The New Space Race: Why Are America and China Racing to the Moon?

NASA’s Artemis program has drawn attention for its plans to send astronauts around the Moon. But behind that mission is a broader strategic effort: a new race between the United States and China to return humans to the surface of the Moon.

This time the race is about much more than flags and footprints. The country that gets there first may have an advantage in choosing to build future lunar infrastructure, set technical standards, and shape the next phase of space exploration.

at nasa ignition event Last week, officials spelled out that urgency in clear terms. NASA is trying to get Americans back to the Moon before China and before the end of US President Donald Trump’s term.

Jared Isaacman, the billionaire nominated by Trump to lead NASA, put it this way: “NASA has said we will return Americans to the Moon before the end of President Trump’s term. Our great rival said before 2030.”

“The difference between success and failure will be measured in months, not years.”

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So the race is on, at least politically. NASA is working on an accelerated plan to land Americans on the Moon as early as 2028, while Wu Weiren, chief designer of China’s lunar program, has said: “By 2030, the Chinese people will definitely be able to step on the Moon. It is not a problem.”

Casey Dreier, head of space policy at the Planetary Society, believes the 2028 target is not realistic. But he says that China has become a useful medium for NASA and its supporters.

“China is building its own lunar spaceflight ambitions,” he said. “Their goal for many years has been to land their astronauts on the lunar surface, to build a lunar base… It’s a helpful way to garner political support.”

Marathon, not sprint

This is not the first time the US has promised to return to the Moon. In 2019, then-Vice President Mike Pence had said that US astronauts would return to the lunar surface by 2024. But political priorities changed, and that deadline came and went.

This is where some analysts see China gaining an advantage.

Dean Cheng, a senior fellow at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies and a longtime expert on China’s space program, says this new race is not a sprint like Apollo, but a marathon. This time the goal is not just to go to the moon, but to stay there.

“One of the special things about the Chinese space program is that they don’t make a lot of predictions,” Cheng said. “But what they do, they absolutely accomplish.”

That’s why, he says, China’s 2030 target is weighty.

Not everyone sees the current moment as a true race. Kevin Olsen, a Canadian research fellow at the UK Space Agency in Oxford’s Department of Physics, argues that the Americans will always have been first to the Moon, and that both sides are eventually going there.

He also noted that Artemis is not entirely an American effort. NASA is working with the Canadian Space Agency, the European Space Agency and JAXA, and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. Olsen says Artemis is a less nationalistic enterprise than Apollo.

“It’s bigger than that,” he said. “This is a step to go beyond the Moon. We’re not there just to claim a piece of it. We’re not there just to get resources. We’re there to explore for the benefit of all mankind.”

Still, timing matters. Dreyer says the 2028 target is partly politically motivated.

“This is the last year of President Trump’s second term and it is the White House’s strong desire that this happen under President Trump,” he said.

Why does the Moon’s south pole matter?

The urgency is not just political. It is also geographical.

Both China and the US have talked about setting up lunar bases near the Moon’s south pole. Scientists and planners consider the area particularly valuable because some of the deepest craters there are permanently shadowed and may contain water ice.

Dreyer says this matters because water can be used for drinking, breathable oxygen and rocket fuel.

“Which means it’s cold enough that you can trap water and ice for billions of years,” he said. “You take water, you separate the two molecules, you can make rocket fuel. We can breathe oxygen, you can drink it.”

This means that the country that lands first can get first choice in the most useful sites.

Listening to Isaacman at the Ignition event, the sense of urgency was unmistakable.

“We are not going to celebrate our adherence to additional requirements, policy or bureaucratic process,” he said. Instead, he stressed the need to increase the pace of lunar missions.

Cheng says this rhythm could matter in the long run.

“Imagine (China) setting up a lunar outpost and rotating a crew every six months,” he said.

Cheng argues that if the US is only going to the Moon once a year or less, it could have consequences beyond reputation.

“What do you think the literal language of space travel will be?” He said. “If there are frequent Chinese missions and rare American missions, what do you think the language of space travel will be is English? And it’s not just literal language like we’re talking about. It’s data formats.”

In that scenario, he says, the country that builds the first sustained base could help set the rules and technical standards for what happens next.

a billionaire space race

A major challenge for NASA is funding.

Dreyer says that, adjusted for inflation, NASA was spending about US$43 billion per year at the height of Apollo. By comparison, NASA’s entire budget in 2025 was approximately US$25 billion.

To bridge that gap, NASA relies heavily on private industry, particularly for spacecraft meant to carry astronauts from lunar orbit to the Moon’s surface.

This has created a parallel competition between two companies led by billionaires.

SpaceX, which was originally contracted to build the lunar lander, fell behind schedule. NASA then expanded the competition. Now both Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin are working to prepare their vehicles.

SpaceX is developing starshipWhile Blue Origin is building it blue moon mark 2 Lander. NASA has said that whichever provider is ready first, it will fly with it.

Dreier says that NASA has to depend on companies over which it does not completely control.

“If Jeff Bezos wanted, he could shut down Blue Origin tomorrow and walk away from this whole thing,” he said. “Not saying he will do it or even likely, but that’s a lot of power in a handful of individuals … to achieve what is nominally a national goal.”

This dynamic is part of what makes this new space race so different from previous ones: a U.S.-led effort that includes international partners and private companies, as well as a Chinese program driven by long-term state planning.

Cheng says Beijing sees the moon as more than a destination.

He said, “When they land, especially if they beat the Americans, the message will be that not only can we do it, but the Americans have lost their skills.”

For both countries, the moon is only part of the story. Any future lunar base is widely seen as a stepping stone to deep space exploration – to Mars and beyond.