{"id":574371,"date":"2026-04-09T18:35:07","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T18:35:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/574371\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T18:35:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T18:35:07","slug":"trumps-race-to-the-moon-is-about-dominance-over-china-not-discovery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/574371\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump’s race to the moon is about dominance over China, not discovery"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Friday, the crew of\u00a0the Artemis II<\/a> mission will splash down on Earth after its historic 10-day flyby of the Moon. President Donald Trump<\/a> is celebrating the achievement as a patriotic win \u201cbeyond the stars\u201d for the United States, even as funding for future scientific endeavors sits on a knife-edge thanks to his administration\u2019s priorities.<\/p>\n

\u201cAmerica is going back to the Moon,\u201d Trump posted<\/a> to his social network Truth Social on April 1. \u201cAmerica doesn\u2019t just compete, we DOMINATE, and the whole world is watching.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speaking with the Artemis II astronauts on Monday evening, Trump said<\/a> their mission had made the U.S. \u201cthe hottest country in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAmerica will be second to none in space and everything else that we\u2019re doing, and we will continue to lead the whole thing,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s positive mood and nationalistic championing go far beyond the scientific successes of Artemis II. They indicate the president\u2019s ambitions for the U.S. to dominate space, with specific focus on the moon. In its recently released 2027 budget<\/a>, the Trump administration requested<\/a> $8.5 billion for the Artemis program to put Americans on the moon in 2028 \u2014 coincidentally the same amount in proposed cuts for K-12 programs.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Budget fully funds the lunar landers, space suits, lunar surface systems, and astronaut transportation systems necessary to safely and cost-effectively expand America\u2019s presence to the surface of the Moon,\u201d the budget reads in part.<\/p>\n

It also calls for hundreds of millions of dollars to establish a \u201clunar base camp\u201d near the Moon\u2019s south pole, and makes the intentions of such an endeavor clear: \u201cThe base camp would establish U.S. dominance on the Moon, enable more intensive use of lunar resources by NASA and U.S. companies,\u201d it reads.<\/p>\n

The three-phase, $30-billion-dollar plan<\/a> for lunar dominance is relatively straightforward. Between 2026 and 2036, the U.S. will identify future landing sites for astronauts on the moon. It will test numerous types of technology on the lunar surface, from vehicles and drones to small nuclear reactors, before moving on to building infrastructure for a moon base and conducting semi-regular manned missions.<\/p>\n

Eventually, a permanent settlement of sorts will be established, acting as a base camp for future expeditions deeper into space. The plan\u2019s success could solidify the image of U.S. as a leader in space, and give it ample mining<\/a> access to a plethora of minerals and elements on the moon. Andrea Harrington, co-director of McGill University\u2019s Institute of Air and Space Law, says that, so far, the plan is legal.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you try to carry out dominance to mean exclusion of others, that is absolutely unlawful under international law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2018Dominance\u2019 is just a word,\u201d Harrington told Salon. \u201cNothing about establishing a moon base, a permanent presence on the moon, is unlawful in international law, and it could just be that dominance is rhetoric.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, former Vice President Mike Pence called<\/a> for \u201cAmerican dominance in space\u201d in 2018. Depending on how that is interpreted and acted upon, however, could violate international agreements on space exploration.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you try to carry out dominance to mean exclusion of others, that is absolutely unlawful under international law,\u201d Harrington said. \u201cJust building a fixed facility in and of itself does not qualify as territorial appropriation or territorial sovereignty.\u201d<\/p>\n

She pointed to the 1967 Outer Space Treaty<\/a>, a keystone document on international space law that President Lyndon Johnson signed onto. The treaty allows all nations to explore and use the moon \u201cexclusively for peaceful purposes,\u201d and bans any claims of sovereignty over the moon. It also bans nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction on the moon or in Earth\u2019s orbit. For nearly sixty years, the tenets of the treaty have been respected by all nations.<\/p>\n

However, Harrington notes that the treaty has gray areas, notably regarding the retention of non-WMDs on the moon. She speculates that the U.S. and other major powers could argue that keeping weapons on the moon is \u201cperfectly reasonable and legal within their rights under the treaty.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course, it could still lead to tension and escalation from an international relations perspective,\u201d Harrington said. \u201cI think it\u2019s worth keeping that in mind.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those tensions are already in play between the U.S. and its biggest adversary<\/a>, China, which has been no slouch when it comes to space exploration. They were the third country to land a rover on Mars<\/a>, they have Tiangong space station, a rival to the International Space Station, which is due to be decommissioned<\/a> by NASA in 2030 and launched its second rover, Yutu-2, on the moon in 2018. It became the first vehicle to reach the moon\u2019s far side, becoming the longest-lived rover<\/a> on the lunar surface.<\/p>\n

Start your day with essential news from Salon.
Sign up for our free morning newsletter<\/a>, Crash Course.<\/p>\n

China\u2019s interests also lie in ensuring military defense capabilities. It first tested shooting down a satellite<\/a> in 2007, and has since invested in anti-satellite missile systems and an orbital defense system to deter attacks from orbit, along with enhanced space surveillance technologies. A 2025 report<\/a> from the Air Force\u2019s China Aerospace Studies Institute warned that the offensive use of these technologies \u201ccould threaten U.S. military superiority\u201d to \u201cproject power globally.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, laid out American concerns during a congressional hearing in September 2025. \u201cMake no mistake,\u201d Cruz said<\/a>, \u201cWe are in a new space race with China. And if we fail, there will be a bad moon on the rise.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Trump administration is not keen on failing. An executive order<\/a> from Trump in December 2025, entitled \u201cEnsuring American Space Superiority,\u201d called for \u201ccreating a responsive and adaptive national security space architecture\u201d through allied cooperation and private sector investments.<\/p>\n

Steven Mirmina, a former senior attorney at NASA and an adjunct professor of space law at Georgetown University Law Center, cites China\u2019s successful lunar rover, the success of its Tiangong space station<\/a>, and its proposed International Lunar Research Station as elements of a new space race.<\/p>\n

\u201cChina is the only other game in town,\u201d Mirmina told Salon, noting that its one-party system does not have the challenges a democracy has in political battles over budget and timeframes in space operations.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery four years, the leadership changes, Congress changes, and priorities change,\u201d Mirmina said. \u201cIn China, if they have a long-term goal, they can attain it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s new budget certainly prioritizes the Artemis program, but at a tremendous cost to science funding. The budget calls for more than $3 billion in cuts to what it calls \u201cwasteful\u201d scientific initiatives, including an unmanned sample mission to Mars and a climate change program that it claims \u201cimposed climate extremism on developing countries.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nearly $300 million would be cut from space technology, which includes so-called \u201cfrivolous technology projects such as \u201cin-space sustainability goals.\u201d A further $143 would be cut from STEM engagement initiatives for students, which the Trump administration slammed as \u201cwoke\u201d and \u201cmisguided.\u201d All in all, NASA would see its budget cut by $5.6 billion in 2027.<\/p>\n

NASA administrator Jason Isaacman defended<\/a> the cuts in an interview on Sunday, saying that the agency has a budget \u201cgreater than every other space agency across the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those budget cuts have Mirmina questioning the U.S.\u2019s chances of winning the new space race and retaining highly knowledgeable personnel. He called the cuts \u201cshort-sighted.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow are you going to develop the space technology that you need to do what you want on the moon if your space technology budget is cut?\u201d he said. \u201cHow are you going to inspire young people to go into careers doing STEM if you don\u2019t engage with them, if you don\u2019t have public outreach for them, don\u2019t get them involved in NASA\u2019s events?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard for me to wrap my head around,\u201d Mirmina added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Friday, the crew of\u00a0the Artemis II mission will splash down on Earth after its historic 10-day flyby…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":574372,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[79],"class_list":{"0":"post-574371","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-science"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=574371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/574371\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/574372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=574371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=574371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=574371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}