MUNICH KRAFFT EHRICKE CONFERENCE China’s Space Program— Hare or Tortoise? by Jacqueline Myrrhe and Dr. William Carey March 25—In the recent past China has introduced China spends on space, corresponds to roughly a economic and political initiatives which promote its tenth of NASA’s annual budget or 30-50% of the rise as a global power. Embedded in this process is its European Space Agency’s (ESA’s) budget. national space program, allowing the ‘Middle King- • Slow: China has not conducted many missions—so dom’ to follow a very smart concept for a step-wise far there have been only 6 manned missions with 11 build-up. The basic principle is to develop key systems taikonauts involved (two of them flew twice). —such as launch sites, launchers—or tracking, telem- • Technologically less advanced: It is based on etry, and control (TT&C) systems—which can be used copied Soviet-Russian technology. across the different fields of space exploration: from • Not significant enough: China is not a major space Earth observation to the manned space program, lunar nation because it has not launched relevant science exploration or other areas. It is maybe a little bit like a missions, which are the strength of NASA and Lego system or the menu of a Chinese restaurant. ESA. • And anyway: China is pursuing military goals, Hare or Tortoise—Dynamic or Slow? space dominance, space super-power ambitions. The hare and the tortoise story is about the proud and idle hare who thought with FIGURE 1 his long legs he is the fastest animal in the universe and can win any race. Day-by- day he was joking about the tortoise, saying: “You with your short legs will never achieve anything.” One day, the tortoise had enough of this and challenged the hare: “Listen, hare, only because you have long legs, you do not need to be so arrogant. And anyway, how can you know for sure that I am not able to run fast? Let’s have a competition!” In similarity with this fable, China’s space program is looked at as being a slowly moving tortoise. Why did this ste- reotype come into being? China’s space program has the reputa- tion of being: • Small: Yes, it has a relatively small Relevant milestones in China’s space program: From left: Chang’e 2; Yinghuo budget. The annual ca. $1.8 billion 1; Tiangong 1; Shenzhou; CSS. April 7, 2017 EIR Mission Countdown 2017 13 talent. The economy during the Cul- FIGURE 2 Milestones in China’s Societal and Economic Development tural Revolution did not completely stand still, but progress did. Only after the death of Mao Zedong could the sit- uation halt. China’s firsts in space are embedded into these dramatic decades of the nation’s post-war development. China’s Firsts in Space: The East Is Red—DFH 1 As an outcome of the Korean War, China felt under nuclear threat and asked the Soviet Union for technical assistance in the development of its own nuclear capabilities including long-range missiles. The Chinese re- quest was granted. The launch of Sputnik 1 on Octo- ber 4, 1957 by the Soviet Union sin- cerely impressed the “Great Helms- man,” Mao Zedong. Such a satellite he wanted to have for his own nation, So what is it then? preferably with the support of the Soviet Union. Chi- Is China’s space program a dynamic hare or a slow na’s space ambitions were not driven by a race. For tortoise? China, the underlying principle was to catch up with Is it a threat to the world? leading technology developments in the world. After a historical overview of the beginnings of the The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) set up a Chinese space program, the second part of the article task force for the technical and scientific development will focus in on current developments. of an indigenous satellite connected to a long-term and comprehensive national satellite program. CAS was Milestones in China’s Societal Development fully aware of the relevance of satellites for future na- To understand China’s space program it is necessary tional scientific and technical development. Chairman to take the societal and economic context into consider- Mao advised his comrades: ation. This is particularly important from the time after World War II until the turn of the millennium. If we’re going to throw one up there then throw At a time when Western nations in Europe, the a big one, one that weighs two tons. Of course United States, and Japan enjoyed economic develop- we start throwing small, but with one that is at ment and prosperity, the Chinese economy rode on a least two tons. Something like that chicken egg rollercoaster. of the Americans, I won’t do it! Until 1958 the Chinese economy experienced mod- erate growth. Initiated in 1958, the Great Leap Forward Despite the Soviet Union supporting China’s mili- project was supposed to catapult China within 15 years tary missile program, there was no assistance in the into the league of leading industrial nations. After only civil space sector. 3 years however, the economy of the country was Worse, because of the Great Leap Forward, too few broken. The following Five Year Plan brought some allocated resources and materials, and too small a work relief, until in 1966 the Great Proletarian Cultural Rev- force made it impossible for CAS to succeed with a na- olution took its course. The persecution of intellectuals tional satellite. Lack of progress and missing know- and academics damaged a whole generation of experts, how made the Chinese experts realise that they had to teachers, the scientific elite—most of China’s best start from scratch: developing sounding rockets first. 14 Mission Countdown 2017 EIR April 7, 2017 1975, carrying some of the FIGURE 3 payloads originally intended for DFH 1. Although most Chinese satellites even today are based on the DFH bus, the actual intention of the scien- tists and engineers to aim for a long-term program only began to evolve in the 1990s. China’s firsts in space are embedded in the dramatic decades of the nation’s post-war development. China’s Firsts in Space: Geostationary Satellite And they did! In March 1974 three young telegraph workers wrote In 1961, after the Great Leap Forward, the Chinese a letter to the government pointing out to the Chinese leadership focussed on the so-called “Four Moderniza- leaders that positions in geostationary orbit can only be tions,” among which was science and technology. The assured by actually placing an object there. satellite work group within the CAS was still strug- In 1976 Mao—shortly before he died—approved gling. The Director of CAS’s Geophysical Institute, the project and China notified the ITU—International Zhao Jiuzhang, saw the big progress the military made Telecommunication Union—that it was going to place with the development of missiles and wrote a letter to a telecommunications satellite into geostationary orbit the party leaders in which he suggested to: by 1980. After the end of the ‘Cultural Revolution’ in 1976, . combine the tests of our ballistic missile pro- Deng Xiaoping was responsible for education, science, gram with launching a satellite, and get the ben- and technology—one of the four ‘modernizations’ that efit of hitting two birds with one stone. he thought to be the most important. Deng became famous in illustrating his idea in a In 1966, the ‘Cultural Revolution’ deeply impacted 1978 meeting when he tried to persuade his comrades the Chinese society and shook its foundations. Intellec- to go for a communications satellite program in this en- tuals were targeted and scientific institutions became thusiastic way: places of conflict and violence. Under those circum- stances, CAS and other institutions involved in space If we invite a good teacher to give a lecture in the developments asked the Communist Party to protect Great Hall of the People only 10,000 people can their institutions with the help of the military. Mao ap- hear it, but if the same teacher were to give that proved and since that moment the Chinese space pro- lecture on television, and everyone had the gram and the People’s Liberation Army have been tied equipment to receive it, that’s a classroom of un- together and have remained in tandem until today. limited size. After 12 years of hard work, impacted by economic and technical constraints and political and societal in- It was also decided to develop a cryogenic upper terference, China launched its first satellite DFH 1 on stage, which led to a delay in the overall program. At a April 24, 1970 (in the middle of the chaos of the ‘Cul- certain point Deng wanted to buy a communications tural Revolution’). China thus became the fifth nation satellite from the U.S.A., however this initiative did not in the world to do so. The 173 kg (not 2 tons) singing work out and the self-set deadline for a launch in 1980 satellite was more of a propaganda instrument than the was slipping. starting point for a solid, sustainable science program. As before with the Soviet Union, the insight pre- For comparison: 1970 was the year when Lunochod vailed that instead of relying on support from other 1 explored the Moon, Venera 7 soft-landed on Venus, countries, China has to find and go its own way: and Apollo 13 was able to make it home to Earth. China’s second civilian satellite was launched in If we buy, we can buy one or two, but we can’t April 7, 2017 EIR Mission Countdown 2017 15 go on buying indefinitely.