[HN Gopher] China Moon Mission: Aiming for 2030 lunar landing
___________________________________________________________________
China Moon Mission: Aiming for 2030 lunar landing
Author : rbanffy
Score : 77 points
Date : 2026-02-03 19:32 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (spectrum.ieee.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (spectrum.ieee.org)
| PassingClouds wrote:
| It is interesting to see who will get there first. China seems to
| be right on target with their schedule, but the US is being more
| ambitious, this also looks a bit more fragile on execution.
|
| I long suspect Blue Origin will be the first US based to touch
| down as Starship is just too complicated to get it done in the
| next 2-3 years, but that doesnt mean even the 2028 landing is
| assured.
|
| Space exploration had been fairly low key for decades but the
| last decade has been something to see.
| chihuahua wrote:
| Maybe my date calculations are off, but I think the people that
| landed on the moon on July 20, 1969 got there first. According
| to my calculations, if China lands people on the moon in 2030,
| that will be approximately 61 years later. The people that got
| there 61 years earlier can be reasonably said to have gotten
| there first.
|
| Oddly enough, the same country also accomplished the second,
| third, fourth, fifth, and sixth landing on the moon by humans.
| So if all goes well, China can be extremely triumphant with
| their highly anticipated seventh place trophy.
| XorNot wrote:
| And as we all know, successful enterprises are always the
| ones which do something once and then never again for 61
| years. /S
| chihuahua wrote:
| They did it 5 more times. Are the goalposts moving so that
| you have to do something 7 times before it counts?
|
| They stopped doing more moon missions in the 70s because
| people lost interest very quickly and nobody cared anymore.
| XorNot wrote:
| No I'm poking fun at the defensive reflex of Americans to
| get very upset at the notion anyone else will go to the
| moon. Because in context, who will get their first is the
| relevant question again because _no one_ has the
| capability anymore.
|
| It was perfectly clear in context that the OP was talking
| about the new space race where the question is which
| modern superpower will get there first. It's just
| hilarious that so many Americans immediately begin
| talking about how really _they_ got their truly first, in
| an effort to pretend they couldn 't understand and change
| the question to one which doesn't hurt their ego.
|
| The America which landed on the moon in the 1960s is dead
| and buried. And the America which said it's going to land
| on the moon again _hasn 't done it yet_ and it's not
| clear that it can.
| throwui wrote:
| One was coloniser and another one was a colony. That's why
| 61y gap
| wtodr wrote:
| Based
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _One was coloniser and another one was a colony_
|
| This is an America-centric geopolitical model with zero
| predictive power.
|
| China annexed Tibet in 1951 [1]. Xinjiang has been fighting
| colonization from the Qings, Soviets, Nationalists and PRC
| for over a century.
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annexation_of_Tibet_by_China
| chihuahua wrote:
| I think GP was referring to the fact that the United
| States is made up of former colonies of Great Britain,
| but that was such a long time ago, I don't see how it
| matters for the moon landing.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| It's a neo-leftist international model that divides
| everyone into colonizer and colonized nations without
| particular regard for history or reality. The former are
| bad and powerful. The latter weak and victims.
|
| It offers no predictions, policy prescriptions beyond
| railing and an infinity of excuses for justifying pretty
| much anything for the latter and against the former, down
| to subgroups within each nation.
| RobotToaster wrote:
| It was part of China since 1720, it briefly declared
| independence in 1913 but that was recognised by no
| foreign nation [0]
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibet
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Correct. Conquered or colonized in 1720 [1]. A century
| before the British colonized China with almost the same
| model (small garrison, literal Mandarin in charge). Put
| another way, the British controlled Hong Kong for longer
| than China has Tibet.
|
| The coloniser-colonised model works in the New World.
| It's silly outside it as a general model. (And it
| misfires completely when comparing America and China.
| Both were colonies. Both have colonized and hegemonised.)
|
| [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_expedition_to_T
| ibet_(1...
| chihuahua wrote:
| Indeed, the 13 colonies that formed the United States in
| 1776 were a colony of Great Britain up to that point, but
| what does that have to do with the moon landing? In the
| 1960s, neither country was a colony of any other country.
|
| But regardless, I will congratulate China wholeheartedly on
| its 7th place, if and when that happens.
| kube-system wrote:
| Neither the current space race nor the cold-war era space
| race have anything to do with planting a flag in a history
| book. They are geopolitical dick measuring contests of
| contemporary power.
|
| The current question isn't "is it possible?", it is "who can
| pull it off today?"
| nancyminusone wrote:
| The people from 61 years ago are either extremely old or
| dead. Of the other three-quarters of the world population
| born after December 19, 1972, none have made it there; it
| will be a first for them.
| baxtr wrote:
| Are you talking about Mars? Moon happened a while back.
| tartoran wrote:
| Mars is Elon Musk fantasy. Manned missions to Mars are
| extremely dangerous and pointless at this time.
| georgeburdell wrote:
| Watch China's announcements year to year and you'll see their
| plans do change. Long March 9 has gone through enough design
| iterations that I wouldn't even call it the same rocket anymore
| hdivider wrote:
| This space race is different for one core reason: China is more
| stable than the Soviet Union was in the 1960s.
|
| If we beat the Chinese somehow, I don't think they'll just
| dismantle their space program and focus on Earth. They'll keep
| going, and they have the economic base to expand their program.
|
| I think we're seeing the beginning of a new kind of space race.
| It's likely to be much longer term and grander in scale over
| time, as we compete for the best spots on the Moon and the first
| human landing on Mars in the decades to come.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _China is more stable than the Soviet Union was in the 1960s_
|
| Xi literally just purged "the country's top military leader,
| Gen. Zhang Youxia, and an associate, Gen. Liu Zhenli" [1].
|
| This is the mark of a dictator. Not the Soviet Union at its
| finest.
|
| [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/03/us/politics/china-xi-
| mili...
| wtodr wrote:
| This is the same trite bullshit we've been hearing for
| decades. Look at where China is today.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _the same trite bullshit we've been hearing for decades_
|
| Nope. It isn't. Xi has ruled China like a dictator that
| breaks the tradition of intraparty competition the CCP has
| had since Mao.
|
| When Xi ended his Wolf Warrior nonsense it seemed to signal
| a reset. Now we have this nonsense.
|
| > _Look at where China is today_
|
| Look at where America is today. Both are richer than
| they've ever been. More militarily potent than ever. Both
| are growing their economies, militaries and territorial
| ambitions. Both have serious issues, including the
| gerontocratic oligarchic consolidation of power at the
| expense of national interests.
| SilverElfin wrote:
| Not that I disagree, but I'm curious how you define
| national interests.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _curious how you define national interests_
|
| My metric would be what the country's population today
| and weighted populations of the future, if they could
| weigh in, would choose.
|
| It's possible to frame _ex post facto_ and impossible to
| pin down in the present. And it's inherently subjective
| and culturally relative. But it's useful to reason with,
| including for finding patterns in history.
|
| One pattern is the cost of corruption. If a leader is
| making billions off their power, they're putting person
| about polity. That's currently true in America [1] and
| China [2][3]. The difference is America has a chance to
| fix that in '28. China used to rotate leaders. But Xi
| fucked that up. (Note the language similarity between the
| above comment and how MAGA defends itself. "Trite
| bullshit." Beijing has a hidden MACA problem, it's just
| had a tougher time dealing with it because Xi reveres
| Mao.)
|
| [1] https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/spy-sheikh-
| secret-stake-...
|
| [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/18/world/asia/chinas-
| preside...
|
| [3] https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2025/mar/20/us-
| intel-sa...
| blibble wrote:
| > Look at where America is today. Both are richer than
| they've ever been. More militarily potent than ever.
|
| just don't look at the first derivative vs china
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| The argument is the reflexive defensiveness works-and is
| raised--in both cases. Premature declarations of victory
| have _never_ been a historic sign of strength.
| tartoran wrote:
| Keep in mind that China is not where it is today because of
| Xi. He could take it further for sure but so can he press
| the wrong buttons. It remains to be seen how China fares in
| the next few decades.
| fakedang wrote:
| Yep, China was on a massive and insane growth trajectory
| prior to Xi. Xi's policies and constant banging of war
| drums at Taiwan's door has cost China massively in terms
| of foreign investment and even knowledge transfer
| opportunities (by the ever-gullible West).
| RobotToaster wrote:
| He's doing a better job than Zhao Ziyang, that's for
| sure.
| baxtr wrote:
| The question is rather: Where could China have been today
| if it started opening up decades earlier?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Where could China have been today if it started
| opening up decades earlier?_
|
| Or without Mao being a trash fire of a leader. (Flip
| side: where would they be without Deng or Zemin, or
| others in the CCP who put nation above personal interest?
| The folks Xi is killing because they threaten his
| personal interests.)
| baxtr wrote:
| Maybe the combination of capitalism + democracy is so
| successful because it aligns the incentives of leaders
| and the masses best (to the extent possible).
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| My takeaway from China is democracy is less important
| than political competition. Between Mao and Xi, the CCP
| had the latter without the former. Today, America has the
| former and is struggling to keep the latter.
| baxtr wrote:
| Yes agreed. But competition for what?
|
| I'd say for the good of the majority of the people.
|
| In other systems only those on top profit (maybe 10-20%
| max) even if they claim otherwise.
|
| Thus democracy, through competition, aligns the leader's
| incentive with their people best.
| standardUser wrote:
| China had fallen behind long before Mao, after being
| among the most powerful and advanced nations for most of
| recorded history. It appears to now be stepping back into
| that familiar role.
| Fricken wrote:
| Neither China or the West handled the transition to
| industrial civilization well. A key difference is that
| most Chinese died due to incompetence on the part of
| their leaders, but in the west they mostly murdered one
| another on purpose.
|
| Once again a Nazi is in charge of the western world's
| most advanced rocket program.
| subw00f wrote:
| It's amazing. The American president is quite literally
| creating a parallel military force to jail and kill people
| on the streets, they're arresting opposing journalists,
| politicians, pressuring tv channels and news organizations
| to fire people, invading countries without congressional
| approval, threatening allies with annexation for no fucking
| reason, dismantling any social programs left, and all of
| that led by a proven pedophile billionaire that was the
| customer and friend of a huge human trafficker, as were
| most of his billionaire friends who he favors with
| absolutely no shame.
|
| And this is just the latest news coming from over there. I
| won't mention the fact that there are people alive today
| who couldn't drink from the same fountain as other people
| because their skin is dark. It was never fucking great.
|
| So if you are American and still talk all this shit about
| China being a dictatorship and authoritarian this and
| "purge" that, I wish you would honestly shut the fuck up.
| Really. You are in no position to have an informed opinion
| on this because all of your information is force fed down
| your throat by half a dozen mega companies that are in bed
| with your regime.
|
| So yeah, I'm sure China has a lot of issues, but if you
| didn't live there for some time or even speak the language
| for that matter, just shut the fuck the up.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _if you are American and still talk all this shit about
| China being a dictatorship and authoritarian this and
| "purge" that, I wish you would honestly shut the fuck up.
| Really. You are in no position to have an informed
| opinion on this because all of your information is force
| fed_
|
| Bit defensive there, eh?
|
| China is an autocracy and Xi is acting in the predictably
| self-destructive ways a dictator does. The U.S. is
| heading down that same path, with Trump practically
| mimicking Xi. N = 2 doesn't weaken an argument. And folks
| who lived through the Nazis saying they see similar veins
| today doesn't undermine their credibility.
|
| (The hilarity of it is if you take your comment and
| replace China and America with partisan or pro-American
| coding, you could pop it out of Hegseth's office and it
| would be right at home. Your comment almost seals the
| point that Xi is all the problems of MAGA, except polling
| China instead.)
| subw00f wrote:
| Yes, I'm aware how ignorant I may sound, but it's so
| goddamn frustrating to read this kind of bullshit
| everytime I come to an American platform.
|
| Ok, China is an autocracy, right? Could you explain to me
| how China conduct elections? Can you explain to me how
| they approve laws? Do they have a constitution? A justice
| system? Try answering these questions without much
| looking up and even if you do, please note the sources.
| No need to answer me really. Just ask yourself whether
| you know this or not and how qualified are you to
| actually label a HUGE state like China with one single
| heavily charged word.
| elzbardico wrote:
| The US is not an autocracy, is a mix between a plutocracy
| and a gerontocracy.
| hdivider wrote:
| I agree there is a lot of chaos over there, and numerous
| challenges. But I don't see China collapsing anytime soon,
| nothing like the Soviet Union. It's going to be a long-term
| space race.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _I don 't see China collapsing anytime soon, nothing like
| the Soviet Union_
|
| I don't either. But the Soviet Union's space programme lost
| its steam in the 1970s. (Venus was its last ambitious
| achievement.)
|
| If China gets bogged down in Taiwan because Xi fired every
| military expert who might disagree with him, that's going
| to cost them the space race. (Same as if America decides to
| replicate the Sino-Soviet split with Europe over Greenland.
| We can't afford a competitive space programme at that
| point.)
| adventured wrote:
| There's a question as to whether China's surplus
| capability is enough to overflow the deprivation that a
| space program might suffer in a chaos Taiwan scenario.
|
| Their resources and capabilities are obviously
| substantial and sustained (not going anywhere). The USSR
| had only a few patches of sustained serious economic
| output, the rest of the time was rolling from one
| disaster to another, one deprivation after another.
|
| It seems entirely plausible that China getting bogged
| down in Taiwan wouldn't be enough to deprive them of a
| run to the Moon. The US was able to sustain NASA during
| Iraq-Afghanistan, and go to the Moon during the Vietnam
| War (plus cultural chaos).
|
| That said, China isn't going to get bogged down in
| Taiwan. It's going to unfortunately be easier than most
| are imagining. China will ultimately regret not moving on
| the island sooner when they see how easy it's going to be
| to take it and how weak the US response will be (the US
| can't sustain a stand-off with China in that region for
| more than a few weeks before folding, unless it's willing
| to go to full war mode economically (which it's not)).
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _seems entirely plausible that China getting bogged
| down in Taiwan wouldn 't be enough to deprive them of a
| run to the Moon. The US was able to sustain NASA during
| Iraq-Afghanistan_
|
| We probably lost basing on the Moon because Bush went
| into Iraq.
|
| China getting bogged down in Taiwan means more political
| repression, more restiveness in Xinjiang and--if New
| Delhi isn't totally stupid--needing to prop up Pakistan
| and its strategic fronts in the Himalayas. It also almost
| certainly means demand destruction in Europe, the EU and
| ASEAN.
|
| > _China isn 't going to get bogged down in Taiwan. It's
| going to unfortunately be easier than most are imagining_
|
| The same people saying this today had hot takes on Kyiv
| falling in '21.
|
| China invading Taiwan demilitarized Japan and India. It
| fundamentally changes its doorstep in ways that incur
| costs. To the Soviets, Afghanistan. To America, Iraq and
| possibly Greenland. To China, Taiwan.
|
| (And let's be clear: this is a vanity project for Xi.
| Taiwan would have voted, eventually, to peacefully join
| China if pre-Xi trends continued. But he needed it on his
| watch. Hence the stupidity.)
| wafflemaker wrote:
| >The same people saying this today had hot takes on Kyiv
| falling in '21.
|
| Please note that Kiev not falling after a week in '22
| (assuming you misspelled) was pure luck. Russians had
| extreme advantage in man and firepower. They made a big
| mistake by using their army against their doctrine - not
| bombing/shelling targets before attacking (what Russian
| army was designed for).
|
| But them losing the war (at least the first week) is due
| to a few lucky dice rolls for us. Us both Europe, but
| also for me as a Polish expat, knowing my brothers and
| friends are not dying right now fighting Russian army
| with all the Ukrainians conscripted into it.
|
| These lucky dice rolls that I can come up from memory: 1.
| Shooting down one of two military passenger planes with
| russian Seals that were to take Kiev's Hostomel airport
| and open an air bridge. The group from the plane that
| survived did take the airfields, but they couldn't decide
| on their own to move and take the airports buildings - no
| distributed command in Russia at that point. Thanks to
| that, local territorial defence managed to easily kill
| these elite forces. 2. Fast and generous support from
| England in form of Javelins that limited Russian heavy
| equipment advantage. Sorry if I don't credit the
| countries involved correctly. 3. Fast and generous aid
| with post soviet equipment from old Warsaw pact
| countries. These tanks could be used right away as they
| required no re-training. 4. General incompetence and duty
| negligence that was systemic in Soviets and is still
| systemic in Russia. To that we owe cars running out of
| fuel, or having their tires pop, because, against orders
| to regularly move them, they all sat with sun damaging
| one side of the tire so many years, while the responsible
| for maintenance were drinking vodka and eating pierogi
| with kielbasa.
| hparadiz wrote:
| > pure luck
|
| this is actually skill, bravery, and fortitude
| alephnerd wrote:
| > And let's be clear: this is a vanity project for Xi.
| Taiwan would have voted, eventually, to peacefully join
| China if pre-Xi trends continued. But he needed it on his
| watch. Hence the stupidity.
|
| From what I've been hearing from my buddies still in the
| NatSec space what matters at this point is the 2028
| Taiwanese Election and maybe the 2028 Philippines
| Election. If neither see a definitive victory for either
| side in 2028, it gives a face saving off-ramp for the Xi
| admin to argue they brought the "Taiwan Problem" back on
| track to the pre-2014 status quo. Of course they could be
| closeted KMT/TPP supporters but it does come down to the
| 28 elections.
| Animats wrote:
| > If China gets bogged down in Taiwan...
|
| Look at the geography. Taiwan is a long, narrow island.
| All the important parts are in a narrow plain on the west
| side, facing China. There's only about 20km of depth from
| the sea.
|
| The war in Ukraine is like fighting over Iowa, one farm
| at a time. Taiwan is not like that.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| _If China gets bogged down in Taiwan_
|
| The odds of them losing militarily are virtually nil.
| They could face an insurgency, but there isn't a whole
| lot of rural Taiwan for insurgents to vanish into and
| occupying cities is a lot easier absent language and
| cultural barriers. The could be isolated politically and
| economically, but realistically China's territorial claim
| on Taiwan is on far firmer legal and historical ground
| than many other territorial disputes (eg their control
| over Tibet).
|
| I don't see the US involving itself directly. What are
| they going to do, counter-blockade? Start a naval
| shooting war with a full-on nuclear power on the other
| side of the world? I don't see Japan backing that either,
| despite their natural anxiety over the vulnerability of
| the Ryukyu islands. Support for US bases in Okinawa is
| ambivalent at best, and while Japan is surely not
| thrilled about Chinese regional hegemony it's also a
| reality they've dealt with for thousands of years.
| ck2 wrote:
| btw just for comparison over in the US
|
| Trump has purged dozens of Generals, the head Admiral of the
| Navy and Coast Guard, head of NSA and Cyber Command and many
| other top-level officials in the military
|
| and there are only 1,000 women in various special forces (had
| to pass same physical tests as men) but he is trying to get
| rid of them all too
|
| Now that is the mark of dictator, agreed
| adventured wrote:
| Trump was elected by the people of the United States.
| Twice. Soundly. Not a dictator.
|
| Xi was never elected to his position by the people of
| China.
|
| Being a bad president isn't the same thing as being a
| dictator.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Trump was elected by the people of the United States.
| Twice. Soundly. Not a dictator_
|
| Trump is not a dictator, but not because he was elected,
| but because of our courts and federal system (and
| theoretically Congress).
| chrisco255 wrote:
| The Commander in Chief of the military, also known as the
| President, has the authority to fire at will, that is how
| it works in America for 250 years now.
| RobotToaster wrote:
| There's a better article about it in the WSJ of all places
| https://archive.is/48m3F
|
| Missing from both is that Zhang Youxia was the last senior
| PLA leader to have seen frontline action in the Sino-
| Vietnamese war.
| dragonelite wrote:
| Vietnam frontline experience is irrelevant in 2026, when
| its more drone dominated.
|
| Im sure China has plenty of observers/volunteers embedded
| at the Russian side in the SMO making plenty of notes,
| reports, and get modern warfare experience..
| largbae wrote:
| All frontline experience is valuable. It reminds the
| leader that in war, real people, people on your own side,
| people that you know, people that you will miss, will
| die.
| smallmancontrov wrote:
| and in this case the particulars match the archetype: my
| understanding is that Zhang was the "dove" while Xi is
| the "hawk." The hawk just ate the dove. We're going to
| war.
| smallmancontrov wrote:
| Did the USSR ever manufacture 80% of the stuff in your house?
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Did the USSR ever manufacture 80% of the stuff in your
| house?_
|
| China makes about a third of the world's stuff [1]. Soviet
| Union probably peaked around a fifth, though it might have
| been as high as a fourth.
|
| China is undoubtedly stronger today, absolutely and
| relative to the U.S., than the Soviets ever were. But
| history is littered with self-obsessed autocrats ruining a
| good thing.
|
| Part of what makes the world today frustrating is both
| America and China are squandering their advantages in
| remarkably-similar ways, with each regime's defenders
| speaking almost identically.
|
| [1] https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/china-worlds-sole-
| manufacturi...
| alephnerd wrote:
| > Part of what makes the world today frustrating is both
| America and China are squandering their advantages in
| remarkably-similar ways, with each regime's defenders
| speaking almost identically.
|
| Personalist rule be personalist.
| NoMoreNicksLeft wrote:
| If they had manufactured 80% of the stuff in my house,
| wouldn't Reagan have concluded that they had won the war
| before it started? A country that manufactures 80% of the
| things you need to live might just decide to not sell them
| to you if you misbehave.
| smallmancontrov wrote:
| Yes, but the real question is if Reagan still would have
| pushed as hard for financialization and
| deindustrialization if he understood that he was
| ultimately selling American industry to communists.
|
| I think he would have. I think he hated American labor
| more than he hated foreign communists. If his head were
| still around in a Futurama Jar to comment on the matter,
| I think he would be blaming American workers for the
| consequences of his own policies.
| chrisco255 wrote:
| Reagan didnt push for deindustrialization and "the world
| is flat" world view didn't take precedence until after
| the fall of the Soviet Union in the 90s.
|
| At the time, everyone was still optimistic that China
| would eventually become more open and even democratic,
| that Russia would not regress, etc.
|
| It was still common for electronics and microprocessors
| to be made in USA well into the 90s. Reagan had nothing
| to do with the expansion of WTO and trade deficits with
| China that ballooned under HW, Clinton, Bush Jr and
| Obama.
| janalsncm wrote:
| Xi appointed himself president for life in 2018, almost six
| years ago. China wasnt exactly a bastion of liberal democracy
| before then either. Sacking a top general is basically par
| for the course.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Sacking a top general is basically par for the course_
|
| Yes and no. Military readiness and potency doesn't require
| liberal democracy. It _does_ require skill and command, and
| sacking military leaders for political reasons is how
| powers from Athens to the Soviets screwed themselves.
| janalsncm wrote:
| Yeah but the question of stability was relative to the
| Soviets. The US has a good amount of instability as well,
| and has been hemorrhaging scientists lately.
|
| So if the argument is that _sacking a top general implies
| that China is too unstable to prevail in a future space
| race_ I don't buy it.
| hbarka wrote:
| Our dear leader just purged the Pentagon and other hallowed
| agencies, what does that make us?
|
| https://www.reuters.com/world/us/latest-purge-hegseth-
| remove...
| arjie wrote:
| Do we already know what the best spots on the Moon are or will
| that be determined by the early missions doing survey?
| hdivider wrote:
| Yes to both I'd say. The south polar region will be contested
| because of the presence of water-ice and abundant sunlight.
| rzerowan wrote:
| Theresa though i read somewhere that i tend to agree with -
| with the level of tech and space experience that China
| currently is capable of , they could possibly launch a return
| mission as early as next year(if they so chose).
|
| However they have their own timetable and milestones , hence
| going to the moon has already been earmarked with followup
| misson for a lunar base and further missions already penned in.
| So less of a race if one party is just doing their own thing.
|
| We see the same dynamic viz Taiwan , western commentariat seeks
| to impose deadlines and spin rationales when they never
| materialise. Or the AI race where China keeps churning out OSS
| models while American labs are in a sel declared 'race' for
| supremacy.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| Is there a good, consolidated technical description of their
| mission architecture?
|
| (Apparently Artemis II is now pushed off the March [1]. Alongside
| Starship's next scheduled launch [2].)
|
| [1] https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/missions/2026/02/03/nasa-
| conducts...
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Starship_launches
| spiritplumber wrote:
| If another space race is what it takes, then I welcome it.
| kens wrote:
| As a historical note, the first President Bush proposed in 1989
| to establish a base on the Moon and send astronauts to Mars by
| 2020. In 2004, the second President Bush set a goal of returning
| to the Moon by 2020 and going to Mars in the 2030s, starting the
| Constellation program. In 2017, Trump announced that astronauts
| would return to the Moon, with the Artemis III project now
| planning a landing no earlier than 2028.
|
| As a result, I don't have a lot of optimism about a US landing on
| the Moon. On the other hand, the James Webb Space Telescope did
| succeed even though the launch date slipped from 2007 to 2021. So
| I've learned not to be completely pessimistic.
|
| Sources: https://www.nytimes.com/1990/05/12/us/bush-sets-target-
| for-m... https://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/15/us/bush-backs-goal-
| of-fli... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constellation_program
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