Google reveals China's military secrets

GOOGLE EARTH has shown pictures of what military experts say is China's new nuclear ballistic missile submarine.

Defence experts say that the new class, known as the Jin-class or Type 094, is expected replace the unsuccessful Xia-class (Type 092) which was built in the early 1980s.

The sub is still classified but was snapped by the commercial Quickbird satellite in late 2006. It can be seen on the Google Earth web site. Defence experts are fascinated by the details which they can make out from the satellite picture. They can be read here if you are interested in nuclear submarines.

We wonder if China might want to stick Google on its list of banned sites, or use one of its anti-satellite weapons to knock out every commercial satellite which flies over the country. µ