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A US Senate hearing this month met with dire warnings that China is leaping ahead of its global rivals. (Image: Universal Images Group via Getty Images)<\/p>\n
In space nobody can hear you scream. But here on Earth, legions of voices are being raised in anguish as China takes a disturbing lead in the second space race to put astronauts back on the moon and seize its prizes.<\/p>\n
Britain and Europe are unlikely to put anyone on the lunar surface for years, and even America has unexpectedly fallen behind China in the challenge that could determine the future security of our planet.<\/p>\n
China is due to put \u201ctaikonauts\u201d \u2013 their version of astronauts \u2013 on the moon by 2030, with plans for a lunar base powered by a nuclear reactor. The burgeoning superpower, which has massively ramped up its military in recent years, could be in a position to dominate space from its lunar stronghold.<\/p>\n
All Britain can do is stare at the moon and wish on a shooting star. It has been 53 years since America put the last man on the moon.<\/p>\n
The first space race was ignited in 1961 when president John F Kennedy called on the US to put a man on the moon before Russia<\/a> \u2013 and it succeeded with Apollo 11 in 1969. But that effort was as much about international prestige and Cold War bragging rights as it was about scientific development.<\/p>\n Today\u2019s second space race, with the US facing off against China, is more about establishing a strategic lunar beachhead: a fortification that could control the future lunar-Earth space economy, plus global spy satellite operations and the exploitation of lunar resources.<\/p>\n But a US Senate hearing this month met with dire warnings that China is leaping ahead of its global rivals.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is highly unlikely that we will land on the moon before China,\u201d cautioned former NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine. \u201cThat puts the nation at risk.\u201d<\/p>\n And it\u2019s not just the US in jeopardy.<\/p>\n Britain\u2019s lunar ambitions are reliant on the European Space Agency, which is itself looking to ride on the coattails of NASA.<\/p>\n Russia<\/a>, which was first into space with Sputnik in 1957, following that up with Yuri Gagarin\u2019s first manned space flight in 1961, has never put a cosmonaut on the moon, but is poised to partner with China\u2019s moonshot in an alliance that could prove deeply troubling to the West in deep space.<\/p>\n \u201cIs the Chinese-manned space program embedded in the military? You betcha!\u201d says Scott Pace, Space Policy Institute director at George Washington University. \u201cDoes the military contribute to the manned space programme? You betcha!\u201d<\/p>\n At stake are the moon\u2019s potential spoils and its formidable strategic advantage.<\/p>\n Both China and America aim to land in the Shackleton Crater at the lunar South Pole, 6,800 miles from where Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin first stepped in the Sea of Tranquility in 1969.<\/p>\n They hope to harvest local ice deposits for drinkable water, breathable oxygen and even rocket fuel.<\/p>\n But more important is the base\u2019s potential military significance. It would provide a commanding oversight of Earth\u2019s satellites \u2013 vital to modern warfare.<\/p>\n Military experts believe the next world war could be fought in space, with spy satellites and orbiting weaponry creating a terrifying new sort of battlefield.<\/p>\n A shocking Pentagon report earlier this year called space the \u201cdecisive domain\u201d for any coming war between the superpowers, predicting: \u201cControl of space in 2050 will be aggressively contested \u2013 it already is.\u201d (Image: -)<\/p>\n A shocking Pentagon report earlier this year called space the \u201cdecisive domain\u201d for any coming war between the superpowers, predicting: \u201cControl of space in 2050 will be aggressively contested \u2013 it already is.\u201d<\/p>\n Yet China\u2019s lunar programme appears to be speeding relentlessly forward, with a string of successes. In recent weeks it has triumphantly tested its first stage propulsion system for the new Long March 10 rocket, tested its \u201cLanyue\u201d lunar landing module and residential base, and unveiled its state-of-the-art spacesuit, crafted specifically for lunar conditions.<\/p>\n Uncrewed missions by China since 2020 have meant it is now the only nation to retrieve lunar samples from the near and dark side of the moon.<\/p>\n China also plans to build an imposing International Lunar Research Station \u2013 but neither Britain nor the US will be a part of it. Its partners are hardly our closest allies: Russia<\/a>, Belarus and Pakistan.<\/p>\n China\u2019s centrally managed command-and-control economy makes it an indomitable force compared with America, where NASA\u2019s objectives can change with each new incumbent of the Oval Office.<\/p>\n Making matters worse, the White House has proposed a 25% cut to NASA\u2019s 2026 budget, with a 50% reduction in its science budget.<\/p>\n Britain\u2019s lunar hopes rest on America\u2019s Artemis programme, the successor to the Apollo missions. However, Artemis has been repeatedly delayed, and tied up in bureaucratic red tape.<\/p>\n SpaceX\u2019s Elon Musk<\/a> lamented that the US Federal Aviation Administration \u201cis smothering the national space programme in Kafkaesque paperwork\u201d. Retired US Space Force Lieutenant General John Shaw praised China\u2019s \u201cintegrated grand strategy for the Earth-moon system\u201d, compared with America\u2019s piecemeal plans, and cautioned: \u201cWe may find ourselves, rather than in a leadership position, in a position of increasing disadvantages.\u201d<\/p>\n Artemis is centred on the reusable heavy-lift launch vehicle Starship developed by SpaceX, docking with an Orion spacecraft carrying the crew. But a lunar mission will require a dozen or more additional Starship launches just to fill a propellant depot \u2013 in low Earth orbit \u2013 with fuel to power the lunar lander. The Starship has yet to carry any astronauts and it exploded during three of its last four test flights. If that wasn\u2019t bad enough, a 2022 Orion flight experienced the near-catastrophic loss of heat shield tiles.<\/p>\n Congress was shocked this month to hear aerospace experts scorn Artemis as a flawed programme doomed to give China an unassailable advantage.<\/p>\n \u201cWithout a successful Artemis programme, we risk ceding the moon to China,\u201d warned Allen Cutler, president of industry group the Coalition for Deep Space Exploration. And former NASA chief Jim Bridenstine bemoaned the fact the Artemis programme was selected in 2021, at a time when there was no permanent space agency chief.<\/p>\n Uncrewed missions by China since 2020 have meant it is now the only nation to retrieve lunar samples from the near and dark side of the moon. (Image: Getty Images)<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t know how this happens,\u201d he told senators, \u201cbut the biggest decision in the history of NASA . . . happens in the absence of an administrator.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is an architecture that no NASA administrator that I\u2019m aware of would have selected if they had a choice.\u201d<\/p>\n China is keenly aware of the moon\u2019s strategic and military value. Landing on the moon several years before America and its allies could shape the future of lunar and space exploration, and mould regulations for its exploitation, while keeping America and Europe in its crosshairs from some 238,855 miles away.<\/p>\n Boasting the world\u2019s largest standing army at two million, China\u2019s rapidly expanding military reach and might were proudly displayed when the People\u2019s Liberation Army staged an intimidating parade earlier this month in Beijing, where guests of honour included Russia<\/a>\u2019s Vladimir Putin<\/a>, South Korea\u2019s Kim Jong-Un and India\u2019s Narendra Modi.<\/p>\n China displayed its nuclear arsenal, mobile intercontinental ballistic missiles and new fleet of hypersonic weapons that manoeuvre at several times the speed of sound.<\/p>\n![\"This](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/6447933.jpg\" "\\"This")
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