Boots on the moon needed to beat ‘belligerent’ China: Mitchell Institute

WASHINGTON ― The United States should begin preparing now to put boots on the moon in order to beat China to domination of outer space, argues a provocative new policy paper by the Mitchell Institute.

The paper thus advocates for the US to overturn nearly 70 years of a consistent national space policy that separates NASA’s civil from military space activities under Title 10, as well as Washington’s almost 60-year stance as a champion of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty (OST) that prohibits territorial claims and military occupation of the moon and other celestial bodies.

Entitled “Military Human Spaceflight: A Key Component to U.S. Space Superiority,” the paper is premised on twin assumptions. First, that lunar resources and territory are a critical first step to the future habitation of space, and as such are vital to US national security. And second, that Beijing’s lunar research program is a guise for using its military to occupy the moon as an “extension” its “belligerent” earthly ambitions to extend China’s territory.

“[F]uture American space security is at risk. China’s military-led human space flight progression is positioning the People’s Liberation Army to achieve strategic advantage in lunar access, infrastructure, and resources,” Kyle Puma, Mitchell Institute senior resident fellow for space studies, said today.

Puma, a retired Space Force colonel who formerly led the service’s aggressor training and the paper’s author, spoke to reporters in a briefing prior to its public rollout Friday.

Competition for control of the moon is “likely to reach a tipping point” at which it may well spiral into conflict, the paper asserts. But the lunar race represents only the first leg in what the paper says is a longer-term, existential space race fundamentally different from the Cold War-era competition between the US and the former Soviet Union.

“The original race had a visible finish line: Land on the moon first. Today’s race does not,” Puma said during the press briefing. “Instead, it’s an enduring competition for strategic positional advantage in space success for either side, China or the US, that requires the ability to execute and defend on-orbit activities over long durations, such as routine transportation, sustained logistics, resource extraction, power generation, human habitation, and infrastructure protection.”

Both Puma and Charles Galbreath, senior resident fellow at Mitchell’s Spacepower Advantage Center of Excellence, further dismissed diplomatic efforts with China aimed at building more robust norms of behavior in space and preventing future conflict ― alleging that China’s lunar research base would be “operated by” the People’s Liberation Army in violation of the OST.

Beijing publicly states that its plans are aimed at “contributing to the peaceful uses of outer space by mankind” and has invited other nations to participate.

And even if such norms and rules were to be established for human occupation and resource exploitation of the moon and other celestial bodies, Galbreath argued that Beijing would be likely to ignore them.

“We’ve seen year and year out that here terrestrially, China has violated existing norms, and so even if we establish them, would they adhere to them?” he said.

Thus, the paper in essence argues that a US military presence on the moon will be required if for no other reason than to deter China from a land-grab and holding the rest of the world “hostage” to its terms for utilizing space.

The paper further notes that while any US military service could conceivably be deployed to establish a military presence and hold territory on the moon and in space, the Space Force is the “only service that builds space-minded warfighters from their first day of service” with a “deep understanding” of the domain.

Thus, it recommends that the Space Force first move to “establish a military human spaceflight program within its Space Test Course graduate program to counter PLA space activities and enforce positive norms and standards.” It also urges the use of commercial space stations in low Earth orbit as “proving grounds” for establishing what human missions might have “advantages” for terrestrial military operations.

Asked about support from Space Force leaders for the concept, Puma acknowledged that at the moment the service is primarily concerned with getting enough resources, both in dollars and in people power, to fulfill its “brown water Navy” needs in deterring threats and building warfighting capabilities in near-Earth space.

He also noted that it would be a challenge for the service to launch even a small exploratory effort, because it “is so exciting to some people and generates so much interest that it could draw attention and then resources away” from current requirements.

[T]hat’s why we talk about a pragmatic approach; we’re not talking about ‘let’s have the Space Force start building rovers with laser weapons on them,'” Puma said.

And while establishing and sustaining Guardian operations in space will be “very expensive,” he maintained that “those investments now can kick start the economies of scale” as the US space industry and the larger space economy matures and therefore get cheaper over time.

Galbreath added that the paper also is addressing “risk management” via getting in front of the inevitable.

“At some point in the future, United States is going to wake up and say, ‘I need military humans in space,’ and can then do a crash effort to develop the capability rapidly. It’s going to cost more money. It’s going to be a riskier endeavor … [than if] you can develop a pragmatic and sensible way to eat down that risk over time … so that when the need arises, you’re prepared for it, you’re not surprised for it by it, and then have to catch up,” he said.