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China

Were You Wondering About China's Long-Term Moon Goals?

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
November 29, 2013
Filed under , ,

China aims for the Moon, Nature
“Space analysts expect that the lunar and crewed objectives of China’s space-flight programme will merge, with Chinese astronauts (known as taikonauts) aiming to walk on the Moon some time in the 2020s.”
China will achieve first soft landing on the moon, CNTV (Video)
Meet China’s Jade Rabbit, the peace-loving moon rover, Quartz (Photos)
NASA Exploration Ideas – With Added China Bashing (Update), earlier post

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

31 responses to “Were You Wondering About China's Long-Term Moon Goals?”

  1. TheBrett says:
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    I hope they do. That might get some more funding for space programs out of wounded pride on the US’s part, especially if it’s also coming in a period after the US is no longer the largest economy on Earth.

    • MarcNBarrett says:
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      Don’t count on it. Republicans would rather cut taxes on rich people and corporations to zero.

      • cynical_space says:
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        Yep, let’s keep pointing fingers and trying to blame the “other guy”
        for the demise of our space program. Bickering among ourselves, always
        looking to place fault, although it’s never “my side” that is the
        problem of course. Only we know the “true path” to space exploration
        enlightenment. Its obviously your fault, you Old Space/New
        Space/Republican/Democrat/liberal/conservative/<“pick your favorite enemy”> type you.

        Consensus in the space program
        community? Hell, we’ll be doing good just to stop the flames and have a
        rational discussion. Meh. A pox on all our houses. 🙁

        • Michael Spencer says:
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          It is worth pointing out that our great country is in the midst of a decades-long public debate about the role of government. Those on the right see ‘government is the problem’. And while those of us on the left recognize the importance of the right’s mediating influence on programs that could become too large, feel that government has a proper role improving the lives of citizens.

          Nonetheless, this debate and the concurrent thrust in the state legislatures over abortion and family planning characterize the current political climate fairly, I think.

          Some say that the right’s governmental antipathy is driven by meanness. Others say the left is driven by starry-eyed socialism and an unrealistic understanding of capitalism. While I prefer not to assign motivation, it is true that there isn’t much communication.

          This political atmosphere is not likely to change soon, mostly because while the left (posing as Democrats) receive more votes than the right (posing as Republicans), in point of fact legislative seats are currently defined heavily to support the right. And it is also true that progressive excesses of the past have made the public wary.

          It’s possible that our country is more progressive than one could surmise from headlines; it is also possible that I am biased. Nonetheless, until these larger issues are resolved, there will be no spending on space, on infrastructure, on national railroads, on sensible health policies, on energy policy, nor on– well, the picture is clear. We will continue with a do-nothing Congress and a populace whose world views are driven by stunning levels of spending by interest groups.

          • pilgrim101 says:
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            Boots on the moon ASAP should be the only clarion call for NASA and the private space folks right now. We are too busy eating corn to track its progress thru our body and the result is going to be starvation. Right-Left who cares. The body needs to search for food to live. What is the malfunction at the federal level you may ask? Lack of educated vision on both sides of the Aisle, while the helm is left without a informed navigator to steer the ship away from the rocks. The R & D progress made from a all out moon colonization/resource program will build the infrastructure need to make us a multi planet race at a sustainable level. Our future can not be a repeat of the Ford-Carter years. If so we are doomed to walk the shores and forever dream of voyages missed.

      • dogstar29 says:
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        The money to send Americans to Mars or even the moon does not exist in the NASA budget, and it is highly unlikely the situation will change. Realistically, we have two choices. We can continue to exclude China from the ISS program, or work with them in LEO and possibly on robotic programs. Those, in my opinion, are our only choices.

        I withdraw my criticism of one political party, and concede that both are to blame. Bill Nelson’s irrational promotion of SLS is a case in point.

  2. savuporo says:
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    From the picture, it looks like they intend to drag race a spidery thing with another bigger spidery thing with a bucket on its head ?

    Seriously though, i hope their lander is as successful as Chang’e 1 and 2 were – and by gaining confidence they start ramping up their schedules and bugets more, too.

  3. kcowing says:
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    Huh? I don’t recall banning any political comments recently.

  4. Anonymous says:
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    We had better get ourselves in gear soon and get back to the moon pronto. The Chinese have declared their intent to claim their rightful share of the moon’s resources. If we lag, we risk them establishing bases on the moon and declaring a “special use and exclusion zone” that covers the whole body. Look what they are doing now by suddenly declaring air defense zones. Co-operation, not on your life unless they change their ways – and that does not appear likely.

    • Vladislaw says:
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      actually they have declared they are building a space station

    • Steve Whitfield says:
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      How do you expect them to behave if senior Reps. like Wolf are continuing to do and say the things they are? Wolf is not alone; he’s simply currently the worst of those in the spotlight.

      • dogstar29 says:
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        I agree. Unfortunately Wolf has unprecedented personal power over NASA through his ability to insert arbitrary personal orders into budget legislation. I was told by a former congressional aide that Wolf had threatened to slash the NASA budget (i.e. by 50%) if his orders to cut off any contact with China were not followed, and that NASA was clearly intimidated. Moreover Wolf is unique in actually using NASA as a tool to further his anti-Chinese biases by denying Chinese scientists access to public conferences and ordering the arrest of a Chinese researcher at a NASA center on charges that were later found to be false.

    • Michael Spencer says:
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      Those who claim that space exploration is a necessary step towards a multi-planet humanity and therefore essential to saving the species should be applauding this move, one would think.

  5. LPHartswick says:
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    All I know is that the hypocrisy on both sides of the aisle is enough to make you swoon. Our politicians, few of whom are known to be deep thinkers, can’t seem to take the long view on anything when it comes to the country’s best interests. It doesn’t seem to matter whether it’s our foreign affairs, our monetary policy, or a policy on the exploration of space. It’s truly pathetic. I feel the exploration of space by the United States of America is a truly important national goal, certainly worth spending 1% of the federal budget on annually. We need a heavy lift vehicle, research on nuclear thermal propulsion and life sciences. We should return to the moon first, learn to use resources in that location, and then go on from there to Mars. Appropriately funded as a national priority all of this is doable in a reasonable timeframe. My father’s generation could see this, and probably accomplish it. This bunch of characters…. Well…. Let’s just say I’m not so certain. Any of you people have children out there now you should make sure they have a working knowledge of Mandarin.

    • Vladislaw says:
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      If our children knew mandarin, would they beable to find the budget lines in the chinese budget that is currently funding a future lunar mission for humans?

      • dogstar29 says:
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        China is most definitely not in a race and I think it will be quite some time before any such mission is funded, but if it is I expect it will be paid for with real tax yuan and not by adding to the national debt.

        • Vladislaw says:
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          I think a lot of people confuse their government with their capitialistic corporations. I do not believe their system is free from pork anymore than ours is. As a chinese manager in the space program had asked Dr. Griffin when he was there, how do you keep getting funding for manned spaceflight. Apparently it is a very hard sell over there also.

    • Wendy Yang says:
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      I already knew Mandarin, does that means I have an advantage?
      Seriously though, it’s ironic how we view NASA on a higher level than how most Americans view NASA.

      • dogstar29 says:
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        I’d be interested in your perspective of the goals of China’s human spaceflight program, not in terms of the moon or Mars, but in terms of the geopolitical goals of the program here on Earth. A lot of information on the objectives of the Chinese human spaceflight program is available at http://www.cmse.gov.cn/ The web pages in Chinese and English are obviously different but as I cannot read Chinese the differences are unclear.

        • Wendy Yang says:
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          What they are doing, basically, is catching up to their idol. NASA is a very strong drive in China. Most students, whether they realize or not, were inspired by this “mysterious American power with advance technology that enables them to land on the moon” and decided to play catch up. Much like the Sputnik crisis, except less intense and the not in a race factor.

  6. Jafafa Hots says:
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    Congress writes legislation, congress writes the budget, congress represents the people (sort of.).

    The President can “get it” and propose anything he or she wants to, but it has to be funded.

    Unless there is a big enough industrial lobby to force it through if the people aren’t behind it, OR unless the people are behind it with a huge public demand (maybe even would take both), then it won’t be funded.

    For better or worse, space exploration simply does not make the short or medium list of public priorities at the moment.

    Nobody is going to win an election any time soon running on a big new space program.

    There have been no overtalking/shouting matches on the cable news networks about space policy recently.

    This is just the country we live in at the moment.

  7. dogstar29 says:
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    Who? and what should they get? Keep in mind what happened to Gingrich.

  8. Vladislaw says:
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    It is a simple observation, unless you can show otherwise where the republicans are standing fast on NASA and space spending, perhaps you can provide a list of links were the republicans have fought against any cuts to the commercial crew program?

  9. savuporo says:
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    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/2

    “A rationale for this long-term programme is that “there are many ways humans can use the Moon”, and he outlined a startling vision for its exploitation.”

    Its startling ?

  10. Rocky J says:
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    If China lands taikonauts on the Moon in the 2020s, it is symbolic. Any entity that is serious about establishing a lunar base or mining, needs to develop a robotics program to construct a habitat or complete a survey and begin a mining operation. A long term program is necessary and the article does point out that the Chinese are capable of defining in the long term. But the ESA and NASA could probably do nothing for 10 years and still match and catch them.

    What is more worrisome is that the Chinese has some capable launch vehicles and could undercut even the cheapest commercial launch vehicles (Zenit, Proton-M, Falcon 9). They have done this with solar panel production; flooding the market with subsidized panels. If SpaceX breaks under $1000/lb to LEO, I would think that the Chinese would be essentially giving away their rockets to match price. SpaceX might have most of a 10 year lead on anyone matching their manufacturing process and re-useability.

    The ESA and NASA need to find the Near-Earth Asteroids and survey a cross-section of types to lay the ground work for commercial exploitation. With this, the robotic technological advantages that Europe and the USA presently have would create a significant lead in the exploitation of NEAs as material resource.

    • dogstar29 says:
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      The moon is a _symbolic_ goal for the Chinese, just as it was for us in the sixties. Commerce is the real prize. The Long March 5 is a capable and efficient system and will certainly be a competitor, but even the Chinese are not claiming they can undercut SpaceX if Musk can make reusables work.

      • DTARS says:
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        That is why the Chinese will be the next to have a reuseable booster!!! Unlike pork space doing everything but compete above board with Spacex. I’m sure that china is already working on making long march recoverable and reusable. I bet Spacex’s lead is less than 5 years. Keith will post about china’s grasshopper in a year or two.

        Let’s do the math lol

        1 Grasshopper proves they can softly control and land their booster.

        2 on their maiden falcon flight they got their booster safely back into the atmosphere.

        3 competitive access to LEO

        1+2=3 lol

        The Chinese can add and they want to compete!

        They are already working on it!!!

        • dogstar29 says:
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          There is no evidence they are working on it as of yet, but I think it’s safe to say they are thinking about it.

          • DTARS says:
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            I know there is no evidence. Just see us standing flat footed as the they slowly walk by us and leave us in their dust.

  11. Jafafa Hots says:
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    Looking at history, I’d say nothing big can happen unless a POTUS champions it and then gets assassinated.

    You have one historical example to go from where it worked your way.

    What about other big proposals? Both Bushs’? Went nowhere.

    The Apollo program was a historical anomaly. You can’t count on things happening that way again.

    If you want a big program now, you have to find a different way to make it happen, and that almost certainly will require the nation getting fired up about it.

    They got fired up about Apollo for the obvious Kennedy and Cold-War related reasons. They also were not in the midst of a long recession (or depression, depending on who you talk to.)

    What is happening now, or in the near future that will make the public get fired up about a Presidential speech that’s nto about jobs, the economy, other social issues, etc?

    People have a lot more competing for their attention and tax dollars now, and they don’t have as isolated a view of international relations.

    No Presidential plan is going to light a fire under the general public’s butt about space unless some currently-absent external factor makes them very intent on it happening.

    Doesn’t matter if it’s our dream, doesn’t matter if we see chances of it fading. If it’s not a national priority in a personal sense for a LOT of people, it’s not happening any time soon.

  12. nasa817 says:
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    This country chose war over space exploration back in the 60’s and we never looked back. The military industrial complex is eating us alive with no end in sight. Had we spent the money on R&D and space exploration that we have on defense over the last 40 years, we would have colonized the solar system by now and would be headed to the stars (a la Star Trek).