China's Heavenly Palace

摘要

WHEN the first Shenzhou spaceship was launched in November 1999, the Beijing Zhongguo Xinwen She published an article describing a four step programme to build a major space station for industrial applications. Another source emanating from the famous Go Taikonaut website described the development of China's space station in the frame of a hypothetical Project 921-2, officially under way since February 1999. During the same period, Chinese space engineers began to present some technical papers on possible stations at a variety of international congresses.