If that was a guesstimate on frame rate it's likely off.

Regardless of US controls, I can from Australia buy a high quality 50 fps thermal scope with built in 1000m (or ~ 1000 yard) laser range finder from Hangzhou, China.

ie. Why lock the stable at 9 fps when out on the open plain 50 fps is already running free.

The US government obviously has no control over what China sends to Australia, so it this case the cat is out of the bag. However I can assure you the limit is still real for US companies: https://oem.flir.com/support/support-center/knowledge-base/a...

Cheers for the follow-up .. and that's certainly interesting.

Chinese 50 fps thermal cameras and scopes have been about for a while now, they've been supplying the industrial specialist market even longer than the general consumer goods market.

I note the US export control is limited by licence .. which likely means the US high frame rate thermal gear is equally as available in AU as (say) TI DSP chips were when they first iterated that family (ie. restricted by licence but easy to purchase in allied countries if you just sign a form stating you're not supplying them to countries in the Chinese sphere of influence, etc.)

Now that China is also making them I wouldn't be surprised if they drop this. But FLIR has been doing milspec thermal cameras for over 20 years and I think the regulation certainly slowed down proliferation of this equipment in the early days.