In Outer Space We Trust.(China's space program)

Before space-shuttle launches were suspended early this year, even the most routine missions would attract diehard fans, who gathered along Route 1 in Titusville, Florida, in the wee hours to peer over the water at Cape Canaveral. Last week China, the world's most populous country, put on a show more exciting than anything NASA has in decades, and yet only a handful of ordinary tourists came to witness the historic launch. It wasn't for lack of enthusiasm; being a space groupie in China isn't easy. The launchpad in Space City is in the middle of nowhere. To get there, you first fly to Yinchuan City and then drive 11 hours through the Gobi Desert and a gantlet of military checkpoints. The 20,000 or so people who showed up were VIPs, soldiers, scientists, official media, security officials and, of course, the ground crew of technicians and engineers. Most of the onlookers sitting outside on carefully arranged stools in the early morning of Wednesday, Oct. 15, were in military uniform.

For 21 hours the world's eyes were on China--specifically on Yang Liwei, the 38-year-old former MiG pilot whose 600,000- kilometer voyage won him the adulation of millions of Chinese citizens. But China's moment in the limelight really belonged to its engineers--not just the ones who managed the nuts and bolts of the launch itself, but the ones who run the country. Their ranks include China's new President Hu Jintao, a hydroelectric engineer who graduated from prestigious Tsinghua University--China's MIT--and six of nine people on the powerful Politiburo Standing Committee. They are joined by electrical engineer Jiang Zemin, who as president kick-started the manned space program 11 years ago. For decades, China's leaders have maintained an unwavering faith in the power of technology to propel the country beyond its myriad problems. For them, putting a man in space was the climax of decades of progress and a defining moment of China's communist leadership.

In a country rife with urgent problems, from AIDS to a widening gap between rich and poor, a manned space program would seem to be an unnecessary indulgence--a vanity program for China's leaders and a massive public-relations ploy to improve China's image abroad. Remarkably, Beijing seems to be motivated by more than the symbolic and military payoffs. China's leaders have long insisted that space research holds the key to practical benefits that can spread throughout Chinese society. They claim it will hold back expanding deserts, save endangered species and improve the lot of hardscrabble farmers.

Last week's brief Shenzhou V flight carried a symbolic cargo of seeds-- tea from Taiwan, of all places. But earlier unmanned launches carried aloft seeds and seedlings from grapes, orchids, American plums, garden vegetables and dozens of other plants. Chinese scientists say that micro-gravity, Earth's magnetic fields and cosmic rays unfiltered by the atmosphere trigger big changes in plants--some grow bigger, hardier or faster, and others contain more nutrients. They claim to have grown football-size eggplants, monster tomatoes and meter-long cucumbers. "Our tomatoes have 20 percent more vitamins than normal ones," says Tong Yichao, head of the Great Eagle Green Life Food Co. "We're using the space environment to [help] solve problems on Earth, especially the plight of poor Chinese farmers." Tong says he's bred ...