I don't think Clinton 'gave' China anything. Loral is supposed to be the one that sold the info.

To punish China for Tinnaman Square the US instituted a trade enbargo that was in force unless the President signed a waiver. US companies needing to get communication satalites up needed China as there were too many for the US to launch, so Clinton signed a waiver.

Then a Chinise rocket blew up and destroyed a $200,000,000 comm sat.

The Chinise had a 'staging' problem; when the first stage ended the second would either fire early or late. Loral had the solution and asked for a waiver to sell the 'necessary' solutions to China.

Clinton got two sets of advice: State said do it in order to build on relationships started under the first Bush, and the military said don't as it might help the Chinise with their ICBM's.

Clinton signed the waiver and more US companies got their satalites up.

As I recall a special prosocutor looked into this and found no wrong doing on Clinton's part, but I don't remember if a full scale investigation was undertaken.

This waiver and Loral's sale saved American companies hundreds of millions in cost to get their comm sats up. Still, you have to wonder if it was that smart a thing to do.

Pooka