China Moon Plans Come into Focus

 

It’s been something of an afterthought since the US Apollo program ended in December of 1972, but the Moon is moving into the public spotlight again.

What’s becoming clear is that a new Moon race is well underway, one with plenty of participants but one most pointedly pitting China against the US.

The competition has a different character than it had in the now distant past — it’s become more a long-running endurance race and less the clearly defined sprint it was in the 1960s, when fear of Sputnik tended to unite sentiment in the US.

Today, as opposed parties slot in and out, the ‘where’ and ‘when’ of US space targets are in constant flux, according to a China expert and tech strategy analyst.

“Do we go to Mars or the Moon?” author Dean Cheng asked, as he discussed his “China and the New Moon Race” in a book launch and lecture at the Space Policy Institute in Washington, D.C.

“When you think back over the last five administrations,” he said, “how often have we gone back and forth over what should we focus on?”

In effect, the Moon and Mars have vied as objectives. As Donald J. Trump returns to the White House, the balance between Moon and Mars efforts will be tested anew. This is especially so, since Moon and Mars rocket pioneer Elon Musk appears a constant murmur in Trump’s ear.

Meanwhile, in Cheng’s estimation, Chinese space exploration has a more pointed and profound tenor. That is because it is seen at home as a strategic national priority touching on all aspects of national power — political, diplomatic, cultural, and technological. Cheng emphasized that China’s space strategy is “sustained, systematic, and strategic.”

That’s as the US finds it very difficult to sustain interest in space, said Cheng, who has served as an analyst for the Heritage Foundation and the US Office of Tech Assessment, and participated in a user group associated with the National Space Council.

Set the controls for the Lunar South Pole

Conservative ‘steady as it goes’ China space planning may be moving ahead at an increased rate. Last year, China’s Chang’e 6 mission succeeded in landing on the Moon’s far side and then returning Moon rocks to Earth. An effort to place astronauts on the Moon is clearly afoot.

According to Cheng, the Peoples’ Republic’s recent space white papers show a plan to dominate space technology — particularly that related to communications and logistics — while other announcements disclose a speeded-up Moon station effort.

“All of a sudden, the Chinese came out and said, “we are going to land a Chinese set of astronauts on the moon by 2030,” Cheng said, “and so it’s worth thinking about just why it is that the Chinese have broken their own past mold with the announcement of their current planned lunar landing mission.”

Recent white papers disclose China’s interest in exploring the lunar south pole, a region thought to be rich in potential resources, including water ice and Helium-3.

A better sense of China’s Moon ambition may add new clarity to US space planning that has often bordered on befuddled. Last month, outgoing NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, while announcing significant delays in the US’s Artemis Moon mission, said it was vital “for us to land on the south pole so that we do not cede portions of that lunar south pole to the Chinese.”

[This also appeared on my Medium.com blog.]

Related
Dean Cheng at SPI — Jan 2025

ARTEMIS on hold on NYT — Dec 2024

Defense One on China Space — Jan 2025