Is China really plotting to take over the moon?

From Washington Examiner.com (June 28, 2022):

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson recently accused China of plotting a military takeover of the moon. He noted the several successful landings the Chinese have achieved on the lunar surface. Through its English-language mouthpiece, the Global Times, the Chinese Communist Party hotly denied any such ambitions and accused the United States of “hypocrisy” and harboring imperial ambitions of its own concerning Earth’s nearest neighbor.

First, we can dispense with any protestations on behalf of the CCP of high-mindedness concerning its space program. China has been fortifying islands in the South China Sea. It is casting a covetous eye on Taiwan, the inhabitants of which consider themselves citizens of an independent country, while China regards it as a “breakaway province.” China is developing a “belt and road” system of infrastructure investments designed to bind much of the developing world to itself. China is busily stealing intellectual property all over the world. It is committing human rights atrocities that rival those of Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia, including the genocide of the Uyghur minority.

In short, China is the new evil empire. The ruling Chinese Communist Party has no moral impediment against seizing control of the moon if it is able to do so.

Why would China or anyone else want to control the moon? The answer: resources.

A recent article in Science Focus divides the moon’s resources into three categories: rare-earth metals, helium 3, and water.

Rare-earth metals are an increasingly important part of many high-tech products, especially those related to green energy. Unfortunately, China has the vast majority of rare earths. While the United States strives to develop domestic sources of rare-earth metals, environmental concerns are stymieing attempts to set up mining and processing facilities. Concern for the environment would be less of a problem on the moon.

Helium 3 is rare on Earth but plentiful in lunar soil, where it has been deposited over billions of years by solar wind. The isotope has long been touted as a fuel for nuclear fusion. Scientists at the Fusion Technology Institute are developing a reactor that would fuse deuterium with helium 3 to create a reaction that, unlike conventional deuterium to tritium fusion, creates little or no radioactive byproducts. The drawback of such a reactor is that it must run considerably hotter than a conventional fusion reactor.

Water is the third important lunar resource. As the late Paul Spudis, a lunar geologist and advocate of a return to the moon, noted a few months before his death, the lunar poles contain an abundance of ice water in permanently shadowed craters. Water can be used for drinking, agriculture, and sanitation by future lunar settlers. It can also be refined into rocket fuel, making the moon a way station for the rest of the solar system.

Mining lunar resources and transporting them back to Earth or to orbital factories would be a formidable task. However, companies such as SpaceX and Rocket Lab have reduced the cost of space flight. That progress should continue, especially as humans return to the moon and start prospecting for its treasures. The moon contains the key to supporting a technological civilization based on clean energy.

Contrary to the complaints the Chinese Communist Party has levied against the United States, NASA has been quite open about its desire to establish an international regime to regulate the moon and its resources, hence the Artemis Accords . American law has mandated that while no one can own lunar territory, private companies have the right to own resources that they extract.

If China is serious about eschewing sole control of the moon, perhaps it would like to sign the Artemis Accords. No other act China could undertake would better prove its assertion that it does not intend to extend the imperialist strategy it is undertaking on Earth to the heavens. Nelson should publicly invite China to do so. Its response, if it cares to give one, would be illuminating. [source]

With the Biden regime in control, I wouldn’t be surprised if China tried this.