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China

Is China Really Winning a Space Race with Us?

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
December 20, 2013
Filed under , ,

Wolf and Rogers Want Answers from Clapper on Implications of China’s Space Program, Space Policy Online
“Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA) and Rep. Mike Rogers (R-AL) wrote to Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper today asking five questions about the implications for U.S. leadership in space and U.S. national security of China’s recent accomplishments in space, including landing a rover on the Moon last weekend.”
Lost in Space, John Logsdon, Politico
“After all, just under 18 months ago, NASA landed the Curiosity rover on Mars, a much more difficult feat than the Chang’e 3 mission by any measure. Curiosity is almost an order of magnitude heavier than Yutu and technologically much more advanced. So if there is a “planetary rover race,” the United States is the clear leader. While China talks about a future space station, the United States is the managing partner of the multinational International Space Station, in full operation since 2011 and with six astronauts and cosmonauts in orbit today. The same holds true in almost every area of space activity–the United States has a clear technological and operational advantage over other countries. It’s just not clear America has the determination to sustain that edge.”
Earlier posts on China

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

31 responses to “Is China Really Winning a Space Race with Us?”

  1. Rocky J says:
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    Space race? NO. Not like the race of the 60s, one that we made a 10 year sprint to the Moon. Race – no. Competition? Yes, where competitors budget and sustain their resources for the long haul. Competition particularly involves launch services where Delta and Atlas have fallen out of competition because they are too expensive. I read somewhere that it has been 4 years since they launched something other than DOD or NASA.

    Ok, I won’t say the word! … Falcon. Oops, I said it! Do you want to compete? Like Jack Nickolson’s retort, ‘can you handle the truth’?

    The competition is in going somewhere, doing something to explore and discover and now to exploit raw materials which will ultimately be a benefit to humanity not just Americans or international corporations. Americans already have claim to the greatest discoveries of the 20th Century. It has transformed our view of the Universe and our place within it. There is a lot more to discover.

    Discovery and wealth are prizes of this competition. But Americans do not recognize that the World is transforming, uniting. Europe’s EU is poised to take a next step involving unification of their banking system. Ukrainians protest in sub-freezing weather to join the EU. Modern telecommunications – the internet will lead to a unified Earth despite China or anyone’s resistance now. Right now we need to use our resources wisely to compete but also build more international cooperation which will ultimately win over competition as we extend humanity beyond Earth.

  2. Anonymous says:
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    The most counterproductive statement ever made regarding US
    space policy was the infamous April15, 2010 “been there,
    done that” statement. Now we are paying for it. We must not live under a
    moon dominated by a country with China’s ideology. The Europeans want to work
    with us, want us to lead but they are often frustrated. Whatever works
    the best should be used, be it Falcon, Dragon, SLS, Orion or whatever. Lunar
    landers are often pointed to as “so expensive” and “so
    difficult”. It has now been shown that landing on the moon is within
    the capability of many. Putting together a comprehensive, goal structured
    program, similar to the Transcontinental Railroad (a much used but highly apt
    example).

    Get move on with this; it’s only our future as a free world that’s at
    stake.

    • Vladislaw says:
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      Please explain how china is going to dominate 9 BILLION acres of land? Post guards?
      sheesh .. insanity on a bun.

      • Anonymous says:
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        The point is if we don’t establish a ground presence soon then the Chinese won’t have to worry about guarding anything. Handwaving and personal attacks only benefits others to our detriment.

  3. DTARS says:
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    Lost in Space

    Even though the thrust of Logsdon article is about the USA working together with other countries to make Space more relevant.

    This part troubles me.

    He said

    “To be able to travel in deep space, NASA is developing a new spacecraft called Orion and a large rocket called the Space Launch System, with a first test launch in 2017 and a first launch with a crew in 2021; where that launch will take astronauts is not yet clear. But the Orion and SLS efforts suffer from unclear goals and objectives, leading to questions about their sustainability. If either were canceled, the outlook for continued U.S. space leadership would be bleak.”

    Don’t we need to cancel SLS and Orion and put that money to more affordable efficient programs that help the Cots commercial programs settle and explore space??

    If one as wise as Mr. Logsdon truly believes we need SLS and Orion to maintain our edge then we truly are lost in Space.

    Correction lost on earth

    • Denniswingo says:
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      The developer of the theory underlying Quantum Mechanics Dr. Max Plank once said…

      “Science advances one funeral at a time.”

      I fear we have reached the moment in time where this is true of exploration as well.

    • LPHartswick says:
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      Maybe, just maybe, he knows something that you don’t. Nah! You’re right that just couldn’t be…right?

      • DTARS says:
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        Then what is it. Here to learn!

        • Ben Russell-Gough says:
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          It’s politics, of course (when is it not?).

          NASA’s continued existence is a fragile coalition of military, intelligence, industrial and ideological special interests that only barely have any common ground. These interests include large solid rocket motors (missile propulsion) and large subsidies to keep the shareholders of large defence combines in the manner to which they are accustomed. For that, eternal R&D programs are needed, be they re-inventing the wheel in military aviation or attempting to build an uneconomical super-heavy space launcher. Of course, all they really are is camouflage for these subsidies.

          SLS isn’t necessary for exploration in itself (there are other ways of doing it, possibly more cheaply). It’s just that, without SLS and Orion, the coalition that even gives the smallest chance of doing something in this field will dissolve and have their bought-and-paid-for Congresspersons take their votes elsewhere for the subsidies they want. So, SLS and Orion are critical (irrespective of whether they fly) to maintain the political support for any exploration at all.

          • Steve Whitfield says:
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            But if the framework that keeps the building standing also blocks the doorways and keeps the building from being used?

          • Ben Russell-Gough says:
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            Well, that doesn’t really matter. It’s the building itself that matters to the decision-makers, not that it ever be used. They’ll just build another one from scratch, and then another, and then another, all to stand idle and fall into ruin. All to ensure the money keeps flowing.

          • DTARS says:
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            If the money must flow. Then they must be made to do what’s needed efficiency.

            We are being rob!!!””

            Tax payer

          • Steve Whitfield says:
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            I guess, unfortunately, our cynicism is part of the process, too, along with the building for the sake of building, instead of building what we really need to take us forward. Running a jobs program, pork production, and building (but not always finishing) hardware that’s of questionable utility seems like a mighty inappropriate way to run a civil space program, but it looks like we’re stuck with it.

            A lot of people, on all sides, have said that how NASA/civil space is run needs to be changed, but I’ve yet to see a proposal for how to change it that stands any chance of coming to pass. Congress continues to hold all the cards because they write the Bills and they dole out the money — and their goals are not our goals, despite all the gung-ho rhetoric they put into their letters and feed to the press.

            I have no doubt that mankind will eventually explore and then profitably inhabit the solar system, and be much better off for it. But future historians will wonder why we took such a hard road and such a long time to achieve it.

        • Vladislaw says:
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          No one wants to accept the political fallout for gaining a healthy NASA. There are to many centers, to much dead wood, to much infrastructure to upkeep. So which congressional district is ready to lose that profit center in their state?
          There should be a non partisan panel with the power to CHOP, as it is .. the pork premuim can not be cut out of the NASA budget until commercial is well established.

      • Steve Whitfield says:
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        You make what I think is a very valid point, as a generalization. But in this particular case, when so there’s much public evidence against his assertion…?

  4. savuporo says:
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    Why this is not a race : US and China have clearly stated very differing reasons for going to space.

    US space policy is driven by “science and exploration and inspiration” , whereas Chinese keep saying theirs is “technology development, growing talent and resource potential”

    If two people go into the woods, one takes a camera to take home pictures of deer and flowers, another one goes for firewood, food and maybe find a nice spot to build a hut, they are not really racing, are they ?

    • DTARS says:
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      I agree
      The person that gathers the fire wood and food and builds a warm hut survives the cold winter. The other freezes to death unless the other gives him shelter.

      The ant and grasshopper

    • Anonymous says:
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      You are correct.

      We’ve done the race thing before, and it was unsustainable. A race implies that there is time limit, that there is an end, and that there is a prize that only one will have.

      We need to have a better reason for our exploration than a race.

      • Bernardo de la Paz says:
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        The race thing was when all the real progress happened. All we’ve done is slow down into stagnation once we declared the race to be over. The only reason it was unsustainable was because it seemed everyone else dropped out of the race. Thank goodness the Chinese are now proving that wrong – they will either motivate the US to get moving again, or leave the US deservedly eating their dust.

        Advancing technological and industrial development of space as an economic resource are the real goals.

      • DTARS says:
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        A better reason, let me think hummm?

        How about having the capability to get resources in the future when we need them.

        In the mean time we have natural competition with another tribe nothing wrong with using that to wisely do the smart things to make a highway to the moon affordable for all humans.

        the ant and the grasshopper

    • Bernardo de la Paz says:
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      What you just said is that China is definitely winning the race.
      While the US may currently be maintaining an illusion of leadership based on past accomplishments, China is definitely winning the race to put together a coherent, viable, and productive long term strategy, which means they will certainly pull ahead if the US doesn’t get it’s act together.

  5. Ben Russell-Gough says:
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    I don’t believe there is a race because the US and China use space for very different things.

    Right now, the US only sees near-Earth space as an extension of its own strategic interests. Primarily it is a site for reconnaissance and both military and civil navigation and communication assets. The occasional scientific payload seems to be primarily techno-welfare and a sop to keep the scientists and engineers who build the far-more-important military payloads on-side.

    China sees space as both a source of foreign revenue (commercial satellite launch), soft power projection (giving their satellite countries space access) and of national prestige. I’m pretty sure that their BEO exploration program is solely so that they can tell the masses that China is one of the top names of the Major League of nations.

    For what it’s worth, I genuinely despair at Boeing and Lockheed’s dependence on government money in the space launch business. Delta-IV and Atlas-V are both reliable enough that they could make a major dent in ILS, Arianespace and China’s commercial launch customer lists if they were cheaper. Instead, though, they price themselves out and remain attached to the government teat. It is not a strategy for long-term corporate survival but that doesn’t really seem to be a goal most executives care about anymore is it?

  6. DTARS says:
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    Christmas Eve 2013

    We are about to launch.

    When you started settling the poles of your world, we were forced to move. It was a secret operation. I being the keeper of the magic/knowledge of old, I had to get creative. My small team used your human technology and ancient magic to create what we needed. Our cover was nearly blown during our move, by the Apollo astronauts. Buzz Aldrin still says he saw us.
    We setup our operation on the moon, under the moon to be more precise.
    I liston to your news, so I know what’s going on. Your latest soft landing on the moon was interesting. I believe you earthlings will make a sustainable effort this time which will mean that we will have to move again. This may require me using more ancient secrets. I think this time we will pick a moon of Jupiter to setup operations.
    It is interesting to, how you make it so hard on yourselves. Here I am the keeper of all the ancient magic from your fore fathers when they first came to earth. Yet I must keep it from you for your own protection.

    You just aren’t ready.
    I’m begining to wonder if you will ever be.
    If only you would behave and be nice. I have tried to tell you over and over that if you want to wheeled the magic of old and once again travel and live among the stars that first you just have to be GOOD.

    SANTA CLAUS

    Merry Christmas to all!

  7. Vladislaw says:
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    In order to have a race, you first have to define the finish line. There isn’t any race as there isn’t any finish line to determine a winner.