Chinese officials recently released a 25-year space exploration plan that details five major scientific themes and 17 priority areas for scientific breakthroughs with one goal: to make China a world leader in space by 2050 and a key competitor with the U.S. in space, for decades to come.
Last week, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the China National Space Administration, and the China Manned Space Agency jointly released a space exploration plan for 2024 through 2050.
It includes searching for extraterrestrial life, exploring Mars, Venus, and Jupiter, sending space crews to the moon and building an international lunar research station by 2025.
Clayton Swope, deputy director of the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says the plan highlights China’s long-term commitment and answers some lingering questions as well.
“I think a lot of experts have wondered if China would continue to invest in space, particularly in science and exploration, given a lot of economic uncertainties in China … but this is a sign that they're committed,” Swope said.
The plan reinforces a “commitment to really look at space science and exploration in the long term and not just short term,” he added.
The plan outlines Beijing’s goal to send astronauts to the moon by 2030, obtain and retrieve the first samples from Mars and successfully complete a mission to the Jupiter system in the next few years. It also outlines three phases of development, each with specific goals in terms of space exploration and key scientific discoveries.
2036-2050
The extensive plan is not only a statement that Beijing can compete with the U.S. in high-tech industries, it is also a way of boosting national pride, analysts say.
“Space in particular has a huge public awareness, public pride,” says Nicholas Eftimiades, a retired senior intelligence officer and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank. “It emboldens the Chinese people, gives them a strong sense of nationalism and superiority, and that's what the main focus of the Bejing government is.”
Swope agrees.
“I think it's [China’s long-term space plan] a manifestation of China's interest and desire from a national prestige and honor standpoint to really show that it's a player on the international stage up there with the United States,” he said.
Antonia Hmaidi, a senior analyst at the Mercator Institute for China Studies, told VOA in an email response that, “China’s space focus goes back to the 1960,” and that “China has also been very successful at meeting its own goals and timelines.”
In recent years China has carried out including Chang’e-4, which marked the world’s first soft landing and roving on the far side of the moon, Change’e-5, a mission that returned a sample from the moon back to Beijing for the first time, and Tianwen-1, a space mission that resulted in Chinese spacecraft leaving imprints on Mars.
In addition, to these space missions, Bejing has implemented several programs aimed at increasing scientific discovery relating to space, particularly through the launch of several space satellites.
Since 2011, China has developed and launched scientific satellites including Dark Matter Particle Explorer, Quantum Experiments at Space Scale, Advanced Space-based Solar Observatory, and the Einstein Probe.
While China continues to make progress with space exploration and scientific discovery, according to Swope, there is still a way to go before it catches up to the United States.
“China is undeniably the number 2 space power in the world today, behind the United States,” he said. “The United States is still by far the most important in a lot of measures and metrics, including in science and exploration.”
Eftimiades said one key reason the United States has maintained its lead in the space race is the success of Washington’s private, commercial aerospace companies.
“The U.S. private industry has got the jump on China,” Eftimiades said. “There's no type of industrial control, industrial plan. In fact, Congress and administration shy away from that completely.”
Unlike the United States, large space entities in China are often state-owned, such as the China Aerospace Cooperation, Eftimiades said.
He adds that one advantage of China’s space entities being state-owned is the ability for the Chinese government to “direct their industries toward specific objectives.” At the same time, having bureaucracy involved with state-owned enterprises leads to less “cutting-edge technology.”
This year, China has focused on growing its space presence relative to the U.S. by conducting more orbital launches.