Vikram Mansharamani reports that at a cost of more than $150 billion, the International Space Station is the most expensive object ever built. This price tag is more than double the combined costs of China Three Gorges Dam, Boston Big Dig and the Chunnel. But as noted by CNN, funding for the International Space Station may run out in the early 2020s. That happens to be around the same time that the Chinese are expected to complete their own space station, potentially leaving the Asian power with the sole operating lab in orbit. And given that Congress banned NASA from working bilaterally with anyone from the Chinese space program, it is unclear if U.S. astronauts will be welcome. The Chinese space station is merely one part of the Middle Kingdom extraterrestrial ambitions.
Tinkering in space has emerged as an important plank of its geopolitical strategy. And if recent history is any guide, the Chinese are serious about their plans in space. To begin, their program has already accomplished a great deal over the past few years. In 2013, China became the third nation, after the u.S. and the Soviet Union, to soft-land a spacecraft on the moon. In 2014, the country also sent a probe around the moon and back, the first such mission since the 1970s. But China has even grander plans. These include a 2018 mission to send the first probe in history to land on the dark side of the moon, where the extraordinary geology is largely unexplored. Other plans aim to bring back lunar samples as well as to land humans on the surface of the moon. The country has Martian ambitions as well.
What are the Chinese doing? Why the increased focus on space and specifically the moon? Mansharamani sees several reasons.First, China views space as a potentially game-changing source of energy security. Specifically, the moon has abundant supplies of helium-3, a light and non-radioactive fusion fuel that is virtually nonexistent here on Earth.
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