U.S. Blocking Countries From Hitching Ride With Rival Moon Base Project, China Claims

The current tensions between the United States and Russia have been described as a Second Cold War. The two feuding factions are now drawing lines in space. A top official in the China National Space Administration criticized the U.S. for interfering in its efforts to attract countries to plans for a base on the lunar surface. If the project sounds familiar, it's because NASA's Artemis program will also feature a moon base constructed with the assistance of several international partners.

The Chinese Lunar Exploration Program aims to land two taikonauts on the Moon by 2030. The CNSA isn't stopping there. The agency and Roscosmos, Russia's space agency, also announced plans in 2021 to build the International Lunar Research Station by 2035. However, there hasn't been a flood of countries seeking to join the ILRS project. Wu Weiren, the CLEP's chief designer, told Reuters:

"The ILRS' development trend is very good but compared to the U.S.' Artemis Accords, ours is much smaller in terms of countries because the U.S. is always interfering in our cooperation with other countries, including with Europe."

So far, 54 countries have signed the Artemis Accords. The non-binding agreement, created by NASA and the U.S. State Department, establishes an international framework for the peaceful exploration of the Moon and other celestial bodies. The Accords also outline how countries should go about mining on the Moon for resources. Critics, like CNSA and Roscosmos, have stated that the agreement is too American-centric and similar to the behavior of colonial European powers. At a glance, someone could compare the Artemis Accords to the Treaty of Tordesillas, which carved up the New World between Portugal and Spain.

Only 13 countries have joined the International Lunar Research Station. Wu's assertions of American meddling aren't unfounded, but it's not a targeted effort aimed at the Russo-Chinese project. The 23-member European Space Agency considered joining until Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. A country joining the moon base project means directly aligning with Russia, which is once again a pariah state in the West. ILRS members are either within Russia's tightly-knit sphere of influence, like Azerbaijan, Belarus and Kazakhstan, or close Chinese allies, like Pakistan, Venezuela and South Africa. Thailand and the United Arab Emirates are the only countries that are both Artemis Accords signatories and ILRS members.

Since the original Space Race's end with Apollo–Soyuz in 1975, international collaboration has become a necessary aspect of funding crewed space missions. No single government is willing to dedicate the money and resources for a national space agency to operate independently. The NASA-Roscosmos rivals-to-roommates saga ultimately resulted in the International Space Station.

However, political divisions and multiple military invasions have led the partnership to crumble and both agencies to stagnate to different degrees. Roscosmos threatened to abandon the ISS after Russia invaded Ukraine, then dropped the threat after it became clear it couldn't build its own space station. While the Artemis Accords have been a relative success, NASA has struggled with the actual return to the Moon, as setbacks and delays mean that Artemis III won't land an astronaut on the lunar surface until 2027 at the earliest.