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At a time when space exploration has become a competition between world powers, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) plans to send an unmanned probe to Mars by 2021, which will be the Arab world's first mission to another planet.
A new UAE Space Agency will be created to coordinate the UAE's growing space technology sector and to supervise the mission. The mission will be led by Emiratis and will expand the nation's human capital through knowledge transfer from international partners, as well as increasing human knowledge about space exploration and distant planets.
"The UAE Mars probe represents the Islamic world's entry into the era of space exploration. We will prove that we are capable of delivering new scientific contributions to humanity," UAE President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan said in a statement Wednesday.
Do you think this is likely? I do not know of any country which was able to launch such missions in only 7 years.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday July 17 2014, @03:38PM
You don't need to get to the moon to prove that. Just have John Glenn kick a nuke out the door during one of his 3 orbits and you can save the next 7 years' worth of effort and money.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"