Beijing has just sent, on the night of May 29 to 30, three new astronauts to its space station. And in particular, for the first time, a civilian astronaut.
Until now, all Chinese astronauts sent into space, or welcomed aboard this Chinese space station, were part of the army, and had more pilot training. But since May 30, the Long-March 2F rocket has flown the first Chinese civilian.
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This newly elected is Gui Haichao. This 36-year-old scientist is not quite a neophyte in the sector: he is a university professor specializing in space engineering. Its mission in space at an altitude of 450 kilometers will be to conduct experiments to study quantum physics and work on the origins of life. This opening of missions to civilians is for China a way of showing that it is modernizing, that it is gaining ground in technological mastery, and that it can compete with the biggest on a global scale.
China now plays in the same division as the United States in space. The two countries are clearly the two leaders in space. China has invested billions of euros to catch up and, since sending the first astronaut into space in 2003, it is now part of the very select club of nations that can conduct manned flight programs in a autonomous, it now plans to launch two manned space missions per year.
Space Europe slightly behind
Moreover, its space station (admittedly four times smaller than the ISS), has been fully operational since last year. And the Chinese also succeeded, in 2019, in a world first, by sending a machine to land on the far side of the moon. Two years later, in 2021, their technology made it possible to land a small robot on the surface of Mars, and now China aims to send a crew to the moon by 2030. It clearly competes with the United States on this project.
Space Europe now finds itself further back, especially since historically it was not built on a strategy of opposition or competition like Russia faced with the United States, or today China and the United States, explains Xavier Pasco, director of the Foundation for Strategic Research and space specialist.
Europe in space has been built more on collaboration and the sharing of technologies. Today, its challenge is to keep its place in the big leagues, by collaborating in the most ambitious international programs, while maintaining its autonomy. China says it is open, for its part, to possible collaborations with foreign astronauts, but we still do not know what the real content of these collaborations would be.