In an interview with German newspaper Bild, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson voiced his concern that China intends to mount a military takeover of the Moon.
“We must be very concerned that China is landing on the moon and saying: ‘It’s ours now and you stay out’,” Nelson told Bild during an interview. Nelson characterized China’s space program as a military one. He also remarked on China’s long history of espionage on all levels from corporate to academic to military. China, unsurprisingly, took diplomatic umbrage.
“This is not the first time that the head of the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration has ignored the facts and spoken irresponsibly about China,” said Zhao Lijian, a spokesman at the Chinese foreign ministry. “The U.S. side has constantly constructed a smear campaign against China’s normal and reasonable outer space endeavours, and China firmly opposes such irresponsible remarks.”
Zhao also bristled at the implication that China had stolen technology. “The development of China’s space industry has been achieved entirely through independence and self-reliance, and its rights and achievements cannot be questioned or discredited in any way,” he said. Nelson has previously spoken publicly about China’s theft of unclassified space material, and he raised those points again during the Bild interview.
Pro Forma Protest
Of course China firmly opposes any external criticism. After all, one must stick to the Party’s talking points. But the Party doth protest too much, methinks.
China has denied any interest in weaponizing or militarizing space. In fact, they loudly denied their own advancing anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons program. That is, until their well-documented 2007 ASAT missile test destroyed one of their weather satellites. The explosion created a swathe of debris jeopardizing everything in its expanding orbit.
This image shows what’s currently orbiting at various altitudes. You’ll have to click through to see the full-size version. Image by Rrakinishu (not to be confused with Rakinishu). CC BY-SA 4.0
Once other nations have to maneuver their satellites and even the International Space Station to avoid the cloud of shrapnel you just generated, it’s tough to argue straight-faced that you weren’t doing the thing you clearly did. But China rose to the challenge. A week after the missile test, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman and propagandist par excellence Liu Jianchao told Reuters that while he had read “foreign reports” of the test, he couldn’t confirm or deny their accuracy.
Well, I Never
“I can’t say anything about the reports. I really don’t know; I’ve only seen the foreign reports,” Liu told Reuters at the time. Par for the course, for the guy next in line to run China’s State Council Information Office — formerly known as the Central Office of Foreign Propaganda.
“What I can say is that, as a matter of principle, China advocates the peaceful use of space and opposes the weaponization of space, and also opposes any form of arms race,” he said. “China will not participate in any kind of arms race in outer space.”
Perhaps not. After all, what kind of terrible person wants an arms race? But fears about the Chinese militarization of space aren’t just the province of one NASA administrator. Last year, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a Global Risk Assessment claiming China intends to weaponize space and “match or exceed U.S. capabilities in space to gain the military, economic, and prestige benefits that Washington has accrued from space leadership.”
It’s Only Libel If It Isn’t True
With a great deal of respect, I don’t think we have to listen to China tell us about irresponsible commentary and ignoring facts. Nor am I much inclined to humor China’s threadbare insistence that it would never steal technology, oh me oh my. There is an exhaustively documented trail of evidence detailing China’s organized campaign of IP theft and espionage in sectors private and public, ranging from infosec to energy to aerospace.
Or perhaps we should listen, because so many of China’s state endeavors are object lessons in how not to comport yourself on an international stage. The ongoing Uyghur genocide is an eloquent example. So are China’s expansionist territory claims in the South China Sea.
It’s generally unwise to take at face value the claims of politicians, used car salesmen, and state propaganda agencies run by autocrats. To borrow a phrase, your boos mean nothing to us; we’ve seen what makes you cheer.
Diplomatic Duplicity
Let me be very clear. This is in fact a case of the pot calling the kettle black. When it comes to dumb, awful shit we said we wouldn’t do and then did anyway, our national conscience is just about the same shade of gleaming black as our combat boots. That’s precisely why I think Americans are well equipped to recognize China’s hypocrisy. It’s a different and exciting mode of moral lassitude, distinct from our usual MO. Who better to recognize cruel intentions on an international scale than the country that is still running Gitmo? We are the nation that wrought the Tuskegee experiments and blazed the Trail of Tears. We built, staffed, and ran Abu Ghraib.
You know what we didn’t do? Create an entire authoritarian model that relies on bribes, black-bagging and memory holes.
Sometimes, China does exactly what it says it will. Sometimes, China says one thing and does entirely another. But in all cases, China executes its national directives by wielding the absolute power of the state. The PRC is accountable to no one. And it never seems to matter to China what anyone else thinks; the Party stays flawlessly on message. Nor does China sweat the laws or borders of others’ countries, or the treaties others signed. To put it lightly, this creates a ‘trust deficit’ of epic proportions.
‘China Didn’t Open Pandora’s Box’
After China’s 2007 ASAT missile test, Moscow condemned the program. Then, Sergei Ivanov, Russia’s former defense minister, told Russian state-owned press agency RIA Novosti that “It is not China that opened up Pandora’s box.”
Ivanov was telling the truth about that much. The United States and India have both conducted anti-satellite weapons tests in the past, as has Russia. In fact, Russia was the most recent nation to test anti-satellite weapons when it destroyed its own defunct Cosmos-1408 satellites back in November of 2021. But in March of that year, Russia and China renewed diplomatic pressure on the US to sign a treaty agreeing not to put weapons in space — and banning ASAT weapons.
The United States, in turn, called for a moratorium on all anti-satellite testing in April 2022. China and Russia have pledged support for this idea, but it’s the same mealy-mouthed language as ever. The Eurasian Times quoted Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin as saying: “We hope that the American side will truly assume the obligations of a major power, revise a number of its own negative actions in outer space, stop the hypocritical practice of expanding its military superiority under the pretext of arms control, and stop blocking the process of coordinating legal documents on arms control in space.”
Maybe Just Quit Blowing Up Satellites
Any attempt by China or another nation to build a military installation on the Moon would violate the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. A functional military installation on the Moon that posed a credible threat to Earth (presumably via a lunar-launched IPBM*) would require technology that doesn’t currently exist.
As of this writing, China is not publicly known to be pursuing any explicitly military objectives on the moon or in LEO. At the same time, the US government has warned against China’s future plans in space. Meanwhile, Russia is doubling and tripling down on its official stance of aggression toward the ISS. The dance goes on.
NASA officials and employees of other space agencies often talk about maintaining cooperation in space and the importance of working together in orbit even when conditions on the ground are less than stellar. Such cooperation has a long and storied history; the United States and Soviet Union cooperated in the 1970s and early 1980s. But cooperation in orbit requires at least some degree of trust between nations. Lately, that kind of trust has been in short supply.
*IPBM stands for interplanetary ballistic missile. Now you know that’s a thing. You’re welcome.
Feature image by NASA.
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