MOSCOW, Aug. 3 By the end of the next decade, China may strengthen its positions in outer space so much that it will become a player comparable to the United States, a scientist said in a comment Head of the Space Research Institute Academician Lev Zeleny.
“Maybe in the middle or the end of the 2030s, China will increase its space presence so much that it will become the main player, or at least commensurate with the United States,” the expert believes.
The academician clarified that it is impossible to determine one leader in the space race. This is an area that has many directions of movement. If a country dominates in one direction, it may lag behind in another. The expert gave an example of how, during the space race in the second half of the 20th century, the USSR and the USA, American astronauts landed on the moon, and the Soviet apparatus delivered samples of lunar soil.
«As they say, competitions in the Olympics are held in different sports, but there is a team standings, where the number of points is summed up. If space research is evaluated by such a sports method, which I consider wrong, then, probably, in integral, in many areas, China can over time (not so far this time) to become a leader in space research,» Leo Zeleny commented.
«Gradually, in planetary research, China begins to overtake the United States. It is clear that it is overtaking Russia so far, but I hope, only for now,» the academician added.
At the end of April, the head of NASA, Bill Nelson, said that today the United States is competing with China for a place on the moon and fears that Beijing could get ahead of Washington and claim its rights to the South Pole. Prior to this, Nelson had repeatedly stated that Washington was in a space race with Beijing and warned the US Congress that insufficient funding could be a «catastrophe» for US leadership in space.