The New York Times published a piece today on the “challenge” to the United States of China’s space ambitions: http://nyti.ms/uDbieb.
Edward Wong and Ken Chang did a good job with it, and interviewed John Logsdon, whose ubiquity in space-related stories I assume spawned humorist Andy Borowitz‘s Davis Logsdon, the fictional University of Minnesota polymath.
But where’s the challenge, really? Underlying the space race was the development/demonstration of rockets capable of orbiting — and, by extension, delivering nukes — across oceans. The Chinese can do that already. Even if the Chinese made a great leap forward, so to speak, in their space technologies, the real threat would be application of space systems for surveillance/reconnaissance/military uses. They’re developing space-based military capabilities anyway.
Given the extraordinary cost of space missions and the relative trickle of science launches compared to the deluge of good mission ideas, more rides into space can only be a good thing. On the human spaceflight side, if the Soviets and the Americans could get along/collaborate going back as far as the Cold War 1970s (see Apollo-Soyuz), then we can work with the Chinese now and in the future.
We don’t have the bandwidth or cash for another space race. More importantly, we should be welcoming China’s space ambitions — just as we do those of the Japanese, Europeans and Indians.
