How Mars became the prize for a new space race — and why China is hellbent on winning it
This article was originally published at The Conversation. The publication contributed the article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.
Steffi Paladini, Reader in Economics & Global Security, Birmingham City University
Looking at its achievements over the past decade, nobody would doubt China is aiming to win the new space race. Not only has it been the only country to land on the Moon in about 40 years, and the first to soft land on its far side, it has also planted a flag on lunar soil and brought samples back to Earth.
The race between several nations and private companies, however, is far from over. China is now approaching Mars with its Tianwen-1 mission, which arrived on February 10. A successful insertion into orbit – the rover won’t land until May — will mark another crucial milestone for more than one reason.
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Mars may be close to Earth, but it is a challenging target. Nothing demonstrates this better than the figures. Out of 49 missions up to December 2020, only about 20 have been successful. Not all these failures were attempts by newbies or early endeavours. In 2016, The European Space Agency’s Schiaparelli Mars Explorer crashed on the surface. Also, ongoing technical issues have forced ESA and its Russian partner Roscosmos to postpone its next mission, ExoMars, until 2022.
China is not the only country at Mars. On February 9, a UAE probe, Hope, achieved the same insertion maneuver. It is not a direct competitor to the Chinese mission (the probe will just orbit the planet to study the Martian weather), but (NASA's Perseverance rover), set to arrive on Feb. 18, definitively is.
To further raise the stakes for China, among the handful of countries that have managed the notoriously tricky insertion maneuver into orbit, there is one Asian country there already: India, China’s direct competitor in space but on Earth as well.
This image depicts the journey of India's Mars Orbiter Mission, the country's first interplanetary mission. The Indian Mars orbiter will arrive at the Red Planet on Wednesday, Sept. 24, India Standard Time (late Tuesday, Sept. 23, U.S. Eastern Time).
Artist's concept of Mangalyaan. (Image credit: Indian Space Research Organisation)
The Indian Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), aka Mangalyaan, reached Mars in 2014 – the first to make it at its maiden mission. This is one reason why a successful outcome of Tianwen-1 is so important for China’s status as the new space power: it’s a way to reassert its space dominance over its neighbour. Unlike for India, it’s not the first time China has attempted a mission to Mars (the previous one, Yinghuo-1, in 2011, failed on launch). However, on this occasion, the odds for success look a lot better.
Space Age 2.0
Different countries have different development models when it comes to space, so the new space race is partly a competition for having the best approach. This reflects the specific character of the so-called Space Age 2.0, which, compared to the first one, looks more diverse, and where non-US actors, public and private, feature prominently, especially Asian ones. If China leads the pack, so does its vision.
But there are bigger things at stake. The development effort behind China's space sector is still largely government funded and military led. According to the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, a congressional commission of the US government, China considers space as a "tool of geopolitical and diplomatic competition." It is clear that, together with cyberspace, the cosmos has become a fundamental new warfighting domain, where the US are the main — but not the only — adversary. That means commercial considerations come second for many countries, even though they have become increasingly important in the overall scheme of things.
