Missile pioneer left his mark on both sides of the Pacific

In a comment that epitomised the late Qian Xuesen's value to both China and the United States, former US secretary of the navy Dan Kimball apparently opposed the Chinese scientist's return to his homeland, fearing he might know too much about missile technology.

'I'd rather shoot him dead than let him leave America. Wherever he goes, he equals five divisions,' Kimball reportedly said.

The communist scare of the 1950s, led by US senator Joseph McCarthy, was responsible for Qian's return to China in 1955.

On the mainland, it was hailed as a patriotic act. Kimball lamented that it was 'the stupidest thing' the United States ever did.

Qian, also known as Tsien Hsueshen, died on Saturday at the age of 98 in Beijing. He is known on the mainland as the father of China's space and missile programmes. He steered the country into launching intercontinental ballistic missiles, the Silkworm anti-ship missiles, weather and reconnaissance satellites as well as the manned space programme.

Qian was purged by the US for an alleged link to the Communist Party in the 1950s and eventually allowed to return to China after a tricky diplomatic trade-off. Kimball was quoted by Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine as saying: 'He was no more a communist than I was, and we forced him to go.'

Kimball's fears were substantiated by China's launch of the manned Shenzhou V space mission in October 2003, of which Qian helped lay the foundations, catapulting China into the same league as the United States and Russia.