Russia turns away from NASA, says it will work with China on a Moon base

[Winston]

Russia turns away from NASA, says it will work with China on a Moon base
China wants a long-term presence on the Moon in the 2030s
9 Mar 2021

https://arstechnica.com/science/202...y-will-work-together-to-build-a-lunar-station
The heads of the Chinese and Russian space agencies signed an agreement on Tuesday to work together to build a "scientific" station on the Moon.

Under terms of a memorandum of understanding, the two countries will cooperate on creation of an "International Lunar Science Station" and plan to invite other countries to participate. The agreement was signed by Zhang Kejian, director of the China National Space Administration, and Dmitry Rogozin, the chief of Russia's space corporation, Roscosmos. The agreement was announced by Roscosmos.

Details about the project were fairly sparse, specifying only that the countries would work together to create research facilities on the surface and/or in orbit around the Moon. The goal was both to establish long-term, uncrewed facilities on the Moon and build up the capabilities for a human presence there.

 

[Art Upton]

Un-crewed facilitates , sorta like this movie MOON: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1182345/

Except for the clone(s) to fix the bots.

 

[shockie]

like no one saw this coming? The Russian economy is smaller than that of the state Of Texas......they are only a world power because they happen to have 10,000 nuclear weapons.....pointed primarily at us...... I wonder why our politicians never encouraged American corporations to send their factories to Russia to try and get them out of their communist ways....ohhh....that's because it wouldn't work......Socialist and Communist countries are inherently corrupt and decay from within....Russian will be in the dustbin of history sooner than later unless it starts WW3 and kills us all with a nuclear winter.....

 

[Daddyisabar]

Beware,
Today the Earth has a new moon, a RED MOON!

Come on Merica, where is the good ole Cold War fight!

Godless Red Hoards on the moon could quite possibly run into National Socialists on the dark side.

 

[teepot]

I wonder what the Chinese found on the Dark Side of the Moon. I haven't heard anything.

 

[Voyager1]

I wonder what the Chinese found on the Dark Side of the Moon. I haven't heard anything.

Apparently, “there is no dark side of the Moon. As a matter of fact, it’s all dark!”.
(Credit to Pink Floyd)
Seriously though, this alliance is not surprising.

 

[Woody's Workshop]

I was reading an article the other day on the fall of the USSR. Long to short before the fall during Reigon, they tried to get American Company's to invest in the USSR. But it failed primarily the State had to own a controlling portion. There is a whole lot more to it than that. I suggest going to history.com and search for the fall of the USSR and read the article. It was very enlightening, and at the time I was totally unaware what was going on.

 

[lakeroadster]

Based on history (does anybody even read history?) China and Russia have historically gotten along famously... .

 

[icyclops]

Good for them....Who cares...this is so far away in time and economy’s. let them waist there money and they better bring a lot of duct tape with them....they will need it To plug all the micro-meteor holes...

Mars is the future....let’s start building an atmosphere....

 

[MetricRocketeer]

Hi everyone,

In my opinion, every country interested in space exploration should turn its attention first to the moon (Luna) before working on Mars or on anything else. Luna is a feasible jumping off point for further solar-system exploration, or for exploration beyond the solar system.

I am arguing that countries should concentrate on Luna -- establishing permanent colonies either on lunar territory or in lunar orbit or both. From Luna, with its lack of atmosphere and its much weaker gravitational force than Earth has, launching and landing spacecraft is much easier than doing so from Earth. Furthermore, again due to Luna's lack of atmosphere, astronomical observations are more easily carried out from Luna than they are from Earth.

Thank you for listening.

Stanley

 

[FishnBeer]

Chinas trip to the moon will be financed by american consumers, buying chinese made products to further fund their growing power

 

[Alan15578]

Hi everyone,

In my opinion, every country interested in space exploration should turn its attention first to the moon (Luna) before working on Mars or on anything else. Luna is a feasible jumping off point for further solar-system exploration, or for exploration beyond the solar system.

I am arguing that countries should concentrate on Luna -- establishing permanent colonies either on lunar territory or in lunar orbit or both. From Luna, with its lack of atmosphere and its much weaker gravitational force than Earth has, launching and landing spacecraft is much easier than doing so from Earth. Furthermore, again due to Luna's lack of atmosphere, astronomical observations are more easily carried out from Luna than they are from Earth.

Thank you for listening.

Stanley

Only if the spacecraft and fuel is mostly obtained from in situ materials.

The back side of the moon would be a great place for a huge radio telescope.

 

[Daddyisabar]

I foresee another Sino-Soviet Split!

 

[teepot]

Could be. It depends on who finds the Monolith first.

 

[icyclops]

Could be. It depends on who finds the Monolith first.

I thought that was floating out near Jupiter.

 

[aerostadt]

I thought that was floating out near Jupiter.

The first one was found on our moon. In the movie the Star Gate one is out by Jupiter. In the book the Star Gate is on Saturn's moon Iapetus. My, how this thread has gone astray.

 

[Daddyisabar]

Cast aside the space nazis and silly monkey men, the Ruskies went with the CHICOMS because they are better funded and can blow up a few villages with no consequence. NASA on the other hand lacks the cash and always takes the costliest approach, but only after several study groups have approved and all congress persons are throughly bought off. Do the Ruskies have anything left for the CHICOMS to steal?

 

[icyclops]

The first one was found on our moon. In the movie the Star Gate one is out by Jupiter. In the book the Star Gate is on Saturn's moon Iapetus. My, how this thread has gone astray.

Not talking stargate here.....2001 Space Odd and 2010 Space Odd......

first one on earth with the monkeys (2001), second on the moon with the monkeys in space suits (2001), third one floating around Jupiter or Saturn (don’t remember which in 2010)...

now take a right turn.....

 

[icyclops]

Sorry....I loved that movie (2001) as a kid....

I’ll leave for good now...back to the Russians and China...

 

[teepot]

Maybe once they start to make progress congress will better fund NASA. And a new space race will start.

 

[boomtube-mk2]

Chinas trip to the moon will be financed by american consumers, buying chinese made products to further fund their growing power

It's China's world, we're just paying for it.

 

[aerostadt]

You know Arthur C. Clarke wrote some non-fiction, too. His book on the making of "2001: A Space Odyssey" told of the tribulations of making the movie with Stanley Kubrick, while writing the book at the same time. In some ways it seemed to me like Clarke was subservient to Kubrick. Reminded me of writing a theses under the supervision of an advisor. Let's don't go there. Clarke's book, "The Promise of Space" is a good read. It is interesting, although Clarke talked about Star Gates and Warp Drives in his book, he was fully aware that such devices were far from reality. In fact he referred to such inventions as "Narrative Devices", even though he used those same narrative devices himself. I would consider "anti-gravity" in the same category. Such devices conceivably could make our space travel extremely practical, but there is no such invention even on the far horizon. We have been stuck with the chemical rocket in some form for over a hundred years and the practical performance has maxed out. We have not even progressed to using nuclear thermal rocket propulsion, although that basic technology is there, if we were willing to take the risks, but that seems extremely unlikely.

 

[Antares JS]

Beware,
Today the Earth has a new moon, a RED MOON!

Come on Merica, where is the good ole Cold War fight!

Godless Red Hoards on the moon could quite possibly run into National Socialists on the dark side.

 

[aerostadt]

Well, things were set up for this Sino-Russian agreement as posted by Winston in the first post. The US lunar program has one cornerstone based on the Gate Way Space Station, which is a hold-over from the Asteroid Retrieval Mission (ARM) formulated during the Obama years. The US invited the whole world into an international program based on this lunar orbital space station, but the Russians balked from the very beginning, but that is understandable, because it has US influence and dominance stamped all over it. The Chinese have been kept at a distance from the ISS program, because of the predominance of the Chinese military in their space program. Thus, a pairing up of the Russians and the Chinese is a natural. Whether this will pan out remains to be seen. At the moment there is a shortage of hardware and deeds on all sides. If the Chinese make strides on exploring the southern lunar pole, there might be a good chance that the US will wake up.

 

[Winston]

Chinas trip to the moon will be financed by american consumers, buying chinese made products to further fund their growing power

Partial proof of the truth of the signature quote below.

 

[Not Quite Nominal]

Chinas trip to the moon will be financed by american consumers, buying chinese made products to further fund their growing power

Chinese-made products will land on the moon for the same reason Chinese-made products land on American doorsteps:

The Chinese are actually interested in making products.

American corporations and governmental ministries are more interested in empathizing, snark, social posturing, and status seeking than producing things with moving parts. The USMC just posted a tweet from their official twitter that said "get right before you get left, boomer".

I love America - but as a betting man, I know what side I would put my money on.

 

[icyclops]

It was written in the 90’s that if American Business let China manufacture your products, they will bury you. It was well known back then that China was great in Manufacturing (cheap labor and resources)....and that prophecy became true. American business has been sickly for a long time due to losing it’s “making”....Business is about price and not about common sense no doubt....

Let them mess around with the moon. We should go further as that is what we are really good at....invention, innovation...let’s get on with it.

 

[aerostadt]

A good book to read is "The Hundred-Year Marathon" (China's secret strategy to replace America as the Global Superpower), by Michael Pillsbury. Pillsbury feels that the US really started to help China get ahead during the Carter Administration and China has bee accelerating ever since.

 

[aerostadt]

A good article appeared today on SpaceFlight Now with more information about the state of affairs between the Artemis program and the Sino-Russian lunar program.

https://spaceflightnow.com/2021/03/15/russia-looks-to-china-as-new-space-exploration-partner/

 

[dr wogz]

Sorry....I loved that movie (2001) as a kid....

My dad took me to see it when I was 6 or 7.. didn't understand it (repertory theater in the early / mid 70's). But I do remember some: "oooohs" in the audience when when flew all lightspeed / plaid. I now know this was the LSD crowd really really enjoying it!