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[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Chinese Space Progam Chief Regrets US Refusal To Cooperate

Washington (AFP) Apr 05, 2006
China regrets that the United States has rebuffed space cooperation with China, the head of China's space agency told his American counterpart in Washington.

In a meeting Monday with National Aeronautics and Space Administration chief Michael Griffin, Luo Ge reminisced how "very open" he found the United States when he first visited this country in 1980, and later in the 1990s.

"Now, it's the other way around," he said through an interpreter at the privately-run Center for Strategic International Studies, after meeting with Griffin.

The Pentagon has publicly said it considers China's space program a potential threat to the satellite systems so crucial to US military supremacy, a concern shared by many US lawmakers.

"I think a country, if it's open, is going to have progress, and if it's closed, then it's going to be left behind," Luo said.

From 1950 through the 1970s, he said, China was a closed society with a slow rate of development. In the 1980s it began making significant progress, showing it was interested in opening up. Today, he added, "China is very open."

Asked if China was interested in cooperating with the United States and other countries in the development of the International Space Station, Luo said: "We have always been interested, but we don't have (an admissions) ticket yet." He also stressed that China was cooperating in space programs with Europe, Russia, Brazil, Nigeria and Venezuela.

Luo said that China spent about 500 million dollars (more than 400 million euros) per year on its space program, a mere pittance compared to the 16.8 billion (13.8 billion) NASA has requested from the US Congress for fiscal 2007, beginning in October.

Luo also said China was planning several unmanned lunar missions, beginning with an orbital mission next year, a landing in 2012, and bringing samples of lunar material back to Earth by 2017.

With two manned missions orbiting Earth so far, China is third behind the United States and Russia in sending men into space.

Story here: www.spacedaily.com/reports/Chinese_Space_Progam_Chief_Regrets_US_Refusal_To_Cooperate.html

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I don't know how open China claims to be, but some sort of cooporation is not a bad idea. I need more info.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

U.S.-China Cooperation: The Great Space Debate

China is stepping up its space program, preparing to launch dozens upon dozens of Earth orbiting satellites over the next five to eight years. Also being readied are several space science missions, fielding a new heavy-lift booster, as well as strengthening its human spaceflight program to include an Earth-circling space lab and initiating a multi-step program of robotic lunar exploration.

Last week, Luo Ge, Vice Administrator of the China National Space Administration (CNSA), detailed his country’s space aims in back-to-back addresses, first at the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C. on April 3, followed by a presentation two days later at the National Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

In his talks, Luo spotlighted China-Russia intergovernmental cooperation, an inter-governmental agreement with France and the European Space Agency, work with Brazil on remote sensing satellites, and noted China’s role in the Convention on Asia-Pacific Space Cooperation Organization.

NASA Administrator, Michael Griffin, has confirmed that he has been invited to visit China, although no specific date has been set for the meeting.

How best to work with China is increasingly becoming part of a space policy debate in the United States. The posturing between nations is reminiscent of Cold War discussions with the former Soviet Union. Those talks led to an array of cooperative ventures, from weather data exchanges to the docking détente of Apollo-Soyuz in 1975, setting the stage for working together on the International Space Station project.

Given success in the human spaceflight arena, Luo of CNSA said that his country intends to orbit its own space lab by 2015. Leading up to this effort, he added, Chinese astronauts are to carry out space walks, with rendezvous and space docking skills also to be demonstrated in coming years.

“I happen to believe that their goal is to get to the Moon and that their schedule is probably more ambitious than ours is,” said former Congressman Robert Walker and now chairman of Wexler & Walker Public Policy Associates in Washington, D.C.

Walker also chaired the Commission on the Future of the United States Aerospace Industry and was a member of the Presidential Commission on the Implementation of the United States Space Exploration Policy.

China’s lunar desires will be seen by some people as a very direct challenge, Walker said, “but for the Chinese it will simply establish respect for their science and technology programs, which will then allow them, perhaps, to command a bigger price for a lot of their products in the world market.”

More here at Space.com: www.space.com/news/060412_china_cooperation.html

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I'm pleased that the Shuttle is out and real space crafts are being constructed. The U.S. cannot be left behind.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

NASA Chief Will Go to China to Discuss Space Cooperation

NASA administrator Michael Griffin said Tuesday that he will visit China and open up a dialogue with the country’s national space agency.

“The Chinese have offered an opportunity for me to visit with them and discuss the beginnings of a cooperation between us...in space,” Griffin told a Senate subcommittee on science and space, during a Tuesday hearing in Washington, D.C. “The President has advised me to accept that decision, I’m looking forward to it.”

Top officials with the China National Space Administration (CNSA) invited Griffin to their country earlier this month. NASA officials said then that U.S. space agency chief was considering the invite, which came from CNSA vice administrator Luo Ge.

While a formal date for the trip has yet to be disclosed, NASA officials have said it could occur this fall.

Griffin’s Tuesday remarks came after an informal visit to NASA’s Washington, D.C. headquarters by Chinese space agency officials this month, as well as the recent U.S. visit by Chinese President Hu Jintao. Hu met with U.S. President George W. Bush during that visit.

NASA also invited CNSA officials to an invite-only Exploration Strategy Workshop held Washington, D.C. this week. The workshop ends Friday.

“China is, as we are, a great nation,” Griffin said Tuesday. “They are not consonant with us on many things that we would like them to be more closely aligned, and some of those things were discussed.”

Griffin added that the U.S. needs both good partners and competitors in space exploration, and sometimes they can be wrapped in the same entity.

“I think the United States has always benefited from discussions,” Griffin said of China’s invitation. “I do not see how it can hurt us.”

China is the third country to launch astronauts into space following Russia and the U.S. The nation’s first manned spaceflight, Shenzhou 5, launched in October 2003 with Chinese astronaut Yang Liwei aboard. A subsequent two-person launch shot into space in October 2005 during the country’s Shenzhou 6 mission.

Story here: www.space.com/news/060425_griffin_chinavisit.html