Why is there suddenly a great interest in a new moon landing after more than 50 years?
In: Planetary Science
The biggest reason is China. They’ve been steadily ramping up their space operations for decades now. They have a space station roughly a third the size of the ISS in orbit. They’ve put up their own version of GPS. They’ve landed uncrewed landers on the far side of the moon. They’re preparing a sample return mission for launch soon. They’re planning for a crewed base at the lunar south pole to harvest water ice. The US doesn’t want the Chinese to have any advantage, so they’re going to try to do similar projects to stay on the same footing.
Why? Because in space possession is 99.9% of the law. If the Chinese establish a base at a strategic location on the south pole of the moon, they could easily break the outer space treaty and declare ownership of as much of the moon as they desire. If the US can’t match with a base of their own, the Chinese get a massive leg up in future space exploration and exploitation while the US struggles to play catch-up. Remember, all space exploration stems from military demand. A base on the moon extracting water for rocket fuel is a huge advantage compared to the current strategy of launching all our fuel up on top of a rocket.
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