What's really happening, Yuri thought suddenly, is they've taken our engineering design and built it. But what if we're just being used somehow, having our brains picked, our expertise stolen? Then what?
He said nothing, though, just listened quietly as the older man continued.
"Also, the new ceramic composite they've come up with for the fuel injection struts was heated to thirty-five hundred degrees Fahrenheit and repeatedly stress-tested. Those data were particularly impressive. You know, the struts have always been the Achilles heel for a scramjet, since the fuel has to be injected directly through them into the combustion chamber. They have to withstand shock waves, and thermal stresses, far beyond anything ever encountered in a conventional engine. Nobody else has ever come up with a material that can do it. Not us, not the Americans, not anybody. But now, their high-temperature materials and liquid air cycle have finally made the scramjet concept a reality. The last roadblock is gone." He looked up, still marveling. "All we or the Americans can do is make engineering drawings of those engines, just pictures."
"I hope you're right. But when we switch over from JP-7 to liquid hydrogen, nobody knows what can happen. It's never been done before."
"Are you really worried?" The old man studied him.
"Damned right I am. Who wouldn't be?" He looked around at the milling Japanese technicians, then lowered his voice. "And I'll tell you something else. There're other things around here worrying me too, maybe even more. Something about this project is starting to feel wrong."
"What do you mean?" Andrei stared.
"I'm beginning to suspect ... I don't know. So far it's just a sense, but—"
"Yuri, let me tell you a hard fact," the elder Androv interjected. "Like it or not, this project is the only chance the Soviet Union has to ever own a vehicle like this."
"That may be true, but if we—"