“We’re in a space race with China, and I’ve been pretty vocal about how good they are,” he told The Washington Post in a recent interview. “They’ve had great success, especially in the last decade. They usually say what they want to say and do what they say.”
But while China has made many space achievements, including a manned space station in low orbit and landing a rover on Mars in 2021, the U.S. is on track to return astronauts to the moon’s surface ahead of its biggest rival, Nelson said.
NASA plans to one day establish a permanent base at the lunar south pole, the hottest place in the solar system. In a key step toward that goal, the space agency plans to send four astronauts around the moon late next year, then land humans on the moon for the first time since the final Apollo mission in 1972, later in 2025.
“I think it’s on schedule,” Nelson said.
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But that timeline has been delayed several times because of technical challenges, including efforts to better understand the performance of the capsule’s heat shield to fly astronauts to and from the lunar vicinity. During an uncrewed test flight around the moon in 2022, NASA’s Orion spacecraft’s heat shield “went into an unexpected abrasion” in more than 100 places during its atmospheric re-entry, according to a report released in the spring by NASA’s inspector general. In some places, large chunks appeared to have fallen off, leaving scars that looked like holes in the material.
“If the same issue were to occur on future Artemis missions, it could result in the loss of the spacecraft and/or crew,” the report concluded.
NASA’s plan to return humans to the Moon is complex, requiring the Orion spacecraft to put humans into lunar orbit, then transport them to the Moon’s surface on another spacecraft, SpaceX’s Starship, which will then rendezvous with the astronauts in lunar orbit for the return flight to Earth.
NASA is closely monitoring Starship’s development due to its critical surface landing mission. SpaceX recently conducted the fourth test flight of the massive spacecraft, the largest and most powerful ever made, nearly completing a full circle around the Earth. The company said the flight was largely successful, allowing it to continue developing at a rapid clip.
Nelson said the success of SpaceX’s final Starship flight is a “good indicator” of NASA’s ability to get to the moon before China, but Elon Musk’s company still needs to demonstrate that the craft can be refueled in Earth orbit by a fleet of tanker spacecraft, safely fly humans, and soft-land on the moon — all highly ambitious feats., A complex task that could take years to accomplish.
Both the US and China aim to eventually build bases near the lunar south pole, where water exists in the form of ice in permanently shadowed craters. Not only is water essential for life, but its components, oxygen and hydrogen, can also be used as rocket fuel, enabling further exploration of the solar system.
Nelson said that while the United States and China are competitors, they will have to find a way to coexist on and around the moon, and that their space programs are also tied together by threats in space, he said.
U.S. officials say Russia is developing nuclear weapons that could be used to destroy satellites in Earth orbit and cripple critical U.S. national security infrastructure used for missile warning, reconnaissance and precision guidance. Russia denies any intention to station nuclear weapons in space.
Still, Nelson said the issue should concern all countries with assets in space, especially China, which not only operates a growing number of spacecraft that could be disabled by a nuclear blast, but also a manned space station.
Speaking publicly about the threat for the first time, he said: “All nations should be concerned that Russia may intend to put nuclear weapons into orbit. Such a capability could pose a threat to every satellite operated by countries and companies around the world, as well as the vital communications, scientific, weather, agricultural, commercial and national security services on which we all rely.”
He added: “This is an opportunity for the Chinese government. If a Russian nuclear bomb is deployed in space, it will pose a threat to Chinese astronauts and the space station. … They have an interest in Russia not deploying nuclear weapons. So they will try to exploit their relationship with Russia and their relationship with Russia.” [Chinese President] With Xi Jinping [Russian President Vladimir] Will Putin encourage Russians to reconsider?
Placing nuclear weapons in orbit would be a violation of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. As China and Russia continue to challenge the United States in space, NASA and the State Department have sought to lead a growing international coalition under an agreement known as the Artemis Accords, arguably the most significant international space policy effort since the 1967 treaty.
To pressure China’s space program, which Nelson and others criticize as being run secretly as a military branch, the pact’s signatories agree to abide by rules of conduct in outer space and on and around the moon. They are required, for example, to share scientific discoveries and provide detailed reports about what they are doing and where they are on the lunar surface.
Meanwhile, NASA’s lunar exploration continues. This year, the space agency expects one of its commercial partners, Houston-based company Intuitive Machines, to land a second unmanned spacecraft on the moon’s surface, with other privately developed landers to follow in coming years. Earlier this year, the company’s spacecraft became the first commercial spacecraft to land on the moon’s surface and the first American spacecraft to make a soft landing since the Apollo era.
But despite all the talk of a space race with China, astronauts taking part in the Artemis program, which is due to orbit the moon in 2025, say they don’t see it that way.
“We don’t see this as a race. We feel this is the right direction for exploration and the direction we’re heading,” NASA astronaut Reed Wiseman, the flight’s commander, said at a recent Washington Post Live event.
“But as Americans, we feel the pressure building,” he added.
