the ride, page-24

Forged,

Currently China is still considered to be a hostile nation to us as regards technology and weaponry. Have a look at the Government stopping Huawei from any involvement with the NBN. Also the current level of attempted and real hacking into Australia's, and the rest of the West's, defence networks. Starbucks, Rolls Royce and Rolex are not considered items that can be used against us in a time of conflict, and yes we are happy to take their money as they are happy to take ours. Their uptake of capitalism is still tempered by the fact that it is a military based Communist regime. They have a contradictory position in that they love western products but have no love of the west.

Yes they have a lot of nukes etc which they have developed under their own accord with no assistance from the West. While they obviously have the capacity and numbers to create all forms of weapons etc the West is openly not providing any assistance to them to develop these weapons.

One of the biggest problems we have is that the Chinese have little or no respect for international patents and patent laws, so there is little that can be done in stopping them from duplicating companies such as Metal Storms technology, why buy it when you can steal it. Any sale by the liquidator of this technology would need security clearance. This is of course why MOD reported it to the Government at the time of the reported approach. However,given that there was little or no interest in the IP (as a going concern) some six months ago one has to expect that the same will happen now and that the patents that are near to expiry will expire and the others the same over time.