'm using or just how it is? I use Voyager.

Remember: "If the flag has yellow, he's a fine fellow. If the flag has white, you're in for a fight."

My dad brings this up when China comes up in conversation and I’m always just like “yeah, and..?” Like if we’re so smart why are they the ones with bullet trains and solar panels and not us?

And in the case of AI models it's straight up deranged to act like China is "stealing" from the US because US corporations trained those models on stolen data to begin with

The whole story is fascinating, if more than a little fucked up.

He and his engineering team decided to seek out US troops to surrender to because he didn’t want the Soviets getting their hands on his rocket tech. The US government got him out of the country, forged documents to get him into the US legally, granted him immunity and shielded him from being prosecuted for war crimes and atrocities he was involved in.

yes, and so much more. the americans actually took everything and anything rocket related they could get their hands on, trying to prevent the russians from doing the same.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip

Yep, Saturn IV if I remember correctly

Americans bought out his contract. He died a very rich man.

Yeah didn’t the Chinese invent gunpowder?

p.s. tankies go home

Yeah, fundamentally science and engineering are internationalist collaborative projects.

Oh I don't know. I think America still leads China in school shootings.

China stealing technology is the whole reason why the USA doesn't cooperate with them in space like it does other countries. So it hasn't been that long since China felt like it needed to.

every measurable metric except for Gdp and consumption which isn’t really a win at all.

So much of US GDP is tied up in the FIRE sector anyway. Housing is overinflated. Insurance is overinflated. Tech is crazy overinflated. It's something of a joke to say the US is outrunning China when US businesses are touting triple-digit P/E ratios following decades of low-interest borrowing and bailouts.

And with all the consumer goods prices skyrocketing, you have to wonder how long American excess consumption can even last. $4-6/gal gas isn't going to be any kinder to the US Automotive market today than it was during the Bush Admin.

They never tried to steal any tech, they were given tech by the US government for years in return they were to be the one and only source of cheap consumer goods and then trump 1.0 happened and all that was thrown out the window.

China hates trump for a multitude of reason but this one in particular especially.

You know exactly why and how your tech was ‘stolen’.

I mean, was it even stolen? Most of the Operation Paperclip Nazis got cushy US jobs, extraordinary pay packages, and even seats on the boards of private contracting firms.

How many Nazi multi-millionaires were running around the NATO-block ten years into the Cold War? Allen Dulles loved these guys and took very good care of them.

It was 12 years for us, it's been 250 years for the US

The ones who beat the US at every part of the space race until the moon landing? Those Soviets?

Tbf, they were quite good. Yes, they did take in German scientists and hardware to boost heir rocket program, but they mainly used them to transfer knowledge, and then dumped most of those scientists. And after that, they had indeed several very impressive feats. Like that Venus probe thing. I think that one was one of the best.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_influence_on_Soviet_rocketry

Was that ever in doubt?