China and Russia have agreed to jointly build a research station on or around the moon, which will set the stage for a new space race.
The United States and the Soviet Union, followed by its successor state, Russia, have long dominated space exploration, placing the first astronauts in space and on the moon, and later collaborating on the International Space Station, which has been in orbit for two decades.
The joint announcement by China and Russia on Tuesday has the potential to confuse the geopolitics of space exploration and once again set competitive programs and targets for the scientific and possibly commercial exploitation of the moon. This time, however, the United States and China will be the main players, with Russia as a supporting player.
In recent years, China has made great strides in space exploration, by placing its own astronauts in orbit and sending probes to the moon and to Mars. It has effectively positioned Russia as a partner in missions it has already planned, surpassing a Russian program that has stalled in recent years.
In December, China’s Chang’e-5 mission returned lunar surface samples displayed with great fanfare in Beijing. It was China only the third nation, after the United States and the Soviet Union, to achieve the feat. In the coming months, a lander and rover is expected to be sent to the Martian surface, hard on the heels of NASA’s Perseverance, which arrived there last month.
The two countries did not set out their joint projects or set a timeline. According to a statement from the China National Space Administration, they agreed to use their accumulated experience in space science research and development and the use of space equipment and space technology to compile a route map for the construction of an international lunar science research station. . ”
A memorandum of understanding signed Tuesday in a video conference by Zhang Kejian, head of the Chinese space program, and his Russian counterpart, Dmitri O. Rogozin, referred to the Chang’e-7 mission, a Chinese investigation which is expected to be launched. to the moon’s southern pole in 2024. China’s lunar sins are named after a moon goddess of classical Chinese mythology.
For Russia, the agreement is a turning point.
The Soviet Union initially led the first space race in the mid-20th century before falling behind the United States, which placed the first man on the moon in 1969, an achievement the Soviet Union never succeeded in doing. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia became an important partner in the development of the International Space Station.
After NASA pulled off the spacecraft in 2011, Russian Soyuz rockets were the only way to reach the International Space Station until SpaceX, a private company founded by billionaire Elon Musk, sent astronauts into orbit last year. .
China, on the other hand, has never been invited to the International Space Station, as US law prohibits NASA from collaborating with Beijing. This meant that China “had no choice but to set and pursue its own goals,” said Joan S. Johnson-Freese, a professor of national security at Naval War College in the United States. .
China has sent 11 astronauts into orbit since 2003 and built two smaller space stations, called Tiangong-1 and 2, which have since been put into service. Modules for a third station are planned to launch this year.
China has pledged to ‘keep the joint project with Russia’ open to all interested countries and international partners’, as the statement states, but it appears to exclude the United States and its allies in space exploration.
The United States has its own plans to revisit the moon by 2024 through an international program called Artemis.
With Russia on its side, China can now attract other countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America and introduce parallel programs for lunar evolution, said Namrata Goswami, an independent analyst and co-author of a new book on space exploration, said, ‘Scramble for air. ”
“China has created an ideological story about its lunar base that offers its advanced space capacity as an asset to those who want to participate in an alternative mechanism of lunar exploration and resource exploitation,” she said.
Claire Fu contributed research.