Will China Beat the United States Back to the Moon?

The Stakes in the New Space Race Are High

Recently, during an address on the space economy to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the start of the space age, NASA Administrator Michael Griffin made the assertion that China would beat the United States to the Moon. His remarks follow:

"I personally believe that China will be back on the Moon before we are. I think when that happens, Americans will not like it, but they will just have to not like it. I think we will see, as we have seen with China's introductory manned space flights so far, we will see again that nations look up to other nations that appear to be at the top of the technical pyramid, and they want to do deals with those nations. It's one of the things that made us the world's greatest economic power. So I think we'll be reinstructed in that lesson in the coming years and I hope that Americans will take that instruction positively and react to it by investing in those things that are the leading edge of what's possible."

Most people are not aware of the full scope of the Chinese space effort, which has political, economic, and military components. While there has been no announced Chinese humans to the Moon effort, much of what China is currently or is planning to do in space would tend to point there.

China's manned space effort seems to be designed to steadily increase China's space operations capabilities. The Shenzhou 5, which flew in 2003 with a single taikonaut (Chinese for astronaut), orbited the Earth for just over twenty one hours and proved China's capability to launch humans into space. Shenzhou 6, with two taikonauts, followed in 2005 and remained in space for five days. The crew performed some biomedical experiments while aloft, proving China's capability to maintain humans in space for slightly longer periods while doing science.

Future Shenzhou missions will feature space walks, rendezvous and docking, and longer duration missions. This follows the pattern of America's Mercury and Gemini programs, which preceded the Apollo lunar program and gradually improved America's space operational capabilities.