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China

Is ESA Going to Help China Build a Space Station?

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
March 1, 2013
Filed under , , ,

Europe May Work With China on Space Station, Scientific American
“China aims to establish a large manned space station within the next decade, officials have said, and the latest reports suggest that this outpost could host not only Chinese astronauts, but European spaceflyers as well. A plan is afoot for China and Europe to cooperate on the venture, which might see the European Space Agency (ESA) building technologies, including a rendezvous and docking system, for the station, in exchange for opportunities for its astronauts to visit the facility.”

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

13 responses to “Is ESA Going to Help China Build a Space Station?”

  1. common sense says:
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    sdds

  2. dogstar29 says:
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    ESA was badly burned in 2004 when, after investing billions in collaboration with the US, Bush announced, out of the blue, that the Shuttle and ISS would be terminated. Having Plan A and Plan B only makes sense. Moreover ESA obviously doesn’t have to contend with the sinophobic Frank Wolf (R-VA) or with people so nostalgic for the Cold War that they would incite a generation of nuclear confrontation between the US and China solely for the purpose of raising American enthusiasm for re-enacting Project Apollo. 

    Leaving aside the fact that China has no motivation whatever for a moon race with the US, China is the world’s second largest economy and within a generation is likely to surpass the US in GDP. Rather than going out of our way to increase tensions, it makes more sense to build understanding between the superpowers through collaboration in space, and thus reduce, at least a little, the potential for nuclear war.

    Of course, it would make even more sense to invite China to join the ISS. But don’t hold your breath.

    • Brian Thorn says:
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      “Out of the blue”? We were pretty lucky the Shuttle program wasn’t ended a year earlier after the Columbia disaster. There was nothing shocking about the Shuttle retirement decision, although year and number of flights was still uncertain.

      And in 2004 Bush said nothing about ending ISS.

      • Rocketscientist42 says:
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        Facts are such stubborn things, aren’t they?

      • dogstar29 says:
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        Bush announced that the US would withdraw from support of the ISS program in 2010 in order to divert the money to pay for the Constellation program without raising taxes; this was later extended a few years and then rescinded by president Obama. The Columbia Accident Investigation Board concluded that the Shuttle should be replaced, but that it could fly safely until a replacement system for human flight to the ISS was operational. The CAIB specifically recommended a shuttle replacement system designed solely for access to LEO, saying that a more ambitious program would be very likely to fail because the resources to develop it were limited.

        • mattmcc80 says:
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          I believe you’re misinterpreting his statement, which was that they would wrap up their *construction* commitments by 2010.

          http://www.cnn.com/2004/TEC

          • dogstar29 says:
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            Initially Bush indicated the US would support the ISS only until completion of construction, since this was the sum total of our obligations to our partners. Indeed, the cost of Constellation and the decision to cut US taxes left little choice. A few months later the Ares I/Orion to ISS was inserted into the schedule to give US astronauts, if not cargo, a way to continue participating in ISS. How this could be done without slipping Constellation or increasing the budget was, as best I can recall, not explained.

        • Brian Thorn says:
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          Cite? He said the Shuttle would retire in 2010 after completion of the Space Station. He didn’t say ISS would end in 2010.

      • Steve Whitfield says:
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        We must remember that in the 2004-2008 period there were a lot of things said by the US federal government that either didn’t come to pass or were significantly revised or delayed (America was Bush-wacked).  This makes it very difficult to reliably recall or research what the actual events were, so we’re all probably going to continue contradicting one another about events during this period, as has already happened many times before.  A fruitless argument.

        With respect to the US/ESA relationship, the ESA can hardly be blamed for looking at other possibilities.  They’ve been let down by the US too often to keep all their eggs in that basket any longer.  Clearly both ESA and China have faced the fact that the US is not going to allow Chinese involvement with the ISS.  This is a double shame because 1) it’s a lost major opportunity for all concerned, and 2) it was enforced by a relative handful of self-centered, paranoid old fossils who are still insanely living the Cold War, and thereby seriously degrading the possibilities for several billion people and needlessly recreating old international tensions in the process.  If it were at all possible to approach this situation completely objectively, then, in my opinion, rep Wolf and his cohorts would be candidates for charges of treason, or at least sedition as a minimum.  A political representative’s personal feelings (or obsessions) should never take precedence over the decisions which are in the best interests of his/her constituents.  Those citizens who agree with rep Wolf’s bigoted (in my opinion) statements are likewise living in the past and are in need of proper education.

        How are Americans going to react 10 or 20 years from now when the other space nations have banded together for mutual benefit?  Will it take the creation of an international space collaboration where the US is the only excluded and ostracized nation to make people realize the error in the current situation?  If this happens, I’m sure there will (still) be those who insist that America doesn’t need any other nation to conquer space; and that the US can do it alone.  These people need to grow up and face realities instead of continuing to engage in wishful thinking.

    • Joe Cooper says:
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      You mean the station that’s up there & operating right now for which we paid the overwhelming majority of the cost? With Russia as #2 in funding and the only party besides the US to send humans there? The one that ESA uses at this very moment?

      Not that I oppose them working with China too, but how did they get screwed here? They chipped in and participated well in a project that didn’t go perfectly. That’s a little unfortunate but I think it’s fair all around.

      • dogstar29 says:
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        It isn’t a question of whether ISS has helped or harmed Europe, but rather of whether it serves US or European interests to exclude only China (of the world’s major nations) from ISS.  If the ISS is to make significant progress it needs substantial additional investment in logistics, orbital facilities, and science. Unless we want the total population of space in 50 years to still be six, we need new resources, and beyond China it isn’t clear who has them. China can provide the only human access immediately available that doesn’t require Soyuz, and the only major new source of long-term investment in human spaceflight. If we force Russia, ESA and China to create an entirely separate program so they can work together in space, we risk making the ISS irrelevant; although the US remains the world’s largest economy, every year our resources are a smaller percentage of the world’s total.
         
        Equally important, this is an international program, and excluding one only of only two countries with the present ability to send humans into space is a sure way to increase tensions. What is our geopolitical goal in space? To encourage trust and cooperation among the superpowers, or to start a new Cold War and condemn another generation to living under the threat of nuclear destruction? The risk of nuclear war remains much higher than the risk of asteroid impact. Having lived through the Cold War once, I think anyone who suggests we should work actively to increase the level of conflict in the world through a new space race has a death wish. Collaboration in space is only small one part of a much larger picture, but it clearly changes superpower perspectives in a way that reduces the overall risk of violent conflict.

  3. MarcNBarrett says:
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    If China launches a space station, then their own station will be vulnerable to in-orbit debris from their very own anti-satellite test. Do they have the same capability as we have to track most of that debris, to make sure their space station will be able to avoid it?

  4. cuibono1969 says:
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    The competition for China’s space station in the 2020s is likely to be Bigelow/SpaceX. Maybe ESA should look more to the private sector for it’s next hookup in space, although given that ESA is under threat of a takeover by the never-knowingly-sensible EU, that’s probably too intelligent to be realistic.