MOSCOW – Russia and China have agreed to build a base on or around the Moon, the latest signal of geopolitical maneuvering in space and an apparent reprimand from the United States.
Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, this week signed an agreement with the Chinese National Space Administration on the joint creation of what they call the International Scientific Lunar Station.
The memorandum of understanding between the two governments is the latest sign that Russia views its future in space primarily as a co-operation effort with the Chinese space program rather than with NASA, its main partner of the past 25 years.
NASA has invited Russia to join an American lunar project known as Artemis.
The project with China will be “guided by the principles of equal distribution of rights and responsibilities” and will “promote cooperation … with open access to all interested countries and international partners”, the Russian space agency said in a statement after the memorandum was published. Signed Tuesday.
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The statement from Roscosmos said that the purpose of the lunar station with China was to strengthen scientific cooperation and to promote “the exploration and use of outer space for peaceful purposes in the interests of mankind”.
This wording reflects Russian criticism of the NASA-led Artemis project, which also suggests that the construction of a space station orbits the moon as the basis of a broader international effort to explore the lunar surface.
Last year, Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin expressed NASA’s effort as a sort of NATO political project in space.
“With the lunar project,” Rogozin told Russian tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda in July, “we see our US partners deviating from the principles of cooperation and mutual support that developed during cooperation with the ISS. They do not see their program as internationally., but similar to NATO, “he adds.” We are not interested in participating in such a project. “
NASA and Roscosmos were the two main partners responsible for the construction and operation of the International Space Station, or ISS, a project launched 20 years ago that serves as the ultimate expression of reconciliation between Russia and the United States after the Cold War.
But this relationship seems to be slowly deteriorating as broader relations between the US and Russia deteriorate.
The Soviet Union launched the first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, almost 60 years ago, which sparked an intense race with the United States. The US placed astronauts on the moon eight years later.
Moscow has never landed cosmonauts on the moon, and in recent years its space program has faltered and struggled with issues of corruption and quality control, while the US commercial space industry and the Chinese space program have pushed forward and threatened Moscow’s once deepening far beyond. program.
In China, the state-run Global Times ran a front-page article celebrating the agreement with Russia, explaining to its readers that Washington was trying to position itself to dictate the conditions of future international activity on the Moon and beyond, in deep space.
‘To participate in shaping the direction of space exploration and to have a say in making the rules, China and Russia must be at the forefront of space exploration and balance and fairness must promote with force and action, ‘he said.
Memoranda of understanding represent little more than the first steps toward a project, but they are symbolic and indicate the political times in which all space programs, whether Russia, China, or the United States, continue.
In the near future, Russia and China say they will coordinate different robotic missions to explore the moon.
NASA is banned by the US government from cooperating with the Chinese space agency. China’s space program, which is relatively isolated, has made great strides over the past decade. Unable to join the International Space Station, Beijing is focusing on creating its own national space stations.
Details on what the proposed lunar station with Russia will look like are unclear at first.
The statement from Roscosmos said it would be “a complex of experimental research facilities created on the surface and / or in the orbit of the moon” to facilitate a wide range of research and reconnaissance efforts, both with and without crew.
In other words, the international lunar station sounds a lot like a Russian-Chinese response to the NASA-led Artemis project.
However, projects like these take years to get off the ground, and the Russia-China memorandum is the first in a long list of required steps. And although Russia has yet to accept NASA’s official invitation to join the Artemis project, it has not yet officially rejected it.
“I think it’s a kind of diplomatic negotiating contest,” Pavel Luzin, an independent Russian space policy analyst, told NBC News. “Russia has nothing to offer China in a Chinese-led Moon program, and Russia should definitely continue its space cooperation with the United States and Europe (as well as with Japan and Canada), other than the conclusion of the ISS program. . “
Luzin says it remains unclear whether Rogozin’s harsh rhetoric about the Artemis project represents official Russian policy.
“Rogozin has said that we are not going to join Artemis, but it seems that this is probably just his personal opinion rather than Russia’s official and final decision,” Luzin said.