China is at the center of the space race 2.0
The country’s latest lunar mission was a major milestone
On Tuesday, the WSJ reported that a lunar capsule carrying the first rock samples from the far side of the Moon had touched down on Earth, marking a significant milestone in space exploration. But, unlike the pioneering missions of the space race of decades past, this cutting-edge endeavor wasn’t masterminded by the US or Russia, but by China.
Space Race 2.0
China's lunar ambitions have been growing steadily since its Chang'e 1 lunar orbit mission in 2007, with NASA data revealing that the country has now made 9 missions to the Moon. But, collecting rocks is just one small step in China’s plans: the country wants to put astronauts on the surface by 2030 and build a base on the lunar south pole, in conjunction with Russia, by 2035.
Meanwhile, after decades focused on the Earth’s orbit and the International Space Station, NASA has rekindled its own lunar ambitions with the Artemis program. Launched in 2017, Artemis has the out-of-this-world aim to "learn how to live and work on another world as we prepare for human missions to Mars". Like China and Russia, America’s plans for a permanent lunar base also center around the strategically important lunar south pole.
The risk, of course, is that this new space race exacerbates the tensions between China and the US. There are legal accords, most notably the Outer Space Treaty, which precludes nations from claiming sovereignty over the Moon. But if your chief economic rival is on the Moon and you’re not, then pieces of paper thousands of miles away could be hard to enforce.
Furthermore, China isn’t the only new country in this space race, with more than 70 countries now boasting a space program. The other difference compared to the 1960s is the new role of private companies: 5 out of the 6 Artemis launches this year are part of NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative, which allows companies to bid on delivering payloads for NASA. America’s most recent mission, for example, saw the Odysseus lander launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.
