Straight to the Moon: What if China gets there first?
Houston has a problem.
Or at least, it will have a problem in 2010. NASA is set to retire the Space Shuttle that year, but the next ride to orbit won’t be ready for another five years—if everything happens on schedule. American astronauts will have to bum rides with Russia (and you know how they drive) until the Ares and Orion vehicles are ready.
In the meantime, NASA is supposed to be on its way back to the Moon. Then Mars. Then Beyond, wherever that is. Americans are supposed to be back where we last went in 1974 by 2020. It’s an awful long walk.
That’s Houston’s problem. Washington’s problem is more complicated. It seems China is likely to get to the Moon first.
“I personally believe that China will be back on the moon before we are,” NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said in a low-key lecture in Washington two weeks ago, marking the space agency’s 50th anniversary, still a year away.
“I think when that happens, Americans will not like it. But they will just have to not like it.”
This does not sit well.
Sen. Kay Bailey-Hutchinson of Texas wrote in yesterday’s Houston Chronicle:
The Chinese are gaining ground in technological areas. China recently surpassed the U.S. as the world’s largest exporter of information-technology products (and the U.S. has become a net importer of those products). The Chinese are now turning their attention to space technology, and they are determined to use it as a means of strengthening their military. We cannot allow other countries to acquire new weapons technologies while America does not keep up.
There must not be a space gap. Or a technology gap. Or a cave gap. “The Chinese” are starting to sound a lot like “the Soviets” of old. This is not an accident. Hutchinson begins and ends the op-ed with Sputnik, noting how the satellite’s launch 50 years ago gave America the swift kick it needed to start seriously funding science education and its own space program, and to eventually get to the Moon first. Now the Chinese are going to beat us, as the warning goes. They’ve only been putting people in space four years, and they’re already shooting down satellites and launching lunar probes.
It’s no coincidence either that a greater investment in spaceflight would benefit Sen. Hutchinson’s constituency, and Griffin’s sad song could easily be read as a plea for more funding. It’s certainly easier to justify buying expensive new rockets when it feels like there’s a cold war going on and those Chinese might win.
Off to the races, then? Not so fast. “The U.S. has to get over this feeling that it has to be a competition,” White House science adviser John Marburger told The AP. Nothing like being masters of our own low expectations.
Or maybe it’s hard to freak out over China’s lunar ambitions when Japan is heading in the same direction. And Europe. And Google.
The Russians haven’t gone away, though. Colonel-General Vladimir Popovkin, Russia’s Space Forces Commander, is telling everybody to cool it: “We do not want to fight in space, and we do not want to call the shots there either, but we will not permit any other country to do so.†(h/t The Great Beyond)
So what’s this really about? Will Americans see a Chinese flag planted on the Moon and ask themselves and their government, “How did this happen?” Or will we shrug our shoulders and welcome China to the lunar club?
October 5th, 2007 at 12:15 am
The thing is China hasn’t been in space for only four years. They put their first satellite in orbit in 1970, and have had some level of ballistic missile technology for about as long. The thing is that between dealing with all the other problems in China, and not getting alot of help from either the US or the Soviets for the most part, they’ve progressed a bit slower. But they’ve been steadily moving on it. Consider that their nuclear ballistic missile program (nukes, after all, being the real fear of Sputnik) has stepped it up roughly every 10 years.
The thing about China’s grand space ambitions is that it assumes that what slowed down their program before (lack of international technical assistance, political upheaval) isn’t going to happen in the future. Somehow I think dealing with things like revaluing the RMB, growing inequality, and a lack of potable water might end up taking up resources that would otherwise go to a lunar base or anything else huge.
October 5th, 2007 at 12:23 am
Oh, and they’ve launched about 50 satellites since that first one.
October 5th, 2007 at 1:25 am
Hmm, U.S has already been to the moon, so wouldn’t that be Chinese arrived on the moon 38 years too late. U.S space tech is way ahead of Chinese’s tech.
But with that said, we know many of the technologies we see today are the direct result of the massive research efforts begun with the space race. Kids today are just not that into science. A new space race could in theory jump start another spurt of technology growth! Which I think is a great idea.
The U.S needs a shot in the arms, they really need to get the kids interested in science, to become scientists and engineers.
On the Chinese side I dunno, they may do this, but they still got many problems. But leave no doubt they will get something out of the whole space thing. It’s not a wasted effort.
The Japanese may there first before the Chinese. They’re at least 10 years ahead of the Chinese.
October 5th, 2007 at 2:16 am
@Yay yo
I doubt the Japanese will bother.
As they likely don’t care about the face to be gained by a pointless 3rd place trip to the moon.
October 10th, 2007 at 6:56 pm
“American astronauts will have to bum rides with Russia (and you know how they drive)”
Um, yeah. NASA aimed Skylab at the big empty patch of the Indian Ocean between Australia and Madagascar and hit Australia. Russia aimed Mir at the big empty patch of Pacific Ocean between Chile and my homeland and hit exactly the right target. Those Russkies may be crazy-arse vodka-fueled nutjobs, but personally I feel safer with them driving.
“Off to the races, then? Not so fast. “The U.S. has to get over this feeling that it has to be a competition,†White House science adviser John Marburger told The AP.”
Give the Marburger a White House-sized soap box, ‘cos he’s on to the right idea. At least, based on that comment, he seems to be. If he’s the current White House science advisor, then I have my doubts. At least give this comment of his a White House-sized soap box.
@davesgonechina: “Somehow I think dealing with things like revaluing the RMB, growing inequality, and a lack of potable water might end up taking up resources that would otherwise go to a lunar base or anything else huge.”
Amen.