U.s.-china Space Relations: Maintaining An Arm's Length

摘要

Since 2003, the space community has been churning over a proper response to China's emergence as a power capable of independent human spaceflight (ironically, a capability the United States is about to lose). Former NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe hosted his not-quite-counterpart during a visit to the United States in 2004, while his successor, Michael Griffin, conducted his own high-level tour in September 2006 of some Chinese space entities - limited largely by China's resistance to openness and the People's Liberation Army, which controls Beijing's space program. The People's Republic of China's (PRC) success in sending a scientific mis- sion to the Moon, its announced plans to orbit a space station, its significant launch capabilities and the growing number of cooperative space projects with other countries suggest to some that a U.S. response is needed.